I played the Tom DeLonge Starcaster and expected to feel nostalgic – but this smartly designed signature has given one of Fender’s most unpopular guitars a new lease of life

Fender Tom DeLonge Starcaster.

I was part of the generation that took their first steps on electric guitar by learning blink-182 songs.

All the Small Things taught me power chords. What’s My Age Again? was my first frustrating encounter with string skipping. I learned the catalog front to back – M+M’s’ whip-fast pull-offs and Carousel’s frenetic scale runs – before, 20 years ago, blink-182 became one of the first bands I ever saw live… although by that stage DeLonge had switched to his new beau, a signature Gibson ES-333.