“A buddy of mine…” 😂 Terrific video, Zac.

Just thought of this the other day: when I was a kid looking for my first electric guitar (circa 1996) I was in a shop here in Ireland, noodling on a sunburst Strat knock-off, when I looked up and saw a blue flower Tele hanging on the wall! Almost certainly a reissue, who knows if any originals even made it to Irish shores, but it caught my eye. If I’d had the money I woulda left the store with it. I even told the fellas at school about it, and they thought I was nuts! lol… “a guitar with FLOWERS on it??”… “Uh, yeah… But they were COOL flowers!” 😂

You know how you can tell these guitars are straight up gawdy? Elvis’s guitar player was afraid to show it him. The guy who did his show in white jumpsuits covered in rhinestones, huge gold sunglasses and danced the way he did. James Burton was afraid to show THAT GUY the guitar 😂😂😂. That’s how gawdy the guitar is 😂😂😂. In a cool way of course.

thank you for another story that will fuel my unending affection for teles Zac

12:34 - a “buddy”. :)

Wanted a paisley Tele for a while. Didn’t know how difficult it was to make. Once again another magisterial brilliant guitar history lesson from Zac.

Just watched the Zak Kuhn interview with Brad and said I wanted a long form video about Brad getting that guitar of his. The Blue Unicorn Tele.

I bought a blue flower Tele around 1973. The front and back of the body finish had disintegrated and had been refinished with a clear coat. The edge of the body still had the blue paint. I had the guitar shop remove the blue paint and refinish with a clear coat for a uniform appearance. I painted the back-side of the clear pickguard to hide the body routes. I was very happy with it! Back in the day when guitars were just instruments, not collectible! Oh well!

I 1st saw cheapy lightweight body copies of both blue & pink years ago & bought them knowing nothing. What I now know I've learned mostly from you & I thank you. I just love 'em....

I have a Made in Japan 1984 version of this guitar. Amazing to play and the finish has held up well! Thanks for featuring this guitar.

Just magnificent stuff, Brother. Long live the tele....!

You are my kind of Tele nerd!❤

Fascinating never seen one of those Blue floral Paisley ! Thanks Zac it's great

Great video, helps me a lot with understanding one of my guitars, which is an original Blue Floral '68. The sides are still blue, but of course the flowers are gone. All original parts, been in the family since '68.

I love that story. Thanks for sharing Zac! 🎸

Very informative, thanks Zac. I've always liked the Blue Flower Teles.

I had a 2000s MIJ RI that I got in like new condition for $550 and I traded it because I didn't like the pickups. I always regret it. But - the series of trades ended with the 2001 SG Standard that I have now and it's really good too.

As I recall, a lot of companies were trying to cash in on psychedelia post the Summer of Love (1967) and Flower Power, and not just in clothing. That may have been the motivation behind the Pink Paisley and Blue Flower Teles. It was a quick and dirty way for a manufacturer to jump onto that particular bandwagon without having to make a major investment. After all, Fender are a So Cal company and California was where it was at musically in America at the time. Haight Ashbury was at its height and an awful lot of Fender's best customers were moving in with each other in Laurel Canyon and forming new bands.

Absolutely fantastic have a wonderful day Zac ❤😊

I've heard of that friend with the "black" paisley... thank you for sharing this!

I love them. So quirky and cool. I have a Pink Paisley MIJ from '97 and a Blue Flower MIJ from 2019.

Awesome video! My number one guitar for the last 20 years has been a blue floral reissue Tele. Would love to have an original ‘68.

The more I look at them the more I love them. Especially the blue.

Zac, First LOVE your channel! You, 5 Watt World and Rick Beato are the best music channels anywhere! I’ve researched your episode history and couldn’t find any episode devoted to the Gretsch guitar. Particularly that the greatest country, or any genre, guitarist was a Gretsch aficionado it would certainly offer an interesting history.

Thanks Zac, fascinating to see the origination of these. I have a Custom Shop ‘71 (?) reissue thats Blue Flower/Thinline/Wide Range HB’s and a Strat bridge. Lovely guitar.

Mahalo Zak! Another informative show.

Your buddy with the black refinish Tele… Was it Brad Blue Flower? 😂

I have been wanting to build one of these forever but I missed the boat on the allparts bluepaisley bodies. Great video and history lesson. Thank you very much.

Thanks Zac, really interesting video.

Great video Zac, my Xotic T style guitar I ordered 6 months ago is supposed to come any day, the wait is killing me.

With poly they still sound great and the full maple necks on those ‘69s are amazing. Ask James Burton. 😉

fascinating history ,thanks Zac

So as often happened to guitars back then, many were deflowered!😂

The shade on sides is perfect.

