Stratocaster vs. Telecaster

No, like have decently dressed frets and a finish with no holes and shit.

i hope $2k fender custom shop jobs comes with at least decently dressed frets!

this guy is local to mpls if i were to spend a lot i would love one of his, so gorgeous

http://www.whalehazard.com/

https://static1.squarespace.com/static/55be87ece4b0bf5a19eae5fa/56ad5ca520c647a79ac0ab07/56ad5cb8c2ea512e75550121/1454202303645/IMG_7417.jpg?format=750w

https://static1.squarespace.com/static/55be87ece4b0bf5a19eae5fa/56ad5ca520c647a79ac0ab07/56ad5cd1c2ea512e755501ae/1454202077813/IMG_7272.jpg?format=750w

$2000 Fenders are factory and don't always have decently dressed frets, and Gibson's even worse. Those Whalehazards are pretty cool and look like good value for money, daft name aside.

I never gave a shit about Stratocasters but somehow in the last year (maybe thanks in part to this thread) I've been sort of enamored of them - like I've literally never played one before but they're basically THE standard electric guitar so maybe I've been too contrarian about it.

I moved to a much bigger town in the last year, with several million people within an hour and have been looking at Craigslist a lot for used strats. There are constantly MIM ones between $300 and $400 so I was waiting for something odd or a great deal and the other day found a 1981 Tokai Silver Star 48 for $350 - it's a copy of a 1976 Stratocaster, with the giant headstock, bullet truss rod, and three-bolt neck and I think I'm going to buy it. I know it's not technically a strat but they seem like cool guitars that are pretty damn close, especially if I swap the pickups at some point.

Kind of stoked about this:
https://i.imgur.com/doHYeeP.jpg

wow that must be from the infamous "lawsuit era" of Japanese guitar making, that logo is particularly brazen

I bet that will be great, I passed on a Univox lawsuit P bass copy recently that I regret

sweet!

Joygoat, buy without hesitation, you will not be disappointed. My 1977 Greco “Super Sounds” is a midrange model from the other major factory and it is one of the best made and nicest sounding guitars I’ve ever played (and I own several nice Fenders etc).

These are also climbing in value as people realise how good they are. $350 is cheap for a Tokai.

Unexpectedly...

https://youtu.be/_vPK8LVdf5I

― Elvis Telecom, Saturday, November 5, 2016 (one year ago)

Yeah, Page gravitated toward the Strat towards the end there, which iirc is why Zeppelin had to break up.

― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, November 5, 2016 (one year ago)

I wouldn't go that far. He used a strat specifically for "In the Evening," specifically for the part of the riff you hear at 1:17. Trem required for that one.

btw I prefer a Les Paul with low-output pups and a tele after that, but I've been messing around with the strat again. there really are some things only a strat can do.

I got an American Standard Telecaster this year via a Facebook gear trade/sell group and frankly I can't imagine playing any other guitar now.

Might not need to swap the pickups. Some that era of Tokai,Greco and Ibanez actually had DiMarzio pickups. They were an early customer.

i had a 70s burnt orange strat that was super sweet, but the bandleader encouraged me to trade it in because it wasn't vintage enough for him / the band. it's sort of visible here in the upper left next to david johansen. in subsequent years i learned to make my own decisions.

http://spectatorarchive.library.columbia.edu/cgi-bin/columbia?a=d&d=cs19790322-01.2.13&e=-------en-20--1--txt-txIN------

https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7410/10162159956_8a819b170a_o.jpg

That's pretty.

TSF you look cool as hell in that pic btw

Yeah, if it sounds funky, I would maybe just upgrade the electronics and pots. There are these guys in Winchester KY called RS Guitarworks who are local to me that are wizards with guitar electronics and some of their kits really do make a difference. Don't have to use them, but sometimes playing with the capacitors and/or the pots can really change the sound as much as swapping pickups. If it is an older guitar, it is also an option to just get them re-wound so the pickups are original instead of putting in some new pickup.

haha, thx. (xpost) that was taken at cbgb, where i suppose i thought it was the greatest of ironies to wear my columbia shirt, though to be honest most of the people who hung out there were nyu students. i'm paying now for having had all that hair then. my alopecia leaves me without a stitch of it.

browsing through the spectator, i notice that suzanne vega was playing on campus the same night we were, 3/24/79. that was our last gig ever, and maybe one of her first?

http://spectatorarchive.library.columbia.edu/cgi-bin/columbia?a=d&d=cs19790323-01.2.12.2&srpos=2&e=-------en-20--1--txt-txIN-%22suzanne+vega%22+%22postcrypt%22------

wow yeah I had no idea she was even playing the 70s.....

