Fender Francis Rossi Telecaster

Status Quo must have been one of the inspirations for Spinal Tap= they had some psychedelic hits in the 60s then reinvented themselves as a boogie-rock band in the 70s, and updated once again with more melodic elements throughout the 80s. One constant was the twin-Telecaster formula perfected in the 70s by Francis Rossi and Rick Parfitt (RIP). Despite being popular in the UK and Europe for five decades(!), even opening the Live Aid festival, Quo never really made it big in the US or elsewhere. Perhaps then not too surprising that for a guitar as iconic as this, and Quo as Tele players in general, Fender USA never made a signature version. Leave it to Fender Japan (and Quo were never huge in Japan either) to release a very limited set of 100 instruments of Francis Rossi/Rick Parfitt Telecaster models, back in 2003-2004. As you can imagine they are extremely hard to find today. And here Fender Japan came through again with the important Rossi modified details, 3 Lace sensors, split G&L style bridge, and even the hole in the body.

Francis Rossi's #1 1957 Tele was sold at auction in London for £118,000. Not too shabby for an instrument that in his words was hardly playable any more, as it was very hard to keep in tune and the wood had 'gone soft'. But then whoever's buying probably wasn't intending to use it for studio sessions