Affinity Telecaster

Especially on a budget. I'm a lefty player for at least 25 years on and off, not a pro., and of course I've always had real difficulties finding decent lefty guitars, and places that support or service them properly, in some cases, and I've never been in the position to blow upwards of $2000 on a guitar, so, I have to stick to a budget or moderate price level instrument, which is fine since I'm no Eric Clapton, but I'm better with rhythm guitar and fingerpicking folk-rock style, etc. My main guitar is a budget-brand (but good quality) lefty 12-string ac. electric that I use mainly for power pop, 60s-80s rock, folk rock, and such. I also own a Takamine 6 string acoustic electric that's starting to wear at the bridge a tad, but it's still playable, and some older Les Paul 100 Epiphones and a Squier basic Strat that is still in ok condition, but it's also showing some wear and tear by now. The Telecaster is a much-needed boost to my collection. I've got amps, tuners, pedals, and all kinds of accessories, cleaning cloths and fluid, so I'm good as far as that goes. Shipping was absolutely impeccable, carefully sealed and wrapped, and came with the 2 year Fender warranty card, and some allen keys for setup. You can definitely learn to do a setup on YouTube these days, but I would take it to a good shop with a good guitar tech., if possible, if you haven't done one before, and, it also helps to invest in a good guitar neck stand before doing any work on it. Also, slacken those strings before changing a set, or one string! Will save a lot of heartaches. A really good guitar string winder and cutter is also essential. My beautiful blonde wood Squier Tele arrived today, and I unpacked it, inspected it, plugged it into my wonderful Fender Mustang II modeling amp, tuned up, checked intonation and setup a bit, and it seemed to be set up pretty well at factory, which is rare and somewhat unexpected. Sounds darned good, plays very smoothly, and the neck is nice and narrow for my small hands and fingers. The finish on it is gorgeous, and the frets aren't rough or extended past the neck, which is fantastic. Pickup switch seems to be solid thus far, sometimes on cheaper guitars they are a bit wonky and finicky. The pickup top hat switch was a bit weird, it seemed like it should've sat lower on the pickup switch, but it didn't, but it seems solidly seated now. I ripped through Springsteen's The Promised Land and it sounded like a Telecaster. Whether it sounded like the Boss is another tale, but it was in tune and had that shimmery, twangy Tele sound. Good enough for me! I would really recommend this Tele for lefties on a budget, or beginning with lessons etc., or even moderate level players. I'll see how it goes, but out of the box, it's a great value and a very smooth-sounding, versatile instrument. This Tele is also modest in body size, so it's kid, teen, or beginner-friendly for sure in terms of the guitar's modest profile. Has some weight but it's not over the top like a real Les Paul Gold Top or whatever. Can't find any negatives thus far! The hardware on it seems fine for stock. Of course, if you can, dropping better tuners and pickups in it will only improve it, but that's true for most entry-level guitars (or any that aren't custom jobs to begin with). It's nice to pull a lefty guitar out of ship box and be able to actually just plug in and play, it's a real joy, and I'm already over the moon with this guitar. I would recommend bringing it to get a setup done, however, which I'm going to do as soon as time allows. Lefties don't have tons of great options, so I would heartily recommend this Squier Telecaster for those lefties on a budget or beginning, you cannot go wrong. I was going to pick up an Ovation lefty Balladeer (or lesser) ac. electric soon, but I was having a hard time finding one. The thing with electrics is, they require more yearly or even monthly, maintenance than most acoustic guitars, at least in my experience. Not comparing this to an Ovation, but heck, the Telecaster is a versatile guitar, and I'm satisfied with it so far. One thing beginners need to understand is electrics and acoustic-electrics are really two COMPLETELY different animals. The fact that you can plug both into an amps. and FX are where the similarities really end: both play differently, feel differently, and behave a lot differently. I find most acoustics a lot harder to fret, too, but I also don't have huge Jimi Hendrix hands! If you want to just play rock, blues, folk rock, southern rock, pop, or some metal (if so, I'd go more for an Ibanez, Dean, or Jackson, or something like that that's particularly intended for metal or speed metal), and have an easier time fretting barre chords and power chords, this is the guitar for you. You want to play along to Springsteen, or The Pretenders? This is, for sure, the guitar for you. It sounds particularly good via some chorus, reverb, or compression, or all of the above, with a bit of gain, to get a nice, shimmery, biting but clean kind of sound. I feel for you, my fellow lefties! Buy it! Now! At least it's a good guitar, and it's not $5000. The quality Fender puts even into their lower-end models takes some of the lefty frustration out of the usual mix, which is at least one obstacle cleared when you're trying to get a quality instrument for a lefty while still learning your craft. An unplayable guitar that doesn't stay in tune and buzzes like a B&D chainsaw, is not wont to keep students or beginners playing. This shouldn't do that to you. Also kudos to Fender and Squier for making some decent lefties available at various price levels, it's enormously helpful.

