DeArmond Jetstar Special

These instruments have undergone the most extensive field testing ever undertaken by a guitar manufacturer. Fender first marketed DeArmond in select European and Asian markets for a year, before making them available to the US and Canadian markets. The success of DeArmond in these test markets is unmatched by any guitar line in recent memory. Great Britain's, The Guitar Magazine, rated DeArmond's M75T a top ten best buy, while Guitarist Magazine hails DeArmond's M75 "the winner" in it's "Head to Head" article. Reviewers in Germany, Italy and Japan had similar reactions when testing the new DeArmond models. Even well known artists like Chrissie Hynde and John Jorgenson have acclaimed the DeArmond line by adding these instruments to their arsenal of guitars.

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10

I got the black no scratchplate model in a pawn shop because it reminded me a bit of Bo Diddley's Cadillac fin guitar. The body shape is actually the same as the 1960's Guild Thunderbird used most famously by Muddy Waters.

Most of the guitar's spec is covered in other reviews, I found it to be a pretty standard budget guitar with a nice neck, but I decided to try to make it prettier.

I stripped off the thick black finish, sawed off the long upper horn and little bump on the headstock, stained the wood a nice reddish-brown, fitted old Kay pick-ups and hardware and a decent set of vintage style tuners. Oh, and a chrome Deluxe badge from a 60's Hillman Hunter.

The guitar now looks and sounds far better and seems to fascinate a lot of people at gigs, all wondering about it's origins!

An original feature I DO like are the three strap buttons to adjust height.

Pretty standard rock sounds pre-makeover, with the old Kays through a Selmer Zodiac it gives you all the Bo Diddley/John Lee Hooker growl you could ask for.

Originally about average, with pretty poor tuners but if you can get one cheaply it's an unusual guitar to customize to your spec.

The guitar is pretty solidly built in general though the original paint chips quite easily and the lowest strap button has a tendency to come loose. I don't see why it couldn't be a main gigging guitar with a little tweaking

No point, they wouldn't recognize it.

I've been playing for 28 years and own lots of vintage cheapos (Hofners, Kays, Silvertones etc.) If any were stolen I'd weep. I would definitely buy another Jet Star and modify it (in fact even if it wasn't stolen) I love the shape and oddness of it.

i own 3 jet star specials..all 22 fret 2 solid top, 1 laminated top. all have two humbuckers with volume and tone. one is factory pickups..one is pearly gates and dimebucker..one is emg active 85 and 89 with coil tap options. black, trans red mohogany, and sparkle purple.

this guitar is my fav for sound...cutting highs with low of lows. i dont use midrange very often and this guitar was designed for that. i put it through line 6 fx and kustom amps. i have them all set up different for different styles so sound individualy is tricky to describe. but over all this guitar wins me over....and its competing with my other very high end guitars. just gotta rework them to get the desired sounds.

ive changed most of the options in them but the neck along with the versatility of the guitar make its feel and action extrodinary.

these are my gig guitars..they dont knock outta tune...they stand on there own

the company doesnt exist now and tech support isnt available. unfortunately fender owns or owned them.....ive never had a good or comfortable experience with fender...who cares about money too much?,..fender does. fuck fender

ive owned at least one of these remarkable machines for 6 yeasrs now and outta the 14 guitars that i own, i play these the most often and only buy this style guitar now. i own some very nice equipment and of course the ones that are hard to find end up being my children...figures. this guitar is also the most comfortable style ive ever played....and believe me ive played them all. the routed of edges on the top, bottom, side, front , and back provide flexibilikty for all sized people. it is impossible to find an uncomfortab le position with this beauty. these guitars are outstanding and i hope to own one of every color option available.

i dont know the year but it's red and has two humbucking pick-up, a 3-way toggle switch...the thing reminds me of my sg but red and with two pick ups and 22 frets

i love the sound, but i also run it through a vox valvatronic 30w...the only thing when it comes to sound i don't like is the mute bass tone it puts out...but it has real bright and splashy mid's and high's

normally i dont like electrics...i prefer a good mexican made nylon or cheap acoustic, mainly for the finger picking styles i do for jazz, rumba,classical...and with all the others i've play i just doesn't feel the same, my Jet Star on the other hand i can do it all with or with a pick.....i bought mine from a pawn shoppe and the finish is still mint so...the fit? nothing feels as good as a "daisy rock" guitar

i've had about 3 months and i've probally only tune once a week playing once a day

