New year, new guitar?
I have a motley handful of instruments in my studio which done a lot of work over the years.
But the only real ‘pro-level’ one is a pre-CBS strat. Well, our investments seem to have been doing well for the last couple of years, and my wife seems to be in a genial mood… so I’m thinking of acquiring one more ‘serious’ instrument.
Of the classics, I have never owned a real Les Paul or Tele.
So, fellow players: which of those two would you go for? Or something else?
Fender has introduced several models ranging in price from around $600 to $2500.
I bought the Special Edition FMH three years ago. It includes coil taping features.
I like the 6 lb weight. It’s much easier on my aging shoulders and back. Sweetwater weighs all the guitars before posting on the web site.
I splurged on the Plek. I didn’t know anyone locally that I’d trust for fret leveling. Imho the Neck and Setup is what separates a $600 guitar from a much higher priced model.
I paid a little over $900 for mine (not including the Plek) and bought a Gator Transit soft shell case. I play it daily at home and in a church band.
I see everything has gone up since I bought my gear in 2022.
I’m surprised at how many models Fender is offering. It’s a bit overwhelming.
I remember when the choices were the Squire and American Standard.
The Custom FMH I bought was introduced about 10 to 12 years ago. My local Guitar Center had two in stock. I remember playing them and being impressed. I waited a few years before buying from Sweetwater.
Their inspection and the Plek option made the difference. Plek still requires an experienced Tech that understands how to use the machine.
I was idly browsing Temu guitar stuff when I came across a small picture of part of the top of a Les Paul. There was almost zero information The price was $2.56. For that pittance, I decided to gamble on just what it was. Knowing Temu it could be a miniature keychain guitar, a pack of strings, or a nice picture. Altogether it came to $5.96 including tax and shipping. I got it today, and am amazed to find it’s a legit guitar, albeit a fraudulent copy of something. Everything checks out on it. I swapped out the tuners for a set I took off my SG. They were awful. Today or tomorrow it’s going to my guy for a set-up. It wouldn’t surprise me if they were being sued by Gibson and had to unload these copies. It’s identical to this:
New arrive Joe Perry Signature Boneyard LP Electric Guitar/ Tone-o-matic Bridge - TikTok Shop
Wow, a $6 guitar? I’ve gotten more than one guitar for free, but that’s impressive. It’s made out of wood?
Yeah, it’s real guitar! I think it’ll be pretty nice once it’s set up. It’s a Joe Perry sig model. Now I have to find out who Joe Perry is. On the headstock was a piece of tape that covered up the phony Gibson logo.
A $3 guitar that had $3 tax and shipping? What the?
It’s really crazy. I had no idea what I bought. I thought it might be a short scale kid’s guitar at best, but it is a real guitar.
It’s starting to bug me: how could FedEx send a guitar from Cucamonga, Ca. to Lincoln, Ne. for $2.99? When I bragged about this deal in a Chibson group, some called bull shit, and it does sound like bull shit. Something doesn’t make sense. They could accidentally undercharge me for the guitar, but that doesn’t explain the FedEx.
NGD. Well, new bass day. I just got the Glarry 101 shortscale bass. For $60, it kicks ass. It’s about the size of a regular guitar, so it’s perfect as a couch bass. This little thing sounds great, and is just so easy to play. I have a Sterling (by Musicman) full sized bass, and I think it might get sold. It’s just not fun compared to this tiny bass. It helps that I have a tin ear 
Short scale basses are pretty great. They play easily, and the shorter scale gives you more of the fundamental and fewer overtones. I have three or four, and love them. My favorite is the Danelectro Longhorn. It’s super light, and has a narrow neck to boot. The one thing I had to do with it was replace the aluminum bridge with a brass one from Allparts, which sadly is a very hard to find part these days.
So, how much are you selling the Sterling for, and what color is it? <wiggles eyebrows>
It’s a flat black with a finish where you can feel the grain. Not sure what it’s called. Not sure what it’s worth. One thing I know for sure, it’s not an easy chair bass, swinging that long neck around and weighing a ton. So now I have a Danno 12 string, a misc, 6 string, and the Glarry sitting within reach of my chair. And a looper.
Tell that to someone who plays a stand-up bass and see how much sympathy you get.
