Fender Telecaster

1953 ORIGINAL ESQUIRE TELE..(single neck pickup tele..even has route for neck pickupunder pickguard) my dad bought new. I was hesitent to leave the review as I don't wan to 'highbrow" in any way..just so happened whne I was a year old Dad bought it and I just had it refreted. It's NOT mint.. been through 2 fires and the Nitro finish is kinda screwy around the nech joint. The back of the neck is completely worn smooth from my Dad. If some wonder why people pay so much you would just have to hold it and play a nice open G. There is no other teles ever made that SOUND SO HUGE..something about the virgin alder wood that Leo probably guessed at and bought a bunch of it. This is the loudest cleanest sound I have ever heard..it just screams and sustains. Even the original Kluson tuners stay in tune at a gig all night..The reissues are nice..I played the 60th anniversary HIGH $ one and it isn't even close...it's the wood and age I guess.LINDY FRALIN personally rewound the pickup for $60 with freight..he is the KING of tele pickups and rewinding. Features?..naahh..just the best sound I have ever heard.. from 87' PRS I bought new to other Fender teles and Gibson..Hamer..Parker Fly..etc That monster tone & sound IS the feature.

Right after the very nervous refret which turned out great, I took it to a gig. I had the PRS set up for the rectoverb and just thought the second set I'd plug in and wham!!! ..the guys in the band looked around as I hit the old open G with jaws agape...so I wen into Honky Tonk by the stones and it was heaven...I haven't put it down for the last few gigs. Rich..bright..belltone..and the overdrive is straight up stoned and beyond. If you ever have the $ as I don't these with cosmetic wear can be had for 18 to 30,000...worth every penny and will go up in price. I have had much better players play it and a big grin is always guatanteed..."wow man..unreal".. is very common.

The mostimportant setup on a tele is the nut...so important..Joey Burrel from Brandon is the genius that did mine and the sixth string is just has a slight groove...not a "channel"..BONE only...find someone who knows how to "shallow set" a nut a get him to put one on your tele..bone only..you will be amazed...low action only is the result..but man the tone is worth it. I didn't mess with anything else...It's just so hard to believe how this 53 year old guitar puts the newer ones to shame..it's weird..I mean How did Leo know what kind of wood? what kind of neck joint?..pickups?..the iconic bridge?..the string trees?..what size frets..etc..etc...Maple will never sound like this..as I have quite a few guitars..

haa! well I guess this question answers itself...one refret and one rewound pickup in 53 years!!

I have no clue but I have been told the Fender Custom shop would nornally be the ones to do a refret..no way I was letting this guitar get more than 90 miles from me...I wouldn't take any amount of money for it..well maybe..

Been playing since I started on this guitar at 12..I'm 55 now..Yea I wish I could have asked my Dad to buy 20 more..he paid $128 plus case.
Oh it will not be stolen...yea I would find 30,000 or more if I lost it to get another..no doubt. Well other teles don't compare..that's why Danny Gatton and Bruce Springsting played 53's. In fact one of Bruce's first albums has him and a 53 Esquire..blond.
I'd judt like to say if you ever have the $ and opportunity..buy it!
God Bless Leo Fender..he started it all man!!!

Left handed standard Mexican Telecaster, cream in colour with white scratchplate. Per serial number made in 2003. Maple neck and fretboard and 21 frets with black dot markers in the usual place. No gimmicks, whistles or bells but perfect for R & R!!!

The stock pick ups aren???t too great, the bridge pick up is too spiky and brash, it sounds cheap. The neck pick up is more refined but still not much better than average. I???ve got a ???Jim Reed??? telecaster that has Kent Armstrong pick-ups in that sound much better. The tone/volume pots suffer from ???all or nothing??? as well ??? they are either full on or off.
Having said that the guitar does sound nice unplugged so replacing the pick ups with Seymour Duncans and getting decent pots will probably improve it ten-fold.

Got this second hand but it was in pretty good nick apart from a nasty bang on the body at the top. No fret buzz or string choking. Paint job is nice and evenly applied.

A1 perfecto!

Never needed to contact Fender.

Nice and basic Fender Tele. Easy to play and well made ??? it???s only let down by electrics but they are easy to replace. Budget an extra 100 GBPs if you???re buying to make it giggable.

Single Coil direct replacement pickups wound by Lindy Fralin. These pickups are not noiseless and have a little bit of hum but that shoud be taken care of with the proper shielding of the guitar. These pickups are wound to be flat in response and are cryogenically treated to remove harsh overtones. ( what this does is basically "ages" the metal in the pickups and makes them more dense as a naturally 50 year old pick up would be but in a brand new product, for example)the tone is incredible, high output, very clear and even. They come stock with a plate on teh bridge pickup to increase sustain and it definately does. They use a hybrid magnet set up each matched to the string base don harmonics and tonal tendancies.

I installed these into a 2003 69' Thinline reissue guitar ( mexican) I think its funny, all you have to do is say mexican adn people go running...the fit and finish on this guitar is amazing... its perfect I cant find anything wrong with it... imean its not your standard mexi series either ya know. I though the stock pickups were harsh and plastic sounding. This fixed it right up. The other mods I have done to the guitar: 250K pots, Switchcraft jack adn switch, I also installed a .047mfd orange drop capacitor( all from callaham guitars). The other mod I have is the Callaham bridge... amazing piece seriously....the stock is so flimsey and just so cheaply made- this should be the first thing any tele player does to their guitar.

The output level is a tad hotter than stock, but Callaham waxes it one extra time for noise reduction. These pickups are also not overwound. The tone is very balanced..although maybe a tad bassy at times...who has ever complained about that from a tele? the tone is very clear. I was in the studio sunday and I was blown away by it.I play mostly Alternative/rock kind of stuff ( Our Lady Peace, Flickerstick, fuel ect..) it works really well along side my Gretsch New Jet.

I woul definately buy it again. I would recommend any of callaham guitars products to anyone and everyone. I am not a boutique type person and I have never changed pickups before I am very glad I did.

Fender Mexican Telecaster. Year? Umm.. probably 2001-ish. standard telecaster single coils at bridge and neck. sunburst color. i changed the bridge pickup, pickguard, and added a copper static shield under the pickguard.

The guitar sounded awesome. I was surprised that it rocked so much stock out of the box. I added a Seymour Duncan "Vintage for Broadcaster" bridge pickup, and that thing makes it oh so sweeter. i've played thru a number of amps with it. Fender Hot Rod Deville 410, Traynor YCV40, Vox Pathfinder 15r, and finally, my most recent aquisition, a Fender Blues Jr. Sounds awesome thru everything. I play light gain/natural breakup indie rock type sounds mixed with a little blues and rock. If you've ever hear Built to Spill, that's the array of sounds I like to use, and the Tele is ideal for all of them.

