One expensive guitar or several inexpensive ones?

Admin M@ said:
"Expensive" and "inexpensive" are not useful qualifiers when it comes to choosing guitars/cars/etc.

Instead, you should select items that really please you.
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Agree 100%! I've had an 'expensive' guitar, PRS McCarty Brazilian, and discovered that it didn't equate to 'better' for me. While it played extremely well, had incredible build quality and was beautiful, I had other guitars that cost 25% of it that I enjoyed playing more.
 
Admin M@ said:
"Expensive" and "inexpensive" are not useful qualifiers when it comes to choosing guitars/cars/etc.

Instead, you should select items that really please you.
Click to expand...
But that's what it will boil down to! some like inexpensive guitars and are content with that $250 HB or EART, while others like the 15k Huber Bernie Marsden, some have both! What rounds out your collection? It's not meant to be a good or bad question only an exploratory one.

Budda said:
I think its a car thread now.
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Every thread has a rabbit trail or two as long as we steer it back on track it's all good! ;) pun intended!
 
From a bedroom player perspective, it doesn't really matters, some prefer having one workshorse, some need to buy a guitar regularly and get motivated...

From a gigging and recording musician perspective, I decided early on to get an expensive guitar, I even sacrificed effects and amp for that, and I would redo the same. (I ended up with several expensive...But I'm getting old)

1) You need good luthery and confort, to never fight the instrument and be able to play your best.
2) You need reliability, because hardware slicing strings, faulty electronics, tuning instability are a NO
3) You will sometimes travel light to gig or studio, so once again, better have a beast of a guitar to do it all
Bonus) Like me you're a modern guitarist and you want the most confort, efficiency and reliability you can get.
Anti) You like vintage stuff and want an Authentic guitar, I'm out, I don't like to think they spent efforts to recreate flaws and manufacture cons :D
 
Lax said:
Anti) You like vintage stuff and want an Authentic guitar, I'm out, I don't like to think they spent efforts to recreate flaws and manufacture cons :D
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I don't agree. I mean...yeah, it's weird in some specific cases. I don't know whether they did it or not, but replicating the incorrect bridge/neck angles on an R2 would be silly. But literally every new fangled "super comfy" guitar that I've played hurts my hand. I'm not sure who's ergonomics they were designed for, but it wasn't me.

Which is fine...to each their own.
 
Sixstring said:
But that's what it will boil down to! some like inexpensive guitars and are content with that $250 HB or EART, while others like the 15k Huber Bernie Marsden, some have both! What rounds out your collection? It's not meant to be a good or bad question only an exploratory one.
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I like the exploratory questions, and want to dig deeper into the inexpensive/expensive question.

What is the most $ you would pay for a guitar?

Doesn't matter if you have the money or not. Where do you draw the line at? - 'it's too much'

As mentioned, I have a lot of vintage Gibsons (LPs, LPCs, RDs), and the majority of them were less than $2k. (Granted, i bought them over the years, starting in the 90s...so prices were different)
I have one 70's Goldtop that I paid 2800 for, and that was about the top of the mark for me.
Even my Tom Anderson's, still between 2-2.8k.
That Huber looks crazy nice! I've played one before and it was amazing. but I could never spend $13k on a guitar. It's just over the point of being reasonable for me.

I'd say my cut of is - $3k...maybe 3500 for the perfect guitar.
 
Yeah if you bought 70s era gibsons in 1998 prices were drastically different than 2019 lol. Norlin went from awful to 4kcdn in about a decade?

I never thought i’d spend 2k, then i did. Then 4k, then i did. Then 6k, then i did. My two most expensive and 3 most cheapest guitars will not be sold.

5 figures and spitting distance (I forget usd conversion) is beyond reasonable to me. I have never played a guitar that would make me want to pay that much. After owning a few boutique and custom shop guitars, the extra bling n’ brag past reissue CS just isnt worth it to me personally. 5 figure vintage instruments should increase in value faster, but i dont want those either lol.
 
BBN said:
I'd say my cut of is - $3k...maybe 3500 for the perfect guitar.
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I'm right there with you! For me I have always felt that if I have to pay more than this for a guitar I just got to have I'm scratching an itch that I probably shouldn't scratch.

I feel more comfortable in the $1200- $2500 range, plenty of new and used guitars that are great players and have all of the bells and whistles I would want. The most expensive guitar I have ever bought was a New PRS CU24 and that was back in 07 and that was $2600.
 
BBN said:
What is the most $ you would pay for a guitar?

Doesn't matter if you have the money or not. Where do you draw the line at? - 'it's too much'
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I'm honestly not sure I can answer that. Probably $3k USD....ish. I guess. If nothing changes.

But...if I imagine winning the lottery or something and taking care of long-term "I don't have to work any more but still want to" investments and stopping myself from throwing money away on every little whim, I wouldn't automatically say no to a 6-figure burst just because it's expensive.

It's hard to put a limit on it. Money isn't worth the same thing year to year, and situations change. So, in the abstract, there isn't a limit. In a more reasonable reality...about $3,000 in today's USD.
 
