How old are u when u get your first Fender?

[Kap'n]

It it was an Armstrong unit, it was probably a "Blue Clipper."



If not, it was likely a Jordan BossTone

[HotRod]

COOL! The Jordan BossTone. I thought it was fuzz-tone, I knew it was something tone.

I wish I still had that just for kicks. It was quite the grinder!

Sound sample - kewl!

Thanks Kap'n!

- HR

[ch willie]

It was the first one of the ones who got away: a Telecaster Bass. I got it when I was 15, and I traded it for cheap copy of a Telecaster guitar. At the time I couldn't have cared less. I had just gotten a Rickenbacker 4001s that I still play. Now, though, I wish I had the Fender too. First Strat was a 90s white MIJ 68ri. It was beautiful, but the neck had some bad tonal places that no one could fix.

[phantomman]

If not, it was likely a Jordan BossTone

JORDAN BOSSTONE......that brings back some memories, Kap'n!

I had one "back in the day" that I used with my first playable guitar -- a beat-to-crap Melody Maker routed for humbuckers. Usta use it with my '64 Fender Concert for all that garage-band grunge -- Electric Prunes, Max Frost, Talk Talk, Valleri, Omaha, Psychotic Reaction......man those were the days.

[Stonefreefuzz1]

Electric Prunes!

[coldsteal2]

I remember the Boss Tone, they were kind of
crummy (great for picking up radios) but sounded
pretty good when they worked right

[Dave Gallagher]

This is an old thread but I just found it. It brought back some memories of a great guitar. It was 1964 and I was 15. My Mom bought me a red Fender Musicmaster and a Champ amp. I began taking lessons at Ace Nash music store where she bought the rig. My first teacher was a fantastic guitarist named Vince Arter. He was playing a beat up Strat with a Rosewood neck that sounded great. A few years later I traded that guitar in for an Esquire. Over the years I played a number of Strats and even a few LP's.
I now will only play my maple neck Strat. Nothing else will do.
I am glad this thread came up as it brought back a great memory of a wonderful time in my life.

[toxpert]

Interesting thread...
I was 11 years old when I got my first 'real' electric guitar. That was a 1954 Stratocaster... orginal finish, parts, etc. No case though ... my mom and dad got me a case later on for my birthday.

This was back in 1964 ... and that guitar was simply an 'old' guitar back then...not quite as nice as the new 1964 Stratocasters with the rosewood fingerboards.

I later traded that guitar for a Gibson in 1969. Doh !!

[Cogs]

That "d'oh" might be excused depending on what Gibson it was traded for!

[Jonnda]

if a fender squire bullet counts, then i was around maybe 18.

[flintpunk]

Long story as short as I can get it...

I started playing at 17 when I was a senior in high school. I had resurrected a 1960-something SG with a broken headstock that I was too dumb to know that I wasn't supposed to be able to fix. I repaired the headstock, and wired it myself. It only came as a body, headstock, single 60's PAF (that I still have!), and lyra bridge/tailpiece, but I got it all for $12! I custom-made a pickguard for it out of ultra-thin modeling plywood. I painted the guitar flo-green and the guard got sprayed white. I spent a lot of time on the paint and after several hand rubbed coats, It looked fantastic, played ok, but screamed 80's!!!

I first played it though my parent's stereo, but I eventually saved enough ($250) to buy a 4x10 (tweed Bassman look-alike) Earth Revival that was on consignment at a music store in Ann Arbor. The output transformer died on the Earth around the time I turned 18. My mom was talking to one of the DJ's at the radio station where she worked and he said he had an amp for sale. I gave my mom $80 and she brought home a 65 blackface Showman. I played the Showman through the Earth 4x10 for a long time until I quit playing when I met my 1st wife. She wouldn't let me play in a band because she was afraid I'd cheat on her. I played the SG, an Ibanez Destroyer(MIJ), and a Charvel model 3a (also MIJ) through the Showman/Earth from 85 until about 91.

I started playing again 99 or 2000. A couple years later, I got my first Fender guitar for $400. It was a mid-90's sunburst American Standard Tele that I couldn't bond with. I guess that would have made me 35 or so when I got my first Fender guitar. I got it right around the time I started participating on the TFF. Some of my earliest posts were about how to make that thing sound like a Tele. The elders here all told me the tone was in my hands, but that guitar wasn't right! I got it close, but I never found what I was looking for. Although I never liked that guitar, I've got 4 Fenders now that I'll never part with... an '02 Hwy 1 Strat relic w/Tele neck & JVaughn electronics, a real '74 Tele, a real '74 Tele Deluxe neck w/custom pine body, P-90's (in the Tele deluxe configuration), and B & G benders (that one is still under construction), and an '08 Am. Std. P bass. I would say now I'm definitely a Fender player. I still have one Les Paul Jr. DC, but it's got a P-90. I don't own a guitar with a humbucker anymore!

