Telecasters

Here are my Telecasters. The one on the left, Arthemis, was built for me by Ed Beaver, as a little sister to Kreosote, of which you'll find a description under Stratocasters. I'm not sure what wood was used for the body, but I believe it's ash. She has a maple neck with a 17" radius ebony fretboard. Kluson tuners, Joe Barden bridge. Originally the guitar had a GFS Lil' Puncher in the bridge (which is a Barden clone) and a Bartolini PBF-47 in the neck position, kinda like a '70s Fender Telecaster custom. I ended up not liking this set-up, for one because GFS pickups are insanely cheapo. I had them in my other Tele for a while and loved it, but apparently GFS has some consistency issues.

So then Ed became a Joe Barden dealer, and we put a set of Joe Barden T-model p/ups in the guitar. Great pick-ups but slightly too bright for my taste. I was able to get really cool tone with the Bardens and my Fender Blues Deluxe 4x10 amp, but the guitar was too bright for my Dr Z. Maz38 Sr. (For one, a stock 1x12 Dr Z. Maz38 Sr. has a 16 Ω Celestion Vintage 30. It is beyond me why Dr Z. decided to use a 16Ω speaker on an amp that's bright enough as it is. I've since replaced it with an 8Ω Nick Greer Special Design, which sounds like a cross between a Weber Blue Bell and a Weber Silver Bell).

*note*: Mark Easterling told me about a trick you can do with a Barden T-model bridge pick-up: Since it has three screws to hold it in place, you can screw the treble side of the pick-up, the blade closest to the saddles, all the way down, with the bass side sticking up. You'll get more bottom end out of the pickup that way.

Anyways, as it turned out, Ed had promised Brian Wooten, of Trace Adkins band, a set of Barden T-models. So he needed mine back. I ended up trading pick-ups with Brian and took over his Kinman AVn-60's, which I absolutely love. Punchy, articulate, clean and very woody, and that's what I use now.

The guitar on the right, Bitch, started out as a Fender Nashville Tele, and has a Parsons/Green B-bender. Stock, the guitar had a maple neck. The original neck was an insane piece of shit. The wood was so stiff that the truss would not even move so I ended up stripping the truss. I took that neck and put it out with the rest of the trash, after battling with Fender's customor service. I then bought a birdseye maple Warmoth neck with a compound radius. When I got it in the mail and checked it out it felt funky. I called them and they told me that if you weren't used to a compound radius neck, you need to get used too it. Okay... I put that neck on.

The guitar had always sound shrilly bright to me, so Ed suggested putting one of his necks on there, so now Bitch has a Stratocaster type maple neck with ebony fretboard. This is when we discovered why the Warmoth felt funky; it was warped. Even though the neck was still under warranty, Warmoth pretty much told me to go fuck myself, so to hell with them.

Yet the guitar was still too bright, but I had an excellent job waiting tables so I could afford experimenting with pickups a little bit. Originally the guitar had Fender Texas Specials which are overrated beyond belief, I discovered. A Fender Texas Special is seriously nothing more then an over-wound stock Fender pickup. After a string of different pick-ups (DiMarzio, GFS, Rio Grande and such, I decided on the Seymour Duncan Vintage stacks, which is essentially a humbucker.

As you've probably figured out by looking at the picture, Bitch is a tribute to Clarence White and Marty Stuart, who both inspired my to explore Telecasters. Besides the visuals, she even has a Scruggs banjo D-tuner. I had Ed put one of those Scruggs on my high E-string as well, as was done by Clarence and Marty, so I could instantly go to a semi-open G tuning for banjo rolls, but I ended up stripping it and took it off.