??? why would i need it???

look im just some stonner kid with hoop dreams...and this guitar is better than any other i've played with the excception of the Venus by Daisy rock sorry i just like chick guitars (i have big hips)

I think it was made in 99, I bought it in 2000, it was made in Indonesia if I remeber right. 22-Frets, solid plank, 2 passive HB PUs one volume, one tone, rosewood fretboard, ET. C.

Nice, this was the first Humbucker as I ever owned, and it spent a good deal of time being borrowed by friends who just needed to "really just rock out on it for a while, dude, I'll give it back to you in a week". Needless to say, they were impressed.

It sounds like an SG that has 2-3 inches of chime-space between the bridge and the tailpiece. Warm, ringy. I like the tone.

I fixed the action, bt it was easy, no truss-rod adjustment needed.
The only flaws I found were after my friend used ti to play slide and dented the frets by pressing the slide against the fretboard. That idiot. Everything else was totally kosher.

I broke the bastard by accidentaly knocking it over, but after stuffing the stripped screwholes in the neck with toothpick bits and woodglue and tightening the neck back on (with a bunch of woodglue in the socket) it had even more sutain and tone than it had to begin with.

N/A

I have lots of stuff, I'm not gonna waste your time with that, but this axe has been a mainstay in my lineup and I wish they still made them.

For 85 bones, it's a total deal.

the guy at the guitar place said it was pretty old, but it really didnt look like it. made in indonesia. the neck looks longer than my epiophone fat strat.pretty simple, 1 volume 1 tone. 3 way pickup selector. the body is a some sort of wood with a nice red-laquer finish. it looks like a melted gibson firebird, but a little fatter. the one thing i heard everyone say is the crappiness of the tuners. its true but those can be replaced cheaply. i got it used cause it had a small scratch on the front of the body. 150 bucks. very satisfied

the sound is sweet. i play old school punk (black flag,poison idea, bad brains, shit like that? but alos a lot of funk/punk (big boys, minutemen, the dicks)it works real fine with what i play. another feature i liked was that when you play single chords, or soloing or whatever, it sounds just like a telecaster, real twangy. i dont know what the deal is with everyone wanting the low-end sound, but i wnt this shit to be bright. it does a good job of that

i bought it yesterday and played a show 2 hours later. everything seems to be great except the tuners. overall its pretty simple. holy fuck ladies and gentlemen, this is the coolest body style i've ever seen. even if it poops out, i'll probably never sell it.

i played it live yesterday, nothing happened.and i would say i get pretty riled up and move around a lot. i never use a backup. if i break a string or something, i'll borrow someones guitar. looks like it will last after i replace the tuners.

never dealt with them. im pretty sure if you needed something, fender could handle it.

i've been playing guitar for a little over a year. but i pick up my axe pretty much everyday so i progress very fast. if it were stolen or lost, i would make an attempt at buying another one, but i just cant seem to find this thing anywhere else. the body style is soo fucking awesome. i play an epiphone fat strat, hich is a good guitar, i was just looking for something new for the hell of it.

I just bought my "red Gumby". It is basic, of course. 1 volume, 1 tone, and a toggle.

I really love the sound. Great sustain. I like to use it finger picking. Eventhough it has a solid body, I get nice long residual effect on held notes.

I bought it used and have no complaints. feels great. I like to drape my guitar strap over the Northwest corner of the body. Doing this has the effect of tilting the guitar towards me and makes the fret board more accessible.

Strap buttons seem good. Like I said, I bought it used, and it must have been dropped because on the back there is a quarter-sized piece of the finish missing and a crack in the finish around it. I mention this because I see no ill effect of the incident in the playability or tuning of the instrument.

haven't had it ling enough

I'm glad I bought it. I keep my '67 Rickenbacker at the studio and the red gumby at home.

