Fair enough. But be warned that you really won’t get an “electric” tone with that Taylor, you’ll get an amplified acoustic tone. I own a 114ce that I believe has the same pickup and electronics as the one you’re looking at. It sounds very nice when amplified, but I’m sure not going to play heavy classic rock power chords on it and expect that to sound like my solid-body instruments. I use the electric part of the guitar to do recording, and just run the instrument straight into my computer interface. It is nice to play with some light effects (e.g. reverb), but that sweetening is all I ever add to the tone.
Interesting and helpful. Perhaps I’ll go with a cheaper Taylor CE and also look at a decent solid body electric. I’d rather spend $2,000 and get two well-made guitars, than spend the money on one guitar that won’t do what I want it to do. That will just result in more whining to my wife about needing yet another guitar. So suggestions for a new electric are welcome! 
Learjeff: thanks for that. I think the guitar I have now is suffering from the exact problem you describe. The high E string buzzes, no matter what I do; since this guitar is handmade by some local yokel, it wouldn’t surprise me if he cocked it up somehow.
Chefguy: a MIM (Made In Mexico) Tele – and I’m told especially a Baja Tele – is not a bad choice, and not that much money at $500 new, $800 for a Baja. The Telecaster is the most basic but solid guitar there is, and MIM ones are well thought of. I suppose it depends on if you want single coils or humbuckers in a guitar if you’ll like a plain old basic Tele. There are (or at least have been) humbucker models though.
Here are all the MM Telecasters that Musician’s Friend offers. You still very likely will want any instrument you buy to be set up by a tech, but we’re talking <$50, and it’s just something you have to do when you buy an electric guitar. I’ve never had issues where a nut’s action was too high buying a reputable brand, but always the intonation isn’t quite right, or some other thing.
I mentioned earlier that I’d seen Mimi Fox at a jazz festival. She was doing some finger work that I’ve never seen and am at a loss to describe. On this video, you can see it at 45 seconds in. It looks like some sort of combination of harmonic-with-picking-and-hammering, using both hands. No idea. Even my guitar instructor is a bit puzzled by it and thought perhaps it was similar to the heavy metal technique of “tapping”, which I’m also unfamiliar with. I turn to the experts here for an explanation, and please “Layman’s terms! None of that insider bullshit!”
Those are called “harp harmonics.”
Think of the harmonic you get when you lightly mute an open string at the 12th fret and pluck it. A pretty, high note exactly an octave above the open string. A harp harmonic is simply doing that with a fretted note. It’s easy to try. If you normally use a pick, you’ll either need to palm it or put it down for this:
- With your usual fretting hand, fret (for example) a G on the third fret of the low E string.
- With the tip of the index finger of your picking hand, lightly mute (but do not fret) a G one octave up, over the 15th fret of that same string.
- With the thumb of your picking hand, pluck the string between the muted note and the fretted note. (Alternatively, you may use your middle or ring finger to pluck the string on the other side of the muted note. It works either way.)
Voila! It’s very easy to do, but very hard to do so smoothly and cleanly that you can work it into phrases of fretted notes. That chick is bad ass.
Thanks, I’ll give it a try later. Yes, she is indeed a bad-ass. I was totally blown away by her solo performance this year. It seems she has that same quality that some piano players have, of being able to play both ends almost independently, sort of like having two brains. Oscar Peterson could do that. As I look at that video, I can see that she is not only seemingly moving her index picking finger to different harmonic frets, but also plucking with her middle finger as she uses her left hand for other things. It makes my brain hurt trying to figure it out. There’s a more complicated passage at about 1:10 on the same video.
I haven’t seen the video but look forward to it.
Sounds like a technique that Lenny Breau was the master of. I haven’t seen Le Ministre on the boards lately, but he is a huge fan of Breau’s.
They are similar to what Eddie Van Halen does on songs like Dance the Night Away during the chorus and bridge, and on Women in Love off the same album. But with an electric that is set up with a low action and with a lot of gain in the signal, you can tap the harmonic simply by tapping the fret 12 frets up from where you fret. With an acoustic, you need to do a harmonic “touch” then lightly pluck the string to get it going, per OneCent’s overview…
It does sound like she has chops…
I just looked at a couple of Breau videos in which he explains how to use the technique; cleared up some questions in my mind, as he slowed things down so it could be followed.
This guy is a monster with harmonics. He uses a technique that interleaves harmonics with fretted notes and the effect is heavenly.
