I see SO MANY posts where people say; Leo would never do this, never do that? Of "he did it the right way originally." As if everything that's come after is some bastardized version of "his vision?" I mean the guy didnt jump into the cyrogenic vault with Walt Disney. He did sell Fender, and then go onto design and build guitars that departed quite a bit from the early Strats and Tele's.
I mean; Music Man, G&L. Yeah, some of the stuff looked like a Strat with a 4+2 tuners and a round pickguard, but some of them were quite different. I think people have this idealized vision of the guy, that he really wasnt. It's kind of like looking a child actors, and expecting them to stay the same age, forever, for us, even if that's not what happened, and not what they wanted.

Indeed he did.

But virtually everything he designed and produced up until that moment in January of 1965 has stood the test of time.

I call that a pretty fair track-record for the original company which bore his name.

Arjay

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"Here's why reliability is job one: A great sounding amp that breaks down goes from being a favorite piece of gear to a useless piece of crap in less time than it takes to read this sentence." -- BRUCE ZINKY

Absolutely, no doubt. I guess my point is, why do people look at some of fenders designs that depart from the strictest most orthodox view of Strats and Tele's(ill leave out jaguars and mustangs and the like because compared to the other 2, they're a needle in a haystack), and think he would have some issue with it, or gasp, take offense to it?. I can't see anything from the man that would indicate that its remotely true.
I mean lets be honest, its not Leo Fender that has a problem with it, that falls to the people who make the statement. Its like when people are homophobic, but hide behind one sentence, from one book out of the bible. Obviously I'm exaggerating for dramatic effect.

I'm no expert but I thought Leo himself even felt that way with some changes, take the Strat for instance he never liked the idea of guitarists using the 3-way switch jammed in the "in-between" positions. The "5-way" switch wasn't introduced until CBS bought out the company and they implemented the new 5-way. Leo always resisted putting it in his Strats because he interpreted the "Quack" sound as the Strat losing it's clarity and wasn't a fan of the sound at all, or the addition of the 5-way switch.

Snowy

Walt Disney was cremated, so I guess the whole premise of your argument is flawed!!!

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I'm not an expert, but I play one on the internet.

I'm no expert but I thought Leo himself even felt that way with some changes, take the Strat for instance he never liked the idea of guitarists using the 3-way switch jammed in the "in-between" positions. The "5-way" switch wasn't introduced until CBS bought out the company and they implemented the new 5-way. Leo always resisted putting it in his Strats because he interpreted the "Quack" sound as the Strat losing it's clarity and wasn't a fan of the sound at all, or the addition of the 5-way switch.

Snowy[/quote]

Id have to see that in his quotes, since the guy didn't play himself, and with maybe a few exceptions, it didn't happen until much later, and his later companies made guitars you could pull pickups out and snap others in like Legos. He didn't seem to worry too much about handing the reins over to other people if he thought they had better ideas than him. I think people forget that these things didn't come from him exclusively; there were many other people who contributed significantly to the development of these. From what I read into his biography, he wasn't a " my way or the highway person", he couldn't be, he didn't play the guitar. It'd be like me telling people "this is how you make a surfboard, period" (though i think i could figure it out)
It seems like people tend to take him, and Les Paul, and time has had a way of melding the two together.. Les had big issues with people deviating from the original design, like when they stuck his name on a SG. Leo Fender reminds me of my father; my old man can't play three chords, but open the wiring up on a guitar, tell him how you want it to sound, and in 20 minutes, not only will it sound that way, but the wiring and soldering is so clean and neat, it boggles my mind. He's the one that got me rewiring my guitars, modding my pedals and amps. Christ, he was the one that heard me complaining that my amp didn't have enough bottom, told me to leave it for the week. I came to the house the next week, plugged in, and had a plastic smile on my face for the next two hours. He pulled the transformer out of an old gigantic shortwave radio or something of hta sort, and pulled the caps out of various radios(he restores old tube radios for a hobby).
Point being; he doesn't play the guitar, or a frigging kazoo, but he knows electronics, old electronics, like radios the size of refrigerators, and all the principals transfer over. That's how Fender started. Lucky for me, my father has a lot of time on his hands, and the only time we could ever relate to each other was after I had him teacch me to solder. So he only know how they're supposed to sound by what he heard, and input from people who play.
I don't honestly expect people to stop projecting their own biases onto a guitar maker that people idolize because, hell, he obvikously made something that everyone on this sight loves, regardless if we cat agree on anything else. I just was thinking about it because I was talking about that tool Ed Roman. A guy who does think his way is the only way, and talks the biggest smack about other builders, like Paul Reed Smith: who arguably after Leo Fender, the guy who started Gibson (I can never remeber who it is, I always go right to L.P.) is probably the guy who's made the biggest mark in regards to solid body guitarfs (though up until recently I had an archtop, that forever I mistook for an older McCarty hollowbody, you know the ones that look like a prs from the front, but is 4" thick, annd the top and back are milled out of a solid piece of flamed maple) I'm rambling off topic, that stream of counciousness thing. Anyways, the guys a D-head, and makes overpriced guitars that are just slightly altered versions of guitars made by the very same people he badmouths, except for maybe Lindsey Buckinghams little guitar, that's kind of original.
I don't know, when I read comments about Leo hating some new thing Fender comes out with, it makes me think of that suctard. And I don't believe he's anything near that. He was a guy who made basically the Model T of guitars; an awesomly simple, almost industrial looking thing, especially compared to the higher priced, but also classic and timeless Les Paul. The LP, you hold it, and smell it, and feel its weight on your shoulder, and out of your amp, and its obvious why its still around. The strat and tele? Like I said befoere; their slabs of alder/ash bolted to a slab of maple. But its outlasted every fad and trend, in nore or less its original form, because they were created out of consensus, and inquiry. Not because he said "t this is how it is, and how it should always stay. This is way too long for me to go back and proofread on my phone, so if there are typoes, sorry, but you know what I mean.

