Purchased a Jem77FP 1991

BigBazz said:

Awesome, I'd love to own one too but the price has gone up a lot in recent years, I almost bought a blue flower pattern one for £800 about 10 years back and these days they sell for closer to £1800, think I missed out. Are you gonna play it regularly or keep it for special occasions?

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I am gonna make it into my number one I believe. It is in great shape. The only thing out of order on it was the tremelo bar stud that the trem arm slips down into. It was loose. It has some pencil lead size pings on the side of the neck. I have already steamed those out and it is nice and smooth now.

My les paul wasn't shabby and kind of a rare one too. But I did not play it hardly at all because I wanted to keep it all nice and pristine. I also have a nice fender strat as well. I am on the fence about holding onto it because I am really a one guitar kind of guy.

Sp this is probably going to be my main axe now. I am not one for being careless and such and I tend to take care of stuff pretty good. For over 20 years I gigged with the same les paul I got when I was 18. So I think I am gonna make this Jem here my number one.

I have set it up like I enjoy and I have played it so much these past couple of dasys my fingers are sore!! That has not happened in a very long time.

If there is one thing I can say about it I am not crazy about is the pick up selector configuration. I think I am gonna figure out how to rewire the selector switch for a different combination. It is the middle single coil that has me not so thrilled. By itself it is great but when split with the humbuckers it is not as bright as I would prefer. Although the humbuckers are just fine by them selves.

I thought about finding a stacked humbucker in a single coil size and see what happens with that.

I think it would open up the guitar sounds into something really awesome.

Also I got kind of spoiled with a few guitars that had locking tuners on it. I know it sounds crazy but I am thinking of going to a set of locking tuners to keep from having to wind the pegs up with the string. I am not a fan of the striung eye being on the headstock end.

Other than that the only real issue the guitar has is the back neck plate is all mucked up like the rest of the originals out there. But the back is in as good of condition as the front too.

Over all for the age of this guitar, I would consider it at least a 8.5 out of a 10. Some of you may differ.

It is about as nice of a player grade guitar you can get. And that is what I am gonna do with it as well. Play the heck out of it.

My friend who was the original owner took and babied it as well. He has a ton of guitars too. He was stationed in Hawaii in the Marine Corp. when he ordered it through the music store over there.

He got the phone call when it came in and they opened the box and it was the Blue one instead of this one. He said this is not the jem I ordered. He almost kept the blues one but went ahead and ordered this one. He said he is glad he did.

He had to think on it for 3 days before he made his mind up. We have traded several guitars the past 3 or so years. I met him from a craigslist deal as a matter of fact.

Anyways he is a great fellow and is super nice. A great player too.

I had an Ibanez prestige RG652AHM I purchased new. I sold it after a couple of years and went back to a fixed bridge set up. I got to missing the double locking tremelo and wished I never had sold it.

So I made my mind up to sell the les paul I had and I was just gonna get one of the new white JEM 7 that are made in Japan.

I did not know it but he had been gassing for my les paul ever since I picked it up.

I think it was a great trade for the both of us. I am totally happy with this guitar because it is the Jem I really wanted in the first place.

And every year they seem to be going up in price even more.

ibaraki_gaijin said:

I'd make that trade in a heartbeat.
I like a Les Paul. But the original floral JEMs are the absolute best. Looks in better condition than mine too.
Congratulations.

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Thank you. I have never played a real jem before or even saw one in person. I had a Jem Jr. and I was not a fan. Hey I know some guys could do all kinds of stuff to it to make them sweet but I did not have the patience to make one of those into something cool

I asked a couple of guys who owned them their thoughts on the Jem and they all said it was a very good quality guitar.

I had a prestige RG and the neck was wide and thin. It took a lot of practice to get used to the wizard profile. I am not a shredder style player. I am rock n roll/blues/hard rock kind of player. So it is a little different than what most guys who play the stuff I like would choose as their guitar.

The profile on this jem is is more rounded than the RG I had and also a little bit chunkier too. I am glad because it feels a lot better than I was expecting.

I used to wind as much of the b and e strings around the tuner as I could and I'd wait to change strings until I snapped either about the third time. Only because I'd always never just change strings, that was the time to do a full cleaning, maintenance, the full routine, and back then I just wanted to play, not work on guitars. Funny how that worked out. But if you broke one at practice you'd get the stink eye from everybody. Never play a gig with fatigued strings, you're just asking for Murphy to show up. I always liked the tone of dead strings better though, without the extra ring you get of a fresh set.

But after your wife jams a plain string in her finger for the umpteenth time, and it's not like we all haven't jammed a g string in a finger at some point, I figured out how to leave the ball at the tuner and stop it. The positives, it's locked, it's never slipping, you only have to wind the string one or two winds, and personally I think it looks cool still, 30 years later. Negatives, none. I stopped winding the whole string around the post and changed strings more often and would just do a half cleaning instead. Never looked back.

You can't tighten a holder from the top, you're just asking it to loosen again, and it will. I was going to have a tool made years ago since Ibanez won't sell one, but I don't think that would get it as tight as using channel locks on the tip and then cranking the nut tight. I used to do this on every guitar that went out the door and every trem I'd sell, but then in the last could years they've been getting them so tight I wasn't getting any turn on either, so I stopped. Last month I shipped a JS1CR and 3 days after he started playing it the holder was loose. The new bars with the new fat bushings will loosen one fast if it's not tight. Instead of having him ship it back 3000 miles I walked him thru pulling the trem, when I got it there was a full half turn of slop in the tube. They never tightened it at all. So it's back to doing every one again, and you'll get about 1/8th turn on the nut, which is definitely enough to start working them loose.

Tighten them once right and you'll never have to do it again. Locktite won't help if you don't tighten it right anyway.

Weird in the one shot it looks like the clear yellowed and another shot it's clear, but there's no fade on the pickups.

They're great, because to my mind they're the most unique look of all the JEMs..
(Well maybe PMC/DNA too) and these originals the neck is my absolute favorite and I've played a few. Not just a shredders guitar, a little thicker. Just feels like home to me. I play everything from post rock to J pop on mine.

On the pickups, don't mod the guitar until you try this: get an EQ pedal.
I love the PAFs, the split position sounds nice too but has a problem. There is a real volume drop and it can feel a little thin if you directly A/B contrast it with a high end strat.. (Although if you're a Vai fan you might want that.. For that Sisters / Boston Rain Melody tone)..

All fixable for me with a $40 EQ pedal. Leave the EQ off when on neck or bridge. Kick it on when in positions 2, 3 or 4. Use it to boost the volume slightly to unity and slightly boost the mids and treble (play with what suits you) and you can get a great single coil sound.
Modding a guitar like this reduces the value and ruins the look if you stick a black hotrails in the middle or something like that. Give the EQ a try before you touch that soldering iron.

I took and looked up some pick ups last night.


I also measured the ohms and the single coil in the middle position is only like 5.2 ohms
And the in between selection was right over 2 ohms. Very low out put.


The bridge humbucker is 8.4..... that is a great impednece for getting great overall response.
..the neck is in the same neighborhood.......but to me the neck pick up sounds great clean but a little muddy with gain.


There is a Satch single coil size pick up the measures 7 and change ohms.

It also comes in pink too.

I will give it some thought......it can always be put back original.

There is also the mad hatter set up........I think it is a pretty cool option and would be a about the same cost as swapping the single coil but it involves a bit more work......but it is all plug and play solderless set up.