Why do so many people like telecasters?
I am wondering If I might like them and no i dont like country/western or any stuff like that.. are they any good for rock or anything like that?
Why do so many people like telecasters?
I am wondering If I might like them and no i dont like country/western or any stuff like that.. are they any good for rock or anything like that?
I use mine for blues and rock, the tele is just right, its very rude and in your face, plus I feel it takes a real good player to be able to truely play a tele, you can hear all your mistakes lol good luck and go buy one u will see what I mean.
I don't get into country or western or that kind of stuff either, but I love teles for blues and rock!
Lots of great players do the tele stomp! Bloomfield, Page, Gibbons, Muddy Waters, just to name a few...
Jason
The Bear Guy
Because it is a straight up, no nonsense guitar.
I am primarily a Strat player, but I love pulling out my Tele because it has great tone and snap, strings through the body. I mostly play blues with mine and the tone is so true and pure.
There is NOTHING like a Tele bridge pup, awesome!
I'm a long time Strat player and, generally speaking, I never really cared for Tele's until I recently tried out a few new Nocasters. Naturally, with 5 pickup settings, a Strat has the edge on versatility....but for out & out tone, the 3 basic sounds in my new Nocaster make my '64 Strat blush. And, my '64 Strat is the best sounding Strat I ever laid my hands on. But, sometimes that Strat quack tone is the only thing that works in a song. So, I now drag 3 guitars to a gig instead of 2 :lhg
Bottom line: the "right" Tele is amazing....but, like any guitar, you have to find the "right" one.
For me, there are three big animals that do what they do best........Les Pauls, Strats, and Teles ......three very different animals......those three are what all the others in the food chain would aspire to in the electric world.....gibs
I like my tele for the rock gritty raunchy sounds to the chicken pluckin country twang.
Don't get me wrong i like my strat but when i want to make lead solo's punch, it requires the sound of a telecaster.
It's really hard to describe the appeal of a tele --the shape, the tone...nothing else feels as right for me. Very responsive and versatile. It's the perfect guitar for my needs.
I think Teles are kind of generic, but I mean that in a good way. They've got a very pure basic tone coming out of that bridge pickup that can be used to make any kind of music. Yes, they'll do the twangy country thing but they can rock too. You'd be surprised how many jazz musicians use them (neck pickup).
They allow you to change your tone just by how you pick or by the amp or pedals you use.
To me Strats always sound like Strats. Yes, they have more pickups but so what? They all have that nasally, weedy, pinched "Stratty" tone no matter what amp you're using and no matter which pickup position you're in. I hate that.
Lower the tone knob on the Tele bridge and play thru a high gain amp - it sings like a Les Paul, but it cuts thru the mix better than a Paul ever could.
Don't forget Beck, Robben Ford, Ed Bickert...
It is a bit embarrassing to have been concerned with
the human problem all one's life and find at the end
that one has no more to offer by way of
advice than "try to be a little kinder."
-Aldous Huxley, novelist (1894-1963)
I began as a Strat player, and have become primarily a Tele player. Once you get their mojo, and your technique can coax the magic out of one, all kinds of great musical doors open that only the Tele can give.
:smokin
'My art and profession is to live.' Michel de Montaigne
...Page used a Tele through a Supro amp. Fantastic tone. Great sound for blues and rock! The guitarists arsenal= Les Paul, Strat, and a Tele!
i've never owned another kind of electric guitar. i first had a korean fender tele for many years, then recently acquired an american series, so my perspective is kinda narrow. but i learned to play on old one, and the new one has taken me to new levels after years of stagnation.
i think their simplicity allows for a wider range of expression in some indefinable way...
"Wait, it's a trap. Get an axe."
The tone, the design, the functionality, the mojo, ....they're true originals.
:nelson
They got's tone to da bone.
Hay-Zoose-H-Kryste, AGG...ya ain't never hoid of KEEF?!?!?! :rrOriginally posted by a_great_guitarist
Why do so many people like telecasters?
I am wondering If I might like them and no i dont like country/western or any stuff like that.. are they any good for rock or anything like that?
The Fender Telecaster is the most honest electric guitar ever produced...period.
Tele's got twang, balls and grit.
Strats are the Prom Queen, Tele's are her slutty little sister. :)
I too played Strats exclusively for a long time - a decade. Then I bought my first Tele because I loved the neck shape and the acoustic tone - it is a MIJ 50s RI. So wound up changing the hardware and PUs and refretting it and it is still so killer. Acoustically it is totally alive, very responsive and as others say - honest.
I put HBs or miniHBs in the neck so I can go from jazz, blues and woman tone in the neck to springy poppy shimmer in the middle to cast iron balls and bass roots rock redneckabilly twang in the bridge. To me, it is far more versatile than my old Strats. By altering my picking technique, phrasing and playing with the vol and tone controls, I get a wide range. The Tele never feels mushy or thin. From bop runs to faux steel, it is the king. And there is no extraneous stuff to impede the flow of traffic. Just a simple, responsive guitar that lets me maximize my expressiveness. ANy shortcoming is in the player, not the Tele.
My two cents, of course!
