Telecaster Love Thread, No Archtops Allowed

[nodog]

Christianm77,
The man is a jazz athlete gold standard the drummer was amazing too. Nice choice thanks.

[Cobra]

I have a nice doublebound homebuilt mahogany Tele, the Cobracaster...
It has a lightweight 1pc body, good hardware, & a neck by Ian Anderson.
The pix show a Lollar CC pickup, but it didn't match well with the bridge PU.
It's now sporting a Lollar Firebird neck PU, which is a far better match.
Tonally it sounds like a Tele should, not dark or muddy.
I use it for bluesy jump swing pseudo jazz, & it fills that role well.

[Skip Ellis]

Here's mine! Homemade from a 2x8 from Home Depot with maple cap. 20 year old Allparts neck, Bill Lawrence Keystone in bridge and Charlie Christian by somebody in Nashville whose name I don't recall. It's been my ONLY electric guitar for years - does everything I need.

[Jazz_175]

Here are my two Fender telecasters.
The celadon green is a '59 Custom Shop and the other is a '52 reissue.

[unknownguitarplayer]

This looks very similar to your guitar, Flat, but it's from 1961 and has a Jazzmaster neck of the same vintage. It's not mine, but I've borrowed it from the original owner a few times. It's a pretty iconic guitar. Anybody recognize it?

[Flat]

I don't recognize that tele, unknownguitarplayer--but I definitely can dig it.

A lot of cats here are going for the sort of perfect "jazz tele" -- modded or built from various parts. (I've got a sonic blue body and a mahogany neck in the closet waiting to get hitched someday, for example. Thinking the mahogany will roll off some ice pick trebles, maybe a Lollar CC or humbucker neck pickup, hmmm, etc.)

And yet never in a million years would I have thought of just putting a Jazzmaster neck on a tele! Too much uptown for the downtown, if you know what I mean.

But I look at your photo and think, "Now that's the jazz guitar Leo should have made. Just put a "jazzy" neck on a tele and be done with it!"

I wonder if Fender ever considered that? You'd think the Henry Ford of guitar would have been all over the idea of interchangeable parts.

Seeing neck binding on a Fender solidbody reminds me of Eric Johnson's recent signature Strats with rosewood boards. Very distinctive.



Looking forward to see if anyone recognizes your lovely frankenstein...

[MaxTwang]

I would like to try a Filtertron in the neck position on a Tele. Combined with a twangy Tele bridge pickup it would make for a very versatile guitar.

[mr. beaumont]

Lacking access to a good pic, so instead a quick video of mine...

96 Am. Std, pickups are original...not much else! Glendale 3 saddle bridge, mjnt green p/g, warmoth boatneck with ebony board, and now fender locking tuners.

[boatheelmusic]

This looks very similar to your guitar, Flat, but it's from 1961 and has a Jazzmaster neck of the same vintage. It's not mine, but I've borrowed it from the original owner a few times. It's a pretty iconic guitar. Anybody recognize it?

Is it the tele used by the Funk Brother Joe Messina on most Motown tunes?

[mr. beaumont]

I think you mean Joe, but i also think you're right.

[David B]

Fender Japan did a limited run of 'Joe Messina' Teles some years ago:

[boatheelmusic]

Nice tone, Jeff- what strings are you using?

[mr. beaumont]

Nice tone, Jeff- what strings are you using?

Chromes, .12's. I pretty much just put 'em on every guitar now.

[AlainJazz]

Ok, I'll bite. Here's my American special Tele. I just got it recently.

[unknownguitarplayer]

Yep, it's Joe's guitar. He's got another one that's identical, but pretty beat up. He switched over to an Ibanez archtop a few years ago and doesn't play the Tele anymore.

[Flat]

Did Fender make that for Joe? Or was it something he or his luthier put together? Do you happen to know?

[boatheelmusic]

Chromes, .12's. I pretty much just put 'em on every guitar now.

I tried the chrome 12's on my tele, but the tension!!!!

love them on my ES175.

[Ric Lee]

Skip Ellis, great looking git. Flame maple I feel is sometimes hard to do classy on a tele, feels like putting a suit on a 2x4 but this looks great.

[mr. beaumont]

I dunno...class up a tele too much...it kinda defeats the purpose.

[Ric Lee]

I dunno...class up a tele too much...it kinda defeats the purpose.

yeah that's how I feel about Tele's that are super duper deluxe especially some of that fender shop one-off 10's of thousands deal.

Loving your super deluxe tone with that Roland Micro-Cube. Sounds great. I accidentally had two videos playing when I clicked play in Youtube and there was some epic delayed reverb tele going on!

[entresz]

I have a MIJ '62 Custom Telecaster, Candy Apple Red. It has the stock pickups and wiring still, but it does have a very nice jazz sound. I still prefer to use my archtops for jazz, the Tele has a bit too much sustain and doesn't have the springy 'thunky' sound of the archtop. Flatwounds would probably get closer to that, but I also like the trebly snap that roundwounds deliver on a Tele. I've ordered some Bill Lawrence microcoils for it, by all accounts they are incredible pickups, it will be interesting to see how they compare to the stock pickups.

[unknownguitarplayer]

Joe had a Tele (it was a white one, not the one shown) and Fender gave him the neck after he did a clinic for them in a Detroit music store. He switched out the neck himself, and also modified the bridge by separating E and B string saddles. A bit later they gave him another Tele (the one in the pictures) with an extra neck.

As far classing up a Tele too much, or trying to make it something it isn't, Joe refers to his as a "pizza board".

[55bar]

Here's my Hahn 228

[55bar]

And here is Nate Radley playing his!

[oldwoodak]

wildwood tele with humbucker has been seeing a lot of action since I got it this year, from rock to jazz. it's just the thing