There are constantly MIM ones between $300 and $400 so I was waiting for something odd

I know it's fashionable in some circles to hate on MIMs. I've had two MIM Strats and a MIM Tele. I know they're not rare or cool or odd or sexy. But they are dependable and durable; their quality is pretty consistent over the last 15 years or so. They provide a very accurate and surgical sound that you can color or not, as you choose.

Also I have no fear of gigging with or lending out one of those instruments. If one were stolen or broken I wouldn't weep. I have older, quirkier, and rarer instruments but I generally do not gig with them.

(Not meant as a dis of joygoat or anybody; by all means, you should pursue the guitar of your dreams if that's what you're into.)

Strats are the chicken of guitars -- bland but versatile and there are ways of making it delicious.

In my experience 70s Japanese Fender copies typically crush MIM Fenders in terms of feel, playability and craftsmanship. I've owned about half a dozen dating from 1973-1978. All fantastic.

I’ve got no issue with MIM fenders - I’ve got a Mexican Tele which is probably my “best” guitar as the others are an Indonesian jazzmaster and Chinese epiphones dot. They’re just such a commodity - there are 20 actual fender strats between $250 and $400 on Craigslist within an hour of me right now and I was in no rush so kept waiting for some insane deal or something unusual.

I did buy the Tokai and it’s pretty nice - all original, mid line model so not the DiMarzios but the Tokai “greybacks”, was refretted recently and looks better than a lot of new guitars I’ve seen plus I imagine these are bigger than the originals would have been. Neck is super thin and has a 7.25 radius so it feels crazy small to me. Plus it makes all these sounds that I totally recognize from all over but never made myself before. My dream was a white one with a rosewood fingerboard and a 70s headstock which I wasn’t ever going to find for less than $500 so this thing is awesome. And it’s $115 cheaper than the cheapest Silver Star on Reverb right now, not counting $110 to ship it from Japan.

I've mentioned before that my session playing pals noted in Nashville a real uptick of MIM Teles as most favored guitar.

Plus it makes all these sounds that I totally recognize from all over but never made myself before.

As long as we are also including S-500 vs ASAT I am comfortable participating in this discussion.

Telecaster >>> Stratocaster because the strat volume knob is in exactly the right spot for me to hit it constantly and unintentionally while playing.

hah, my peeve is accidentally knocking the pickup selector out of position.

some people like the Stratocaster volume knob placement because it's close enough to manipulate for e.g. pinky volume swells.

I think I'd like a Telecaster with more Strat-style body carves for greater comfort, but at the same time I really like my Thinline Telecaster.

If I could afford a custom Stratocaster it would have one pickup (neck) and one knob, but I know I am out of step with the rest of the universe on this. Most one-pickup guitars have bridge only. Even on the Telecaster I only ever use the neck pickup.

tl;dr: love them both, annoyed by some features of both, can't choose and am glad I don't have to

I get the volume swell thing and know some people flip the Tele controls to get something similar but man it just messes me up

YMP why not git yo self a 70s Musicmaster - not too pricey, neck-only heaven. The late 70s ones have super meaty necks and of course they’re 24” scale.

Yeah I love where everything is laid out on a Strat

i just took off the knobs on my strat, can still adjust with the pegs

Matthewk, on my list! Hohner Jazzica too.

um, Hofner

I think I'd like a Telecaster with more Strat-style body carves for greater comfort

fender are doing those offset teles again atm:

https://shop.fender.com/en-GB/squier-electric-guitars/other/paranormal-offset-telecaster/0377005521.html

i had one of those squier duo-sonic reissues for a hot minute a while back. was a seriously great guitar and i loved playing it.

don't have it anymore. still have my tele tho.

and you know why that is?

because teles rule. (source: this poll)

They do. I had a perfectly dece MIM Tele some years ago, and sold it for some inexplicable reason.

