One very cool Mustang

Fender Mustang 2 Review

When I bought my first ‘real’ amp it was about volume. To be heard over the screaming teenagers was the challenge. It wasn’t about tone. It wasn’t about looks though the old cream Tolex with the ox blood grill cloth Fender ‘The Twin’ certainly did look cool. Above all it was LOUD and with a fair dose of Fender treble it would cut through the rowdiest audience. So some forty years on amp requirements have somewhat changed with the emphasis now clearly on tone. I’m from the guitar-lead-amp era and to this day have never been into the little coloured boxes full of secret chips that gobble up your precious guitar tone. Having been an owner of a digital amp for some nine years the valve v’s solid state battle is long behind me. If you can’t afford one of everything then the modelling amp wins out for me. The pure guitar signal, converted to digital, processed every which way in software, then converted back into an analogue signal does it for me. No little coloured boxes, just your guitar, a lead and an amp. If you can accept a CD (or worse still) an mp3 over vinyl you won’t have any issue with a new-fangled digital modelling amp. Enter the Fender Mustang 2.


The first thing you notice about this baby is just how light it is. Compared to its 40watt tube amp/single 12 equivalent, the Hot Rod Deluxe™ III, the Mustang 2 is less than half the weight of the ‘Deluxe weighing in at just 10 kilos. So weight per watt we’re ahead by double. How about the price? Again we’re ahead, with the ‘Deluxe at $1100 and the Mustang 2 at a Big Mac over $300 the Asian produced ‘stang definitely is ahead in the bang-for-buck stakes. Not that this review is a comparison to assume one amp is better than the other but as it’s chalk and cheese. It’s up to you the buyer to decide which one is the cheese. For my purposes the Mustang 2 would suit me just dandy for home recording with its 24 pre-sets, 24 inbuilt effects and 24 zillion cool tones. I’ll throw this in.. how much would 24 effects pedals set you back?  Let’s fire this thing up..

Controls at the front

Hey, this is cool. It’s the same old Fender suitcase amp design but some clever dude decided to put the knobs along the front instead of at the back of the amp. This is just about good, however, you still have to look from above to see your settings unlike on the traditional front-facing black faced amps. Another little bug bear are the amp model selection LED’s. They are very bright making it difficult to see which model you have selected in subdued lighting. Blinded by the LED’s you might say.

The optional foot switch would be a must if you’re gigging with the Mustang, at least you can have your two most used presets right there under your foot. Apartment jamming? No worries. You have an Aux input for your mp3 player and an 1/8” headphone Jack which can double as a speaker emulated line out. As well as the usual array of volume and tone controls we have the pre-set selector plus two other very powerful controls for modulation effects and one for delay and reverb effects. These reflect the effects for the pre-set amp models but can be mix and matched allowing you to apply your favourite effects on any amp model you have selected. There is an illuminated Tap button for the modulation and delay speeds which is handy for alterations on the fly. Of course you can spin these knobs to OFF if you so desire. And just for fun Fender have given us a Tuner albeit just three LEDs, flat, in tune and sharp plus a Tuner/Mute button.  But wait, there’s more..

The Fender FUSE software

The Presets.This is where this little combo steps up to the plate and shows its true colours. Remember those 24 zillion sounds I mentioned? They’re all here in Fender FUSE. The software is available for PC and Mac and ran flawlessly on my Win7 box. Not only can you edit every function on the Mustang 2 but you can complement and edit the on board sounds plus add additional effects or combination of amp and cabinet/speaker models not available directly on the Mustang 2 and drop your edits into the two user preset banks. You could overwrite the factory presets for the full complement of 24 presets.

