Telecastes and your worship band...

First post here in quite a while for me.
For the sake of good discussion, do you prefer the clean Tele sound or a distortion/dirty sound with your Tele?
What tone do you end up playing the most?
steve

Every Sunday I play my Tele thru my Tweed Deluxe amp that my son Clay made me.....It gravitates between clean and distorted


Bill Hullett

First post here in quite a while for me.
For the sake of good discussion, do you prefer the clean Tele sound or a distortion/dirty sound with your Tele?
What tone do you end up playing the most?
steve

Hidy ho Steve!
Blessings on you my friend! I just got done with my homework (1:40am here :wink: ) and decided to wind down by looking at the new posts here on da TDPRI, and lo and behold, by brother Steve has been here!

At church, about 70% of the time I'm playing with a "just breaking up" kind of clean tone. This is because mostly I'm leading the band, and singing. The rest of the time I probably am playing a distorted sound...
Now next week, I'm playing a big conference at another church for four days. There, I won't be leading, or worried about tech stuff, or what the team is doing...I'll just be playing guitar ... :mrgreen: And it will be very very nice! I will play mostly lead lines and solo filler stuff... and most of that will be a dirty sweet singing sustaining kind of sound.... how bout you Steve, and the rest of you guys??

Peace!

~Shawn

My most-used sound with my Genie is a "Tweed" patch on my RP200a. It's mostly clean with just a touch of slightly dirty warmth. I also use the piezo side of the guitar quite a bit through a Zoom 504 acoustic pedal. For rare lead solos, I use any of a variety of more distorted, sustaining sounds on the RP200a. I also lead most songs.

do you prefer the clean Tele sound or a distortion/dirty sound with your Tele?

Yes. :wink:

My Teles (CIJ 50s/USA 52RI) get used every week at church, from chimey clean w/tremolo, light overdrive that responds to picking dynamics, to saturated OD (not distortion tho, really). I like it all. I only use one OD pedal, that's Carl Martin's AC-Tone, based on an AC30. Two gain settings (identically voiced) plus a built-in and independant clean boost - very good sounding and "feeling" pedal, and likes the tele a good deal. I don't even miss the AC15CCX that I sold a few months back!

The Tele/AC-Tone gets used with delay (DD-20) and occasionally a wah (Vox 847, true bypass, in a Hiwatt wah casing) into my new Juke 1210. Playing alot of Hillsong material, so my pedalboard setup is geared towards that...

Trevor

My Tele isn't completed yet, so I've been playing my Daisy Rock and my Les Paul in church still. I tend to favor a harder crunchy distortion, without it turning into fuzz. The clean on the Les Paul is absolutely beautiful, the Daisy Rock, not so much.

Lately we've had a few more musicians join, so I've mostly been playing acoustic rhythm, our lead guitarist plays a Godin SDXT (pretty sure that's the model) and he favors a distorted sound.

Zion '50 with Parsons-White---G&L ASAT Classic w/Glaser b/g---G&L ASAT Classic with Parsons-White. Usually clean with a little touch sensitive edge via Boss CS-2 or Retro-Sonic
comp into Keeley Time Machine Boost, Tone Factor Copperhead and, starting this Sunday, a Tim tryout. Always at least one analog delay DM-2/Retro-Sonic/Memory Lane coming. Sometimes a digital dealy for the timed/syncopated parts. Never a real "distortion" pedal or tone. The question is usually what would James Burton/Jerry Donahue play if they played Matt Redman, Tim Hughes, Delirious, Hillsongs/United, etc. songs.

I also mostly play teles in our praise band. In rare occasions i'll use my 335 or my strat, but its mostly the 62ri or the 52ri thru a DRRI. Clean or distorted it all depends on the song. We try to cover a lot of different CCM artist.

Zion '50 with Parsons-White---G&L ASAT Classic w/Glaser b/g---G&L ASAT Classic with Parsons-White. Usually clean with a little touch sensitive edge via Boss CS-2 or Retro-Sonic
comp into Keeley Time Machine Boost, Tone Factor Copperhead and, starting this Sunday, a Tim tryout. Always at least one analog delay DM-2/Retro-Sonic/Memory Lane coming. Sometimes a digital dealy for the timed/syncopated parts. Never a real "distortion" pedal or tone. The question is usually what would James Burton/Jerry Donahue play if they played Matt Redman, Tim Hughes, Delirious, Hillsongs/United, etc. songs.