They're honest. They make good companions. They are responsive to your every whim. They purr when you need them to purr. They growl when you need them to growl. They feel perfect in every way. But first and foremost, they're honest. No BS guitar. And I don't care what anybody else says, I think they're beautiful.
I find in General I like things simple. I'm definitly a "more thier is , the more thier is to break" kind of guy. I once played through a friends Mesa Boogie and liked what I heard so much I thought about getting one. But once I saw how many Push pulls there was and as many on the back!!, I said NO way. Samething with my stero equipment, TV ect. Nothing Fancy. The basics have got to be the goods though.
The tele reflects that way of thinking. The 1 Pup Esquire being the Ultimite 1 trick pony............but what a PONY!!
The "right" Tele is fun to play!
I like 'em 'cause they got 1 BIG vol. and 1 BIG tone so you can tweak your sound on the fly without gettin' lost. :boobs I also like 'em 'cause you can play 'em like an acoustic ;) 'cause your arm is in a different place than it would be on a strat.I also like the fact that there is no middle pup to GET IN MY WAY :! 'cause I like to pick n strum hard right there in the middle of the body. :lhg
DAMN. I wish I could remember where I put them!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
2 1/2 years ago when I first started playing I thought "Why would anyone want one of those things". I thought they were ugly and a relic from the past with no technology at all.
Whoa, now that I have a few guitars and had a chance to play a Tele or 2, a 52 RI is a must for me. It will be my next guitar (maybe a Martin first).
The tones you can drag out of the Tele! What a classic. Now thats a man's guitar!!!!!!
brianf
Oh Man!!! I never knew Fender made amps too!!!
I believe the Telecaster can do it all, from country to metal.
METAL????????????? :rr :ax :! My tele don't wanna play metal.
DAMN. I wish I could remember where I put them!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
you might need to change your name if you don't know the answer to that question... ;) JUST KIDDING!!!!!!!!!!!!!Originally posted by a_great_guitarist
Why do so many people like telecasters?
I am wondering If I might like them and no i dont like country/western or any stuff like that.. are they any good for rock or anything like that?
It's a real work horse, man's man type of guitar.
Beware, it'll make you start playing country.
Originally posted by Scott_F
Beware, it'll make you start playing country.:nelson
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If this ain't a good reason to have a Tele, there just ain't one...
I'm gonna go hug my Tele now...
Teles are fun because you gotta strangle them get some tone out of them, Having a 10K Nocaster pickup in the bridge doesn't hurt either.
I wouldn't use mine for metal ( I'd use my Les Pauls, Hamer, or my PRS )but their great for rock and blues
So many accolades has surrounded the famous Telecaster as it is known today. It has truly become an icon in the country field where it began (Jimmy Bryant & Jimmy Wyble).. and crossed over into the R & B field (Curtiss Mayfield), blues (Muddy Waters, BB King and Gatemouth Brown), rock (Beck,Page & Clapton), psychedelia (Pink Floyd's Sid Barrett), jazz (Ted Greene, Howard Roberts, Bob Bain & Barney Kessel) and the Tele masters like James Burton, Roy Buchanan, Danny Gatton, Amos Garrett, Albert Lee and Jerry Donahue... Why.. Because it's was born of functionality, balance, fidelity and raw tone!!
The Esquire/Broadcaster/Telecaster idea was a natural progression of Leo's insight into Spanish guitars from his solid Hawaiian steel instruments and Paul Bigsby's Merle Travis prototype so visable on the SoCal bandstands. Thanks to the pioneering help of George Fullerton, Charlie Hayes (the Fender salesman who asked for a new guitar), Dale Hyatt and Don Randall it became a reality. With much criticism at the 1950 trade show, the Esquire took off slow at first. The true reality of the Fender solidbodies lack of feedback and great steel guitar like tones right at your fingertips.. enabled the guitarist to be majestic and full of great guitar tone at almost any volume. Fender's new guitar picked up speed and many others followed. Freedom at last!
To begin with, the original Fender Spanish "Esquire" guitar featured a two or four way matched pine body. These earliest of Esquires actually have quite a bit of acoustical volume in comparison to the generally heavier ash bodies. Pine was too soft and impractical even though it sounded good. Only the original black Esquires used pine (some were actually white like the first few '49 prototypes) and the guitar was recently reissued by the Custom Shop. During that fertile period a dozen two pickup Esquires were built with the steel guitars ash wood and blonde finish which began the tradition we enjoy today. The ash hardwood was a perfect choice for great sustain and ringing high end tone.
I've discovered the lack of a truss rod also gives it a more woody tonality. Of course the reinforcement of the neck was soon implimented with the introduction of the Broadcaster version in October of 1950. Neck wise, I enjoy my early '50 Esquire V neck since it's so similar to the Nov '56 Strat I use. The full fit in the curve of the hand is really a very serious handful. After nearly five months of trimmed decals (which I prefer to call "The Fender Guitar).. the Telecaster name was first used in August of 1951.. the very month I was born! No one could even come up with a name after Don Randall's contest was promoted. So the Television, a relatively new and then popular invention inspired the Telecaster name. Radio broadcasting to TV broadcasts was the first jump.. the stratosphere was next...
