I really miss the sound of the bridge pickup in a Japanese '72 Deluxe Tele I owned a few years back. The guitar wasn't anything special, but the bridge pickup was this Broadcaster-style single coil (supposedly) wound by the chap who wound Brian May's pickups, and it was so fat and punchy sounding. It was awesome for aggressive drop tuned riffage. Can anyone give any thoughts on Telecaster-style guitars with hot single coil pickups in them?
I have a few that I'm looking at. Has anyone experience with them or opinions? They're all around the £500-1000 price range, give or take. The last two are custom guitars from the States and will be a huge expense to import. I don't want vintage specs. Ideally I'd like belly/forearm contours, but they're not essential. Thin necks, flatter fretboard radii (9.5" or above). I don't mind a humbucker in the neck or a P90 as long as it has a bridge Broadcaster. The body shape doesn't even have to be a Tele.
Chapman ML3 Pro Traditional
Gordon Smith Classic T
Fender American Special Tele
Fender Player Series Tele (the new Mexican yokes)
Reverend Buckshot
Reverend Eastsider T
G&L ASAT Classic/Special
Godin Stadium '59
Fret King
Balaguer Thickett
Titan by Kauer KR1
I've also chatted to a lovely dude who makes Ruby Guitars in the UK. He makes these cool little guitars using slab bodies, stained finishes, custom pickups, built in the UK by a young and seemingly passionate chap, all for around £1000-1200.
Comments
They are cheap upgrades to any decent Tele - around £50-60 including offerings from UK hand wind pickup makers. I wouldn't just look for one with a Broadcaster fitted.
Or a Seymour Duncan's broadcaster
Early broadcaster pickups were wound with 43awg wire, later telecaster pickups were wound with 42awg wire. 43 awg wire has a higher resistance per foot that 42 awg ... so for roughly the same number of turns and the same output the broadcaster 43awg pickups display a higher DC resistance. Their tone is more punchy and aggressive in the mid range (a characteristic of the finer wire gauge) which can make them seem louder as they cut through better .... but a later 7k pickup has the same output as an early 10k one!
You cannot compare DC resistances for output when a different wire gauge is used ...end of story.
Formerly TheGuitarWeasel ... Oil City Pickups ... Oil City Blog 7 String.org profile and message
he recently wound a liquidator bridge for my tele... awesome pickup!...
the clip below was recorded on my on my phone so quality isn’t the best but....
tele>5e3... clip starts with the guitar volume rolled back to about 7(ish) sounds like a tele... on full volume the pickup has enough poke to push my little amp into overdrive!...
https://soundcloud.com/user-296617142/liquidator
More than happy with it!... buy a tele... buy one of these pickups and be happy!
I didn't mean the original 1950s pickups, I meant the CS Nocaster (not Broadcaster, my mistake) reissues. I definitely remember reading that for a couple of years the bridge pickup had a dc resistance of around 10k and sounded different. Maybe they switched wire gauge and the output was more or less the same, or maybe they had more turns of the same gauge of wire and it did have a higher output. Hard to find any info about them now anyway, it was a good few years ago.
Formerly TheGuitarWeasel ... Oil City Pickups ... Oil City Blog 7 String.org profile and message
A normal Telecaster bobbin physically will not take 10k worth of 42awg wire ... my hardman is nudging 9k with 42awg, and is bursting the doors at that. It's a lot higher output than a vintage Broadcaster style (like my 9.5k, 43awg Fortyniner). By the time of the 'Nocaster' Fender had switched to 42awg wire, and genuine nocaster pickups are around the 7k mark, but with the early alnico 3 magnets (like the Esquire and Broadcaster pickups) which gives them more natural midrange than the later alnico 5.
Formerly TheGuitarWeasel ... Oil City Pickups ... Oil City Blog 7 String.org profile and message
Thanks! I'll keep a look out for one of those. When do they change to what they are now (American Professional)?
@TheGuitarWeasel I'm not necessarily looking for a 'high gain' pickup; I still want it to sound round and... 'vintage', just with a little more bite and rambunctiousness. Describing pickups is a nightmare. All these random adjectives makes me sound like a clown.
Has anyone tried out any of the guitars I listed?
I was simply stepping in to correct the usual error of equating high DC resistance with high output.
As far as I can see, very few 'off the shelf' guitars have a true Broadcaster pickup in the bridge.
Formerly TheGuitarWeasel ... Oil City Pickups ... Oil City Blog 7 String.org profile and message
*An Official Foo-Approved guitarist since Sept 2023.
Any variations in feel of the two guitars?
The words of a mass murderer.
You can pick them up for about £750 in decent condition if you’re patient
Here's the neck pickup, and then neck and bridge (taking the lead part). Sorry I don't think I recorded the bridge pickup on its own.
I'll keep my eye out for the Standard between '12 and '16.