Fender, Cease & Desists - Fret Talk 457 roundup

This week’s podcast very quickly descended into one of those “has one of the biggest guitar makers in the industry completely lost its mind” episodes.

The main story was Fender apparently going absolutely scorched earth with cease and desist letters following their recent German court win over Strat-style guitars.

And honestly, the whole thing feels like watching a car crash in slow motion - painful and inevitable.

The conversation started with Fender’s court case in Germany against a company making Strat-style instruments. Apparently Fender won by default, and now there are rumours flying around that companies ranging from boutique builders all the way up to companies like Thomann and Harley Benton have potentially been hit with legal threats over S-style guitars (no official news, so this is speculation at this point).

Which immediately triggered the age-old guitar community argument:

At what point does a guitar shape stop belonging to one company and just become part of music culture?

Because whether Fender likes it or not, the Strat shape is basically the electric guitar silhouette.

Even people who know absolutely nothing about guitars would probably draw one if you asked them what a guitar looked like.

That’s partly why the whole thing has rubbed so many players the wrong way.

Especially because guitar companies have spent decades carefully avoiding Fender trademarks already.

We all know that S-style is shorthand for a Strat type guitar, much like a T-style is a tele or a "single cut" usually means a LP shape.

The entire industry basically developed its own legal safe-word vocabulary years ago.

One of the funniest parts of the discussion was diving back into the old “lawsuit guitar” era from the 70s, where Japanese brands like Ibanez ended up making instruments that are now weirdly collectible because they got too close to Gibson and Fender designs.

Which somehow led us onto headstocks.

Because guitarists will always eventually end up talking about headstocks.

There was genuine appreciation for Schecter managing to basically reverse the Gibson open-book headstock shape and somehow get away with it.

A sort of subtle legal trolling.

Like the guitar equivalent of copying somebody’s homework but changing enough words so the teacher can’t prove it.

The overall feeling though was that Fender’s current approach just feels… bad.

Not “another overpriced signature model” bad.

Actual morale-killing bad.

The sort of thing that makes the industry feel smaller and less creative.

Particularly when smaller builders are the ones potentially getting caught in the blast radius.

For the rest of the conversation, check out the episode over on YouTube at www.youtube.com/@frettalkpodcast

A Poddy Good Time! Fret Talk Episode 456

 Marshall, Pac-Man and the Return of the “Why Does This Exist?” Guitar Gear Debate

This week’s podcast basically became an accidental deep dive into the weird state of modern guitar gear.

We started with the new Hendrix Marshall stack, got completely distracted by a Pac-Man Telecaster, and somewhere along the way questioned whether Jimi Hendrix has now become less of a musician and more of an endlessly renewable licensing agreement.

So, pretty normal guitar discourse really.

The Purple Hendrix Marshall Is Either Amazing or Completely Ridiculous

The biggest talking point this week was the new Marshall Hendrix anniversary half stack — a hand-wired Plexi-style monster covered in this wild purple splatter finish that genuinely looks like somebody let Grimace design a vintage amp.

And honestly?

We kinda liked it, eventually...

It’s got that very specific “stoner doom band rehearsing in a lock-up” aesthetic where you can practically hear someone playing one sustained note through a fuzz pedal for 12 straight minutes.

Spec-wise, it’s exactly what you’d expect:

• 100 watts
• No master volume
• Four-input Plexi layout
• Hendrix Fuzz Face included
• Loud enough to legally qualify as weather

Which immediately sparked the eternal question:

Who is this actually for anymore?

Another Hendrix amp.

Another Hendrix fuzz.

Another Hendrix commemorative thing.

At this point it genuinely feels like guitar companies have discovered a sort of infinite Hendrix content generator.

And to be clear, Hendrix absolutely deserves celebrating forever.

But there is a point where it starts to feel less like tribute gear and more like somebody at a board meeting saying:

“The Hendrix estate isn’t going to pay itself.”

The funniest part is that if Marshall had released this exact same amp without the Hendrix branding and just called it something absurd like:

“The Doom Wizard”

…people probably still would’ve loved it.

Including us.

Because underneath all the branding, it’s still an extremely cool-looking Marshall.

The Pac-Man Telecaster Is Peak 2026 Guitar Marketing

Then came the Pac-Man Telecaster.

A sentence I never thought I would be saying...

Fender has apparently decided that what guitarists have been desperately waiting for all these years is a Telecaster covered in Pac-Man graphics.

Ghosts.

Maze artwork.

Pellets.

The whole thing.

And we spent a genuinely long amount of time trying to work out what the connection between Pac-Man and guitars actually is.

Because usually with crossover gear there’s at least some vague thematic excuse.

But this really does just feel like:

“People recognise both of these brands, so technically this is content.”

The weird part is we probably would’ve respected it more if they’d gone fully unhinged with it.

Give it a built-in 8-bit fuzz.

Make the guitar sound like an 80s arcade machine, why not throw in one of those little emulators and actually have it play Pac-Man too.

At least then the guitar would feel connected to the idea beyond simply having Pac-Man printed on it.

It was so confusing that the more we spoke about it, the madder Alex got.

If you'd like to hear the full episode, head on down to YouTube and check it out. Give us a like too, it all helps.

https://youtu.be/x7GcLd65P6o