What happened to the world of guitars?

[Rct851]

I’m about to add to the list of 30 something year olds who have never played at all but want to learn. Are the boss combo amps crap? Would you buy a China made dean? Is the esp e-ii line of guitars noticeably better in fit and finish then the LTD variants to the untrained eye?

What happened to the world of guitars?

I was recently in Guitar Center because Ive had an itch to play guitar again. Havent played in a long time, but was fairly active when I was younger. Couldnt solo to save my life, but I loved playing Thrash, Speed and Death Metal rhythm guitar. All the guitars and amps are gone except my first...

www.svtperformance.com

 

[Balt21]

The Boss Katana amps seem to get a lot of praise for their price and have a lot of built in effects that can be expanded on with their software as well.

I don’t know enough about those guitars to give a good opinion, but my advice would be to spend more money on an amp than a guitar. If you’re looking at ESP e-ii level guitars, I would shift more of your budget to the amp. Generally speaking, a $300 guitar through a $1,000 amp is going to sound better than a $1,000+ guitar through a $300 amp. I just pulled those numbers out of the sky, but whatever your budget, I would shoot for a higher quality amp over guitar.

As far as fit and finish, even if you can’t play yet, just go to a store and hold some of the guitars you’re interested in. See if you can tell a difference in the way they feel to justify spending the extra money. Notice how some guitars have fatter or skinny necks, different fret boards will feel smoother if you bend the strings while others feel rougher, some neck finishes (back of the neck) feel sticky while others are smoother, switches/knobs will feel different, etc.

I would also bring along a friend who plays and have them play to see if you can tell a difference in the sound (or just ask one of the employees to play for you if you don’t know anyone who plays).

Check out the Andertons Music YouTube channel, they do a lot of shootouts of expensive vs more affordable guitars and talk about the differences, as well as many $1000 complete rigs to get an idea of what you can get for your money.

 

[CobraBob]

@Balt21, good points about how guitars of different manufacturers/models can vary so much, meaning try them out at the store to ensure the one you buy will not only sound decent, but feel comfortable. I noticed in the Joe Satriani video that @_Satch_ posted that he said at the end after a lot of fingering on that cheap Chinese guitar that it "was a bit painful". How you play, bend the strings or move across the fret boards can definitely make some guitars feel more comfortable if you do a lot of playing. My dad taught me how to play (he had an original Martin) and sadly after a couple of years I joined the Navy and never played again.

 

[_Satch_]

As far as fit and finish, even if you can’t play yet, just go to a store and hold some of the guitars you’re interested in. See if you can tell a difference in the way they feel to justify spending the extra money. Notice how some guitars have fatter or skinny necks, different fret boards will feel smoother if you bend the strings while others feel rougher, some neck finishes (back of the neck) feel sticky while others are smoother, switches/knobs will feel different, etc.

+1 on all of this!
Get your hands on as many different guitars as you can to see what feels BEST TO YOU... there are so many variables that come into play just on the neck feel alone. Fretboard radius, shape of the back of the neck in your hand, jumbo frets vs narrow frets, scale length/neck width and the set up of the guitar from the factory. The setup of the guitar can be changed to zero in on what really feels right for you as it pertains to the action of the guitar (string height from the fretboard). Also experiment with resting the meaty part of you picking hand over top of the bridge pieces. Some guitars really feel BAD here with the height adjustment screws poking into your hand, and when you get better at playing, you will utilize palm muting techniques to drown out any notes ringing out for a long time, so you really want this area to feel comfortable when resting you hand on it.. Just realized that this thread was just resurrected from 3 years ago... did the OP ever get back into guitar playing?
-Satch

 

[Blk04L]

Holy bump lol.