Disney; cremated, frozen; whatever. im allowed to use long standing urban legends as creative license.

cheers

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I'm not an expert, but I play one on the internet.

I think the reason some people think that Leo never eclipsed his early work is because quite frankly he didn't. He made some fine guitars after he sold Fender, but nothing has really topped those early designs.

There have been some very good instruments made by Fender since Leo sold the company, but they have all been variations on his early themes. True they have made some refinements, but they have been just that refinements...Is there a better guitar than a Strat, a Tele, Precision Bass and to be honest, the Les Paul, ES 335, and Martin Acoustics? PRS's are Great guitars, but they are also a variation on the Les Paul Theme.

And lets face it...it is extremely difficult to surpass your own genius. His Legend is secure and what others "Think" of his post Fender work is really irrelevant...even this post.

T2

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What time is it? It's Fender Time.

windwalker - I'm not trying to call you out here, just correct some things in your posts.

First off, I agree with you that Leo Fender was a master tinkerer - a self-taught engineer who could also (and perhaps more importantly) interpret what other people wanted. Case in point - all the input from players like Bill Carson and Eldon Shamblin in shaping the Stratocaster.

I want to make the point here that Leo Fender created only 4 instruments while at Music Man: the Sting Ray bass, the Sting Ray guitar, the Sabre bass, and the Sabre guitar (if you see a Music Man with a "I" or "II" after the model name the "I" means it has a 12" radius and the "II" means it has a 7.5" radius - no other differences). None of the guitars had a 4+2 headstock; although the basses had the 3+1 headstock and it was designed by either Forrest White (a partner in Music Man) or George Fullerton (who was working for Leo's other company CLF Research at the time). Those guitars that "looked like a Strat with a 4+2 tuners and a round pickguard" had absolutely nothing to do with Leo Fender; they were designed by Dudley Gimple and Sterling Ball after the Music Man company went bankrupt and was purchased by Ernie Ball. The only Leo design still in production by EBMM is the Sting Ray bass. The Sabre bass was produced for 5-8 years (from 1985-early 90s); the Leo guitars had 2 humbuckers and various types of active electronics and frankly were never really popular. They were never put back into production by EBMM.

However, Leo could also be a real bastard to people who he thought crossed him. The story of the demise of Music Man is basically a bitter public divorce; the only stories left were a "he said, he said" coming from books written by Forrest White and by George Fullerton. Here's what I gather from reading both their books (granted I've only read Fullerton's first book from the early 90s, not the one he wrote shortly before his death).

The company that became Music Man was originally started by former Fender employees Forrest White and Tom Walker. They took their business plan to Leo Fender circa 1972 or so - while Leo was still under his 10-year non-compete contract with CBS. Leo liked what he saw, and not only gave them advice but became a "silent/under the table" partner by providing financing. When the CBS non-compete expired in 1975 he was announced as a full partner in the Music Man company. Leo stayed away from the amps - he was never comfortable with solid-state circuits (one of the secondary reasons why he sold Fender in the first place) - but designed some instruments for them. Leo also owned another company called "CLF Research" (CLF = Clarence Leo Fender). CLF Research actually designed and built the guitars and basses as an OEM supplier - basically they made them, sold them to Music Man, and Music Man sold them to their dealers.