I've come to appreciate Fender's tone more as I've grown older. Tone doesn't matter so much when you're a kid...The more distorted the sound, the more all guitars sound the same!

I've let a few other Fenders pass through my hands that weren't right for me and I've got a couple more I'd like to own. I'll probably build those from original and custom parts like I'm doing with the Deluxe. One will be a carbon-copy of my Strat/Tele relic and I'll build that one using all Fender parts. I love that guitar dearly, but I think the relic job on it is too much. I'd like to own the same guitar and put my own hard earned wear on it. The other build will be a custom pine-bodied black-guard Tele in natural pine with clear lacquer finish, a '52 reissue neck refinished in lacquer, and CSTS pickups with RS guitars vintage 60's wiring...'ya know, just for honky-tonkin'!

[lineboss58]

I was around 22 i went out and bought brand new anniversary stratocaster i had way to much money at the time. I found out that i didnt really like it the frets were to small the pickups were terrible and it was so heavy compared to a normal strat. I sold it after a couple of years it would be a few decades before i got another strat but now i have i would never part with it.

[refin]

I was about 17 when I got my first Fender,a '66 strat.I was 14 when I got the first Fender amp,a BF Showman with 2 JBL D-130s---it was my guitar amp and our PA.

[Middleman]

Great old thread. I was 17 and got a Fender Mustang in 1970. Played it through a Kustom amp. I traded the Mustang and my Arbiter Fuzzface for a Gibson SG a year later.

[thegeezer]

I was 15 when I finally got the Jaguar and BFDR. Now it's Strats and a DRRI for my main rig.

[J-75]

I think I was 16 (1963). I bought a used white '59 strat for 325 bucks (Cdn). Sold it about 10 years later for 460 bucks.

[thegeezer]

The Jaguar was $350 and the BFDR was $400 both new, I worked to get them. It was 1965.

[Aaron]

At 13 I received my first Fender, it was a black Lead II. Wish I still had it. Been many Fenders along the way. Have a MIM Strat now, absolutly love it.

[cwilliamrose]

I got my only two Fender products (see signature) when I was 6 weeks into being 14 years old. That was in 1966, they were both used but in very good shape. I still have them both along with my first new guitar ever, a CV Tele that's been here for less than a month.........Bill

[demioblue]

I was 31, I think. It was a CIJ 68 reissue with a 40mm nut. Olympic White, maple neck. I got rid of it when I got my current fender in 2007, a 57 Vintage Hotrod. Don't need another strat after that one. It was PERFECT. heh...

[coldsteal2]

My first Fender actualy was an amp
a new 66 Blackface Bassman with small cab
traded it in for a 67 Blackface Bassman
the folowing fall.

I had forgot about the 66

actualy the 66 had a tighter sounding cab than the
taller 67 cab

[Gusdaq]

I got my first strat in London in 1970 when I was 18, it cost £110 with its original beige case, it was a 63, which i had had modified later by having the rosewood fingerboard stripped off and a maple one put on!!! Imagine that!!!! Where is that guitar now i wonder (I traded it for a 69 Les Paul, as you did in those days) the s/n was L150 something, and i bet someone thinks that it is a 'sandwich' fretboard from the factory where some 60's strats had maple boards glued on!!!!!
Me and Roger Giffin know the truth!!!

[GUITARKID514]

I just got my first strat a few weeks ago. I'm 21. I was a Gibsonite before then for 12 years. There's hope for us! :)

[thegeezer]

I know a lot of guys my age have bought and sold Guitars and Amps that would sell very high today, the moral: Hold on to your good stuff and don't mess with it unless you have to.

[Schtang]

WOW this thread is back again - ok I'll post more pics

got my first Fender Twin Reverb amp when I was 16 and got my first Fender American made Strat when I was 19 (It was an old 1975 Stratocaster, take a look). The 75 strat use to be my number one, pickup a 1990 Fender USA Std Strat which is way better, it has been my number one for 9 years now.

Then





NOW

[eaglewolf]

I just bought my first Fender - a MIM Strat. I'm 47, soon to be 48. In fact, I got my first Gibson when I was 46. I finally found myself in a position where I could afford it and other things in life didn't interfere with the aquisitions.

My parents bought me my first electric guitar when I was in my early teens, about 14, give or take a couple of yours. It was an Epiphone with a Strat-like body that had humbucking pickups. That was a great guitar to learn on, and I wish I still had it. Actually, since I bought the Strat used, it only cost about $70 more than the Epiphone did about 30 years ago, though the Epiphone was new. I guess I can't complain about that!