Stock, I had a static problem... when your fingertips would touch the pickguard while strumming, picking, you'd hear a snap, crackle, pop thru the amp. i added a copper shield underneath the pickguard. it took a while for whatever that static was to wear off, but now that it's gone, it stayed gone. big improvement.

the sunburst finish on these mexican teles is real nice. looks much better if you ditch the white pickguard unless you like that sorta thing. a black or tortoiseshell pickguard looks way cooler with the sunbury in my opinion. the action on this guitar is incredible. for a 350 dollar guitar, i can hardly believe how sweet this thing plays. forget the american version, just keep trying out mexican ones till you find one that plays sweet, then throw in another 50 bucks for a killer pickup and you have one hell of an axe.

this thing is solid as hell. pretty heavy, i like that. there's no normal guitar rock antics this thing can't take. i bend strings like crazy, and manually tremolo the neck sometimes too, this guitar is tough as nails.. built to be rocked.

never had to deal with fender for anything. all their products have served me rather well over the years. definitely my favorite guitars and amps.

I've been playing for about 17 years. I also play an Epiphone SG, neckthru body style. not one of the real cheapies, kinda middle of the road, with a Seymour Duncan Phat Cat bridge pickup and Les Paul neck pickup. My main amp right now is a Fender Blues Junior thru a 2x12 open back cab loaded with one Vintage 30 and one G12H Anniversary speaker. I also use a Vox Pathfinder 15r. these little amps are awesome, best 140 dollars i ever spent.

telecasters are my favorite type of guitars, and i just couldn't see dropping close to a grand on an american model. and i'm glad i didn't , my mexi tele rocks.

2002 Mexican-made standard Tele, two pickups, two pots, one switch, maple neck, six-tailpiece bridge, white pickguard with black finish, absolutely rock-standard off-the shelf model. Haven't messed with it in any way except that I took off the factory strap buttons and replaced them with buttons for a strap lock, because it occasionally slips out of the strap. Nicknamed it "Marcos", after the celebrated spokesman of the Zapatista movement - I like to think some of those guys know people who've worked for nothing in the Fender plant.

I play for fun, pretty much anything except what passes these days for metal - punk, country, blues, grunge, 70s rock, swing, bebop, free improv, weird experimental ambient nonsense, all of it equally badly but with enthusiasm. The beauty of this Tele is that it has a very plain sonic personality - it's not noticeably fluid and trebly like a Strat, nor does it insist on being cranked up to 11 like my Epiphone LP 100. The neck pickup is a little mushy but that's its only idiosyncrasy, and I think that goes with having a Tele in the first place. The switching is quiet and it goes smoothly from polite country runs to screaming punk terror with no dead moments. At first I was unused to how far apart the strings are, and discovered to my horror that I was a far worse player than I thought I was, but I took this to mean that I should up my game. A Tele really puts manners on you as a player and makes you sound like yourself. I respect that.

I don't like the way the little metal cups that hold the string-ends on the back of the guitar have a way of falling out onto the ground while you change strings, but I suppose I could glue them in. Also the B string tuner has a way of sliding gently out of tune more often than seems normal. I always stretch new strings and I often play extremely hard, and it's tricky to keep this thing in perfect tuning for more than half an hour at a time. But maybe it's the way I play.

I think I could probably use this thing to repel intruders from my house without doing it any serious damage. Teles are a living reminder of the fact that an electric is a lot closer to a machine tool than it is to an acoustic. The finish is exceptionally tough, although the pickguard has lost its original gleam thanks to me playing Minutemen tunes with a metal pick.

I've been playing for 20 years and this is so far my favourite guitar, although it's easily the toughest to play that I've ever known - I also have a battered old Squier Strat, a temperamental Epiphone LP 100 and a lovely old Yamaha dreadnought. (One of these days I must rationalise.) It has a big, strong, simple personality that forces you to really play it - you can't just zip up and down the neck, got to dig in and hit the damn strings with both hands. Amazing that Mr. Fender got it so right on his first go. I'd never sell it, and the only person I'd give it to would be a child of my own - if s/he can learn to play on this, everything afterwards would be a doddle. It's solid, sturdy, sounds great, looks cool, and it has no airs or graces. A thing of beauty.

I actually put this Telecaster together from a body and neck I bought from ebay and electrics that I bought at a music store. This guitar is @#$%^& ugly. I call it my "uglycaster". The body comes off of a 92 USA Traditional Fender Telecaster. It's a top loader, not string through body. The neck came from a 99 standard MIM Mexico telecaster. I put a top loading, hardtail bridge on it with graphite saddles and a graphite nut. It has a solid top and I painted it a walnut color but as this was my first paint job ever, it turned out looking like $%^&. My wife said it had character, so I just went about making it uglier. Sprayed some orange paint on it, splattered orange, red, yellow and blue paint all over it, drug it by the neck across the gravel driveway a few times, hit it with a hammer and then put a clear varnish over it. Ugly. I put Vintage Noiseless Pickups in it, Fender custom shop pots, and a beat up old tele pickguard along with a 3 way selector. The neck is maple and maple fretboard with 21 medium frets. It looks like an old, beat up, well used tele. It doesn't have many features as no tele does, so you can't max it out but this is a damn good guitar and it is the one I play the most out of the 11 guitars I have. I have probably close to $300 in the guitar.

I play blues, blues rock, classic rock, country, electric folk and hard rock with this guitar. It suits it all very well and sounds like a $3,000 guitar and I bullshit you not. VERY Keith Richards sounding guitar. I've got 3 amps at home, one being a Fender Super Reverb (all tube), a hybrid Marshall Valvestate 40 watt amp (tube preamp - solid state electrics) and a little bitty Marshall MG10CD. Sounds great on all the amps, but sounds the best on the Fender. For some reason to me, Fender guitars sound best on Fender Amps. My Les Pauls sound best on the Marshalls. This has the Vintage Noiseless Pickups which are stacked humbuckers so it doesn't make any noise at all. Tele's are NOT versatile guitars. It has a tone that fits basically all types of music, depending on your pickup position but you can't get that "quack" out of it and you aren't going to get that beefy dark les paul tone out of it either, so metalheads - tele's probably aren't what you are looking for unless you get one of the 2 humbucker models. Very nice country twang, good grunge and punk rock sounds on the bridge pickup, middle position is good for classic rock and neck pickup has a very sweet blues and jazz tone. I love this guitar. It has great tone, plays very well, neck fast as greased cat shit and because of its looks - a lot of personality.