My only current Tele is a Squier (classic vibe Thinline) and it is loads of fun! Light, fast, a little goofy. Very flat radius.

I used to prefer my Tele (MIM, upgraded pups etc) but now kind of prefer my MIM Strat, which is also upgraded with great pickups but is lighter, too, and super comfortable. And in the end, even more versatile. Tremelo bar, more pickup positions, etc

I grew up a Strat kid, they are still amazing and I wouldn't ever not own one.

But I got an American Tele a couple of years ago for an absolute steal and I generally prefer it over the Strat. I still like the comfort and look of the Strat, but I've been playing my Tele a lot more since I got it.

As a music fan. I actually *like* that the Telecaster's lack of versatility seems to have pushed to carve a role electric guitar in an ensemble, arrangement or mix that's specific to the instrument they're playing. It's not a saxophone, it's not an autoharp, it's the punctuation mark at the end of a sentence. I mean, sure, the twang- but the Trve Tele players know how to get a good "zap!" out of it as well. More of that, please, and if you wanna wail get yourself a damn sax #uncoolconservativebeliefs

* for the electric guitar
Heh

Every time I read an online discussion of necks and somebody talks about things getting in the way of their "bends", my eyes roll so hard they fret out on the narrow radius.
This is why I like the Telecaster: it's a block of wood with a robust bridge and a precisely fretted neck, two pickups at good locations on the strings, and nothing else. Suitable for chords, riffs, and pickin if you're so inclined.

Also tbf these days there are a reasonable variety of necks to choose from on a Tele so I don't know quite why people get hung up on that.

honestly the way people run their guitars through elaborate pedalboards now it's probably best to just buy on the basis of what's most comfortable

like you can really discern the difference between guitars after putting it through 10 boutique pedals and the amp

or ppl who insist they can tell the difference between this electric guitar "tonewoods" lol

lol I watched Joe Satriani's rig rundown video once, and if I recall correctly he had a pedal that could simulate different lengths of cord, as if anybody could possibly know the difference. Though I suppose if anybody could it would probably be somebody like him.

ok that's amazing

ums is otm about sound - you can do quite a lot to the sound with your feet, so people are sometimes overly precious about completely marginal aspects of their TOANZ.

To get a little philosophical on y'all, I sometimes get weary of having lots of tonal options. I pretty much know by now what I sound like.

We've all been marketed to death about equipment that heralds versatility as its selling point. Personally, of the approximately 372 sounds that could potentially emanate from my amplifier, I use like... five of them. Clean, dirty, weird, clean+weird, dirty+weird.

I sometimes wish more manufacturers would herald stuff that does one thing well. The Tele comes very close.

(Having said that, I love my Strat as well - it's a very elegant and beautiful object, feels very sensual and comfortrable, and it is as focused and precise as a laser beam. But I do sometimes have a sad about the five-position switch of which I only use one position, and about the tremelo that I rarely use. For a while I had it blocked, but then felt bad that I wasn't using a feature that is a main feature of the instrument, so I took the block out - and still rarely use it. It is a quandary.)

Make and model of guitar can definitely make a difference depending on the music you're making, though; you would likely not use, say, an SG for country licks. For that matter, I have an SG, and its output is so loud I barely pick it up, though at the same time Bill Frisell used an SG for his stuff for a while, so clearly in the right hands it is capable of a lot more sensitivity. Or think of the Rickenbacker. The Rick is immediately associated with jangle, a la Byrds, REM, Tom Petty, etc. But it was also often the guitar of choice for John Fogerty in CCR, for Guy in Fugazi, for Paul Weller in the Jam, and so on. And some of the best tones are all done in-amp anyway. Like Neil Young's overdriven tone, that's mostly just him cranking his amp to various degrees. Same with someone like Jimmy Page, who didn't even have many pedals at his disposal save a fuzz, wah and Echoplex, which is I assume all Hendrix really had, too.

Hendrix famously used the Octavia fuzz/octave pedal