Tuck Andress also does amazing things with harmonics on Over The Rainbow on his album Reckless Precision (a few versions available on YouTube).
Tommy Emmanuel and more magic with harmonics, at the beginning and at 3:30, and the end. With nice close-ups.
Well, I pulled the trigger on a new electric. I was getting a new windshield put on the RV and took a walk. Half a block from the glass place I found a music store and went in. Holy shit, talk about music porn! A wall full of guitars, lots of drum kits, etc.
Anyway, I talked to their guitar guy about my feeble requirements and he steered me to some used guitars that he had personally tuned up and checked out. I was vacillating between a Fender MIM Strat and and a Fender USA Strat, with a price difference of a few hundred. Both were gorgeous, but the USA came with the hard case. The previous owner had put in a set of pickups of a type used by Stevie Ray, and the original pickups were still in the case. He also threw in a couple of sets of strings. Nice red sunburst finish, no dings, no scratches. Sounds great; far and away better than the tele that I have. I was also looking at a Taylor 114CE for an acoustic, but figured I better ease into it in deference to my spouse.
So yay for me.
Total Yay for you! Congrats!
I have to run, but will say something I have said in a bunch of threads: If you are NOT a whammy bar user, you should have the store “block the trem” - take off the back plate and stick a piece of wood into place so the trem block cannot move. It renders the whammy bar inoperative, but makes tuning the guitar a lot easier, especially when changing strings.
My $.02
Is that something I can do myself?
I am sure you could if you are reasonably handy. I would check YouTube - I am sure there are a few clips there. Also Google “Blocking a Strat’s trem” and I am sure you’ll get a ton of hits. Heck, Clapton does it.
Congrats ChefGuy, Excellent choice as it is one of the more versatile guitars out there! As far as blocking, if you’re comfortable with basic woodworking, here ya go!
I was going to suggest a semihollow like an Epi 335, or a WildKat, which may be my next guitar after my next two are built. Winter tires stole my moneys for the Hawaiian shirt Les Paul I am going to put together.
May I humbly suggest your first pedals be a distortion and maybe a wah. I have a Boss DS-1 and a Vox wah but don’t be afraid to go to the store and mess about a bit.
Yeah, remind us: what are you playing through and what kind of music do you want to play?
I’m not really a strat person, but it sounds sweet, ChefGuy. (pics?)
On the strats and stratlike copies I’ve owned, I didn’t actually block them. Instead I put at least three springs on (more if they were lying around and anchor points available in the guitar), and adjusted the wood screws on the plate they attach to so that the tremolo is pulled firmly to the body - firmly enough that when you tune to open E, it still doesn’t move. It leaves the tremolo so that you can use it if you have a really firm hand, but otherwise works largely like a blocked version. It’s the best of both worlds, IMHO.
Right now it’s a variety of things to learn technique. Examples: Layla, Blackbird, Boom Boom, Sarah Smile, Wind Cries Mary, some James Taylor. Basically going back and forth between acoustic and electric, ending the sessions with some blues work. I like the blues riffs and hope to do more with that. I’m using a Roland Cube.
Yay for you! I think you could have been quite happy with a MIM strat, they’re well thought of, but an American Standard is an excellent instrument. I have a red (“candy cola”) one myself. Since you describe it as “red sunburst”, I’ll hazard a guess that your guitar is Sienna Sunburst color, a nice choice.
Note that the latest version of Am Standard Strats come with Custom Shop Fat50 pickups, which I love for really great clean tones. Check if the included, stock pickups are in a cream color bezel, and if so you probably have fat 50’s. These are great pickups, IMO. You should consider trying them and seeing if you like them better! I think Fender switched over to Fat 50’s for American Strats in 2011, not sure. Find the serial number on the instrument (back of the headstock), and Fender has some site you can look that up and get the year. I don’t know if the Fat 50 designation is on the back of the pickups so I’m not sure how determine what your ‘stock’ pickups are by inspection.
So the easy way to ‘block’ a tremolo is to simply add all possible tremolo springs to it (open the hatch in the back to do so; I think 5 is the maximum number of springs, yours probably has 3 installed. Look on Amazon, they sell a set for just a few bucks), then use a screwdriver to tighten the springs until the bridge is flat against the body, immobile. This will possibly make the action really really low, lower than you’d like, so you may need to either adjust the neck relief a bit, or raise all the saddles on your bridge by the same number of turns with a small allen wrench to compensate.
Have fun!