On their launch at Summer NAMM in Nashville in June, like many other of the show’s attendees, we – complete with jetlag, artisanal hangovers and the sound of loud country music still ringing in our ears – saw the new-for-2016 Offset series in its attractive rainbow of colours hanging from the wall of the Fender booth and thought that it was good. In this instance, market forces have helped to create products with plenty of personality. You don’t get to be one of the biggest fish in the pond without street smarts, and you can be sure that Fender has noticed that not only are the likes of the Jaguar, Jazzmaster and Mustang enjoying a second renaissance, there are also plenty of boutique builders taking an offset slice of Fullerton pie.įender’s response to competition and demand? Launch a slew of cool new models at a made-in-Mexico price point that’s hard for the guitar-buying public to resist and impossible for smaller builders to compete with. When it comes to guitars, like the alternative-rock and grunge guitarists of the late 1980s and early 90s that blazed a trail for them to follow, many hip modern-day experimentalists and indie noiseniks turn to Fender’s less mainstream designs for inspiration. If you’ve spent any time browsing guitar gear on your smartphone or computer lately – and let’s be honest here, it’s all too easy to get into the habit of looking at pictures of other people’s guitars more often than you pick up and play your own – then you may have noticed that there’s a whole generation of players out there who have invested more money in the process of assembling a pedalboard than they have in buying either their guitar or amplifier.