The fact that we call this club the '72 Custom Club already says something about this guitar. But what would the '72 be like without two decades of continuing Tele evolution? We don't dare to think about it ('cause we would end up thinking about nothing!). The Blonde Wonder It's highly possible, to say the least, that you already know that the Telecaster — first dubbed the Broadcaster — was the world's first commercially successful solidbody electric guitar, and still is one of today's most played guitars. Needless to say, there's plenty of books and websites about the over 50 year old history of the regular Telecaster, and we won't go too much further into that here.

The Custom Tele But how did the Custom first come into the picture? Well, the first time the Custom name was used on a Fender model was on the Custom Telecaster, introduced in 1959. The Custom was basically a regular Telecaster, but sported "custom features" such as a 3-tone sunburst (instead of the standard Blond) an elegant white body binding, an alder body and a 3-ply pickguard along with the new rosewood fingerboard that eventually ended up on all Fenders at this time. Interestingly, already in '59, the Custom was a slight flirt with Gibson features! Reaching the end of the rope in 1972, the Custom Telecaster was by that time no longer a big seller, perhaps not very surprising when you could have a regular Tele in any color and with choice of rosewood or maple (reinstated in '67) fretboard. The Custom has since been reissued, first by Fender Japan, and is available today as part of Fender's American Vintage series.

'61 Custom Telecaster in three color sunburst with the neat white body binding.

Les Paul or less Paul The fifties in many ways belonged to Fender, who in the early days of the decade had started a revolution with the first massproduced solid body guitar, and thanks to the even more futuristic yet timeless Stratocaster guitar pushed the standards of electric guitar design by leaps and bounds. Gibson had the Les Paul, but they were seen as hopelessly old-fashioned. The today classic, but back then extreme, Explorer and Flying V models did little to help stop the trend.    As always, it was not the guitar designers themselves who decided the trends — it was the musicians who created and exposed them on telly (we're talking about tellycasters anyway, aren't we). As the British R&B boom in the mid-60s brought the blues to the charts, artists like Mike Bloomfield, Eric Clapton and Peter Green taught people how to appreciate the fat soaring sounds of the Les Paul, and another decade later, humbucker equipped Gibsons was suddenly the thing to have, whether you were into glam, heavy rock, progressive or fusion. Jimi Hendrix had helped keep the Strat on the map in the late 60s, and the Tele was a strong seller at the time (no doubt aided by the country rock revival of the late '60s), but CBS by this time obviously felt the need for something more "gutsy" to keep up with the now seriously increasing competition from Gibson.    As faith had it, Seth Lover, designer of Gibson's humbucker, had quit his job at the Kalamazoo factory in 1967 and eventually ended up designing the Fender "Wide Range" humbucking pickup in 1970.

Groovy Naturals and Buttery 'Buckers The first Fender to be equipped with the new humbucker, in late 1971, was the semi-hollow body Telecaster Thinline, first introduced in 1968 with regular Tele single coils. Today commonly known and reissued as the '72 Thinline, it is a guitar that never even reached the Custom's modest popularity but nontheless shares its "resurrection" of today.    Introduced in mid-1972, the '72 Custom was, as you might know, a totally different guitar from the Custom Telecaster produced since the late fifties. It was, for better or worse (it's not hard to guess what we think!), the ultimate hybrid guitar, most notably between single coils and humbuckers, but also between other traditional Fender and Gibson features. The body shape and neck are pure Tele, while the four individual controls and "circular" 3-way switch are "borrowed" Gibson features. It was also fitted with the three-bolt Micro Tilt neck and bullet truss rod, already found on the Strat and other "top of the line" Fenders, but never put on the regular Tele. The '72 Custom was offered with a rosewood or maple fretboard option (unlike the Thinline and Deluxe which were exclusively fitted with a maple neck) and, initially, in sunburst only.    Janurary 1973 saw the introduction of a third and last humbucker variant of the Telecaster, dubbed the Telecaster Deluxe, a combination of Thinline and Custom features, also incorporating Strat parts like the CBS headstock, and "modern" ideas like a flatter fretboard radius. It was recently (2004) reissued as part of the Made in Mexico Classic series and seems to be rather popular among younger acts these days, just like the Custom.

The Telecaster Thinline was produced between 1971 and 1979 (pictured is a '74).

A Very Modest Success The original Telecaster Custom didn't change much through its relatively short life. Some time early on, the old style 3-saddle bridge was replaced by one with six saddles, and in the late '70s the amp knobs were replaced by standard Strat knobs. By this time it was also available in several different colors. (Read the details on the features of the '72 Custom on the Specs and Features page.)    With today's relative success of the '72 reissues, it may seem strange that the '72 and its sisters the Thinline and Deluxe never really recieved the attention that we now believe they deserve. With hard rockin' guitarists like Jimmy Page, Tony Iommi and Angus Young enjoying huge popularity, Gibson guitars attracted a strong following, but neither the Gibson fans nor the established Fender players, with few exceptions, seriously picked up any of Fender's humbucked Teles. Also, there's no doubt that CBS's rapidly declining quality effectively helped fuel people's dissatisfaction with these guitars as with the rest of the 70s Fender line.    The Custom was, however, the most popular of the three, and players like Keith Richards would be seen with one for several years. Most notably, the Custom's hybrid design appealed to people who had seen players like Mike Bloomfield and the above mentioned Rolling Stone put a humbucker in the neck position of their 50s Tellies. Perhaps more of a Tele with a humbucker than a Gibsonish Fender, the Custom was really a highly playable incarnation.    As the CBS era approached an end and a new management was brought in to pull Fender out of the mud after years of declining quality and sales, all Telecaster models but the regular one (which eventually would be redesigned as the American Standard Tele) were discontinued. The Thinline had already ceased production in 1979, and the Custom followed, along with the Deluxe, in early 1981. The "natural craze" was over, and a change in ownership and a complete shutdown of the Fullerton factory – along with the introduction and discontinuation of a thousand cheesy colors – would pass on by before things were rolling again!

The Custom, 1972-81 (blond '77 pictured). The Telecaster Deluxe, 1973-81 ('78 sunburst pictured).

Revenge, at Last! I am not sure which year the Japanese reissue of the '72 Custom appeared (somebody?), but today's Made in Mexico Classic Series reissue was introduced in 1999. Featuring a poplar or alder body, the new '72 is in all other regards a very faithful reissue of our beloved Custom. And finally it seems to have gained the popularity it definitely deserves – one that grows with each day (Fender even seemed to have a backorder of the reissue in April 2001!). Perhaps in the future we will see it being offered in more color options than today.    The Japanese version, with a basswood body and slightly different specs, has been imported for many years and is still being made for the Japanese home market. Read more about these guitars and the original Custom on The Specs & Features page. Thank you for reading! Please let me know if you have any questions, comments, corrections and critique. Henrik, member #28 Home