Kiwi

Welcome Hydra!

I've worked on some MIM strats and found the necks to be pretty damn good, they need minimal fretwork and are pretty straight. Can't say the same for Gibsons, in fact the build quality of their Chinese made Epuphones is often superior iME. But more generally, a decent guitar will allow a bad guitarists to make more imporvment than if they were using one that was hard to play. So yes, there is an argument for buying a good guitar even if you're a bad player because it'll help you make quicker progress. And you don't have to spend a lot of money these days to get a decent guitar, so long as it has been set up properly with levelled frets. PRS SE and CE series are excellent, I've been fighting GAS for the Hollowbody II SE. Used Ibanezes are also often bargains, from the Artcore series (I have an AWD which plays like butter and has a killer stock bridge pickup) to the S-series (of wich I also have one which has been modified into a Chrome boy tribute). Gidin are also fabulous value second hand. If you shop for these models of guitar that were mid price new but second hand, you'll get great value.

Godin generally are very under rated as a brand. They make some excellent instruments.

A 12 string without a warped top seems a very rare thing these days. I would go for a Rainsong but the used prices are a little nuts. None of the composite acoustic guitar makers here in China do a 12 string.

I've been through so many, they all seem to have warped tops due to 6 string bracing...I've heard good things about Alvarez and I played a new one which was great. But the only one I had access to purchase also had a bent top...

Yes to both, not helped by intermittent focus in my eyesight and a reluctance to take my reading glasses everywhere in case it brings on mid life crisis.

Welcome aboard Iain

I bought an Xotic XW1 wah about 7 years ago and now Paul Jackson Jr and Steve Lukather are using them. Very versatile wah but they do take up a bit of space. If you are looking for just classic tones and smaller foot print then a mini Crybaby is the default option.

Acoustic? There's quite a drop off in quality within your price bracket. The necks are less reliable, the guitars aren't set up properly, frets need levelling, the woods are dried too quickly and can warp as they really season. I would suggest bumping the price up a little and go second hand. That way any faults are easier to spot. I have a soft spot for Yamahas as they are usually pretty reliable but Alvarez, Guild and Taylor are also worth considering.

Welcome alpro - got any fixin' stories?

They can be contested, yes. And potentially lost. Back in 2021 Fender tried to trademark the stratocaster body shape but the application was denied after a load of other guitar makers appealed including Schecter, Dean, ESP, Suhr and others. (Not Charvel though, because they are now owned by Fender.) But basically the collective contested on the grounds that the strat body shape had been widely copied over the last 50 or years and Fender didn't object the. So why try and trademark a property now that they had no problem sharing before? Incidentally, public Rights of Way operate on the same basic use-it-or-lose-it principle

PRS SE of almost any description although my personal preference is the hollowbody first followed by the Swamp Ash HSH. Having said that, when I fancy a new guitar, I make one. This might sound like a dream but its happened every year for the last few years now as I've developed confidence and a couple of them are REALLY good. However I'm now caught between running out of space and not wanting to sell any. Honourable mention for the Ibanez AWD83T, amazing guitar for the price used. One of those gems that deserves more recognition once the neck pickup has been swapped out for one from the more modern Artcore range.

Trademarks don't require 'use' because they are validated through rights assigned at registration. They have to be renewed periodically though and trademarking ideally should be enforced too, in order to safe guard against applications to cancel (due to lack of enforcement action). Unlike patents, trademarks can exist in perpetuity so long as they are renewed.

You have just described the last 4 weeks for me. I'm up one self build with another in the works and two opportunistic bass purchases. I have officially run out of space and now have to set a rotating display on my hangers of the ones I don't play so often. Welcome brother...

A seymour duncan 'semi super switch' would give you an extra position which could be wired to combine coils from each pickup.

This might be the crux of Behringers defence. If Klon haven't been selling them and making profit, Behringer might say how can Klon claim damages when they haven't been losing money...and the Behringer circuit is in all likelihood an emulation rather than a copy knowing that timbre can't really be copyrighted or trademarked. In the PRS vs Gibson battle, Gibson's case hinged on there being the potential for confusion between the PRS single cut and Gibson LPs which didn't really stand up to the scrutiny that was eventually applied. Klon's lawyers may come back and say 'copyright or trademark infringement' based on the potential for confusion (depending on what is actually registered as a trademark) Or get a Digitech Bad Monkey :lol: Yeah I went there.

