Years ago I bought a used 1983 Tele. It's so perfect that I refuse to change anything about it except for strings. I have kept the ugly black Straplok buttons. I've kept the small white sticker on the neck plate with the shop's inventory number. It's illegible now but I'm never peeling it off. My point is you can't improve perfection, so I don't. Maybe the tone is in the little sticker on the neck plate, maybe it's in the black straploks, who knows. I'm not risking it.
One day we'll find out that CBS fenders sounded inferior to pre-CBS because of the black plastic neck plate pad.