Fender Nashville Tele w/ Fishman Bridge Reviews 4

My wife surpirised me on Valentines Day with this Candy Apple Red Tele (how fitting, eh?). She said she paid $450 for it from Flood Music in Sioux City, Iowa. I later had them install the Fishman Bridge to make it just like a Power Tele.

The quality and variation of the tone is what I first liked about the Tele before the Fishman bridge was installed. Now the acoustic tone from the Fishman gives the unit even more flexibility. And it sounds so sweet! The frets are deep, allowing great bends. The magnetic pickups still provide the Tele twang, but the third pickup adds a litle more in-between variety.

It plays differently than my Strat, in that the deeper frets had me playing slightly sharp when I was near the nut. I re-adjusted the intonation a few times to correct this, but pressing lighter on the frets when playing worked just as well. It stays in tune fairly well, but some minor adjustments are required periodically. The Fishman Bridge takes a smaller allen wrench than the usual bridge, which Flood Music provided. There is one imperfection on the front, like a flaw in the wood, that is apparent when light reflects just right, but the red color hides it otherwise. A USA version probably would not have a flaw like that, but you get what you pay for.

It is solid! Flood Music did an outstanding job installing the Fishman Bridge, considering the routing of the body for the battery, etc. A little scary to have done on a new guitar, but it is clean! I wish Fender would offer this model with different color pickguards. I will probably change the original brown shell pickguard to a white pearlescent to bring out the Candy Apple Red color. Keep a rag handy to polish the chrome as fingerprints show up on the mirror finish bridge and knob plate.

If you play a variety of music, get this guitar. I can run this clean, or through my Korg AX1G, and produce a variety of tones. I play mainly in church and can go from really mellow acoustic sounds to twangy to Christian Rock, with the turn of a knob and a flip of a switch. Just keep a spare battery with you in case you leave the cord plugged in for a few days!

Dave rated this unit 4 on 2002-09-06.

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