Well, I did all this myself. Action is perfect for me and I do like it a little higher than most people. Pickups are adjusted perfectly. Flaws? This guitar is intentionally flawed.

I have no doubt this guitar would withstand live playing. I don't gig myself, just collect guitars, tinker with them, remodel them and play the hell out of them but this mo fo is tuff. Hardware is top of the line fender, no aftermarket stuff. As far as the finish is concerned, well it looks like crap, but I made it that way, but I had a hard time putting dents and scratches in this thing. I drug it across the gravel driveway beat it with a hammer and it still took a lot of time to @$%^ it up the way I wanted it. I have oversized strap buttons on it. It's very dependable. I've been playing the hell out of it for 5 years now.

Been playing for 25 years and building or remodeling them for 6 years now. I'm a tech, so I can do all my work. I have 11 electric guitars, all strats, teles or les pauls and I have 5 acoustic guitars, all gibsons. I don't hate anything at all about this or any guitar I own. I love them enough to say that NONE of them are for sale.

This is a hybrid guitar. Standard tele features with some changes. Laminated top. Has one volume and one tone pot, 3 way selector and has a Fender Vintage Noiseless Stacked Humbucker at the bridge and a Gibson stacked P-100 Humbucker at the neck. The body is made of Alder and came off of a made in China Rockstar Telecaster Copy. The neck is maple and comes off of a made in Mexico Standard Telecaster. It's a natural color with a red tortoise shell pickguard, with a cream pickup cover for the P-100 pickup, and a cream selector switch top. I put a vintage bridge from a 52 telecaster on it and I converted it to string through body. All the electronics are Fender. I put Schaller locking tuners on it. Neck is very fast with medium frets and I made a case out of maple and velvet for it. I do most of my work myself. I pat myself on the back and say that this tele really WOWs people when they see it and hear it. It looks great, plays great, sounds great and the Rockstar body (which is thin like a Squier Affinity Strat) makes it easy on the back because it is light. I'll be modest with my own guitar building and give it a 9, but I bet you would give it a 10.

It is exactly what I want for a lot of my music. I like pure, no nonsense rock and roll - classic rock, hard rock and blues rock. That's it. Don't give a fuck about anything else. This guitar does it very well. Running it through a Marshall MG30DFX and that does the trick. I have a footswitch for changing channels and that's all I need. It's got the Fender Vintage Noiseless pickup at the bridge and that P-100 at the neck so you can go from Twang to fucking Bang at the flick of a switch. Very versatile. Anything from Hard rock to classic rock to blues rock, pure blues, country - shit it will even hang in there with metal. I love everything about it - I built the mother fucker. Again, I'll be modest and give it a 9, but again, you would give it a 10.

Don't know. Bought it in pieces and put it all together. Everything is adjusted perfectly for me. I set it up.

Well, I been banging away on this fucker for about 2 years now but I never gigged with it. Along came a baby girl and I missed my first children growing up because of music, so I'm a stay home - play home dad now. It will most definitely handle gigs, but I wouldn't gig without a backup even if I had one of those $4,000 Merle Haggard Tribute models.

Never dealt with Fender. I do better work than they do though.

I'm 54, been playing since I was 10. I have a lot of shit, mostly I make my own guitars or at least highly modify them. I'd track the mother fucker that steals this down and rip his head off and shit down his throat. I won't lose it. It's priceless.

Mine was made in 1976. It's simple. It's clean (time capsule clean). It's all natural (in finish and equipment). And it's a Tele; a cutting board with a long handle and a few strings attached ;-)
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Ash body. Natural stain (gorgeous knotted wood on back; very unique). All original. And in virtual museum quality condition.
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I give it a 10 here only because it's a Tele...and ya can't want too much in the way of features or you wouldn't want a Tele.

While my musical style ranges a bit, I'm more into jazz 'n blues than anything. For blues, it is sweet. For jazz, it's far too thin...but am liking it more and more. Odd, I know.
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This particular Telecaster has all the snarl, bite and bark you might associate with a Telecaster, yet also possessed the warmest neck pickup of any Fender I've ever played. And more versatile than I ever figured a Tele could be.

Have to trim my rating to a 9 on this one. While it's a beauty, the upper frets weren't rounded enough or polished. However, I guess I'm a bit spoiled with custom shop guitars and am used to having everything made as it should have been made; by a person, not a machine. Everything else is perfect; tight neck pocket, great fit, and the most beautifully unique wood I've ever seen on a Telecaster.
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Only thing on my Tele wish list, just in case Santa-Fender is listening in: Please bring me a Tele with a wider nut width; 1 11/16" would be nice. Thanks.

Built like a tank. Body. Neck. Knobs. Switch. Abuse it? Don't know why anyone would. But you could...and it'd keep twangin' 'til Tuesday.

Don't know. Never tried calling them.

Yeah, I paid a pretty penny for it...but it was in MINT condition. No, I don't mean, eBay-promised "mint" condition. I mean, like right out of the friggin' factory wrap not a spec of use on the thing MINT condition. Yes, a lot for a Tele...but --- hell, even the case was MINT...and the sound was warmer than any Tele I'd seen.
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Once took it into my local GC. Plugged it in. Then proceeded to play and compare it to every other low- to top-end custom shop & relic Tele in the place. Blew them all away. Customers kept stopping by asking what model it was and its price. Then they'd go up to the GC guy and ask if they could order one. He'd come over and then have to tell them that without a time machine there was nothing he could do.
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Have had many offers for it; last one was upwards of $2800. Must be crazy...but I can't part with it just yet. Only reason it gets a 9 and not a 10 is: I had to pay a ton for it...that and I'd really like that wider neck/nut width. Yes, I know Fender doesn't make it...but I'm wishing.

Hey...it's a boat paddle with string and a couple a pickups! Features? We don't need no ostinking features......

It's a tele! If you play a tele, you know how this baby sounds. Many out there have a dislike for 70's Fenders. I sure did ( pre-concieved from other peoples opinions ) till I happened on this one. This is a great guitar. It was originally a creamy white color and has turned into a butterscotch pudding ( not like the 52 RI though ) yellowish color over the years. I bought it from an old fart that had it sitting in his closet since 1974. The action is low. The bridge pickup is pretty darn twangy with the classic spank leading the way. The neck pickup really surprised me. Far from being muffled and weak, it has a beatiful, bluesy tone and matches well volume wise with the bridge unit. The first thing I did was wire up a new control plate with 250K pots and a new three way. I carefully stored the original with it's 1meg pots. If I ever decide to sell it, I'll re-install or include the original plate. The 250's warmed up the tone and the taper of the vol and tone are now what I expect. The 1megs were more like on/off switches!

