C'mon, baby, take a look at my Fender...
- Letters To You
- 2 hours ago
- 2 min read
September 2, 2026
Bruce Springsteen, in conversation with Brian Fallon, can be seen throughout guitar-manufacturer Fender's newly released film The Fender Telecaster: The One That Started It All., celebrating the 75th anniversary of Leo Fender's introduction of the Telecaster guitar model (originally dubbed the "Broadcaster") at The National Association of Music Merchants (NAMM)'s annual show in 1950. It's the company's self-described "love letter to the Telecaster."
Springsteen and Fallon are among the many legendary axe-wielders appearing in newly filmed sequences talking about their favorite guitar model, including - in order of appearance - Keith Richards, Jimmy Page, Jack White, Jason Isbell, John 5, Andy Summers, Keith Urban, Susan Tedeschi, Jim Root, Mike Campbell, Graham Coxon, Christone "Kingfish" Ingram, Joe Bonamassa, Sheryl Crow, Brad Paisley, Mason Stoops, Vince Gill, and Tom Morello. The film also features archival audio and images of other legendary Telecaster enthusiasts like James Burton, Albert Collins, George Harrison, Chrissie Hynde, Joe Strummer, and Muddy Waters.
During the film's Springsteen-Fallon sequences, Bruce holds in his hands the guitar, his Frankensteinesque Tele-Esquire hybrid that graces the album cover of Born to Run (as well as the covers of Live 1975-85, Human Touch, and Wrecking Ball.) "At the beginning," Springsteen tells Fallon at one point, "when I signed my first record contract, I was going to get to buy a new guitar... I knew I wanted a Telecaster. This is the piece of The (True) Cross right here... This is the guitar I found in Phil Petillo's shop, 1972. It was hangin' on the wall; cost $185. It's a mutt. It's a Telecaster body from the early fifties, and an Esquire neck." In another sequence that appears earlier in the film, Springsteen says this to Fallon about the Telecaster model: "Jeff Beck played one, Pete Townshend played one, Steve Cropper played one, James Burton played one... That covered everything from rock music to soul music to rockabilly, and it was just the guitar for me."
