Musician, frontman and writer Frank Meyer, of the Streetwalkin' Cheetahs, Fear and many more projects, told us about his love for his Fender Telecaster...
Frank Meyer: The piece of gear I cannot do without is my trusty Fender Telecaster. I have a bunch of Tele’s but my prized one is my beat-to-shit cream ‘51 reissue. I bought it brand new about seven years ago, but I’ve played it on tour around the world many, many times now and it’s taken a beating. It looks relic'd, but that’s all blood, sweat and tears…literally! It’s been bled on, puked on, thrown across the stage, fallen over, had glass broken on it, beer bottles smashed on it, and it’s been used as a weapon on several occasions. Ever seen that clip of the Stones where some guy rushes the band on stage and Keith Richards whips off the Tele, smashes the guy with it, and puts it right back and keeps playing without going out of tune?
I put a Humbacker pickup in it when I joined FEAR last year, because the single-coils weren’t quite cutting it. So now I can go between the original single coil for my bluesier solo stuff and the Humbucker for the punk/metal stuff I play…from blues to bite!
I love the Telecaster because it’s basically a baseball bat with wires on it. It’s a very simple instrument, really. There’s not a lot of buttons for me to break or get confused by on stage. Not a lot of choices, which makes the player have to really step up their game. A great L.A. guitarist named B.B. Chung King (RIP) once told me, “It’s all in your fingers.”
Frank Meyer's debut solo album Living Between the Lines is out now.
Photo credit: Michael Bunuan