Cna't comment on the factory action, fit and finish as I got it 33 years after it was made, but as Fenders do, it has held up very well.

Teles have to be the most relaible electric ever made. As far as gigging without a backup, I have in years past when all I had was one guitar. These day's I have 19...but I still gig with one as I'm too damn lazy to carry more than that to a gig. My homebrew USACG tele is my #1. It's actually a far superior instrument in tone, playabilty and feel to the 71. Don't get me wrong, the 71 is plenty cool and a great guitar. If it was all I had, I'd be a happy man. That said, the homebrew is so nice I hardly play anything else....but since ths is about the 71, nuff said. Teles are jsut cool guitars. I have three right now and my eye is always peeled for another. I prefer the ones I make to the store bought Fenders, but the Fenders are nice.

See the review from "brandonito" below, which I wrote right after I got this guitar. Pretty normal '70s Tele...not a ton of features, but it doesn't need them, and it does what it does VERY well.

After playing this guitar as my main instrument for 5 years now, I have to say it's really propelled my playing to new levels. And it DOES get a dark tone, as well, it's just that now I know what to do with it! I use it all the time with a variety of amps (Marshall, couple of old Gibsons, Silvertone), and it's always toneful and very versatile. TELES RULE!!!

Aside from the weight, it's great!

Built like a brick shithouse. has proven to be gigworthy.

FENDER CS SUCKS!!!

Indispensible. If I could only have one, this'd be it.

2003 Mexican Telecaster in "brown" sunburst. I'd call it tobacco but I think that's a rude word in the States now. Not sure of the body material but it looks like one piece. The neck is maple and seems to be one piece - no separate fingerboard. I'm not sure what profile & radius it is, nor what size the frets are. I haven't counted them either! Fender enthusiasts will know. Angled pickup at the bridge & covered chrome at the neck - both single coil. 3 way selector switch, rotary master tone & volume controls, all in chrome. Don't know what type the tuners are but they're chrome too & do what they're supposed to. That's it - simplicity itself. Can't rate it too highly for features but if you want a Telecaster this is what you want.

Now this is what it's all about. With the stock set of 9-42 strings this sounds exactly as the Telecaster is supposed to, and has done since it was first designed. Purists will say that modern materials, electrics & pickups have altered the true Telecaster sound somewhat, but that characteristic twang & bright jangly tone is there, and the neck pickup gives you that nice beefy Keef Richards rythm tone. The pickups give a fair bit of buzz & hiss on high gain, but this is what you'd expect. Played clean with the bridge pickup & the tone wound up it gives a lovely clear jingly-jangly sound more like a Rickenbacker, and overdriven would cut through anything. Think Radiohead in "The Bends" mode. I play mainly Indie/rock style stuff, & particularly like this for single-note picking 'cos the separation is good. I play through a Boss GT-3 into either a Kramer 15W solid-state or (more usually) headphones. I've found I have to have a dedicated set of sound patches for each guitar because of the difference in output & tone - what sounds good with my Les Paul generally doesn't work well with the Telecaster.

Having been a Gibson/Epiphone officianado for the last 4 years, I pretty much assumed that Fender would be the poor cousin, but I was pleasantly surprised at how solid this guitar is. It weighs nearly as much as the Epiphone Les Paul, and the neck feels lovely & smooth & beefy. Your fingers fly round the bottom two thirds of the fingerboard with no problem at all, the only part I'm not too keen on is the way the action was set - a little too high for my liking, making upper register stuff a bit sticky. Although over a year old, mine has no flaws at all that I can see apart from a very slight dent on the neck, and it looks & feels as though it can withstand pretty much anything that my other guitars could under normal use. The quality of fit & finish is fine - no gaps or misalignment anywhere, all the frets are set well & unworn, & the intonation from the 6 adjustable saddles is perfect to my ear anyway. I like the way the maple fingerboard looks - I'm used to rosewood, but the way this has been polished makes it look a bit like a pale version of burr walnut. The body has nice graining where it's visible through the finish, but it actually looks better on the back. I wonder if this one was supposed to be a lefty & somebody at the factory got confused.

I don't play live (believe me, the world is a better place without it) but I've no doubt it could be relied on as my only guitar in a live situation. The only thing is, I can't imagine not using my Les Paul for most of the gig, & swapping to this when the song needed something a little breezier. As I've only had it about a month so far, reliabilty remains to be seen.

Never dealt with them & hope I never have to, although I've heard Fender Europe are quite helpful when it comes to problems. Surely most of us would nip down to our local guitar shop, though.

I've been at it 4 years, & also own an Epiphone Les Paul standard, an Epiphone Zephyr Regent archtop electric/acoustics & a truly awful Encore Strat rip-off (OK, it was my first guitar & I didn't want to spend too much). If it was lost or stolen I don't think I'd be quite as gutted as if I lost the Les Paul, but I've hankered for a Telecaster for a long time because of it's simplicity & tone so I'd probably replace it eventually. Incidentally, I don't think it's worth coughing up the extra for the American version - I looked at a few & I don't reckon they are as good for fit & finish as the Japs or Mex's. Sorry, guys.

I bought this guitar in 77 can't remember the cost not much by todays standard.
It has the standard configeration, two single coils, 5 way switch, vol,tone controls. It's finished in blond laminate with maple neck and fingerboard, made in Japan.

Likes,You can't mistake the sound of a Tele',dislikes, the same.
That may seem a little harsh, this was my main guitar for many years and served me well.

As far as i can remember this guitar only needed a little fettling to stop some E-string buzzing.
The finish was good, though not outstanding and the tone pot was slightly bent. I managed to get the action quite low without buzz and without the need to mess with the truss rod.

Can I depend on it, well yes, it never let me down.
It has gained a few marks and chips over the years and there's very slight wear on the fist frett of the A string but it still plays well.
Over the last few years the electrics have become a little troublesome, soldered joints breaking, humming, but nothing that can't be fixed.

Never had to contact them.

I've been playing for about 30 years now and still enjoy getting the old girl out to play, would I get another one-yes. Good guitars have a sound of their own and the Telecaster is one of the good ones

Standard Telecaster with no vibrato, maple neck, black finish. Old style bridge. Standard tele pickups. Basic Guitar.........

For playing country music it is a must have............

This guitar was set up great when I picked it up from the store

I have had this guitar since 1978 and it has spent many nights from a smokey bar room to outside in the rain, to everything in between.

