Fender Alternate Reality Meteora HH

[Larry Mal]

I feel like Fender often does "new designs" that are mostly an old design with one new part. Here is a Tele with a different body. Here is a Jaguar with a different body. It would be like Chevy saying we created this brand new truck and it is just a Chevy truck with a different door.

I call it my "Taco Bell" analogy, where Taco Bell arranges the same five tired ass ingredients slightly different and calls it something that sounds vaguely Mexican and says it's a new dish.

It isn't.

And actually that's unfair to Taco Bell, who does have new menu items now (or so I've heard).

But you get the point.

[Embenny]

Yep, the saddle-lock bridge was Fender looking at everything that's wrong with the existing hardtail bridges of the time and solving all of their issues. The expensive TonePros locking TOMs only get halfway to Leo's elegant solution of locking the saddles to each other to form effectively one solid piece of metal anchoring the strings to the body.

And he did that almost 40 years ago when he started G&L. In all that time, FMIC's best solution they can come up with is to use the poorly-designed bridge of their biggest competitor from 70 years ago?

I mean, it's not like I'm making a new point here. Just expressing disappointment in the corner-cutting of a functionally important part of a the guitar.

I've got 3 guitars with TOMs, and none are Gibsons. Why are they even on there? I'm thinking of refinishing my Jaguarillo, and if I do, the first thing I'm gonna do is dowel that mofo and drill for offset thimbles so I can at least put a Mustang bridge on it.

[marqueemoon]

“Cool new body shape. What’s the most boring thing we could do with it?”

“Nice. Ok, now what’s the second most boring thing we can do with it?”

[Larry Mal]

The expensive TonePros locking TOMs only get halfway to Leo's elegant solution of locking the saddles to each other to form effectively one solid piece of metal anchoring the strings to the body.

Right... I have a bunch of Gibsons with TOM bridges, and the first thing I do is pull all that garbage out of there and put in a Faber solution with solid steel posts, and the bridge fixed to the posts and all locked down. It costs a lot of money and I like the stuff, but still don't like the TOM bridge.

I'd never buy a Fender guitar that had one on there. Nothing can show me that Fender is phoning it in more than that.

Because Fender makes great bridges... why don't they use those?

[Telliot]

WHY does Fender keep insisting on TOMs and headstock truss adjustment??

[Debaser]

I sense a lot of TOM aversion, but hey it's ok. The ABM 2400 roller is a good idea but over kill, it's a hard tail. I use those with Bigsby guitars, the groove on the wound strings is a V, and a shallow one at that. I'd just use a regular ABM with brass saddles, or Callaham.

But since we are on about bridges, I'd put a black anodized Embia-matic on the blue one, with the canvas phenolic or aluminum saddles (aka Bakelite). I feel this...

[vistavision]

Well, at least they put a TOM on a guitar with a 12" radius.

[B]

If I do pick one up it will take everything in my power not to replace the decal on the headstock with this:

[X-Ray Spex]

Well, at least they put a TOM on a guitar with a 12" radius.

This, thank god. Does my head in when they're like ''Hey this Jazzmaster has a 9.5'' Radius but whatever 12'' Radius bridge it is!''

Honestly my main pet peeve with the Squier J.Mascis, Squier Deluxe and Fender Modern Player lines of Jazzmasters which apart from the bridge issue I really dig.

[shadowplay]

WHY does Fender keep insisting on TOMs and headstock truss adjustment??

I often think the same of Gretsch with the TOM's. I generally fall back on the realisation that people who actually buy the vast bulk of new guitars like TOM's and headstock trussrods (and rufty tufty humbuggers) and Fender and Gretsch can see into my soul and divine that I'd never buy a new guitar in a million years and therefore disreguard everything I think and everyone even remotely like me.

It's not unlike a mate of mine who is a Ferrari dealer. I often bend his ear to tell him what I think they should be doing and giving him the benefit of my exquisite and sophisticated connoisseur taste. He generally replies along the lines off; 'hold the phones...let's tell Maranello what they should be making for a potless Weegie scrounger who'd never buy a new car in a million years and can't afford one anyway. They make new cars, not secondhand ones for grubbers like you to buy when they are ten years old' Do you want me to call Maserati while I'm at it?'

D

*Weegie = Glasgow person.

[s_mcsleazy]

WHY does Fender keep insisting on TOMs and headstock truss adjustment??

I often think the same of Gretsch with the TOM's. I generally fall back on the realisation that people who actually buy the vast bulk of new guitars like TOM's and headstock trussrods (and rufty tufty humbuggers) and Fender and Gretsch can see into my soul and divine that I'd never buy a new guitar in a million years and therefore disreguard everything I think and everyone even remotely like me.

D

*Weegie = Glasgow person.

i think it's because most people are familiar enough with these designs that they wont learn how to use anything else.

i'll give an example of this. my friend brought a used VM squier jag because it came up at the right price and she had heard me talk about jaguars and jazzmasters non-stop. it had a cheap chinese made mustang bridge with the radius being messed up..... since most people think just putting a mustang bridge on a jaguar/jazzmaster is enough to fix the issue without doing any further research. she mentioned it kept going out of tune when she used the trem and just wanted to change the bridge to a AOM/TOM bridge. i told her to leave the guitar with me for 2 hours before she went down that path. so i did the usual stuff. stuck the correct radius saddles on it (i had the correct ones laying around) shielded the body since those VM's can be a bit noisy, adjusted the trem, wrapped the bridge posts and did the rubber washer trick on the grub screws. considering i only had 2 hours. i think i got it set up and playing really well. she played it like that for 2 weeks then just changed it to an AOM bridge and found it played like shit after that and the tuning was worse. sadly the damage was done and she had to get it plugged up and re-drilled.

i also cringe when i see people wanting to convert the gretsch bridges (that work fine 95% of the time) with those poorly modified TOM bridges that still have the knife edge saddles on them.

[smalahove]

This is what they should have gone with

I like that headstock, but I think the Starcaster one would have been better on the Meteora.

[tdbajus]

Heck my M-80 headstock would fit it better.

20181204_180027 by Christopher Louck, on Flickr

That is a cool ass headstock!

[CROSS_guitars]

They should have stuck to the prototype layout.
I particularly like the big F engraved in the pickguard. The new ones would look cool with this.

[marqueemoon]

They should have stuck to the prototype layout.
I particularly like the big F engraved in the pickguard. The new ones would look cool with this.

They really watered it down from here didn’t they?