Old Preset layout

The Presets
We know there are some bright cookies at Fender and they ain’t gona load this baby with dud sounds. So let’s check out what they’ve given us as ‘factory’ presets.
’57 Deluxe:  Running down the orange LEDs first up is the ’57 Deluxe. In the FUSE software they have called this Neil Deluxe. It’s the grungy old tweed Deluxe combo with a 12” speaker and a mighty 15 watts of heavenly tone. Fender has added a touch of stomp box ‘63 Spring Reverb plus a light Tape Delay with a slight flutter. Very cool and very Neil.
 ’59 Bassman: Next down the orange LEDs we land on the ’59 Bassman. This uses the ’59 Bassman model (funny that). This is a model of the original Fender bass amp that has become the ultimate guitar amp for many tone-savvy pros. With the Bassman’s oversized output tranny and 4x10” blue alnico Jensen’s the Mustang 2 does a great impersonation of this famous amp. This preset is pretty pure with the only ‘add-on’ being a touch of small room reverb.
’65 Twin Reverb: Down another click we have the most popular amp of all time; the black faced ’65 Twin Reverb. Surprisingly Fender has really captured this one. With the single coil bridge puppy on my Strat the Mustang 2 produced that exact same sting of its real life counterpart, ouch!! Fender has included a ‘65 Spring Reverb in the preset which is absolutely beautiful. With a couple of mouse clicks in the EZ2 use FUSE software you could drop in a Tremolo stomper and have the complete Fender ’65 Twin Reverb.
‘60’s British: On the next row we find the ‘60’s British, no guessing which amp this is. British Invasion, now there’s a clue. It’s the ever popular diamond fronted Vox AC30, Britain’s answer to the Fender Twin Amp. With its class-A configuration and four EL84’s the only thing these two amps have in common is that they have two twelve inch speakers in a combo cabinet. Of all the modelling amps, including the Vox Valvetronix, the Mustang 2 has a pretty cool jangle not heard in other modellers. Have a listen to the old Searchers hit ‘Needles and Pins’ with my old buddy John McNeely’s Tele and AC30, a wonderful strumming rhythm guitar that is all AC30. Splendid.
British ‘80’s: So we jump down a notch and on another 20 years to the British 80’s preset. This has to be the Marshall with a 4x12 Celestion loaded  quad box. The roadies love this one. So did Jimi and a few hundred thousand others. What is basically a class A/B Fender Twin, Jim Marshall decided to put the amplifier in a ‘head’ as Fender were doing with the Showman and Bandmaster allowing a separate cabinet for more speakers, more noise. Pete Townsend came along and put two boxes on top of one another and the ‘stack’ was born. Guitar players worldwide created Marshall walls of them. Don’t you love it? So to the British 80’s model. I think this one must be an easy one to replicate, most modelling amps have the Marshall sound nailed and so does the little ‘stang. Try shutting your eyes.
American 90’s: The American 90’s, well this must be the Boogie, the loudest amp ever made. This is a hard one for the diminutive Mustang 2 but I was surprised at just how well it coped. Stand well back.

Just two models to go, hang in there.
Super Sonic: Firstly the Super Sonic. This was Fenders first real attempt at a ‘modern’ amplifier made for ‘todays’ guitarist and they have done it well. Unlike an old style amp compromised by little coloured boxes this amp has been specifically designed for the contemporary guitarist. With the creamiest distortion to the deepest reverb this is a joy to play. And (phew) to our last model, the Metal 2000.
Metal 2000: This was Fenders crack at the metal market and I’m not sure that it worked for them. Whatever they have in this model though, it certainly works. The guitar growls and squeals’ and virtually plays by itself, Holy Hellfire!! I want one of these. There is going to be someone out there that will buy this amp for the Metal 2000 model alone.
Well that’s it for the factory presets and I haven’t touched on the stomp boxes, the rack effects, the bias adjustment, the tuner or the fact that through the FUSE interface you have access to hundreds of user created presets and can contribute your own to share with guitarists worldwide who are also  enjoying this great little amp. Thanks Fender.

Audio samples and the direct recording audio interface.  http://youtu.be/6W-1CdbnlP0
Here are a few audio samples of the factory presets, these are from the orange LED bank. I used my Strat modded with Jeff Beck Hot Noiseless pickups. I did test the Direct Recording USB Interface which works pretty nice but decided to record these using an AKG dynamic microphone placed about 6” from the grill cloth and slightly off access. Each sample was normalized but no other effects or EQ have been used. Check them out here on the tube.. http://youtu.be/6W-1CdbnlP0

To sum up the on-board controls we have Gain, Volume, Treble, Bass, Master, Preset Select, Modulation Select, Delay/Reverb Select, Save Button, Exit Button, Tap Tempo Button.  Now the Exit button I will have to read about in the EZ2 understand manual. Oh no, reading??

Test amp kindly provided by KC's Rockshop BORONIA

© Dave Russell 2011