Never had to deal with Fender

Been playing since 1969 and the Tele is the best playing electric I have ever had hands down.I don't play much any more but I will never get rid of the Tele...I have owned a Gibson SG (1969) an Epiphone electric(a 335 copy), an Ibanez, a Carvin, a Fender Jaguar, a Fender Stratocaster, A Peavey, and countless flattops. There is nothing like a Tele. The only bad thing is when on stage, if you have a loud stage volume they feed back quite a lot. It just sounds like a mike squeel. (Drives sound men nuts). I could have changed the pickups but then it would not be quite the same as a standard Tele so I opted to live with the feedback..........

This is a great guitar. With 21 frets, two volume controls, 3-way toggle switch this guitar id very versitile. I enjoy playing a variety of different musics from rock to blues. I like the toggle switch in witch you can change from a beefy humbucking sound to more of a strat sound. My particular guitar is of the tri burst sunburst color.

ON this guitar it suits my style of music. I play rock music from classical rock to modern rock. I use a Crate gfx halfstack. On this amp my guitar sounds great. I use chorus, chrous flange, grunge distortion ect. ON the strat sound on this guitar it sounds very smoot and bright. you can make a variety of different sounds on thios guitar and that is what I like best about it.

THe action and the set-up of the guitar are great. THe pickups could have used a tad of adjustment but were overall very good. On my particular guiatr there were no such flaws.

This guitar will definetly withstand live p[laying. have even used it during live shows. The hardware on this guitar is amazing. I think this guitar will last me a life time. This guitar is a dependable guitar and I don't need a backup during live performances.

Overall, this guitar is just wonderful. After playing this guitar for a year now I have fallen in love with it. I like how on this guitar you change from a humbucking sound to a great strat sound. If I ever lost this guitar I would definetly by another one of these.

This review is for my Fender Standard Telecaster (Made in Mexico)
Basic Specs:
Traditional Telecaster poplar body
Maple neck and fretboard
Die-cast machine heads
Standard Tele pickups (neck & bridge)
3-position blade controls
Master volume, master tone
3-ply white pickguard
Standard Tele bridge with 6 saddles
This Made in Mexico Telecaster has to be among the best Values in all of Fender's lineups. I am a telecaster fanatic and own a custom shop tele, '52 reiisue, American, and a Nocaster. This guitar really holds it's own with the top $$ teles.

For features I give it a 9 simply becasue, well, it's a tele and at this price level there no goodies included like a gig bag or case (though I bought the Fender deluze gig bag for it). Teles prove you don't need alot of features for a time tested unique sound.

Ohh the sound. I honestly find only slight tone (twang) difference beteen this MIM standard and my American teles. ISince most people buying this Tele would also buy value amps, I'll mention this Standard Tele sounds very traditional, rich and typical tele through my smaller Frontman 25 amp (which is a great amp for the money too).
So a 10 for the sound from this Standard.

Once again Made in Mexico no longer means "cheap" from what I am seeing and hearing out this guitar. I have the Brown Sunburst which rivals some of the best fininshes I have ever seen, period. The action on this guitar was set very well. WSo well, that I have yet to make any adjustments. Everything fits well and again the assembly of this tele rivals that of the american teles I own. For all of this I must give a 10 rating a the suprise of the year for me.

C'mon this is a fender tele. Timex probably made up that saying by looking at a telecaster first. I expect this guitar to be around for generations to come.

I only dealt directly with fender once back in '98, and was quite pleased with thefriendly treatment I received for a not so important issue (replacement tuning knob). The Fender rep had me go to my authorized Fender dealer where it was quickly exchanged. Their website for speficific inforamtion is also tops - which I was able to obtain other info I needed through their site! So for their very well laid out web site chock full of data, and the one-time contact a few years back, I give Fender high marks in this category.

Again, this is not only a value leader, this is a solid guitar worthy of playing with teles 5x the price. I highly recommend this guitar to all skill level players.

1995 American CS - 22 medium jumbo frets. Body is sundurst light weight ash. It's a 2 pu - typical tele bridge and Sermor Duncan flat strat pu in the neck spot. It's typical passive electronics but wired in series instead of usual parallel so whwn selector is in mid position the output goes up. the neck is map;e but with an ebony board. The neck is big but one step down from the baseball bat deal. Very soft V with a skunk stripe. Tuners are typical vintage tele with the exception of the low E which is fitted with a Kieth banjo tuner (set to detune to a D). It's fitted with a b-bender- the Parsons-white style- not the Green type used on the Nashville b-bender model. The pickguard is tortoise shell 3 ply.

my setup is tele (usually)>>>carl martin compressor>>>fulltone CS deja vibe>>>budda wah>>>>budda phatman (12ax7s changed to Raytheon blackplates)>>>>TS10 with Keeley mod>>>>Guyatone MD3 echo (the tiny blue box)>>>Gibson GA15RV. I play pop-rock, 60s rock, R+B, rockabilly, funk. The people I gig with do stuff 30 - 60 year olds like - fun, dance stuff - no dark message music. I'm a pick and fingers player - lead style rhythm if you know what I mean. I have owned 5 teles over the years. This one is larger sounding than the others - A bit more sedate than my older maple neck tele clone but brighter than my rosewood neck tele. This is my only tele where the volume knob is really useable (maybe because it's wired in series) I get more variety of tone with this one - strat sounds on the neck, etc. It hums a bit (all good pickups hum) If I want that gnarly cuntry blues tone my maple neck clone is best. But this one is good for doing one gig with one guitar because of the variaty.

I got it used and had some setup work and fret polishing done. He changed the neck pu from a staggered pole alnico which was too mid heavy. The b-bender is as good as my other one. I do this wierd thing where I add heavy rubber bands to avoid inadvertant B string bends. I'm not a country person and don't overuse the bender-I just throw in occassional stuff with it and I also do a lot of behind the nut bends. The big downside of ebony finger boards (one reason not many teles are ebony) is that the wood shrinks forever. The frets needed some shaving down on the edges and the frets are a bit high overall. This is a trade off because the plus is that the ebony sound is BIG. I didn't buy it fore the look but it is pretty. The sunburst ash is nice.

I've had it out a bit. The hardware is decent. I'm a strong arm type player. I like to get my sound from the pick and my fingers and not high volume. I bang on it pretty hard with medium triangle fender picks - scratched up a little. Strap buttons are good. I take a backup.

this doesn't apply.

I've played way too long and have way too much stuff and am looking to acquire more. The ONLY thing lacking is that it doesn't have my perfect neck style which is a 50's strat soft V. This neck is only one click off and this is personal taste anyway. I really like to play in little places where people dance hard and I need a variety of tones and don't like the "digital solution". Of my 22 guitars this one is the most adaptable to all styles. Like all guitar nutcases I REALLY want a different amp and guitar for EACH tune but this tele does ok.

