Chords for The Making of The American Acoustasonic Telecaster | Fender

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My first factory tour was from Leo Fender, and I've been hooked ever since.
He was all about how the guitar was made.
Where I was about the guitar itself, he was like how it got to become a guitar, right?
So here's how we hold it, here's how we cut it.
I was always the kid, right, growing up where you get the new Legos.
Most people follow the instructions and build what was supposed to be the picture on the box.
I went, awesome, more parts to build my own thing.
_ _ If we could make a modern acoustic, what would we do?
There's no rules, we're a new generation that has permission to think a new way.
Part of the design philosophy was I watch modern players play.
Styles have blurred, right, and merged, and new styles are emerging.
So what if we could make an instrument that [C] fueled that?
I had a couple things that really were [Gm] important.
It had to be a Fender guitar, easy to play, awesome feeling.
It had to make a really great sound on your lap, right?
I [C] wanted the on-lap experience.
Oh, and by the way, it's got world-class [Gm] electric sounds because we're Fender. _
_ _ Kind of looked around [C] and went, ah, Tim Shaw's in Nashville.
Hey, Tim, I [Gm] have this idea.
It's kind of crazy.
[C] We have known of each other for years, but we hadn't worked together.
And the minute we started working together, it was like [Gm] working with my brother.
And we've been able to really cooperate on this because we know where the other guy's coming from.
Brian had an idea.
Brian, Josh, and I sat down literally on the floor with a piece of paper and sketched out
how this guitar was going to function.
Sketches turned into 3D drawings.
It was awesome [C] because it had a vision, and they were cut in wood. _
[Gm] We created the first proof of concept body.
It didn't have a sound [C] port yet.
It did have the forearm contour, and it [Gm] had the inset top.
And you could tap on it and [Cm] realize, man, this thing rings like a cajon.
We [G] talked about the resonances and how we were going to maximize performance on this.
And that was one of the things that really intrigued me about the process was the ability
to have something that responded like an acoustic guitar, but was only an inch and three quarters thick.
So we ended up experimenting with the diameter of the port [Am] and the depth of the port.
I got to a point where I put things back together and went, oh, okay, there we are.
Stop there.
Spruce and mahogany, that's [Em] our formula.
We love that.
And this is how we're going to [Am] do the body.
[Em] And then the next challenge was giving it its voice.
I like to talk about the [Am] story as a, if you think about a singer [Em]-songwriter, you [Am] sit at
home and you write what you think is a good song.
You get brave and you share [Em] it with somebody.
And that person then goes, [Am] it's pretty cool.
I like that.
I like the hook.
[Em] You know, the second verse could be a little better.
[Am] And if you trust them, you [C] let them rewrite the second [Em] verse.
The song gets better.
It was like, okay, who do [Am] we play the song for next?
[Em] Larry [Am] Fishman.
Brian called and told me that he was working on a project.
He was working with Tim [Em] Shaw [Am] on a new guitar concept that was going to require a big leap [C] in electronics.
And [Em] he said, Larry, I think you're the guy to do it.
So we sent him one.
[Am] And he was like, this thing really does [Em] something, you know, and it does something really [C] unique acoustically.
It's a great guitar first.
Awesome.
[Em] He validated that point.
Tim and Brian designed a guitar that [Am] was highly feedback resistant.
It's sensitive [Em] enough to be played acoustically.
Sort of the perfect [Am] performance [C] platform that allowed [Em] us to do our work without the guitar
getting in the way.
[Am] He's like, what do I have to work with?
We said, well, [Em] we want a volume knob, a mod knob, and a five-way [C] switch.
_ _ [Em] You're crazy.
And they're asking for some very, very [Am] breakthrough and special things.
And we could do a lot of them at the time, but [Em] some we couldn't.
We got the [Am] invitation [Bbm] to go back to the Fishman headquarters and sit in Larry's lab and hear
it for the first [Em] time.
We had [D] everything set up.
We had a lot of sounds to pick [G] from.
And we spent a [B] couple of days [D] auditioning the sound choices that would go into [C] this
guitar and [G] tweaking them and volume levels and EQ and so forth.
And it was [C] one of those moments that you [G] never forget.
Here was our love child.
And it had [Bbm] all these wires coming out of it because none of the electronics were on board yet.
They were all out [Db] external.
And there was a series of analog and digital boxes, all daisy-chained together.
The development [Bbm] guitar was the biggest Frankenstein you ever saw in your life.
We had stomp boxes taped to the outside.
We had things on the floor, things in the computers.
And the first strum, I remember looking at [G] Tim almost with tears [C] in my eyes.
The initial [G] chord, the first thing we heard was just amazing.
We looked at each [D] other and went, OK, [G] this is really [C] going to work.
And my heart stopped. _
[Bb] It was relief.
[Dm] It was euphoria.
It was, I can't wait for other [E] people to hear this.
I see a lot of hard work from a lot of talented people.
[F] We were knocked out.
At the end of the day, the performance of this instrument far exceeded the [Am] expectation
that we had going into it.
And I've never seen a room full of bigger smiles [C] from so many people in my life.
We looked around at each other and everybody went, no one's ever heard this.
We kind of [G] knew at the moment we had a game changer.
We should make this in Corona.
This should be [C] at the heart of Fender, be a USA-made modern acoustic.
And that's where the [Am] symphony gets even bigger.
How should it be built?
And how should we manufacture it and [F] put it in production?
So [C] Fred added all this new dimension [Am] to it, just helped refine [C] design ideas into things
that were manufacturable.
And so we built a world-class cell [G] to do just this.
We've got staff that make these that are exclusive to [C] the Acoustasonic Telecaster.
It's huge.
This is the sound that [F] I've heard in my head for 40 years.
And it's here.
You can't get a bad sound [Am] out of this.
And that's part of the deal with [D] Fender.
That's [G] part of the things, one of the things I love about Fender, is that when you plug
a Fender into almost [D] anything, immediately you [G] get a sound you can use and a sound that
will [D] make you want to play music.
You know, the music that this guitar will [A] make will influence the next [D] generation.
So ultimately it's for [G] players that want to be inspired.
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