About 1979 Leo had a falling out with White and Walker. Per their partnership deal they had to buy Leo out by repaying his investment plus interest and additional equity. However, Leo agreed to continue the contract for CLF Research to supply the instruments to Music Man. Leo also started designing a new line of instruments with another old Fender employee - George Fullerton. These are the first G&L guitars; there was a time period circa 1980 where the CLF Research factory was producing both Music Man and G&L models side-by-side. Here's were Leo decided to stick it to his former partners - at least according to White: they started making the MM instruments with defective truss rods so MM would be stuck with guitars they would have to send back to CLF to re-work or they would have to destroy and therefore not fill their orders. Now Fullerton tells another story - that MM cut their orders to CLF Research so they had to start the G&L line to keep the factory open. This is that "public divorce" I mentioned; since all the principals are gone now we'll never know the real story of how it happened but this lead to the termination of the contract for instruments between CLF and MM. MM was forced to look elsewhere to have some instruments reworked (they actually went to San Dimas and contracted with Grover Jackson to remake some necks and assemble the parts they got from CLF. Eventually MM dropped the instruments; Leo renamed his CLF Research company "G&L Guitars" and continued to own it until his death in 1991.

The original G&Ls were probably closer to the MM instruments; Leo had to be "convinced" by others at G&L like Dale Hyatt to make the Tele-shaped "Broadcaster", which was renamed the ASAT after (again) Gretsch sued them over the name. Their double-cut guitars didn't get the "true" Strat shape until more like 1990.




Sorry, running out of room and had to delete the cool story about your dad reworking your amp.

Les Paul is another one - musician and natural recording and electronic engineer; created what he needed to get his sound and then gave the technology to the rest of us. However, I think this also gets lost in history - Ted McCarty was the head of R&D at Gibson and really had a lot of input into the Les Paul model guitar. The notorious 1952 models with the horrible trapeze bridge were basically a result of Les and Ted fighting over the design - Les designed the bridge, and it would have worked if the neck was set at a different angle. Ted insisted on the neck angle, which resulted in the guitars being pretty difficult to play. Gibson eventually fixed the neck angle on the trapeze bridge models, and then in 1954 adjusted the angle again once they switched to the wrap-tail bridge.

By the way the guitars Lindsey Buckingham plays are Turner guitars (Turner was originally part of Alembic); he is still in production and does not sell them through Ed Roman any more (smart man). When I was just a green player back in 1981 one of the sales guys at a local store had a Turner like Buckinghams and he let me play it. I had only been playing for about 1 1/2 years at the time and couldn't appreciate what it was (being a 19-year-old metal head); I would love to get my hands on one now.

Funny you should mention the Les Paul. After drooling over the pictures of Les Pauls on Gibson's website for the better part of two decades and reading about such necessary features as long neck tenons and holly peghead veneers, I have come to think of the "Les Paul or nothing else" guys as the biggest cork sniffers in the guitar universe.

+1000!

And I know they didn't teach you that at the NCO Academy down at Maxwell.



It's what we all realize after a lifetime of playing and appreciating Leo's genius and the gifts he left us. Can they be "improved"? Certainly. Are there new guitar designs yet to be "discovered"? Probably. But neither of these hypotheticals diminshes the contributions that Leo made. He's a legend and will always remain so.



Arjay

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"Here's why reliability is job one: A great sounding amp that breaks down goes from being a favorite piece of gear to a useless piece of crap in less time than it takes to read this sentence." -- BRUCE ZINKY

I dont think PRS's take too from Les Pauls, exept for the dual humbuckers. 24 fret vs 22, tremolo vs stoptail. 25' vs 24 3/4". There's really only so much you can do to a guitar to change it before it stops being a guitar an starts being something else. Besides Tele's Strats, and L.P's, there really arent too many guitars besides a PRS you see proliferating too much. You have SG's, and ES's, but not to the same extent, plus they've only been around in mass production since 85. They fill that perfect niche between the two other major guitars.

Nope I went to the NCO Academy at Kapaun AS in Germany...drank lots of great German beers there, but they didn't teach me anything about Fender! And they did'nt teach me anything about Fenders at the SNCO Academy at Maxell, except how to miss them while TDY!

T2

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What time is it? It's Fender Time.

Leo didn't play? At all? I find that hard to believe. I mean, I could understand if he wasn't a "player", like a professional or even an amatuer but I would think the guy could at least strum a few chords. I'm sure you guys know more about him than me, but that was a surprise to me.

Leo Fender....I don't know how well he could play this but he must have known a little.