This guitar is a 1968 Telecaster fitted with a early 50's bridge assembly and 50's pickup. I feel it's the best of both worlds as you get the warmth of the rosewood neck and the power of the 50's bridge pickup. (Measured at 9K)

I play indie power pop and it's perfect for my style. I've been using it in the studio through a variety of amps, Matchless HC30, Vox AC10, AC30, and AC50, 59' Tweed Bassman, Callaham EL84R and EL84V and VHT Pittbull 45 112 and Pittbull 50 112.

The guitar sounds amazing through anything it goes through. The pickups have been potted so they are suprisingly very quiet. Overdriven it's very ballsy and hot. Clean it has a lot of sparkle and chime. I'm really not using it too much for clean sounds as I prefer humbuckers for that task, but it really is nice. The main thing I use it for is hot overdrive. Using either a Boss SD-1, Ibanez TS808 or Matchless Hot Box, I can really push this baby. Recording wise it sits very well with humbucker type guitars. The neck is nice and fat, but not uncomfortable. It's really a thing of beauty.

Set up very nicely with 10's....No complaints here.

I don't use it live, but concidering it's 35 years old with a 50+ year old pickup and bridge, it's held up great.

Don't need em, never will.

I don't own this guitar, but thanks to my good friend Larry of Rose Recording, I'm able to use it for my band's debut album. All I can say is thanks. I now see why people seek out vintage instruments. If your lucky enough to find a good one, it's the way to go. It's gonna be very hard for me to go back to my modern guitars, because I've been spoiled by this Tele. Hopefully my band does well, so I can afford to purchase a few cherry vintage axes.

Highway One Telecaster. No features.

Sound covers the audio spectrum from too much bass to too much treble. The tone control really does evenly roll on and off between bass and treble regardless of the 3-way switch setting. Pots are a tad scratchy...almost imperceptible. When the pots hit the stops, I get a microphonic "click" so I have to be careful rolling up. There is a usable and appropriate tonal configuration for just about every style of music on a Tele...covers a lot of ground. Clean sounds are impressive. Slightly broken up sounds are convincing. Full on saturated overdrive works OK but just doesn't go where HB's can.

Action was just right right off the rack. Intonation was perfectly accurate. Bought it from a real guitar store, that may have something to do with the set-up. Finish is a matte lustre...not a high gloss. I can see the grain through the "honey blonde" color. While not a beautiful piece of wood with highly figured grain...it is still very pleasing to the eye. It looks like an old guitar in perfect condition. The look is so plain that I find it beautiful. It seems to say listen to me...don't look at me. The maple neck and fretboard are comfortable all the way up and down on both sides. Neck pocket is snug...no shim. Set screws in the saddles dig into the heel of my hand.

Simple. There are no fancy, delicate or un-necessary features on this instrument. I can't imagine something failing on an electrical or mechanical basis.

I've traded at this music shop for 10 years. I would recomend them to anyone who needed an instrument. Trade locally with a trustworthy shop that employs people who like what they are doing and you won't have customer support problems.

37 years. I have lots of other stuff. This is my 2nd Fender, but my 1st Tele. I'm kicking my ass for waiting so long to get it. I play it through a Fender BJ with no effects. It is a simple guitar...and plugged into a simple amp it provides a full palette of pleasing sounds. It's amazing what can be coaxed out of this basic combination. The best part is I can get sounds out of these relatively new products that sound just like the sounds I got from my 64 Strat and 67 Ampeg back in the day. OK so maybe they are fooling these old ears...but if they are...they're doing a damn good job of it!

I was looking for a tele, but never seemed to find one that had a really good feeling neck on it - I ran across mine, a "antique" yellow colored one with a maple neck while testing some digital amp simulators....and decided that it played really well. Mine was the standard two pickup tele set up, with one lipstick one at the neck and a standard one at the bridge position, three way switch.

Well tone wise at first seemed perfect for what I wanted to do.....Then after payment was made and was playing it at rehearsal, then the guitar went from good to not so good. The pickups were the noisest, scratchiest pickups I had ever on a guitar, without a doubt.

So I did some research and found that Fender made another set of pickups for it (+$110.00, "Noiseless" tele set)so I bought them and installed them. They cut out some noise but the guitar began to pick up another buzz.......So back into the guitar I went. The replacement fender "noiseless" pickups do not include a ground wire and make no mention of adding on in their instructions. So I added a ground wire running from underneath the plate and soldered it onto the back of the volume pot. Had a friend not mentioned that too me I would never have thought to do that, being as it was a brand new guitar and replacement pickups never should have had the problem in the first place.

The neck also seemed to play better in the store.....The neck seems to set itself differently every time I change strings....sometimes to the point it will make a "hollow" sound at the fifth fret, no matter what string (e,a,d,g,b,or high e) is played. It plays ok now but I do not trust it to be consistent all the time. I knew from word go the neck quality was nowhere near Gibson or Rickenbacker quality, but if all else fails I will buy a warmoth neck and just solve that problem for good. The cost of the guitar overall (before the noiseless pickups, but with a case $482.00) still makes it feasible to add stuff onto it without feeling too guilty.

Set up was good on it, probably helped sell me on buying the axe, but I question the neck construction bigtime. It was meant to be an fairly inexpensive mass produced guitar, and sure enough that is exactly what it is.

Although I will probably never buy another new off the rack Fender again (I would just rather build my own, and get it "right" from word go), I wouldn't say to a person "Never buy Fender." The problems I encountered on my axe were fixable and thats exactly what did. The main reason why I will hang onto this guitar is that I am seriously determined to get my money's worth out of it and all the stuff and work that I had to do to it.

It is fairly reliable as an axe, and a nice alternative to a Les Paul/Gibson style setup but I have actually been to auditions where they considered the Tele a setback!! The Noiseless Tele pickups, when grounded correctly do exactly what they should, vintage tele tone without vintage fender pickup squeals and noise. BUT ONLY WHEN IT IS GROUNDED PROPERLY. Paint seems to be good quality, overall it is an upgrade over a squier. Will probably change the saddles to graphite ones at some point in the future, but for will wait until these are well worn

My advise is this: If you plan on buying a Fender......Tack on three hundred to the price tag to afford a nice case and new pickups. Count on getting the axe sorted out before any serious amount of playing time......You will be a lot happier with it.

The customer support from Fender is only good for the original purchaser, and that is only as good the store you bought it from.

I have been playing for about fifteen years, semi pro. I run my axes through Peavey Ultra 120 amp half stacks (tube amps). I use Boss foot pedals and a Korg AX1500G.

My mind was sort of made up, but their will be no next time for me buying a Fender.