I especially enjoy the original alnico 2 pickups and their perfect placement. Very rich sounds are available right next to the nodal point by the neck. Great for jazz tones and warm rhythm playing. The angled bridge pickup (borrowed from the 1949 Champion steel pickup) sitting on the metal bridge plate gives the stinging Fender tone a real ring and scorching sound. Woods that were used were already naturally aged and perfect tone generators. Today you can tap virtually any fifties Fender neck and listen to the solid ping tone! And when the body and neck both coincide tonally and harmonically.. you have the ultimate Fender guitar!
My personal experience with the Tele began during the late sixties with a '60 Telecaster Custom I bought for $80 with a tweed Champ amp. After playing a new '64 Duo-sonic and then a '54 Strat for a few years, I was ready to try the Grandaddy of them all. My few country friends had the fifties blond neck models (as we called them) and they certainly had a cool look I thought. We were playing outdoor Love-ins in those days with high volume (Twins w/Showman cabs) and I had to be very careful so as not to get the howling sound (leftover air in the pickup winding). Some earlier Teles didn't seem to have that feedback problem I found. Their coils were dipped in the wax longer. The brilliant lead pickup was my main attraction. Certain songs just called for the bright and blazing Tele Tone to the Bone!
Comfort wise.. I was just getting used to the contoured Stratocaster.. yet I stuck it out even though the body edges were so sharp. The normal Tele small radiused edges weren't so bad but took some getting used to. I know of a few original fifties contoured Teles too. Some feel the fact that the Tele stays upright next to your body like an acoustic guitar is more preferable. I also discovered from interviewing Danny Gatton that the overall way the Tele neck is positioned to your body while standing up is farther extended away from you as compared to a Strat. This is due to the lack of the horn as on the P-bass and Stratocaster. Some players prefer that slightly farther position.
During the seventies I had bought and sold a few fifties Esquires and Telecasters to some British players like Clem Clemson with Humble Pie. One refinned '53 I found in OB I sent up to Gene Parsons in Mendicino for a Parson/White String Puller for Jimmy Page. He then switched out the maple neck for the rosewood neck from his Yardbirds Tele and still plays it today. Through the years I started using them more often for sessions and rockabilly stuff while playing with Rosie (Flores) & the Screamers. Phil Kubicki (original Fender Custom shop luthier) built my Wildwood Tele Custom. It has the rare blue green dye injected top and back as used for the Wildwood Fender acoustics. Arlen Roth also had his blue/green Wildwood Tele done around that same time. Being in the studio rental business since the seventies, I can say that many famous producers utilize the Telecasters great sounds on countless records. I remember being in Oxnard watching Jeff Beck use his Tele on a train boxcar while doing Rod Stewart's video shoot of "People Get Ready" and thinking.. what a fabulous Fender Telecaster sound he gets!
Even though most of us play other popular guitars, we always seem to come back to the great Fender Telecaster guitar. To sum it up.. those ol' Telecasters we've come to love and admire really started the whole solidbody bandwagon and still kickass! Thank you Clarence Leo Fender for having the insight to start it off right!!
Robb
I don't know if the Great Guitarist is still reading these or if this post is ancient history, but one fine example of some really butt-kicking Tele rock would be a band called Seven Mary Three. Their first album, "American Standard" is one of my favorites and I believe almost all (if not ALL) of the guitar parts are Nocasters.
hahaha!Originally posted by Stanze
Strats are the Prom Queen, Tele's are her slutty little sister. :)
and the P-Bass is the big brother that will kick the ass of anyone who messes with his sisters!!!
Hey Stroker, what's a "Holly" shit? Is it sort of a festive, Christmas-y sort of shit?
Last edited by kottkewannabe; 02-10-2003 at 06:03 PM.
I don't normally read really long posts, and at first I thought yours was a copy and paste from a website. But, I am in awe of your overall knowledge, and the way you present it plainly... like it is, not as a comparison to one thing or another.
As book critics like to say "Excellent read!"
Stetson
I put a 4 way switch and a set of Texas Specials in my MIM Standard. I think it could be used to play just about anything.
You've seen Christmas Vacation???Originally posted by kottkewannabe
Hey Stroker, what's a "Holly" shit? Is it sort of a festive, Christmas-y sort of shit?
Stroker, I honestly don't know what you're talking about. It was actually just the thing that came to mind as I read your signature. Do tell...
I can only state my relization...I had 7 guitars...PRS, Parker, Gibson, Kinman and Fender and sold em all in favor of two Kinman strats and a 52 RI tele...well...one day it hit me and I picked up the Tele and havn't put it down since... so much so I bought a second 52 RI after shooting it out against a Nocaster...the 52 RI won...and am in the process of selling my last strat type guitar...I also disagree that a strat is more versatle just because it has more pickup positions...I have way more sounds avaliable with my Tele just by using my hands and volumn/Tone pot. and it can cover anything from Jazz to AC/DC...can it do rock...a Tele bridge pickup through a cranked amp doing the beginning of Free's "All Right Now" need I say more...
Chow,
Seegs
Ciao, Seegs.
Chow to you too, Kottkewannabe!!
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