Tele questions.. Sorry if abit noobish..

[BloodRose]

Im gonna ask a very noob Tele question and then for advice. I'll disclaimer myself and say that Ive never been much of a tele guy. BUT, I do recognize the distinctive tones of the tele. Now the questions..
With a tele, which is the key pup for tone? Im guessing the bridge because of the way its mounted in the metal. Or, is it the neck pup? Again, Im guessing the bridge as I had a tele and could cop good tele tones with it on the bridge setting. Now, how important is the typical lipstick type neck pup?
The reason Im asking is that my tele had a mini bucker in the neck position. Now, it sounded awesome, but Im sure I wasnt getting "typical" tele tones out of it.

The tele wasnt a main player and due to some financial restraints has been sold. However, the one I had played quite well and sounded amazing, so Im wondering if I should get another like it, or get one with the more typical tele pickup config? And lastly, what is a good playing and great sounding, inexpensive tele? (My prev was a Squier Vintage Modified one with the mini humbucker in the neck position and the single coil pup in the middle)

Thank you

 

[FuseG4]

Re: Tele questions.. Sorry if abit noobish..

With a tele, which is the key pup for tone?

BOTH are equally important for me. The main switch positions I used was neck/bridge parallel (standard middle position) and the bridge alone. But a good tele neck pickup is a unique sound and it sounds great played clean into a good fender style amp. It's not a strat pickup but it has it's own great flavor. But of course the middle position needs a good neck pickup. Look for sets with a nickel silver cover if you want useable clarity from a standard neck pickup and nice springiness with both pickups on.
YMMV but I didn't gel with the SD tele rhythm pickup and STL-1 vintage 54. Not enough clarity for the neck pickup, bridge pickup was good but a little thin. I fell in love with Fender's Nocaster set though. Sweet and bright neck pickup, and a VERY vintage fender-y bridge pickup with that unique alnico III texture. All three switch positions are sex. Also for something hotter the fender hot alnico III pickups from the highway 1 telecasters was great. The neck pickup was smooth and jazzy but not dark or muddy. The bridge pickup was ballsy like a keith richards kind of tele tone.

also, what's a good cheap tele? Well, yesterday I picked up a Squier Affinity butterscotch w/ 1 pc maple neck tele at GC and gave it a whirl. It sounded great though the neck felt really cheap and half-assed. But yeah, it was bright but very lively even with crappy pickups. It was a top loader and I think that helped it twang in a convincing way. So, it probably doesn't help but I wanna say a good tele is where you find one, and if I had $180 I could spare I would grab that Affinity. I used to own a Squier Standard tele, the blonde/rosewood model. The agathis body had ugly grain that showed through the paint, and it had some setup issues, but that was the first guitar I bought with my own money and once it got the Nocaster pickups it was good. It was on the warmer side of teles.
SX teles from Rondo music are supposed to be killers in the sub $300 range. I'd love to play one. Didn't I6 have one?

 

[AlexR]

Re: Tele questions.. Sorry if abit noobish..

The absolute vintage teles had a cap attached to the neck pickup, making it VERY bassy. So you had 3 tones......bridge being bitey, middle being full with parallel cluck, neck bassy or muddy.

More modern Teles have gone away from the totally vintage setup, giving you better options for all 3 positions. The MIM tele I got of late was a nice piece. The pickups on the MIM are seriously beefy....bridge is 10+ K of muscle, neck was a bit less but still full. It had proper switchcraft/cts electronics so no upgrade needed there.

 

[FuseG4]

Re: Tele questions.. Sorry if abit noobish..

This thread makes me really miss having a tele.

 

[Chris of Arabia]

Re: Tele questions.. Sorry if abit noobish..

*reminds self to put the Baja back together next time I'm in the UK...*

 

[Kramer Guy]

Re: Tele questions.. Sorry if abit noobish..

Those Squier Vintage Modified teles are nothing to sneeze at. I've tried them out at GC and they're really good for the price, but if you want to upgrade , I would go with a Squier Classic Vibe. They're much better than a Fender MIM Standard and exude that classic Telecaster sound at a fraction of the price a MIM Fender Standard would cost you.

 

[elelpe]

Re: Tele questions.. Sorry if abit noobish..

I'm not really sold on tele neck pickup. Not that there's anything wrong with that (I put my beautiful sounding tele neck pickup on my archtop project, mind you). I'm more a rock/blues oriented player so I need more push. P-90 or Firebird mini suit me better in that position while I prefer that angry tele sound from Broadcaster-ish/overwound tele bridge pickup. This set is very versatile from clean to dirty. So I'd say it's bridge pickup for me. Neck pickup? Depends on your application I guess.

 

[Funkfingers]

Re: Tele questions.. Sorry if abit noobish..

3 tones......bridge being bitey, middle being full with parallel cluck, neck bassy or muddy.

Incorrect.

The usual vintage selections were; bridge only, neck only, neck + capacitor "bass tone". The both pickups in parallel, in phase sound was achieved by wedging the selector switch between the first two positions. (The exact same technique as practiced on vintage Stratocasters with a three-way selector switch.)

Very early "blackguard" instruments have a different arrangement again. There is no tone control. Instead, the second pot acts as a Blend - very like the fifth control on some Rickenbacker guitars.