David

P.S. I didn't notice that this thread started about seven years ago - man, that is some staying power!

[Tosprops]

My first Fender was an acoustic guitar I got when I was around 17 way back in the late '70s. I had a Fender Capricorn Amp that I used between 1977 and 1982. I didn't get a Fender electric until I was 44, it was a Strat. However, I went through the 80's and most of the 90's playing mostly acoustic stuff, not on the Fender, but Ovations, Gibsons, and Taylors.

I still have the Fender acoustic, but it isn't a very good guitar. I used to play a Tele on occasion in a band back in the '70s, but it wasn't mine. It belonged to the lead singer.

[Bluestar]

14, in the 70s. Wish I still had it.

[EFburst58]

Mine was a 1976 Telecaster in 1985 , i was 22

[Bard2dbone]

It depends on how you want me to answer: I played bass in the school Jazz Band. I had a piece of crap Hofner Beatle Bass copy by Ventura. It was really more suitable for archery than music. But it was my bass that I'd bought with my own money. But again, it was crap.

I was the only bass player my school seemed to have who could read music. So my band director bribed me to stay in the Jazz Band. He had the school buy a new Fender Precision and said "This is yours till you graduate if you stay in the Jazz Band the whole time."

So I did. I got to keep it over the summers, too. It was my bass for two and a half years. Then they took it back.

My first Fender products that were all mine were a few years later. I went in to the usic store with my tax refund check the first year after I got out of the Navy. I went in to get an American Standard Strat. I played ever Fender product inthe store and in stead of leaving with one MIA Strat, I left with a matched pair of Oly White with rosewood MIJ's, a Strat and a fretless Jazz Bass.

That was March or so of 1989. I still have them both.

The only parts of the Strat that are original are the wooden parts and the neckplate. The fretless has become two basses, a Oly white one with black hardware and a Geddy Lee Sig neck, and a sunburst with a fretless rosewood neck.

[tmmblues]

It took until age 41 to figure out that single coils in alder could produce just as good but different tones from humbuckers and heavy mahogany. I rectified that by making sure that my son had a strat by age 13 and a CS tele (with humbuckers) by 18.

[MarkE]

Hi,

I was 18, in 1980. It was a secondhand 1979 25th Anniversary Strat bought for me by my girlfriend. It was her first purchase on her first ever credit card. She volunteered, honest! I think she liked the idea of me being a guitar hero or something. Oh well, the guitar was nice, shame 'bout the hero bit!

Mark

[photoweborama]

I think I was 42 or 43 when I got my first Fender...

[concert410]

I was 17 when someone handed me a Fender Wah\Fuzz. I gave it away not knowing that all I had to do was spray it out. I got a SF Bandmaster and 2-12 cab at age 19 for $75. Sold that after a couple years to fund a new Peavey Bandit 65. I bought a MIJ '72 RI Strat at 24. I still have the Strat 24 years later.

[68tele243]

I had been playing a 25th anni Les Paul for about 4 years when someone liberated it from my possesion......I had a gig next night and needed to get set up fast, so I went down to my local instrument dealer and without a whole lot of coin purchased a 78 Japanese strat, Dakota Red/white guard/Maple and have never looked back

[Charles Obscure]

I was 22 and bought a '79 Strat in '83 with one of those form fitting cases. It even came with the mini ashtray bridge cover.
I still have it.

[Drewtone]

I was 13 (spoiled kid at the time)... got a 1983 American Standard Strat (lefty, with the weird setup... non-recessed back... springs under the pickguard with only 1 tone control and 5 feet of laquer on the neck, which has just recently worn nicely... as seen in my avatar, still guitar #1 with the lollars in now). Also under the tree was a 1983 Super Champ (yes, one of those!!!). I traded that amp in 1987 or so for a bunch of pedals... lookup dumbass in the dictionary for my photo.

I actually have a photo of me with those under the tree somewhere... would post, but crap, I think I was wearing parachute pants or something equally embarrasing.

[danbomb]

I got a fender lead II when I was 15. I paid a guy to install a floyd rose and sold it to an old friend. I got a '79 strat in '83 and still have it.

[danbomb]

I was 22 and bought a '79 Strat in '83 with one of those form fitting cases. It even came with the mini ashtray bridge cover.
I still have it.

what a coincidence. Mine has been modded to death

[KYChucky]

wow looks like Im the latest here. Got my American Deluxe Strat just 2 1/2 years ago, I was 44...ouch....thats when I started playing actually.