"You're from the sixties... Out! Back to the sixties. No place for you here in the future. Get back while you still can!" - James Earl Jones as Terence Mann, Field of Dreams (1989)
Let's entertain James Earl Jones's legendary outlook on time travel from Field of Dreams for a second. Is there a place for something from the sixties here in the future? He was talking about 1989, but 2026? Get outta here, right? As you might imagine, the sixties are still alive and well into the twenty-first century. Case in point: The Fender Vintera III Mid '60s Jaguar. This showstopping entry to Fender's Vintera III Series marks a welcomed return for a number of fan-favorite features long laid dormant. Maybe actual time-travelers don't have a place in the future, but a classic guitar of the past? Maybe that's a different story.
This is the Fender Vintera III Mid '60s Jaguar.
Shop the Vintera III Mid '60s Jaguar
Back to the Future
Introducing the Fender Vintera III Mid '60s Jaguar
Always in the business of breathing new life into their timeless designs of generations past, Fender introduces their Vintera III Series to give an all-new kick to some fan-favorite fascinations. Among the Vintera III Series, players are treated to plenty of choices with classic Stratocasters, Telecasters, and Precision Basses along with more coveted models like Jazzmasters, Mustangs, Jazz Basses, with even the Fender Bass VI making a return to Fender mainline production. The Vintera III Series is a bona fide celebration of all things retro Fender from classic models to seldom-seen features and functions to a rainbow of vintage Fender finish colors these days rarely seen.
The Fender Vintera III Mid '60s Jaguar is a prime place to see the best of the series in motion. This retro-inspired Jaguar brings together not only your tried-and-true Fender Jaguar features in a modern model, but does quite a bit to revive some bells and whistles that you very well may never have seen in a new mainline Jaguar before! Truly, Fender took special consideration with their Jaguars in the Vintera III to deliver for the ardent devotees to the iconic offset. If you've been holding off on getting yourself a Jaguar until the "time was right," that time might prove closer than you thought. Let's talk about it.
Jagulicious Definition
Fender Vintera III Mid '60s Jaguar Materials and Design
With this Vintera III entry, we're treated to a number of Fender Jaguar specifications both common and uncommon – at least among modern Fender Jaguars, anyway. Let's start out slow, though. Let's talk woods.
Fender Vintera III Mid '60s Jaguar Materials
The Vintera III Mid '60s Jaguar comes together familiarly to other Fender Jaguars. An alder solidbody serves as the base for this guitar with the model's iconic offset shape. A gloss finish wraps the body in a selection of iconic Fender muscle car shades like Shell Pink, Sherwood Green, and 3-Color Sunburst. The classically resonant alder body produces a resonant tone and a feel that's easily handled over the shoulder with a strap.
From here, Fender's classic maple neck reaches out in a slimmer, vintage-inspired Mid '60s "C" shape. Pairing up with the model's shorter twenty-four-inch scale length and smaller Vintage Tall frets across a round-laminated rosewood fingerboard, the Vintera III Mid '60s Jaguar feels authentic in hand for articulate fretting and comfortable moves across a stage. This Vintera III model matches its retro-inspired form with a number of similarly retro appointments like a bone nut, aged white pearloid dot fret inlays, and a "floating" tremolo bridge and tailpiece. In hand, the Vintera III Mid '60s Jaguar is exactly what you need it to be for the real deal.
She Sells Shell Pink
Fender Vintera III Mid '60s Jaguar Tones and Features
Here, we're getting into more of the fun stuff. The more fun stuff, we mean.
The Vintera III Mid '60s Jaguar is authentically vibed visually and physically, sure, but what about sonically? Luckily for all you sixties Jag fans, this Vintera III model delivers the goods. Under the hood, the Vintera III Mid '60s Jaguar features two Fender Vintage-Style Mid '60s Single-Coil Jaguar pickups with all the effortlessly cool sheen and sparkle of classic Fender pickups. Perfect for your sunny surf rock, your jangly indie pop, or any other musical style that immediately puts Jaguars in your head, the Vintera III series gets it done.
The Whole Nine YardsSomething certainly worth noting with the Vintera III Series is its dedication to vintage accuracy. This definitely manifests with the model's onboard circuit switching configuration that throws it back to the designs of original Fender models. Three two-way slide switches introduce Fender's original Jaguar pickup switching control scheme for a deep well of single-coil sounds – not even to mention the period-accurate lead and rhythm circuits! This is worth shouting out with the Vintera III Series, as it's the first time in quite some time for Fender that we get this vintage-accurate pickup control system with everything included, rather than revised upon.
There is a number of features specific to the Vintera III Series that's sure to get Jaguar fans excited. For a couple of these, we're getting treated to features that we haven't seen in mainline Fender Jaguar production models in any recent memory – and that's something worth being excited about. For one, the Shell Pink and Sherwood Green Metallic Vintera III Mid '60s Jaguars both feature matching headcap finishes for unique* aesthetic flourishes that really just look so, so cool.
For another, the Vintera III Mid '60s Jaguar brings back a true, if-you-know-you-know feature of past Fender offsets: a mute. These Vintera III Jaguars feature a built-in string mute behind the bridge pickup for introducing different muted textures into your playing, just as the famous studio session musicians of '60s pop used to. Full disclosure: a string mute built-in to a mainline production Fender is a true rarity. Until this series, the best chance you had at a string mute on your Jaguar was with a Fender Custom Shop model or by adding one yourself. If you're here waiting on your next chance to get a Jaguar with a mute, judging by the length of the spans of time in between when mutes have been offered, respectfully, you probably shouldn't.
And honestly, seldom seen at this point
Fender Vintera III Mid '60s Jaguar Final Thoughts
Alright, what have we learned today?
The Vintera III Mid '60s Jaguar is something special. Putting forward plenty of fan-favorite features that you've likely not seen before in a mainline Fender model, this Jaguar is really something to swoon over. Its retro-inspired specifications and aesthetics already do a lot of heavy lifting for a classic Fender offset that's sure to be a crowd pleaser – the retro-inspired electronics and hardware are just icing on the cake, at that point. Sparkly single-coils, vintage-accurate aesthetics, and some returning features that are practically newcomers relative to their last appearance in Fender production lines all come together for a fantastic Fender sure to stick around.