Nice post...
I played my b bender for the 1st time in awhile.
Just added enough bends to make it remind me of the Flying Burrito Bros!
I'm playing mostly a clean tone ( fender bassman) model thru a Vox Tonelab SE.
That is when I not playing my T 5.

Hidy ho Steve!
Blessings on you my friend! I just got done with my homework (1:40am here :wink: ) and decided to wind down by looking at the new posts here on da TDPRI, and lo and behold, by brother Steve has been here!

At church, about 70% of the time I'm playing with a "just breaking up" kind of clean tone. This is because mostly I'm leading the band, and singing. The rest of the time I probably am playing a distorted sound...
Now next week, I'm playing a big conference at another church for four days. There, I won't be leading, or worried about tech stuff, or what the team is doing...I'll just be playing guitar ... :mrgreen: And it will be very very nice! I will play mostly lead lines and solo filler stuff... and most of that will be a dirty sweet singing sustaining kind of sound.... how bout you Steve, and the rest of you guys??

Peace!

~Shawn

Shawn;
good to hear from you, brother!
Hope all is going well with you!
Blessings!
Steve

My 52 RI Tele is my main church guitar. Mostly because it stays in tune nicely. I always use an overdriven sound.
Although I change pickups for different amounts of breakup. My middle position toggle cleans up nicely for chords. And my Bridge P/U really raises the overdrive level alot.
And the harder I pick, the more overdrive I get. I love my Creamtone Overdrive.:grin:

I am leading worship on Friday nights for Celebrate Recovery with a Fender CS Nocaster through a Lovepedal COT50 Lil China, Eternity into a Silverface Princeton Reverb - the tone is beautiful, full and clean with the guitar volume backed down to about half, Keef Krunch at about 3/4 and cut-through-lead full on.

(Sorry, on Sunday mornings I am playing a Strat)

Peace,
James

I use an American Deluxe Tele into an HRDx. I have a Jekyll & Hyde on my pedal board that is usually set for that "right on the edge of breakup" tone.

We play such a variety though that I have to go from Crowder to Brewster to Camp. For Sundays with either an acoustic feel or a heavier rock feel I take my Parker hardtail Classic which works a little better than the Tele. If I could only have one guitar though that Tele is pretty hard to beat.

My Teles (OK, they're Vinetto Artifacts) usually have a touch of dirt to them - just on the edge of break-up. This way if I lighten up I'm nice and clean, but I can dig in and get some grunt. When I need more (it's whatever the song calls for) I'll kick in a Timmy, Keeley modded BD-2 or Barber Direct Drive for whatever flavor and level of dirt I'm looking for. Back end of the board has a DLS EchoTap delay and a Boss GE-7 used as a clean boost. At church this runs into a POD XT Live which usually lives on a Vox AC15 setting. I forgoe most of the POD's effects in favor of the board just so that when I'm using an amp I don't have to rethink too much (I use the POD's trem because most of my amps have 'em).

Hey Guys,
I plug my "Belly Boy Tele" into one of my Reverb Units then into my "Slowburn" amp 2x10. The Slowburn puts out 15 watts, she's got 2 Weber 10A150's. Even though we have a fairly good sized sanctuary I cant turn it up past 2. If I need any "Overdrive" I use my Mesa Boogie V Twin pedal, I rarely use it however.
We rotate worship leaders so my role changes from one Sunday to the next. When I lead I keep it as sweet and clean as possible because I am mostly just chording, I rarely move from the neck pickup. When others lead I play some lead and slide in the back ground with the occasional solo. We have a fabulous piano player that I love working with, we have been working on little things like she'll start a phrase and I'll finish it,,, but back to the question,,, mostly clean.
Psalm 150

More and more I am learning to clean up my overall sound and rely on my Fulldrive II for the "grit" (overdrive) and the "boost" settings it has. Our stage amp is a Vox Valvetronix AD50 (or something like that), so I like the "AC15" setting for my Tele, with a bit of gain. When I'm on the Strat (and rarely my LP) I prefer the "AC30" setting.

