Squier Classic Vibe Telecaster Custom

I bought this guitar at a time in my life when I needed another guitar like I needed a bullet in my head haha, but this guitar looked and sounded too good to walk away from.

What is is? The Telecaster Custom by Squier.

I was at my local music shop. Recently Fender has started re-releasing many of their classic guitars, but 3 or 4 years ago it was just your standard Strat or Tele. I remember seeing pictures of Keith Richards playing a black double humbucker Tele with a maple neck. Between that imagine and the fact that it could to a bright and chunky sound had me walking this guitar up to the register. It was $259.

It has 4 knobs and a 3-way switch. The knobs are a volume and tone for each of the humbuckers. Mid into my Tom Morello phase, I leaned you could turn down the volume of the neck or the bridge pickup and toggle the switch back and forth for a funky tremelo tone.

The guitar has a subtle metallic flake in the pickguard. Hey, it looks cool.

None. After a pro setup I had this thing playing and sounding great. If I were to do any upgrades, I get new saddles, bridge pickup and tuners, but no complaints.

The body is Agathis, the neck is Maple. The fretboard is also maple. I had one rough fret edge filed down, but can't complain, it's a $250 guitar!

The neck is smooth and is similar to a standard Telecaster neck.

A guitar that can twang and crunch in one package. The dual tone knobs really allow you to dial in versatility.

This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

This is a chinese made tele, however they've limited the run so that each one that's made is more focused and not so mass produced, thus the quality of these guitars is superior and meant to be on par with american made guitars.

FEATURES:
Body Pine

Neck 1-Piece Maple, Modern “C” Shape,
(Gloss Polyester Finish)

Fingerboard Maple, 9.5" Radius (241 mm)

No. of Frets 21 Medium Jumbo Frets

Pickups 2 Custom Vintage Style Single-Coil Tele® Pickups with AlNiCo 3 Magnets (Neck & Bridge)

Controls Master Volume, Master Tone

Pickup Switching 3-Position Blade:
Position 1. Bridge Pickup
Position 2. Bridge and Neck Pickups
Position 3. Neck Pickup

Bridge Vintage Style Strings-Thru-Body Tele Bridge with 3 Brass Barrel Saddles

Machine Heads Vintage Style Tuning Machines
Hardware Chrome
Pickguard 1-Ply Black
Scale Length 25.5” (648 mm)
Width at Nut 1.625” (41.3 mm)

Unique Features “C” Shape Maple Neck,
Knurled Chrome Control Knobs,
Vintage Tinted Neck,
Black Dot Position Inlays,
Gold Squier Logo,
Original Barrel Switch Tip,
Synthetic Bone Nut


UTILIZATION

Pretty nice, surprisingly very very light too, and I've tried a few models, all of them are quite light, I likey!

upper fret access is not what the tele's about so if you want to spend most of your time there you won't enjoy it. The ergonmics aren't there either, the tele was the first electric guitar type to be made thus the ergonomics weren't thought about the first round.

Generally it's just like your typical 21 fret tele with the 2 pickups and a 3 way.



SOUNDS

For a tele, it sounds like a tele. Damn good. Clean, bright, twangy, all that country twang you'd ever want is in this tele.

The stock pickups are amazingly clean and deliver it! Classic signature tele sound!

You want another type of sound you'd better start looking into aftermarket pickups, but as is, and what it's originally designed for, it gets the job done for anybody wanting to play clean/blues/jazz/country stuff definitely!

OVERALL OPINION

I think this series was underrated! Definitely! Maybe because the options were so limited? Only 3 finishes, with specific neck woods etc. The 21 fret thing always kills me with fender guitars I never knew why they did that, it's just so uneven and I'd always feel better with at least a 22 fret neck.

The quality is great though, the build is good, every one of these I've seen has been really consistent, the fretwork is VERY good, the neck is perfect, the finish is great and I see no flaws with the binding anywhere on the body.

And it's light weight. What more does anybody need? I actually think these are better than any of the mexican stuff coming out of the factory. It just seems to have been thought out more, with more effort put into these models. I guess the pickups are what would be lacking but even in that department it's quite decent. Not super versatile for every kind of genre, but definitely good for the genres mentioned previously. Of course, they're not noiseless, cause then THAT'D be too good to be true.

Made in China but watch this guitar, it's heavy ... I'm not talking weight but quality. It has nothing to envy to the Mexican ...

UTILIZATION

The neck is super fun to play and not tiring.
Like all Telecaster, I have only one criticism (if you can call it a reproach ...) but the position of the pickup selector is not suitable because if pickstroke a bit wide, each Once I switched back in bridge position ... while I'm neck ... it's just boring to me but also to adapt my game !!!

SOUNDS

My style of music? well, I'm a pro-fender so this guitar suits me quite ...
I use it on my POD X3, mostly in clean sound with chorus, tremolo, the twang what! but sometimes I think I'm Angus and put a simulation of Marshall Drive in the background, just to burst ... and then it sends heavy ...

OVERALL OPINION

I use it for more than two years, day and night ...
I do not get enough ...
This is my first electric (offered for my birthday with my family) so I have not enough experience or as a comparison but I gets a great kick ...

See other opinions

UTILIZATION

Top handle ergonomics and good quality varnish

SOUNDS

we can have pretty much anything with the right pedals (except metal, though ...)
where it really causes: his clear and distortion 70s

OVERALL OPINION

It's a cheap guitar, pretty well finished, very comfortable and comes out a real Fender sound. It's a telecaster, no doubt! I tried a Mexican, I have not really heard the dif. Very good quality / price ratio. I especially like the neck pickups. Associated with good reverb is huge. A counselor as well as the more experienced beginners who want to expand their XI guitar sound palette! Accustomed to the metal (Epi LP and LTD in active EMG) I wanted a vintage sounding guitar, it can also do the trick for the edgy rock but it's clean / slight crunch it really gives. This is just impeccable.
I have an idea one day replace the plastic nut with a nut in tusk.