Volume. Tone. 2 humbuckers. Pickup switch. What more do I need? Ah - a trem system. No problem, I picked up a 2nd hand Bigsby clone for $30 and put it on. You don't have to be a pro guitar tech to do this really.
This guitar gives you all you need, simple as that - as long as you don't set out for Steve Vai 7-string divebomb stunts.
Yes it's a budget guitar, so it has no active electronics or anything.

I play Link Wray based 60s rock'n'roll/garage punk mainly. Works great, but it also sounds amazing if you go for (semi)clean rockabilly twang - especially with that fake Bigsby.
I use it with various Vox amps (depends where & when) and for fuzzed out lunacy I use a Big Muff. The JetStar handles it, no problem.
Don't pick up this guitar if you're into jazz/fusion, you need something else then.

When I got the guitar I had to adjust the bridge a bit, and I broke the volume knob at the first gig (not the pot itself but the knob) so I replaced both knobs with metal chromed ones, Telecaster style. Problem solved, gives a better grip, and it looks better too.
I was surprised to find a guitar this cheap being so well-delivered. OK no case or anything but I bought a guitar, right?

Allright... it stays in tune, the finish wears off after a year or two of intensive playing, but then I wear some 'jewelry' that isn't guitar-finish-friendly, and when I threw the guitar into the drum kit at a gig last weekend, I broke one of the plastic pickup holders. Nothing superglue and stage tape can't fix. Just don't do as I do if you want to keep it looking like the day you bought it.
I sometimes use it without a backup guitar, but I keep spare strings at hand because violent tremolo use breaks strings - but that's only because I put an old roller bridge on it, I'm looking for a new one to fix that problem. Never broke a string with the original bridge.

Repaired it myself. Threw the warranty out of the window by customizing it I guess, so I'll have to.

I play several other guitars and basses (Vox, Danelectro, even Rickenbacker) but these are either too fragile for use on stage or they don't have a good overall live sound. (Studio is different of course.)
I mainly use both this guitar and a pretty weird thing I put together from leftovers (Teisco neck, Framus body, Egmond and Danelectro electronics). To be honest: one of the reasons I love playing it is to prove to potential youing guitarists that you don't have to spend lots of money on a guitar to sound right. Some zines focus on $2000 guitars with $3000 amps and give you the idea you actually *need* that to get up on stage and kick out the jams. This guitar proves you don't need all that. Oh and those Vox amps of mine aren't vintage AC30s either...!

I played a JetStar Special for about a year, year and a half. Purchased new. 6 string, double humbucking pickups, slab body,
no trem system, black finish with matching neck/headstock, 1 Volume pot, 1 tone pot, 3 way switch. No one at Guitar Center in Totowa NJ could tell me what Agathis was, which was what the body is made of. Learned from writing to other manufacturer that Agathis is a easily-worked wood most indigenous to a coastal region of Austraila, and found elsewhere in the world. The body style attracted me to this guitar, it is a little off the beaten trail, and almsot looks like a womans upper half, the way a dress may drape over the female form, go figure. the body is a nice, full size, which was good for me at 6'3" and 274 lbs, I don't need a dinky guitar. Absolutely no accessories were included, they did'nt even wrap it up for me when I plunked down me money on the counter.

As a 2 year student of guitar, I practice a wide variety of styles daily. I ran the JetStar through a Zoom GFX-707 Guitar Effects Processor, whioch is a little miracle box, into a small, cheap solid state practice amp I purchased new. I used the thickest, beefiest strings I could buy local because I wanted to build up me fingers, and I figured thats what the bluesmen used, and so did Jimi. The fat, thick neck of theJetStar holds up nicely up terrible pressure; I have experimented with alternative tunings and I did beat the tar out of that guitar with aggressive playing from time to time and it put out the sound for me. I do miss that big, fat neck even thugh I have chubby hands with fat little fingers. The 3 way switch and Tone control did not give any where near the range of sounds that my economical "Fender" Squire Strat does, not any where near. I depended on the Zoom processor for a plethora of altered sounds.