I'm a long time player (since 1970). I've played expensive giutars that fell flat on their face and inexpensive guitars that blew me away (1972 Electra Workingman!!!). I am not a buyer of "names" rather I buy on what feels right, plays well and sounds great! First off, out of the box, it was very playable and the neck and frets were dressed very close to American standard. I thought I would scotch bright the neck but seriously think with about 2 hours of playing I won't need to. I also noticed a good deal of residual wax on the bridge pick up. These were pre potted so again, something I won't have to do. It has a graphtech nut which would be an upgrade I would do. The finish...I wanted to do a relic job but wow... I'm not going to mess with butterscotch blonde this pretty. So...the pick guard.. standard black appropriate for color but I have to change SOMETHING on this guitar, thus I went tortoise shell. I find nothing wrong with the Chinese saddles but in order to match the nut I'm swapping them for graphtech string savers. A new set of 10s a tweet of the neck wait a week another tweek of the neck and I'm done. So on to the tone. I've had a couple different standard teles, g&l asat deluxe and a few FINE EXAMPLES of old G&L SC2 (hard tail versions) to compare. Blind taste test tells me that quite literally for pennies on the dollar, I've got 95% of the best American standard. I don't have money to waste but this experiment paid off. If I tinted the neck with gun oil, soaked the neck decals off, replaced with a stock fender decal ( or leave it blank), change the neckplate on back and hope they don't notice it's top loaded, only a rare few guitar guys would be able to determine it's a squire Affinity. The tone is amazing, it's bright and womanly vocal on the neck and middle position. The bridge is deep, rich and can cut through the mix. And remember I didn't change anything critical...just cosmetic ( for my taste). The tuners will take time to tell...they are fine now so I have no worries about the future. The fact that While Gibson is bankrupt, putting out substandard and inconsistent products FENDER can put this out for this price is amazing. I'm sure many many guitar guys my age are going to snob this, but those of us who are impressed by quality over a name will love this guitar. Any of my students wanting to upgrade to electric already know that I will set them up with one just like mine and their parents will be happy with the cost savings. Highly recommend this for vintage players like me and young players alike!

Esta guitarra tiene todo lo que una buena guitarra necesita. Gran calidad, Gracias a MUSIC STORE.

Comprata su budget col sogno di avere quantomeno una mezza Telecaster. Andata ogni oltre aspettativa, una meraviglia per gli occhi e per le orecchie. Non ci si aspetta un suono tale da una chitarra da 230€. Su internet parlavano di un corpo formato da tre pezzi, invece mi è arrivata una solid body molto sostanziosa e pesante. Manico scorrevole e bello da suonare. Unica pecca, molto personale però, arriva con corde 0.09: troppo sottili per me che sono abituato alle 0.10, ma nulla che effettivamente sia un difetto. Venditore rapido, interessato e preciso. Rifarei questo acquisto altre 100 volte!

Also ich habe heute meine Gitarre bekommen, Freude schon beim Auspacken..alles gut. Kurz und knackig....Gitarre an und für sich Super, klang gewaltig...... Design sehr gut. Preis- Leistung ...TOP

初心者です。左利き用を買いました。 色味も思った色で、とても可愛いです。 値段以上の方があると思いました。

Everything about it is just perfect