Really cool story! I’ve only seen one of these before. I didn’t know it came from fender as the paisley did…

Cool episode Zac. Very informative. Glad to be a Patreon and see some of these episodes early. It must have been frustrating for someone back then to have payed the equivalent of over 400 dollars extra only to find out that the finish wouldn’t hold up in the long term. I wonder what price those rare examples would fetch these days.

Great video Zac, this topic has never been as extensively covered (or as accurately). Regarding your estimate at the intro, I think it's more like 10x the number of pink paisley compared to blue flower. You rarely ever see the latter. I'm lucky to own one of each, they're super cool guitars.

I enjoyed today's episode.

I’ve wanted to build one of those! I remember on the Reranch forum a person was also using cloth bandanas vs contact paper.

Great video !

Hi Zac, I was extremely lucky enough to purchase an 1968 orignial blue floral tele from a gentleman yesterday. Its an absolute stunner! His father bought this guitar for him when he was 16 and in 1972 he noticed the back foil was coming off from the buckle wear and was afraid that the front foil was also going to come off. So he removed the pickguard and made a thin clear acrylic that covers the whole front of the guitar and was able to preserve all the flower foils on the front. You said on the video that you glued some of the foil back to the guitar that you showed in the video. What glue did you use? I have some foil coming off on the back and thinking of gluing them back. Thanks for great video!

With all respect Mr. Zack. That is one "FUGLY" Guitar. You rock. Have fun on tour. I'll stay tuned in.

Hey Zac, when you ask who would pay an extra 400 these days just for the finish, isn't that what fender did with the Screamadelica model? Took a standard player series strat, stuck a different finish on it and charged around 400 extra for it? Their original price was 1200 which is about 400 over what a standard player series was. They did drop the price somewhat to get rid of them as they didn't seem to sell as well as they anticipated, but originally they were around 400 over the standard player price.

Top job Zac 👍

Cool story- thank you!

Love your videos!!!

Great video Zac. I have a Fender custom shop blue flower ‘68 which is now my favourite guitar. Do you know what the plan is for the brown refinished guitar on the video? I hope it will be refinished one day soon.

I’m telling ya Zac can tell a good story. Cheers 🍻

I don’t know that I agree that ‘WE’ haven’t figured out how to recreate it. Bill Crook has gotten it as close to perfect as you can get without buying it straight from Borden chemical. He has definitely taken the time.

To do a more durable reissue of this the design should be silkscreened. Leave the paper behind. Wonderful video - thanks Zac!

I remember at Ace Music they were trying to sale Telecaster Bass for $200. Who knew.

I bought one of these in 1968 at Washington Music Center. It was great until the finish started cracking and then curling up.

Great info as usual, thank you so much. I have both the MIJ Fender Pink Paisley ‘69 RI and a Tokai Breezysound Tele Blue Flower, both are nice guitars with the Blue Flower neck better fitting my fingers. You scared me a bit that paper often wears out, a thing I didn’t know about, so I’ll stop taking them to gigs and only use them at home! 😂

I have a partscaster in almost the exact color as the side of that Tele. The company I bought the body from calls it Sherwood Green.

For a second, I thought you had Brad’s blue paisley! That thing must be a one-off. I don’t remember seeing an original blue flower, either. These things are all super cool…why does a yellowed clear coat make everything look so much better?

The bump in Strat popularity in the UK would also have been helped by the lifting of the post war import embargo.. Prior to that US made guitars were very hard to come by in the UK, hence the popularity of brands like Burns, Watkins, Hofner etc..

I remember when these and the pinks came out ... they caused quite a stir. Then and now, I actually prefer the BLUES!

I have a Fender Japan blue floral tele. I love it, one of my favorites! I've always been curious about the history and building techniques. Thanks Zac for doing this! A real treat!

You mention Tele sales dropping off in the early ‘60s and picking up again in 1966. That was probably due to one guy-Mike Bloomfield. When he first came to prominence around 1965 with the Paul Butterfield Blues Band and then with Bob Dylan, he was playing a Tele. I think a lot of rock guys, of which I was one back then, got interested in Teles as a guitar for rock and blues virtuosos. Jeff Beck was playing one too. Regarding Blue Floral and Pink Paisley Teles, I graduated high school in ‘68, the year those came out, and growing up as a hippie-in-the-making in San Francisco, I thought they were goofy, and an example of Corporate America trying to be cool. Well, I was 18…At some point, I got to thinking the Pink Paisley was OK, probably because of James Burton, but in the early ‘70s I was still a Gibson player. I got my first Tele new in 1974, sunburst with a maple neck, and really didn’t give it a chance-it was so different than the Les Paul I’d been playing, and I traded it in on a new Strat. Later in ‘74, I got a ‘59 Tele and realized how great they can be. Loved Teles ever since, and when I started playing country, I had the right guitar for the job. But I’ve never owned a Paisley one, although I wouldn’t turn one down!