I use a Seymour Duncan 'semi' super switch, I can change position 3 from middle pickup to bridge and neck.

And it's done. Had to do a lot of routing to get the bridge located properly including plugging and redrilling one bridge post 1mm further way. The wiring was a challenge, I spent three days of eliminating possible causes to arrive at only one conclusion, the pickup selector switch was faulty. My midboost preamp didn't work and I wasn't going to spend a week trying to troubleshoot it, so I bought one only to discover that the guy who build it didn't include separate earth and -9v wires. So had to jury rig something up to provide the output socket with an earth connection, the boost is definitely warm but it lacks the glassiness I expected. So I have on order a genuine Demester Fat Boost (Tyler style) and at some point I will probably wire the switches so they are series, phase and parallel. Although they were fiddly to solder as well. However, after a fret levelling and proper set up, it plays very nicely and has more sustain than my other two strats. I have no idea why. It's quite a warm and loud sounding guitar as well acoustically. More aging is needed on the sides and back but I have other things to attend to in advance of being in the UK next month.

Firewood: Any Gibson bass from the eighties. I don't care about flammable potential, I'm performing a public service here godammit! Weapon: Steinberger GL2 - wood is just not up to the task and original Steinbergers can really take a beating. Player: Probably the guitar currently being built for me if it turns out to be everything expected. Otherwise #1 MSG with the Armstrong pickups.

What is the fingerboard radius on the guitar you play? Radii of 10" or less often lead to strings choking on bends. 12" or more should be fine though.

Absolutely, it's about selling dreams...as in 'buy this and get closer to living the dream'...whatever that dream is.

Mostly thirds.

Look at barre chord shapes and use those notes as a guide to what to play, then experiment with different positions up and down the neck. Then, if you're brave, try it with inversions and THEN with modes. See how far you can push things without it sounding irrelevant.

OK I think I've reached the end of the road with this one. Or at least I've gone as far as I can... The Ernie Ball VP Jr arrived and works great although there isn't enough space on the already quite generous pedal board for it. Over the weekend, I also discovered someone selling Eventide Pitchfactor for about 230 quid online and so pulled the trigger because it does Eventide Harmoniser detune. So that has replaced the TC Electronic 3rd Dimension. And a second Pigtronix Echolution arrived as well but I may have actually over cooked it a little because just one can handle stereo AND both the RV500 reverb AND the pitchfactor have delay as well...hmmm. Slight buyers remorse perhaps. The only thing left in the set up is another pair of Loudster power amps which I'm in no hurry to buy right now given the Marshall power amp does the job adequately for practice purposes. I'll post a pic of the actual pedalboard once I've finished the re-wiring. Now I should probably go and learn some songs...

Like countless others outside the UK, I've been drawn to and subsequently obsessing over the clean tones that were achieved by in demand US session guitarists in the eighties and early nineties. While Michael Thompson was perhaps best known for his clean tone, Dann Huff appeared on countless Top 10 recordings that featured his lush stereo swells including tracks by Peter Cetera, Amy Grant and others. Part of that sound was down to his rack of effects often involving a Mesa Studio preamp into a Songbird trichorus, then stereo with one side going through an Eventide Harmoniser and Roland SDE3000 or Lexicon delay, the other side going through a Lexicon reverb and then another delay. However another part of his sound involved a highly modified 64 strat c/- Jim Tyler which featured Seymour Duncan STK2 pickups in middle and neck plus a JB (SH4) humbucker in the bridge AND...a Tyler mid boost circult which also sparkled up the presence a bit as well. So I'm going to recreate his 64 strat, including making the midboost circuit. I've nearly assembled all the parts, however I had to trash the cheap neck that was going to be used after I discovered that it had warped into an S shape and whoever made it cut the fret slots at ninety degrees to one side of the fingerboard...DOH. Luckily it was only 30 quid but still...a replacement, fully painted, is on the way. Also, the pickup seller sent a TB5 custom instead of the TB4 (trem spaced version of the SH4) but the replacement has arrived. And finally, the series parallel pickup switches that arrived were on-off-on when I ordered on-on. So waiting for the replacements to arrive from a different seller.