Well, my current guitar came from the Custom Shop in Nazareth, PA. Mandolin Bros on Staten Island, NY wet their beaks, and USPS delivered the guitar to me in Cross Lanes, WV.
I think the bridge pickup on a standard Telecaster has a great sound. I believe it’s a combination of the pu itself and the 250 Kohm pots and cap that complete the circuit. On the other hand, I think the standard neck pu is crap. Would a P-90 or a mini-humbucker be a better replacement?
Well, I didn’t really lose my mind this time, but I did go ahead and buy my ex-roommate’s very heavy and not very loud Ampeg Gemini II GV-22 35-40W 2x12 combo. Its tremolo isn’t awesome until you hit the after-beat switch. But its vibrato and reverb are to die for.
Unlike a lot of Ampeg amps of the era, the Gemini series seem to increase volume until you hit about 4 on the knob, after that it just distorts. Most of their guitar amps (like my old VT-22) would just get louder and never distort. It’s also the most treble forward amp I’ve ever played through. The bright switch will forever be off, and the treble knob will live pretty close to zero.
But it breaks up like nobody’s business once you get past 4 or so on the volume knob. Its distortion is somewhere between my old Decca 18W combo (the first tube amp I ever acquired about 35 years ago) and my Silvertone 1484 (that I acquired about 30 years ago). It shreds, but gets a bit flabby if you go too hard on the bass controls. But it does its thing at a quieter level than the Silvertone, and it has reverb, which the Decca doesn’t have. Plus, the reverb is very lush, while the Silvertone’s reverb sounds “like a martian shaking a spray paint can” in the words of the guy who got it working.
So it doesn’t have as good of a tremolo as two of my other amps, but the magic of its reverb and vibrato more than make up for that. It also isn’t the baby VT-22 I hoped it would be, I’m probably going to have to get someone to recreate that VT-22 preamp with an anemic power stage to get that in a bedroom amp. But it does have a line out output that I can use when I don’t want to bother putting a mic in front of it to capture its magic. That’s very unusual for a '68-'72 tube amp.
Plus, it sounds like its going to fall apart when I push it hard. So it’s like a really heavy Fender Deluxe Reverb, but far more primitive sounding. Fortunately, I don’t play guitar in any bands at the moment, so I don’t think I’ll have to carry it much.
Cool vintage amp!
I used to lug a Fender Super Twin around that was over 90 lbs (if I actually played more, I would’ve switched to something lighter). My 35 lb bass amp I have to transport every week is plenty heavy these days.
One of Keith Richards’ main guitars is a Tele with a ‘50s Gibson PAF humbucker in the neck position.
https://www.fender.com/articles/behind-the-scenes/iconic-mods-the-legend-of-keith-richards-micawber
Thankya! I’m really gelling with it. It’s perfect for some of the stuff I’ve written.
Hehe, that Super Twin is sounding more and more like my Ampeg VT-22. The guy I bought the Gemini II off of remembers my VT-22. When I asked him what the GV-22 was like, he said “It’s nowhere nearly as loud and nowhere nearly as heavy as that fucking VT-22”. I toted that thing around to shows for years. If I needed to be a thrash punk guitarist again, I’d probably get another and have someone convert it to 6L6GCs.
Hehe, I did stop schlepping around my 90lb Super Bassman head, and swapped it out for a Bassman 800 that has the same tube preamp, and I can pick it up with one finger. I’m rolling around the Ampeg 2x15, either way.
Hey, it’s lighter than their 8x10.
That’s what I was using the Fender Super Twin for. Note, it was not the Super Twin Reverb. It’s the short-lived Super Twin that the Nuge was famous for (hate the Nuge, btw). 6 6L6 power tubes. Insanely loud and insanely clean (I have tinnitus because of this monster). It had a horrible distortion circuit that no one in their right mind used so we all ran something into it (I used a ProCo Rat mostly). I have no idea why the hell I bought this amp beyond being 18 years old and thinking bigger is better. That amp was nuts. I had it for 30 years and finally sold it to a guy that was looking for a loud, clean amp (pedal platform) for his heavy metal band. He converted it to a head unit.
I might have to try one out when I make it to a city with a guitar store (I live in a guitar store desert). I currently use a Rumble 500 with a compression pedal (always on) and an overdrive pedal (not always on). It’s working for me, but I can’t seem to stop looking at other stuff. I have to fight the GAS.