Is a fat Telecaster right for you?

This is a type of Telecaster that seems like the ultimate Tele, and for some it might be.

Take a Fender American Performer Telecaster Hum. This is an attempt by Fender to make the ultimate "workhorse" Telecaster.

Before getting into that, I'll explain what a fat Telecaster actually is.

Fat does not refer to the body nor neck thickness but rather the pickups in the guitar. If there is a humbucker pickup at the neck position, that's what makes it "fat".

I own two Telecaster type guitars. One has the traditional overwound single-coil at the bridge and the mini single at the neck. The other is a fat Tele with an overwound single-coil at the bridge and a humbucker pickup at the neck.

Then there is the Fender American Performer Telecaster Hum. This is a fat Tele and the Hum in the name refers to the humbucker pickup at the neck. However, this guitar also has a fair amount of fancy dan electronics in it. The bridge pickup is a newer design by Fender that they call the Yosemite, and the neck humbucker is something they call the Double Tap. Also, there is a push-pull potentiometer to split the humbucker to a single-coil. Also also, there is what Fender calls a Greasebucket tone circuit that allows you to roll off treble without increasing bass frequencies.

The Hum is the do-it-all Tele. It has both the vintage and modern Tele tones all nicely packaged in one guitar, and does do without the sound "mudding out" anywhere...

...but not everybody can afford the Hum. In fact, most people can't.

This is where we get into more affordable options, examining common Telecaster complaints, and figuring out whether having a humbucker in the neck position is actually a good idea or not.

That darned mini-single pickup

The biggest complaint about traditional Telecaster pickups (regardless of who made the guitar) is that the mini-single neck side pickup isn't usable. (And yes, it's a mini-single, meaning not a lipstick pickup. That type of pickup is totally different.)

"Isn't usable" defined: Some complain that the mini-single is either too weak, too "muddy", or both.

I've personally never had a Tele mini-single sound that way. But then again, I don't regularly play a true-to-vintage-spec Telecaster either.

In my experience, yes, a vintage spec Telecaster mini-single does tend to be weak and not all that dynamic. But I wouldn't call it unusable even though others do.

The good and bad of having a humbucker in the neck position of a Telecaster

Whether you do like I did and outright buy a cheap Tele copy with a humbucker in the neck, or install an inexpensive humbucker in your existing Tele yourself (assuming the wood is already cut out under the pick guard to house a humbucker and you've bought a pick guard that can fit a humbucker pickup), this is what you can expect:

Clean rhythm sound: Good.

Overdriven rhythm sound: Not-so good for regular rock, but good if you use fuzz and/or like that '60s rock sound.

Clean solo tone: Good.

Overdriven solo tone: Very good.

Bridge + Humbucker clean sound: Your Tele will still sound like a Tele but you're now combining the bridge pickup with a humbucker that has greater output compared to the mini-single. You may or may not like this, but it works very well for jazz. More on that in a moment.

Bridge + Humbucker overdriven sound: Whether you can actually use this sound or not directly depends on the type of overdrive you're using. Lighter overdrive tends to sound better.

Best benefit of the humbucker at the neck: Jazz tones.

This is where the dynamic response of a neck side humbucker really works on a Tele. The greater output and midrange work very nicely to ring out "fuller" jazz style chords whether using bridge+humbucker or humbucker alone.

No, you will not get the sound of an ES-335 because we're talking about a solid body Telecaster here. But usable jazz tones are definitely way easier to get on a fat Tele compared to a traditional pickup set.

The humbucker just looks cooler

There are some Telecaster players that never use the neck pickup at all and bought a fat Tele anyway. Why? They think a humbucker at the neck position just looks better than the mini-single.

Does it?

Yes.

The bigger shiny rectangle of the humbucker is visually more interesting than the skinny mini-single and looks more impressive. It also looks more expensive even though it's not.

Any Telecaster looks better with that big shiny rectangle at the neck position.

And now the last question. Should you own two Teles?

Should you own two Teles?

As mentioned earlier, I own both types of Teles. One with the traditional pickup set and a fat Tele.

Before answering the question of whether to own both types of guitars, I did own this for a very brief period of time back in 2018:

The Fender HH Standard Telecaster in a special edition color called Sea Foam Pearl, which is not the same as the modern Fender Player Telecaster HH as that one has different pickups in it, is what made me stop playing HH Telecasters. I could not get this thing to sound good no matter what I tried. Maybe the modern Player Telecaster HH sounds better, but I've noodled around on a few Telecaster HH guitars since the one I had, and nope... I just can't make them work for me.

With the fat Tele I have now with the single + humbucker, yes, I like the sound of that. But I also like the sound of the single + mini-single too, hence the reason why I own both.

If you're a Tele guy, you might actually need both types of Teles in your life. I certainly appreciate having both of them.

However, were I to pick just one, it would be the fat Tele for sure. But that's just me. You'll have to decide for yourself if you need both if you're a fan a Telecaster type guitars.

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Published 2021 Jan 21