Yamaha Pacifica Standard Plus review – a quality all-round player

We’re not in budget land any more… but can this upgraded version of Yamaha’s popular S-type guitar live up to its four-figure price tag?

Yamaha Pacifica Standard Plus. Image: Adam Gasson

$1,699/£1,280/€1,249, yamaha.com

If you have a friend who kinda plays guitar but not really, there’s probably a Yamaha Pacifica propped up in the corner of their living room. It’s the ultimate cheap, reliable, don’t-think-about-it-too-much strummer. So… how come the price of this one has four digits?

Well, while the basic double-cutaway Pacifica design has barely changed since its introduction in 1990, what we’re looking at here is the Standard Plus – and this is a serious piece of kit, with serious hardware upgrades, aimed at serious players.

Those everyday Pacificas still exist – I’ve done weekly supermarket shops that cost more than the PAC012 – but this model is a whole new proposition, priced to compete with the big players. And yes, that includes US-made Fender Stratocasters.

One part of the Pacifica philosophy hasn’t changed: like most of its predecessors, this is an all-rounder. The HSS pickup configuration – a humbucker at the bridge plus two single-coils – is mostly associated with hairy rock players, but it really does give you a bit of everything. That’s especially true when, as is the case here, the humbucker can be split (by pulling up the tone knob) to become a third single-coil. The neck and middle pickups promise pure Stratty pluck – with a five-way switch to open up those quacky out-of-phase options – while the ’bucker is there to bring the oomph when it’s needed.

Made in Indonesia, the Standard Plus has an alder body with a bolt-on maple neck and a choice of maple or rosewood for the fretboard. That neck is slender, with medium stainless steel frets and a board that’s very much on the flat side (the radius is just shy of 14”), while the body/neck join is contoured and the bolts are recessed – all hallmarks of a guitar that’s been designed for easy playability.

The Reflectone pickups have been co-developed with Rupert Neve Designs, which is an interesting one – that’s a legendary name alright, but in the world of recording gear rather than guitar electronics. They’re controlled by a single volume knob and that aforementioned push-pull job for tone.

The colours are apparently inspired by ‘Japanese city pop art and the sun-soaked vibes of southern California’. Which is nice. In fact two of the four options are white and black, which might just as easily have been inspired by a plumbing warehouse in Belgium, but the others are more vibrant: a sparkly blue and a lovely pale pink. Note that white is not available with a maple board.

Oh, and if you’re thinking there’s something familiar about the way the pickguard angles down from the bridge pickup to the lower bout, rather than extending back to hold the controls, you may well be right: that’s exactly what the guard on a Yamaha Revstar does. I’m not saying it looks pretty, but it’s a clever little bit of brand-building.

Honestly, straight out of the box, my review guitar was a little too easy to play. No complaints about the slim C-profile neck or the smooth frets, which were wonderfully resistance-free, but the payoff for an insanely low factory action was noticeably buzzing on just about every note.

This, though, only served to highlight another canny design feature: the easy-access truss rod. It soon became clear the problem was a too-straight neck, and a loosening quarter-turn with the included tool (basically a long metal stick) was all it took to create the minimal curve required for clean fretting.

That quick fix aside, I have only good things to say about the playing experience. And that extends to the whammy bar, which is a screw-in type with the thread on the inside. The combination of a Gotoh two-point pivoting bridge, a Graph Tech Tusq nut and Gotoh locking tuners makes for decent tuning stability, and it can just about handle moderate divebombing as well as Bigsby-style wobbles.

One other build issue worth mentioning is that the tone knob came off in my hand – it’s only held on by its own grippiness, not a grub screw – but the simplest solution to that is not to be a big careless lummox.

Yamaha says its design process included 3D modelling to devise wood-routing techniques for increased resonance and better vibration transfer between body and neck. The result is an unplugged tone that’s… well, hardly revolutionary, but certainly pleasant. So what will those Reflectone pickups make of it?

With the Neve connection you might be anticipating hi-fi clarity, and that’s exactly what you get in all positions. The single-coils are bright yet smooth, with plenty of slap when you dig in hard and no muffling when the volume is nudged back a notch or two; and even without resorting to the in-between settings there’s a distinct cluckiness to the middle and – especially – the bridge pickup.

The output level takes a slight dip when you do invoke the quack (which is about as pronounced as it gets), but in general the three pups are well balanced. Just don’t expect a whole load of excitement from the bridge unit: it may be clucky but it’s not twangy, and can feel a touch subdued in single-coil mode.

Naturally things get darker when you push down to engage the full humbucker, but this thicker, more mids-rich tone is hardly less articulate – something you’ll be glad of when you add overdrive. True to the classic HSS Superstrat template, the smoothness remains with high gain: technical lead players will appreciate this guitar’s sonic purity as much as its slick playing feel.

Are you angry with your parents, your partner or the endless broken promises of the international neoliberalist establishment? Don’t get one of these. It can do most jobs extremely well but the one thing it doesn’t have is a snarly edge: Yamaha’s whole approach here has been to make a sensible guitar that you can take anywhere, from stadium gigs and studio sessions to wedding receptions and blues jams.

The one aspect of the deal that might look less than sensible, given that we’re talking about a ‘mere’ Yamaha Pacifica, is the price. But you are paying for a whole new level of quality and refinement – not to mention a very smart padded gigbag. And if you compare it with the Japanese-made Pacifica Professional, which is similar in specs but costs around twice as much, the Standard Plus starts to look like an eminently reasonable proposition.

If you want to stick with the company that invented the Strat, your first port of call has to be either the Fender American Performer Stratocaster HSS ($1,449.99/£1,399) or the Fender JV Modified ’50s Stratocaster HSS ($1,329.99/£1,169). Another strong contender is the Sire Larry Carlton S10 HSS ($1,299/£1,299); or if you fancy something with a Floyd Rose bridge, have a look at the Charvel Pro-Mod So-Cal Style 1 HSS ($1,099.99/£899).