Full Circle: Ode to the Classic Tele Formula

[Travis in BMore]

First off- thanks to this forum and its members for educating me and ultimately helping me build the guitar I always wanted (but never knew how to get).

Let me start with a confession- I have never owned a traditional style Tele.
It's true. While I have certainly played a few, I never had one of my very own. What I mean by 'traditional' is a tele with all single coils, ashtray bridge, and all the little details that make a Tele sound and play like an old school Tele should. All of my "teles" (or wannabe's) have had a myriad of pickup, bridge, and tonewood configurations. So it was that last week I finally finished my partscaster which had, by all accounts, a somewhat traditional Tele build formula including:

-swamp ash body
-CRS ashtray bridge
-all maple neck
-51' nocaster pups

..and so on.

I don't know what I was expecting, but I did NOT get a one trick pony. I can do anything with this guitar. I have the 4way switch mod installed, and that extra setting with the tone backed way off passes easily for a great jazzer ala gibson'esque 'bucker. It has all the twang you could ever want, and the best part is how it fills in the gaps between these extremes. It isn't a "flavor 1, flavor 2, et al....." NO, it's an "anything in between and beyond" sort of guitar. I can only say it must be testament to the original formula for Tele tone. I learned a LOT from this project, but the biggest lesson was to stop trying to re-invent the wheel. It works fine as it is, and I have never owned or played a more balanced, versatile guitar in my life.


I'll be putting some pics up Very soon!

Thanks again TDPRI!!!

[Ricky D.]

Nice to hear that your partscaster turned out well. I wish I had known how cool Telecasters are 40 years ago.

[Steve G]

Cool!
Limiting it just to teles - Ive played thinlines, I own a P90 tele and Ive tried every pickup going.
The sounds I like best remain the three traditional tele pickup positions. Everything I need is there, and the other sounds outside of that are great but.. theyre just not those three tones!