Watching this with my project telecaster bass with the 1968 telecaster bass body. No foil here.

i want one bad! there’s a CS “50’s” reissue thinline tele ive been watching…need it to brother w my CS pink paisley jm! but your insight on how the reissues aren’t done right re: the embossing and stuff bummed me out. 😫😫😫lol

My dream guitar. I have a reissue Tele and Strat, but they just don't look like the original. Would love to find someone that can copy the original pattern.

Marketed to the flower power hippies who generally had no money.😊

They had one for sale in the 80's at a store across the street from Manny's in NYC called We Buy Guitars for a couple of hundred bucks. I really wanted to buy it but I couldn't come up with the money. Oh well.

Great episode! Lots of new info I haven't heard before.

I have a complete all original hardware and case pink paisley in great shape. So I don’t take out on gigs anymore, haven’t in many years but it also has a sound I can’t match with any other tele I’ve tried. Do you think the finish has something to do with the sound

Is it possible that this was the material that was wrapped around Jesse Ed Davis' '59 Tele on the Rock n Roll Circus? It's a dark greenish paisley pattern.

Hey Zac - is the left side of the VS XO an ODR1/Open Road?

Great episode - thanks! Have always wondered how these came to be. That piece you played at the beginning - was that your composition? Sounds familiar but can't place it.

I have a tale of a sparkle silver '68 Tele I butchered that was resurrected to its original glory via a Marty Bell sparkle silver refinished '68 Blue Floral body. Before you call the cops, the '68 Blue Floral's body had deteriorated to the point the frustrated owner had its body refinished in Lake Placid blue. The original sparkle silver body of my '68 had been stripped to bare wood in the early 70s, routed for a humbucker and basically beaten to crap. I finally gave it away and replaced it with a Warmoth (still have it as basis for a Partscaster). To honor the sadly deceased original owner of the '68 sparkle silver, from whom I'd traded for it in '73, I decided to restore the guitar to its original condition. Number one I needed an original EARLY '68 body with the wire channel and recessed ferrules, which is what the Feb '68 spatrkle silver had. The refined Blue Floral body was for sale on Ebay and filled the bill. Marty did a stupendous job of the finish and the guitar is now all '68, just not the '68 that left the factory. Hey, that body needed a good home! The body came to me with the heavy tape over the wire channel intact, though it was removed to do the sparkle silver refin. It also came with the original clear Blue Floral pickguard, though it's in pretty bad condition.

Great video of Waylon doing me and Bobby McGee the guitar player in the background is playing one the video is probably from the 60 or 70s how about doing a video on the Waylon telecaster love your videos

Would these have been more difficult to do things like pickup/electronics upgrades? Does the paper cover the cavities?

It bothers me the Fender reissues have so little of the "paper" finish on them. The edges of blue or pink start way to early on the front and rear. Would love to add a blue floral to the collection, but the reissues don't look right. Cost saving method I suppose, but I am the proud owner of an Early Crook Custom Pink Paisley that looks amazing!

Have you ever checked out Daves Guitars in LaCrosse, WI? Vintage Tele heaven. Also I love the Jesus sticker. Big love from KY!

Have you tried the Rolling b bender mod ?

I like your "Scandinavian" T-shirt. I live in Sweden.

My sheet of vintage cling-foil is dimpled rather than "weaved" let's say, like the paisley stuff. Truly a unique product!

12:34 “Buddy of mine” who just got back from the car wash to remove the Mud on the Tires of his pickup no doubt. Hee hee. Fun video Zac!

So is the guitar yours or your "buddy's" guitar

I didn’t buy one for $175 and I still kick myself for it 😢

if this was purple i'd sell my gold paisley les paul for it

Who pays more money for the guitar with a different color. Really. Look at all the people who think it's a good idea to pay thousands more for a Gibson LP Murphy Lab. Hey guy's I have some new cars that look like they have a couple hundred thousand miles on to sell you for way more than a perfect new one.

Ive never liked the finish on those guitars. Its a pretty poor quality finish

Inflation. from 1968 to 2024. That's a $50. difference. According to the media, It's a 1 Billion dollar difference.

Personally. I would have went for the blonde. I would have saved $1 Billion dollars in 2024 money, and had a prettier guitar.🤣

Man this cat is always awesome