The shiny black paint was without flaw. the Volume knob had chunks crumble off the top of the crown part within 2 days; I removed the knobs until I sold it. I found my hand would hit the Volume and ruin me all too often. I particularly gre to despise the shiny chromed fixed piece where the strings were held in place, whatever you call it, it was a angular piece that hurt my arm many, many times. I put several layers of black electrical tape over this chrome piece to alleviate the pain and also, I know this sounds odd, the chrome piece shined terrible reflections at my bunny Max, who loves to hang out while Dad practices, so I had to eliminate the glare problem too, a helpful hint for all you rabbit-loving guitar players out there!

This guitar could take abuse of hard playing but will not hold tune like the more expensive axes with a locking trem system. I would play live but only fools are not prepared for paid gigs with back-up just in case. This is an economical guitar and should not be expected to become an heirloom. You learn, you progress, you move on and let a buyer help defray the cost of your next axe when you sell off.

I received not even paperwork from Guitar Center in Totowa NJ, so I could not make contact or place a warranty. Never again.

I am a 2 yr student of guitar. The DeArmond JetStar Special replaced a used no-name strat wanna-be I bought to start on. I like the neck of the guitar after I got used to it; it reminded me of swining two bats when on deck at a ball game, it got you warmed up and exercised my fat little fingers very well. I wish I had asked a lot of questions before I bought this guitar, oh well. If DeArmond had been lost or stolen I would not replace it with the same model if I got all my money from an insurance check, no way. I would go try a Danelectro for fun. One day when I came home magically there was nice chunk out of the neck that I spotted immediately. You know how it is, no one touched the guitar! When I took my sad axe to place of purchase I got attitude from manager that it would cost less to replace the guitar than to fix it, then heard snide remarks from another employee about the wisdom of buying a head case. SOB's will not see my hard-earned greenbacks again. I moved on to a "Fender" Squire strat-like guitar with floyd Rose double locking tremolo system and dual humbuckjing pickups. I scored this on sale from Musicians Freind catalog some time back for 200, and it is the best money I have spent on music equipment to date. what a versatile, fun to play axe and it stays in tune thorugh weather and everyting.

This is a 1999 model that is being phased out. Layed out like a Les Paul but looks like a red gumby with roid rage! The body style is very hard to describe- it is like the old Guild Muddy Waters used to play. 2 humbuckers with 3 way toggle switch.

It has a very bluesy tone to begin with but is versatile and can suit many styles. It sounds good thru all 4 of my amps and is not noisy in the least. Im very surprised that this guitar sounds that good but it shouldnt be that surprising- its agathis which is a type of mahogany.

The guitar was set up perfect from the factory and plays as well as guitars costing 10 times as much! It has a nice trans red finish and you can see the wood grain thru it. It has a really nice fret job on it- in fact the fretwork is incredible for the price. The action is very low but it doesnt buzz at all. This guitar has absolutely incredible workmanship for the price. Kathie Lees children sure do make great guitars in their sweat shop! Even the tuners are good.

The Sex Pistols would have loved to have had this guitar in their day so they could have whacked the audience with it and kept right on playing. It is- in the words of Ashford and Simpson- Solid, Solid as a Rock.

Dearmond is great for customer service- they will replace a neck or whatever even though their guitars are dirt cheap! They have a lifetime warranty! I would like to give props to my peeps there at Dearmond- Whassup! A big Shout Out to you!

I have played for 25 years and have had every guitar you can think of- even $2000 ones. You cant play the name- name doesnt matter. Ask Jeff "Skunk" Baxter of Steely Dan. He used to write a column years ago for Guitar Player about budget guitars and all his guitars were cheapo models. He played them instead of the free ones big name companies would give him so he wouldnt be a sell-out. This guitar plays as good as any Les Paul or US Strat i have ever had. Remember, Prince's favorite guitar and the one he used to record "Purple Rain" was a cheap Hohner Tele copy. Now, i have to be really tuff and say things like i would open a can of Whupas* on anyone that stole this guitar and would break the neck off it and jab it thru their abdomen and put meat sauce on the thief and let a wild pack of Dobermans after him. Then, i would let either the pro wrestler Rikishi or Jared from the Subway commercials do a splash on him.