BBN said:
Guitars are not consistent in my experience. I've got 40+ 'keepers' at the moment, many are vintage Gibson. Every one of my LPs plays a little different.
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Umm, yea, huge understatement. Want proof, watch Greg Koch try out some high-end guitars from Wildwood Guitars on youtube. Even over the internet, with little earbuds, I could tell a good guitar, anyone in here could, it's so obvious. He'd be trying a Strat for example, and I'd say "yep, good one" and then look down below the video in the information section and see "the guitar in this video has been sold". Other 4k guitars just didn't have the x-factor. Here's an example of a good one.



When I bought my Ibanez, I tried it against 3 others, they were all different.

I've played 4k PRS's that were awful, others that were magic.

I can't believe people buy guitars without actually trying them.
 
Marantz said:
I can't believe people buy guitars without actually trying them.
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Any time I’ve bought a guitar without playing it first I get so nervous.… But the reality is, online retailers are great these days and you can find anything online including good used deals. And many of us don’t have a quality guitar guitar shop where we live. So I often buy online and have a guitar for a few months and if we don’t mesh just sell it.
 
Marantz said:
Umm, yea, huge understatement. Want proof, watch Greg Koch try out some high-end guitars from Wildwood Guitars on youtube. Even over the internet, with little earbuds, I could tell a good guitar, anyone in here could, it's so obvious. He'd be trying a Strat for example, and I'd say "yep, good one" and then look down below the video in the information section and see "the guitar in this video has been sold". Other 4k guitars just didn't have the x-factor. Here's an example of a good one.



When I bought my Ibanez, I tried it against 3 others, they were all different.

I've played 4k PRS's that were awful, others that were magic.

I can't believe people buy guitars without actually trying them.
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FWIW ...

I haven't bought a guitar other than sight-unseen for a VERY long time - probably the early 1990s. That was pretty much the last time I lived near great guitar shops.

I've been buying online and returning right away if the guitar wasn't right for me. There were also a few that I held on to for longer, but let them go at a loss.

At the moment, my "keeper" guitars are Suhr for electrics, Taylor for acoustics, and a Lakland bass.

I'd much prefer to try before I buy, but that's not been an easy option for me.
 
Marantz said:
Umm, yea, huge understatement. Want proof, watch Greg Koch try out some high-end guitars from Wildwood Guitars on youtube. Even over the internet, with little earbuds, I could tell a good guitar, anyone in here could, it's so obvious. He'd be trying a Strat for example, and I'd say "yep, good one" and then look down below the video in the information section and see "the guitar in this video has been sold". Other 4k guitars just didn't have the x-factor. Here's an example of a good one.



When I bought my Ibanez, I tried it against 3 others, they were all different.

I've played 4k PRS's that were awful, others that were magic.

I can't believe people buy guitars without actually trying them.
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Ok, I'm glad i'm not the only one saying they tried a PRS and had a bad experience.

One cool think about Wildwood - along with a great return policy, you can get on the phone with them, tell the guitar you're interested in, and they will go play it for you and (from my experience) give you an unbiased opinion.
Of course, everyone's opinions are different. But I was trying to decide between 3 LPs and after a few minutes, the guy I had been speaking with called me back and said - yeah, this one (out of the 3) is the one. Everything feels right. And I ended up agreeing with him.
It's a least a little bit of help when trying to buy a guitar online.
 
BBN said:
Ok, I'm glad i'm not the only one saying they tried a PRS and had a bad experience.

One cool think about Wildwood - along with a great return policy, you can get on the phone with them, tell the guitar you're interested in, and they will go play it for you and (from my experience) give you an unbiased opinion.
Of course, everyone's opinions are different. But I was trying to decide between 3 LPs and after a few minutes, the guy I had been speaking with called me back and said - yeah, this one (out of the 3) is the one. Everything feels right. And I ended up agreeing with him.
It's a least a little bit of help when trying to buy a guitar online.
Click to expand...
In an ideal world, they'd only sell the good ones :)
 
BBN said:
Ok, I'm glad i'm not the only one saying they tried a PRS and had a bad experience.

One cool think about Wildwood - along with a great return policy, you can get on the phone with them, tell the guitar you're interested in, and they will go play it for you and (from my experience) give you an unbiased opinion.
Of course, everyone's opinions are different. But I was trying to decide between 3 LPs and after a few minutes, the guy I had been speaking with called me back and said - yeah, this one (out of the 3) is the one. Everything feels right. And I ended up agreeing with him.
It's a least a little bit of help when trying to buy a guitar online.
Click to expand...
Bought my Jackson CS Kelly from Wildwood. A+++ experience would not hesitate to buy from them again (and they're only about 30min from my house, so... bonus!)
 
If I had $7000 (CAD) to burn, I'd love to pick this beauty up.

Custom 24 Piezo 10 Top Electric Guitar Amber Smokeburst​

or $6900 for this:

PRS Santana Retro Core 10 Top Black Gold​

These are in my local shop right now. Lordy lordy!
 

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