Leaderboard

I'd probably want to play it before handing over any money but i do like a budget guitar. my main acoustic is a McIlroy (northern Irish handbuilt by the ex head of the Lowden workshop) so has a hefty pricetag (about £3k now i think) but a cheap chord travel guitar gets almost as much use (got it free from a local facebook group as it needed a setup to get it playing well) and the McIlroy just doesn't work for playing the blues so a Gretsch Jim Dandy with 13's is brought in for bluesy stuff. I've been looking at the recording king guitars as well, i really fancy one of the resonators buy don't have the space in my house for another guitar. Sometimes a cheap guitar can really surprise with a great sound, and equally i've played some big name guitars with huge pricetags that felt totally meh (most of them Taylors) Matt

OHHHHHHH I just discovered on the Googles that this is indeed a five minutes with a screwdriver job..... I also note I discovered Harley Benton via this forum. When Mrs Marlowe catches up with you lot of enablers, there's going to be hell to pay....

Strongbow and Black, down the Northgate.... that brings back memories of our pre-formals!

You absolutely right, in general, but it would appear that there are one or two specific 'high-end' models that are quite prized (can't remember details; can't remember yesterday's breakfast, either, so...). No idea if this is one of those, but being active makes it a cut above the common-or-garden Marlin, I think.

It just made me think of Olde English Cider. I can't imagine that would be too good for your guitar... or your liver.

Heh! Sounds like there's a bit more of an interest developing there - bodes well for the birthday! Thanks - that does look a manageable size. That's the line I've been looking at, thinking of going for the flightcase one for ease of storage. All my pedals / strings/ tools / bits are currently stored in a flightcase box that was once set up for a drill; my dad picked it up somewhere in the early 90s, and we sliced out the foam internals so it's a foam-lined big box now, great thing. Almost like a record box, handy keeping everything safe in my chaotic flat!

I was upstairs earlier and could gear my daughter mucking about with my guitar downstairs. She was trying the pedals and I could hear her gigling as she tried them. She couldn't work out how to turn the looper off, though.

I always preferred Strongbow

It is one of the HBs; the Spaceship 50C. Its 500mm wide and comes with the bag, velcro etc. 33 quid, so it's not going to break the bank. I have the power van strapped underneath it.

I never knew you took piano lessons. She likes a bit of Nirvana and as a result of Stranger Things, has a go at Master of Puppets. She was even trying Misirlou. She downloaded a tab app today, so has been trying things, few of which I recognise. Its mostly stuff she's heard on Spotify.

Such as these:

I might be thinking of Warmoth - here you start with a blank and then can add through their configurator the various routs and drill holes you want. Looks pricey, but a decent blank piece of alder that I would use starts off at anything from £90 to £150 here in UK. I think other suppliers do something similar and probably cheaper - I'll carry on looking Warmoth necks are great...but VERY expensive. However, there are a myriad of perfectly decent 'Fender standard pocket' necks available for less than (and some cases, much less than) £100 that an internet search will find (Gear4Music is a decent place to start).

Those Zipps looked fantastic. Danos are still around, though they seen only to do limited runs of limited designs these days (and used ones are shockingly pricey - I wish I'd bought a U2 RI in Camden in 199 when I saw it new for £150; now they go for twice that, at least, used often.) I wonder how long it will be before we see a Harley Benton take on the Dano concept? If their (lovely) Mosrite models have done well, that might be a logical next step...

That Fishman operation looks the business! In terms of one of these over an electric, for me the appeal is purely the combination of that vaguely Gretschy look (well, if you squint at it....), and the acoustic sound, which will be different than you'll get from magnetic pups in a regular electric guitar. Course, past a certain point, in a live context few in the average audience will notice the sound difference or care, but...

Oh, yeah - way back in the day. I wish I'd discovered Jerry Lee Lewis and Little Richard much earlier, I'd love to be able to play boogie woogie like that now, but I don't think I have the patience / time / coordination any more... That is the big bonus of the web - for kids so motivated these days, it's a great way of finding cool old / niche stuff. (Mind you.... old..... *our* music..... I taught kids this year - final year undergraduates that will be graduating next month - that were born in 2002.... Kurt Cobain was dead by then over three times as long as Hendrix and Morrison were when we were born. Nirvana is like Elvis for them, in terms of relative timeline. This gives me the willies..... I make it a point to tell them their youth disgusts me. They think I'm joking...)