Pepi's Corner

Here is what Pepi has to say about another Fender Guitar:
The Closet Classic to my understanding came out in 2000 when the Custom Shop
figured it could do its own relicing rather than sending it out to Cuenetto
who had been doing all the work up to that point. His guitars from 1995-1999
have been going for big bucks: a guy in Europe just grabbed a 1996 on Ebay
for about $3,500 and had to pay import taxes as well, and another 1995 went
for similar money. So this is a 2000 that a guy bought to collect and put it
in his closet for 7 years as he's not a player -- has the same strings on it
when he bought it. The Cuenetto Nocasters had a more powerful bridge pickup
than the 2000; the new version is intended to be just like the old 51s with
the right shape body, a big fat neck, and a funny wiring where the neck
position is just a highs roll off and really pretty useless -- but not back
in the day when there was a common signal problem and I guess this solved
it; but today it's not necessary and can be rewired. The neck lipstick
sounds really nice and the bridge typical Tele pickup is nice and twangy.
Both are very transparent, more so than my other Teles: Tom Andersons,
Linhof, G&L, and a 77 Fender with Lollars. Harmonics are right in your face
the way I like em. It's not as warm as these other guitars, in particular
the Linhof that has the Humbucker and the reverse Tele bridge pickup which
sounds incredible. The middle position that combines these Fralin pickups on
the Linhof is the warmest tone I've ever had out of this Victoria 2012 and a
65 Vibrolux. These pickups are also really quiet. The neck is chunky U like
the old ones, but this one is not as chunky as some of them that I've picked
up along the way. It's an aquired taste as after about 15 minutes the size
of the neck gets comfortable. The tone pot is odd in how it works as it
doesn't go from low mute to sharp. The frets are fine: I'm usually a meduim
jumbo guy but these thin frets are really fast. The guitar has 9s on it so
I'm surprised that the tone is so good as I find that heavier strings ring
better. It has a nice acoustic unplugged sound which is an important sign of
a good sounding electric. The idea of the Closet Classic is that it's an old
guitar that has been taken out every once in a while and so it's not worn
like a relic but has cracks in the thin finish, etc. I think the thin finish
is also key to the tone. Eric Johnson turned me on to that idea that the
thinner the finish the better. The guitar was $1900 with the special order
birdseye maple neck and for that money it's fantastic and I'm looking
forward to playing it more. I just plugged it in to the amp with an old Klon
Centaur because I heard that these pickups aren't good for pushing it but it
sounded great! I'm a fan of the Custom Shop pickups as I have them in a
Strat and they really sound great. I think that all these highend pickups
are smoking: Fralin, VooDoo, Lollar, etc. It's just an issue of personal
taste at that point, but they are so much better than the old noisy jobs
that get great tone but carry a lot of baggage from the old world with them
that's not so nice... You can only wax a pickup so much... There's an
original 1951 Nocaster for sale on Ebay for $160,000. I'd love to play it
and see how close they got it. Now obviously the wood on that beauty is old
and sweet, but I was pretty happy to get a guitar that had already aged 7
years as literally a closet classic."

The only thing I can add to what Pepi has to say is I would wonder what all that
would sound like through a Louis Electric KR12 Amp...Check out this!(Designed for Keith Richards).
I have a KR-12 Amp and can recommend them!