No, If I had to have another Fender type product I would just build it myself and get it right the first time.

It does have a good feeling design to it, nice and simple for stage use, when set up right a good axe for blues, rock or country. It definitely has that Fender twang to it but mine seems a little "fatter" sounding with the Noiseless Tele pickups, overall very versatile tone-wise. But take the stock pickups out and toss them over your shoulder and forget about them from word go. They are that bad. Not too bad money wise even after the pickups.

For those reading this, the tele needs no introduction.....or list of (non) features. It's as basic as a guitar can be. All you need and nothing you don't. The first modern production guitar and ( as many say ) the best! The 10 rating indicates it has "tons of features"....as we tele lovers know, it does not. Again, it has the features needed to make great, beautiful music! This one has turned a rich, velvety butterscotch color over the years. Lift the 3 ply whitish / fading P/G and you can see the original blonde color. After all these years, it still plays like butter, keeps in tune and sounds twangy and rich. This one came with the original case and a cancelled check from the guy I got it from. He bought it in 1974 for $140 from a pawn shop.

This guitar would suit pretty much any style of playing you can throw at it except that detuned, death metal creamed Korn style. Great for country, blues, jazz, rock, pop, folk, reggae, world, etc. This particular guitar had the infamous 1meg vol & tone pots. I took the whole control plate off, put it away in a safe place and dropped in another one I soldered up with 250K CTS pots, new 3 way and new caps. Doing this smoothed the tone out considerably and did away with the ice pick treble. Actually, I was suprised how good it sounded with the 1megs. The stock neck pickup sounds very, very good. The bridge pickup ( while not as good as some I've heard )twangs pretty darn good. I have another homebrew USACG tele that out plays this and sounds much better, but for this baby's pretty darn good for a 70's tele. A lot of people pooh pooh 70's teles. I happen to think they are fine guitars.

The action on this baby is low and fast. I prefer the action a bit higher, but since my other tele is my #1, I keep this one as is. No gap in the neck joint. Nice weight...not to heavy, but no feather. Nice finish...you can see a bit of the the ash grain. It's 33 years old and it looks and feels great. A very good, workhorse tele. Of course, you can say that about pretty much any tele!

Reliable?? Durable?? Are you kidding me!!?? It's a tele for crying out loud! You could use it to paddle to a gig, smack a few rowdies, plug in and play the gig without ever tuning it! Back when I was gigging, I could not afford a backup, so I usually played the gig with one guitar. In those gigging day's I generaly played strats or 335 type guitars. I was always worried about what I would do if something happened to the "delicate little guitar". Now, if I had been playing a tele back then, I would not have given it a second thought! Probably the most durable, reliable guitar ever made.

Never, ever contacted a company for service.

Great guitar. Again, not as nice as my homebrew, but a guitar I would be happy and proud to play anywhere at anytime. Classic tele tones abound. I really have way to many guitars at the moment. I need to thin it down a bit. That said, this one will stay. I managed to get this guitar at an excellent price. The old gentleman I got it from bought it with the intention of learning to play. As that never panned out, it sat in his closet from 1976 until I bought it in early 2003. I can't tell you how many 70's tele's ( among other things )I bought, sold and traded in the 80's. I managed several music stores from 1978 to 1985 and got first pick when something of interest came through. I always wished I would have kept a few, so it was nice to come across one. Teles are probably my favorite guitars.

UNDER THE TOGGLE SWITCH IS A PIECE OF MASKING TAPE WITH A DATE 10-19-54 AND THE NAME VIRGINIA, I IMAGINE THIS WAS THE QUALITY CONTROL PERSON AT FENDER. MADE IN USA. 22 FRETS. SOLID BODY(ASH)BLONDE IN COLOUR.ONE VOLUME ONE TONE CONTOL 3 WAY TOGGLE SWITCH, ONE BRIDGE ONE NECK PICKUP.MAPLE NECK, ASH BODY. IT CAME WITH A TWEED CASE AND AN AMPLIFIER-A MAGNATONE MELODIER. I BOUGHT IT USED IN 1963 FROM THE MUSIC SHOP MY GUITAR TEACHER TAUGHT AT-EP MELVIN ON COLORADO BLVD IN PASADENA,CA. I WAS 11 WHEN I GOT IT. OWNED IT FOR 40 YEARS.THE MIDDLE POSITION AND RIGHT POSITION ON TOGGLE SWITCH ARE GOOD BUT FAR LEFT TOGGLE IS VERY DULL SOUNDING.THEREFORE I GIVE IT AN EIGHT.

I USE IT WITH A VOX BERKELY SUPER REVERB-18 WATTS 2 10 INCH SPEAKERS.
AND THE MAGNATONE AND ALSO A CRATE GX15. SOUNDS GOOD THRU ALL OF THESE. I PLAY EVERYTHING ROCK,BLUES,HEAVY METAL,ROCKABILLY ETC.I RUN IT THRU A DIGITECH RP100 OR A KORG AX1G TONEWORKS. SOUNDS VERY GOOD VERY VERSITLE CAN GO FROM ELVIS TO BEATLES,TO STONES,TO BLACK SAABBATH TO NIRVANA.MIDDLE POSITION NECK PICKUP IS VERY FULL,MELLOW. RIGHT POITION-BRIDGE IS BRIGHT. FAR LEFT IS DULL NEVER USE IT.

I BOUGHT IT SECOND HAND SO I CANT REALLY COMMENT. IT IS NOT AS EASY TO PLAY AS A STRAT BUT YOU GET USED TO IT. HAD TO REPLACE THE NUT IN 1968 BUT NO REAL PROBLEMS THAT CANT BE ADJUSTED. INTONATION IS HARD BECAUSE OF 3 SADDLE BRIDGE.

THIS THING IS VERY SOLID. IT HAS A FEW NICKS AND SCRATCHES BUT IT HAS WITHSTOOD THE TEST OF TIME VERY WELL.IT IS ALL ORIGINAL PARTS EXCEPT THE NUT SO IT WILL LAST FOREVER. THE FRETBOARD IS A LITTLE WORN BUT STILL PLAYABLE. NEVER HAD A PROBLEM WITH STRAP BUTTONS. ALWAYS BEEN ABLE TO DEPEND ON IT. I GIGGED FROM 1965 TO 1971 AND NEVER USED A BACKUP(COULDN'T AFFORD TO )

NEVER DEALT WITH FENDER ALWAYS TOOK IT TO PEDRINI MUSIC IN ALHAMBRA FOR MINOR REPAIRS.

