1990-91 Fender "Albert Collins" Custom Telecaster
I bought this from a guy in Brisbane Australia in September 2013. It was made in Japan and the serial number indicates in 1990 or 1991.
More recently the Fender Custom Shop in the USA makes an Albert Collins model that costs well over $4000. I really don't see any value whatsoever in paying an extra few thousand dollars just to get a star's fake signature and a "made in USA" stamp on a guitar. I'm a huge fan of Japanese made guitars and in my experience (having owned a lot of really expensive US-made guitars) Japanese ones are easily as good as US made gear.
Albert Collins with his Tele.
Source: John Emms music reviews
According to the ad the specs are as follows:
- 2 Piece Ash Body with cream binding
- Maple cap neck 184 Radius
- 21 Vintage style frets
- 42mm Nut
- TL Humbucker Neck Pickup
- Cloth bound US Vintage Bridge Pickup
- 3 way switch
- 6 Section Custom Bridge
- 3 Ply Pick Guard
The black pickup surround on the humbucker is not original but was there when I bought it. It was actually a bit high for my liking anyway, so I replaced it with one of the brass surrounds from my Riverhead (see below).
Another strange thing is that in every photo of Albert Collins that I can find on the internet his guitar has a transitional logo, whereas mine has a spaghetti logo. So either the Japanese builders got it wrong, or a previous owner switched the neck on my guitar. I actually prefer the spaghetti logo anyway because I'm a bit of a sucker for old things, and I couldn't care less whether this guitar is the same as Albert's. If anyone else has one of these please let me know what kind of logo you have on it.
Back in 1976 or '77 when I was looking for a good electric for my new band in Adelaide, I stumbled across a sunburst L-series Custom Tele in a shop, and it sounded fantastic even though I was no great fan of Fenders. For reasons I can't remember (probably just because I pretty much wanted a Les Paul), I didn't buy it, even though it was well under $1000, probably closer to $500. Bad decision because it would be worth a packet nowadays. I've always had a bit of a fond hankering for Custom Teles ever since then. Then The Police came along not long after that and the idea of one of those with a PAF on it seemed like a great idea.
I saw this one and I thought it looked great and I liked the pickup configuration and the price so I got it. I'd generally prefer a rosewood fingerboard but this was actually really nice, the sound was fantastic and it really grew on me but I ended up selling it almost exactly 2 years after I bought it.
The main problem with it was that there was a very noticeable and irritating volume difference between strings, in particular the D was way too quiet and the G was way too loud. This was infuriating when doing riffs or solos, and that's really the reason I sold it.