 

[Funkfingers]

Re: Tele questions.. Sorry if abit noobish..

*reminds self to put the Baja back together next time I'm in the UK...*

Remind yo'self to use a better body and pickups than the stock ones.

 

[beaubrummels]

Re: Tele questions.. Sorry if abit noobish..

Now the questions..
With a tele, which is the key pup for tone?

All of them.

The bridge, though it's single coil, has a beefier sound and can cop humbucker rock and roll competitively. Through Marshall type amps it fits in well with Les Paul rock songs. Diming the tone (or bypassing the tone altogether and going straight out) through clean Fender style amps can reveal some twang to do country picking as well. 6k-9k Tele bridge pickups are cleaner, brighter, twangier. 9k-10k+ sound more like a mini-humbucker. The metal plate, in my understanding, is just for shielding. I'm not sure it's impact on tone.

The neck gives me Hendrix/Strat tones, certainly good for blues in general as well. When darkened with the tone control, can yield a nice jazz tone. The neck pickup straight out with no tone has a great snap to it that is good for grungy Black Keys type stuff and vintage heavy blues; White Stripes, etc. Makes the guitar sound like a hollowbody a little bit. Also great for Rolling Stones type music. With an Esquire type tone switch set to dark, IME the neck can sound like an archtop acoustic when strummed near the neck.

The mid-position has twang to it that gives me country, rockabilly type sounds. Rolling the tone off to reduce twang gives an alternate blues sound.

Now, how important is the typical lipstick type neck pup?

It's not an actual lipstick pickup, though I can see how it looks like it from a distance. It's just a single-coil. The cover is a shield.

Teles are not nearly as noisy as Strats IME due to what I consider better design. Better shielding is employed throughout the Tele. Even the control plate is a shield.

... the one I had played quite well and sounded amazing, so Im wondering if I should get another like it, or get one with the more typical tele pickup config?

If that's the tone you know and want again, certainly. The stock single coil Tele configuration is very versatile, however. My Tele is my gigging guitar anytime I'm sitting in with a band I don't know very well, or having to play a set list where either I don't know what songs are coming next or there is so much variety I couldn't possibly bring all the guitars necessary.

And lastly, what is a good playing and great sounding, inexpensive tele?

Mine is a Highway 1 that's been rewired like a vintage Tele/Broadcaster using Duncan pickups. The only other I might consider is a Baja Telecaster and do the same rewiring. That's as low as I will go. It's kind of the mid-point. Less than $1000, but still using good blocks of ash and maple.

Thank you

You are welcome.

 

[BloodRose]

Re: Tele questions.. Sorry if abit noobish..

Those Squier Vintage Modified teles are nothing to sneeze at. I've tried them out at GC and they're really good for the price, but if you want to upgrade , I would go with a Squier Classic Vibe. They're much better than a Fender MIM Standard and exude that classic Telecaster sound at a fraction of the price a MIM Fender Standard would cost you.

Yeah, when I bought my tele, I compared A BUNCH. Of all that I played, I liked the Squier Vintage modified and the Fender Baja the best. The Squier was half the price of nearly all that I played and I ended up liking it the best. I put a SD Jerry Donahue pup in the bridge, and a GFS Firebird mini humbucker in the neck.(left the mid Duncan Designed pup in it) That thing could cover a ton of ground, and truth be told, that lead tone I got with the neck position on that guitar was one of my favs.. I think the Squier Vintage mod series are amazing for the $$. Sounds like the Classic Vibes are good too.

Will be awhile before I get another guitar.. Im still in sell mode now. (Ive cut my harum in half over the last few months...) But, I do like having a tele in the arsenal..

Are the necks on the Classic Vibes similar to the VM series?

 

[ItsaBass]

Re: Tele questions.. Sorry if abit noobish..

What does "key pickup for tone" mean?

If it means the pickup that defines a Tele as a Tele, separating it from any other guitar, it's definitely the neck pickup. The bridge pickup is in no way exclusive to Teles, being used on Esquires too (first, in fact). A Tele on the bridge pickup could be an Esquire or a Tele. But a Tele on the neck pickup, or both pickups at once, could only be a Tele.

But if by "tone" you actually mean "good tone," then I say as a matter of opinion that it's the bridge pickup. I don't much care for Tele neck pickups, in general. That's why I pretty much quit being interested in Teles and stuck with Esquires instead. Compared to Teles, Esquires eliminate the pickup I don't use, while making the pickup I do use even more versatile.

 

[Oinkus]

Re: Tele questions.. Sorry if abit noobish..

I have to say Neck just because I like the way my Tele sounds using it. Think the bridge pickup sounds like other guitars more then a specific Tele sound , then again bright and crisp is pretty much what a Tele is about. Go figure , tough question.

 

[jimijames]

Re: Tele questions.. Sorry if abit noobish..

Tele bridge IMO is the most versatile pickup out there. Get an EP boost and a good od pedal and you can cover everything from country to hard rock to metal with just your volume knob


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[Jeffblue]

Re: Tele questions.. Sorry if abit noobish..


I love my Tele builds and as you can see.......I like to include P90s in mine. These combinations sound incredible.