BEEN PLAYING FOR 43 YEARS. I OWN A KAY BASS,AND AN ELECTRIC AUTOHARP.
IF STOLEN OR LOST IT WOULD BE A TRAGEDY BECAUSE IT IS A VINTAGE GUITAR BUT I WOULD PROBABLY BUY ANOTHER TELE OR A STRAT.I LOVE THE TONE IT SOUNDS GOOD THRU ANY AMP,TUBE OR SOLID STATE BUT IT SOUNDS BEST THRU THE VOX BERKELEY(ALL TUBE)

2002 Mexican Fender Telecaster

Ohhhh, I LOVE this guitar! I love Teles in general because they have such a unique sound! I have been playing under a year but this guitar really has inspired me. The pickups are a little muddy, I recommend replacing them...I will soon have Bill Lawrence L-280s on it :)

This is REALLY where the guitar excels. It's the best-built guitar for this price that I've ever played! It's very sturdy; I even like to do this thing where I flip the tone switch back and forth real quick to get a wah-like sound and I've had no trouble with that. This is a great guitar if you just want to get it or play it as it is, but a lot of people love to buy it for it's cheap price then mod it to be a superior guitar.

Oh yeah. This baby wouldn't break if I threw it from the top of the space needle (ok well maybe in that case...)

This is one GREAT guitar. Buy it now!!!!!!

2002 Mexican Standard Tele
22 frets
1 volume knob, 1 tone, and p/u selecter

Standard stuff.

An extremely versatile guitar. I use a Marshall DX100 amp with footswitch and a DOD distortion pedal. I play indie rock, both pop-sounding and louder, and it does everything I need it to do. You can get bright, thinner tones or warm, soft tones. However, the extremes are sometimes muddy. The neck pickup can get really muddy with mids and lows turned up and the bridge can be very harsh.

The guitar was setup very well from the factory. I've had the guitar about 6 months, and I've just taken it in once to be set up. It's built like a rock and stays in tune well if the strings aren't old and stretched. There were no flaws in the finish, neck or frets. I bought this guitar because I was sick of my old guitar's tremolo not staying in tune. This guitar solved that problem. The pickups needed raising, but that's a preference for me because of the style I play.

Like I said before, this thing is built like a rock. I've dropped it several times, been to about 15 gigs with it, everything. It shows no visible wear. I'm not worried in the least about this guitar breaking, even if it's mistreated. If you gig a lot, this is an excellent guitar to have.

Haven't needed it.

If you own one guitar (and I did, until recently), this should be it. It can't be beaten as far as versatility. It may not be as powerful as an SG, but it can be powerful. I suggest changing the pickups for a more full sound, but even without it, this is a great guitar.

Got it new, a few months back. Made in Mexico, it's great value for money. I'm not sure what kind of wood it's made of, but it sounds great and after all that's what a guitar is all about. Mine is sunburst which I think gives a great vintage kind of look to it.

I didn't care much to have an original US or vintage model, coz I knew I was gonna mod it anyways. I replaced the bridge pickup by a Seymour Duncan Hotrails humbucker, and connected it to a push-pull knob that doubles as a tone control (replacing the original one as well). The push-pull switches the Hotrails into serial or parallel mode.

All in all, so after the mod, the guitar has everything I need, and then some.

I play jazz and metal. With the Hotrails switched to serial, the guitar really rocks but not in a metal kind of way coz it doesn't have a lot of bass. But if you want a lot of lows in your sound, buy a Gibson or whatever, not a Telecaster. I mostly play my own music, but if I have to typify it the way it is, I'd say it gives you anything from Van Halen to Mike Stern. My rig is Engl 530 tube pre-amp, TC G-Force FX unit, Roland FC200 stage board, Peavey Classic 50/50 tube power amp and 2 BagEnd 12" monitor cabinets.

Switching the Hotrails to parallel doesn't change the pickup sound all that much, but it does bring its gain down which then balances neatly with the stock neck pickup. The whole setup really turns out to be great.

No flaws. The guitar's so basic that it's hard to make flaws on ie anyway. I didn't need to chop any wood for the mod so the guitar is still fine -- I'm definitely no carpenter. The guitar reads like a comic book, fine tuning it to your way of playing is a walk in the park.
I can play anything I want on it, so the action is fine as far's I'm concerned.

I don't have it long enough to say whether or not it will withstand live abuse. But considering that the model itself is 60 years old, and I'm not a very rough player, I guess it'll be fine. It feels sturdy enough.

Never dealt with them. The guys at Feedback were really helpful though (thanks Wick!)

I play for more than 30 years now. Apart from this, I have Blade R4 (SSS), PRS Standard, Gibson LP Studio, Ibanez RG7620 and Ibanez JS1000. Other gear includes H&K pre-amp, Marshall pre-amp, MesaBoogie DC50, another Peavey tube poweramp and so on.
With the mod, this guitar is a fave of mine in the jazz and cover department. I'd have it replaced in a heartbeat if it were stolen -- albeit with the mods I made.

I recently purchased a Mexican-made Fender Telcaster that I think is a re-issue of a '54. It has a Maple neck, and a dark burgundy color. Although it's in almost perfect condition, the gig bag is pretty beat up.

I play the tele through two amps, depending on the occasion: A Fender Pro 185 amp for performances, and an Epiphone Studio 10 for practice. I like the sound the Epi amp gives it: the classic tele tone that's perfect for that plucky, Fender twang. It sounds great when I play "Green Grass & High Tides" by the Outlaws. absolutely perfect for the intro. The Fender amp (being a solid state inferior Fender machine) doesn't have the same sound quality, but it sure kicks out the volume. I want to amp it through a Marshall to see how it sounds. Great tone, much better than my old '72 telecaster which I played for years, and sold a while back.

It has a standard setup as far as bridge, pickups, etc. The guy I purchased it from must've had it set up for slide, because he had the action so high. I lowered the action, and it plays smooth.

Stays in tune; reliable, lightweight, a great guitar.

Been playing for 30 years (Geez, am I THAT old?); bought my first guitar -a Kalamazoo copy of a Fender Mustang- from Banner Thomas, the former Bass player with Molly Hatchet. I've owned a Gibson Les Paul (heavy as a log), '72 Fender Telecaster (sold it a few years back not as nice as this one), and a Fender stratocaster. I like the Telecaster best right now, I DON"T CARE IF IT WAS MADE IN MEXICO, IT SOUNDS BETTER THAN MOST GUITARS I'VE PLAYED IN THE LAST 10 YEARS.
I would prefer a vintage Fender Esquire or "No-caster", but they are way beyond my price range, just like vintage Martin acoustics. This guitar will serve me well. It's the only guitar that I've ever been able to copy Stephen Stills on "Wooden Ships" -no other guitars have the same "plucky" tone as this telecaster. I love it.