Basses

Eastman FullerTone DC’62 review: “a doozy of a player that packs in a lot of quality at a very competitive price”

June 24, 2025

£899, eastmanguitars.com
Like a barbecue fork plunging into the well-cooked flesh of a vegan sausage, Eastman Guitars has launched a twin-pronged attack on the affordable solidbody guitar market. Maybe you’ve read my review of the first prong, the FullerTone SC’52.

READ MORE: Fender Acoustasonic Standard Telecaster review: “these are sounds you don’t hear in a live context very often”

Well this is the second: the DC’62 is another Fender-inspired model, but this time leaning more towards the Stratocaster than the Telecaster.
Designed by California-based luthier Otto D’Ambrosio and made in Eastman’s Beijing workshop, it’s not quite as cheap as the SC’52, probably because it has three pickups and a more complicated vibrato bridge assembly; but if the build quality and tones are up to the same standard, we’re looking at another bargain.
Photo: Adam Gasson for Guitar.com
Eastman Guitars FullerTone DC’62 – what is it?
The DC’62 is an HSS S-type. That’s a short sentence with a lot of abbreviations in it, so let’s begin by expanding them all. The ‘DC’ stands for double cutaway, which immediately puts us in Strat territory; the numbers take us to 1962, right in the middle of the pre-CBS rosewood fretboard era; and ‘HSS’ means it has one humbucker and two single-coil pickups. Oh, and ‘S-type’ just means we’re not allowed to call it a Strat because only Fender is allowed to make Strats.
Mind you, as we’ve already seen with the other FullerTone model, Eastman is definitely not making copies here. The basic configuration may be Stratty, but the unique two-bolt neck join certainly isn’t, and neither is the body shape. The neck is a 24-fretter that butts right up against the front pickup, and those pups are again Toneriders – including, at the bridge, the same foil-topped humbucker found in the neck position on the single-cut guitar.
Photo: Adam Gasson for Guitar.com
Eastman FullerTone DC’62 – sounds
First of all, I have to say that in my opinion, it’s not much of a looker. I wasn’t mad keen on the SC either, and plenty (including people at this very publication) disagree on that too, but this one doesn’t do anything to alter that impression – subjective as these things always are. That said, it’s also, at least with my skinny thighs, a little uncomfortable to play sitting down: there’s so much body mass to the right side of the waist (not helped by the brass vibrato block) that at times it feels almost in danger of sliding off.
But that’s a micro-gripe. What’s more important is that the neck feels just as slick and welcoming as the one on the SC’52 – and that the acoustic tone, while noticeably less fresh and zingy, has just as much fullness and sustain.
That means there’s plenty of substance for those pickups to work with, and the humbucker gets things off to a strong start. It’s relatively low-output for a ’bucker and does exactly what the ‘H’ in an HSS guitar is there for, offering a punchy tone with some upper-mids bite and none of the weediness you sometimes get from a standard S-type’s bridge pickup.
The two ‘noiseless’ stacked single-coils continue the theme of creamy clarity, with reasonably well balanced output levels and no shortage of quack from the in-between settings. They also cancel hum pretty well. This is basically everything you’d want from a rosewood-board S-type, whether you’re keeping it clean for choppy funk chords or turning up the gain and digging in for blues exploits with a high grimace factor.
The middle pickup is my favourite: full-voiced yet snappy, and letting you introduce an element of cluck without resorting to the full-on phase-cancelling of positions two and four. Hooray for middlies, the unsung heroes of three-pickup guitardom!
Photo: Adam Gasson for Guitar.com
Eastman FullerTone DC’62 – should I buy one?
This is not a guitar for people who crave edgy excitement… and in my view it’s not a guitar for hardcore aesthetes who insist that a musical instrument should look as beautiful as it sounds. But if you don’t mind the slightly gawky looks, and like your tones smooth and disciplined rather than raw and peppy, the FullerTone DC’62 is a doozy of a player that packs in a lot of quality at a very competitive price.
Eastman FullerTone DC’62 – alternatives
A similarly polite and sophisticated take on the HSS formula is the Yamaha Pacifica Standard Plus (£1,280); but see also the Canadian-built Godin Session HT (£1,149) and, for something with an ‘F’ on the headstock, the Fender American Performer Stratocaster HSS (£1,389).
Photo: Adam Gasson for Guitar.com
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