Since we are simulating the original recordings as much as possible, I am weaning myself from my "edge of crunch" settings I've used in the past in order to be clean when called for. This is scary for me! It makes me realize how sloppy I really am, but it is really stretching my abilities and (I hope) improving my playing.

the full gamut depends on the feel I'm looking for

We run a silent stage so I don't have the benefit of an amp, just my Dyna Comp, Blues Driver and Boss Chorus. I am mostly clean with with an occational touch of OD. The dirty stuff is for the younger cats to play:wink:

First post here in quite a while for me.
For the sake of good discussion, do you prefer the clean Tele sound or a distortion/dirty sound with your Tele?
What tone do you end up playing the most?
steve

Yes...actually about 50/50. But then I usually play acoustic. If I play electric, it is for a specific song and about half the time then for a specific OD/distortion sound. However, haveing said that, most of the electric sounds we play as a band (there are usually 2 guitarists, one electric and me on acoustic) are either clean or just on the verge of breakup.

We run a silent stage so I don't have the benefit of an amp, just my Dyna Comp, Blues Driver and Boss Chorus.

Do you go direct from the chorus to a DI? No modeler? Is the sound ok?

Do you go direct from the chorus to a DI? No modeler? Is the sound ok?

I did that for a while before our church upgraded its sounds system (we had a single input for 3 guitars - 2 acoustic, 1 electric - so everything was premixed in small 4 channel mixer on the platform, and everything was direct). With no pedals it sounded like a real nice clean electric, and with proper pedal selection and settings the OD sounds were fine.

My title is how I would describe my sound style. Large church, 5 services over the weekend. What I mean is my Tele is capable of so many sounds, and I explore them all: clean, blues, rock, heavy rock, and country. I have blues/heavy rock flowing through my musical veins, so that is what I play when I can. I keep telling the worship leaders to tell me to knock it off if I play too loud or "rocky" and they say "Uh, too loud, too rocky? How!?" I'm right at home!
Also, our services "tend" to have different average ages and I cater to the musical syles those folks might favor. I play a lot more clean in the presence of our older folks at the 8am. I pick it up more crunchy at the 9:30am and at 11:30, hang onto your hats, cause you gonna hear a Tele scream. Same Saturday night.
I love a clean Tele sound, but if I could choose one, it would be a slightly overdriven sound through my '70's Music Man 112 Sixty-Five. Pure cream.

Tele>Boss SD-1 Franklin Pro Mod>Boss DS-1 Franklin Pro Mod>Fulltone OCD (thanks Shannon!)>Fulltone Fat Boost (best pedal I have--a must!)>Music Man 112 Sixty-Five.

My buddy and I played a youth rally last weekend and he played his Thinline Tele and PRS CE24 into a Frenzel Twin/Plexi and I played my cough..cough.....Les Paul and Strat into my 18watt TMB.... That said our next gig will be at Snow Camp in Jan and I will hopfully have my Esquire build finished up and screaming(Seymour Duncan CS BG1400).

Like others, I play clean or some degree of OD, depending on the song.

I play my 2004 MIM STD. Telecaster or my G&L Tribute Stratoclone

Effects are currently a Boss AC3 Acoustic Simulator, 80s Ibanez Tube Screamer, and a Washburn Chorus

Back in California, I played direct to the board, most of the time.

Here in Tahlequah, OK, I play through my mic'd Fender Frontman 25R or direct into my Kustom Profile PA setup, most of the time.

I mostly play the Tele on the neck pup through the AC3 with a light touch of chorus because I tend to do more traditional hymns and want a more "acoustic like" sound.

When I want to rock, like on a Third Day tune, I play the Tribute in "quack position one" through the Tube Screamer

Our line up always has one acoustic playing the foundation rhythm and an electric playing whatever they want.

When I fill the electric slot I play almost exclusively clean because the two other electric players always play distorted.

When I fill the rhythm slot I play my tele instead of acoustic and so I play that clean also.

My Tele gets a clean Stevie Cropper setup almost exclusively.

It's my "go to" guitar for Southern Quartet style music. It groks the "Old School" sounds like nothing else.


Strats get the bulk of my time because I spent so much time with them over the years that I can do almost anything with one in my sleep. Simply a matter of habit...I can volume swell or bang harmonics all over a Strat without a glance.

Go figure... :roll: