Strats and Teles with humbuckers ??

siraxeman

I've got Strats in HSS, HHH (3 Duncans...JB jnr/Duckbucke/lil 59) and of coarse SSS...I have a Tele in stock SS with 4 way. This got me thinking...of my own double standards. When is a Strat a Strat and a Tele a Tele?? Well...I'm seemingly ok with Strats in all configs...but Teles when I see say a HH tele..to me that is no longer a Tele...i mean by that hearing it you would never say "oh yeah thats a Telecaster"  you'd never know it as such...apart from it having a Tele shaped body. I can accept SH Teles...SS but HH no! But I'm more forgiving of Strats..God only knows why. ) Biased I guess.

So when is a Strat or a Tele not a Strat or a Tele...are all configs accepted in these parts?? Or are some sacrilege??

frankus

anything with humbuckers in is what I'd call ... ghey ... that is all.

Panama_Jack666

Humbucker in a tele is wrong. In a strat, it's acceptable.

This has given me a thread idea...

ThePrettyDamned

Humbuckers, like single coils, work in any guitar.  

A cursory google finds this.  This is still a Tele, just not a vintage one.  I mean, it won't sound like an old fashioned tele.  But it still looks like one, for your average joe.  They'll look at it and be like, hey, that's one of those old guitars that the stones used in a different colour'.  

They won't say, 'Hey, that's not a Tele, that's an abomination, it needs to be a Gibson to have humbuckers and P90! And the bridge isn't an original! How dare they?!'. 

http://i110.photobucket.com/albums/n102/Ronkirn/old/DSC_0001-2.jpg

frankus

I don't think a tele without a plate bridge should be made to suffer any more.

Col_Decker

If it says 'telecaster' on the headstock and the body is telecaster shaped then it's a tele regardless of what you do to it. IMO

axisus

Tele shape and its a tele to me. Might be a right freak bastard but its still a tele.

xSkarloey

Panama_Jack666;145518" said:

Humbucker in a tele is wrong. In a strat, it's acceptable.



This has given me a thread idea...

Don't let Jeff Beck or Seymour Duncan hear you say that. It's Duncan's modified twin HB on Cause We've Ended as Lovers. It's a fat Tele tone but still has the Tele snarl and bite. 

Keef as well is partial to HB loaded Teles, and let's not forget what happened to the last bloke who told him he'd got it wrong...

Pyroman

  I'm with Col Decker and Axisus on this one.

  I'm glad Fender doesn't march in lockstep with the vintage purists, and produces a wide variety of Strats and Teles for all tastes.  I do wish Gibson would do the same, and finally fix that goddamn weak headstock/neck joint.

  I say bring on the Cabronitas, the thinlines, the hollowbodies with Bigsbys and 'buckers!  Bring on the Deluxes, with HH, the P90's, and those with one of each!!  Gimme the fancy maple tops, and burst finishes!

  If I want an old school Tele made to vintage spec, they make those too!  Win-win, I say.

  Hopefully, if all the old school luddites and collectors hate them, the prices on the second hand market will be reasonable.

stickyfiddle

I like a "proper" Tele, but Cabronitas, Deluxes, Customs and whatnot are all great too. I actually fancy going full "Super" with an HH Tele with full Strat contours and edge roundovers. Maybe even a trem and sustainer...?

Dave_Mc

If it looks like one it still is, basically.

Then you have the "super" variants which have a bit more variety to the cosmetics and maybe slightly more extreme mods.

Obviously IMO, and there's an awful lot of overlap.

usedtobe

I can cope with buckers in a Tele - sometimes, but never in a Strat..

impmann

Well, I have a Tele with two humbuckers that was built for a purpose (basically I needed a guitar that if I needed to smack the bass player with half way through a gig, the bass player would break not the guitar... long story). Its great - but doesn't sound anything like a Tele.

Having lived through the 80s, I remember the terrible things done to Strats... Floyds, JBs, scalloping... jesus, it was bad. But now I'm warming to the idea of a 'rock Strat' with a bridge humbucker but no Floyd...

siraxeman

usedtobe said:

I can cope with buckers in a Tele - sometimes, but never in a Strat..

I'm the opposite...to me a Tele = TWANG. I mean even more so than a Strat...and when you stick a bucker in the bridge position that twang is gone. Its no more a Telecaster than another hardtail buckered geetar. 

monoamine

1980 Tokai TE-85 1pc nitro finished sen ash beauty
aka, the "Tele-PAF-caster"
refretted, low action, absolute monster... and it's still a tele in my book

impmann

Oof! Have a wow from me.

ICBM

I would normally have said that a Tele must have either the Tele bridge or the proper Fender Bigsby kit to be a genuine Tele, but that one of monoamine's is possibly the exception that proves the rule…

A Strat really needs three pickups. A two-humbucker Strat isn't really a Strat, to me. I'm not completely convinced that a HSH one is either, unless at least the neck humbucker is a single-coil size.

Lukeage

I stand on this, as I stand on the thought of putting an SC in a Les Paul: it's just not right.

Every time I see a Philips Cleartone Conversion Les Paul with Tele SC in the neck position, I want to kill a puppy.

Likewise every time I see a huge 'bucker with a whacking great silver cover in either position of a Strat or Tele.

frankus

If I got an old Mini Cooper and put caterpillar tracks and a jet engine in it... people might say "look at that mini" because that's all that was recogniseable to them. For the majority of people of a certain age a mini might mean a memory of copping a feel or freezing sleeping in the car or a means of dashing about ... they'd not see a modern mini as a mini, because it isn't as rough and ready - as fun and as simple... that's what Tele means to me, rough and ready, low-tech but incredibly versatile.

To the same end - my mate takes exceptions to new mini owners claiming to own a BMW ... it's a problem of Brand names becoming regular nouns.

Strats and Teles can have humbuckers in them, but I think that makes them rather un-Fendery... for some reason

Dave_Mc

ICBM said:

A Strat really needs three pickups. A two-humbucker Strat isn't really a Strat, to me. I'm not completely convinced that a HSH one is either, unless at least the neck humbucker is a single-coil size.

Then you're getting into the whole "what's a superstrat?" thing, which rarely ends well. We had a massive thread on the Ultimate Guitar forum a while back and it turned into a fustercluck and flamefest pretty quickly. ) There are definitely things which suggest it's the "Super" version, but I think the handiest is "I know it when I see it". I mean a USA standard Fender HSS strat has arguably all the things needed for it to be a superstrat yet to me I'd still say it's a (highly modified) strat. Or especially the new HSH USA deluxe strat or the ones with Floyds, I'd still say they're (again, highly modified) strats rather than superstrats. But an HSS Charvel or Jackson or something like that I'd say is a Superstrat. Why? I dunno. )

It's kinda the paradox of the heap, I think...

Lukeage said:

I stand on this, as I stand on the thought of putting an SC in a Les Paul: it's just not right.

Didn't the original Les Paul have P90s i.e. single coils?

richardhomer

I'm more tolerant of HBs on Teles (Beck's 'Tele Gib', CBS Telecaster Custom/Deluxe, etc) than Strats.

I have no idea why; clearly an entirely unjustifiable and irrational prejudice!