This Is The Cheapest Relic’d Tele I Could Find, And It’s Not Bad

I really am pleased with this cheap find on Amazon and I think more people should try it.

Cheap guitars are awesome. You probably feel the same way if you regularly visit this website. So keeping with that theme, we’ll spend this week talking about a Telecaster I rolled the dice on. While researching cheap Teles for a big project for Ultimate-Guitar, I figured I’d just poke around Amazon and see what random brands I could find.

There’s always some random, cheap, re-branded Tele to be found on Amazon for a shockingly low amount of money. And while I won’t say that it may be environmentally or ethically solid to buy these guitars often, I thought I’d roll the dice just this once to investigate what you actually get.

Lo and behold, I stumbled across this relic’d Tele from a brand called Censtar for just under $230. I was obviously curious if it was going to be any good, because it admittedly looked really good. I mean, I know relic’d guitars are a bit divisive, but I actually like them. My Mexican Strat is naturally relic’d after 10+ years of dragging it around with me, and it looks just as good as a relic’d guitar like this.

However, the attention to detail on this cheap relic’d Tele was impressive. There was realistic texture, depth, and patterns to the work, and it was awesome. But then I plugged it in, and it was even more awesome.

Sounds Like A Tele

The best compliment I can give this affordable Tele is that it sounded exactly like a good Tele does. Nothing fancy, no crazy feature set, just nice slap and twang from the single coil pickups.

I plugged the guitar into a variety of my pedals and the Universal Audio Dream and Ruby amp sims, as you’ve become accustomed to hearing. I think it sounded pretty dang good. It had great depth when I added gain, filling the space with sound and even a touch of sustain. Cleans were sparkly, and the neck pickup was smooth.

Let me be clear, this wasn’t the best Tele I’d ever played, nor do I think it sounded objectively better than a Fender or anything. But for $229, it sounded very good, sounded like a Tele, and looked great. If you’re in need a cheap Tele as a backup, or can’t afford to spend a ton while expanding your tonal palette, this is quite a good value. Sometimes you roll the dice on these cheap guitars, and sometimes you’re rewarded.

While you can always get a lemon, there’s something fun about finding these hidden gems. It almost feels wrong, and because the brand name isn’t particularly well known, I bet you could take this up on stage and no one would bat an eye. Some would guess it’s cheap, others might think it’s some local boutique builder they have never heard of. My point isn’t to say that you should care what other people think, it’s more so that the quality here is pretty high so I doubt many people would assume it’s a $229 Amazon find.

I’d recommend rolling the dice on one too if you’re interested, and you can find more specs and details here.