EdwardMarlowe

You're in good company if you have a touch of the stage fright; Brian Wilson was regularly crippled with it (to the extent of serious stomach cramps and vomiting) before he went on stage with the Beach Boys. It's one of the reasons he went off the deep end originally.

I remember when I first picked up a guitar in the early 90s, the number of experienced players then who used to marvel at the beginner guitars available in terms of quality, price and range then available compared to when they started. Now I find myself doing the same thing. In my early days, a beginner guitar was, for the most part, just that - the better ones might be something that could serve as a back up in case of a broken string if you played out. Increasingly now, imo, many beginner guitars (not the very cheapest, but...) are viable, giggable instruments that could serve well for years in their own right.

I'd agree with the suggestion of trying out as many different styles as you can. See what feels comfortable in the hand, and what you like the look of. (If you hate how it looks, that's not a great motivator to play it...). I'd also suggest looking into the JHS Vintage brand. Good range of takes on all the core classics, designed by Trevor Wilkinson, with street prices that make them, imo, often much better VFM than either the Squier or especially the Epiphone ranges. Their SG alikes are especially nice for the money if that's what wiggles your wire. https://www.jhs.co.uk/collections/vintage/type_electric-guitars

I can see the blade switch being a big plus point for those of us more F than G.... Wouldn't it also open up the option of all sorts of wiring too - like a six-way switch which out of phase/ coil taps and such in there? That could be pretty cool. I'd also be tempted to switch it out for two separate on/off minitoggles, though! It does take getting used to. I bought one years ago as a 'travel' guitar, as it's the perfect mix of being compact without being an unplayable, small scale. Funny thing..... I always considered them pig ugly. Not my first choice of guitar, but having experience of one and enjoying how it played I have a whole new appreciation of the design. Really quite nice to play, too.

Fair points made, though. I've seen other ingenious ideas in the past fall by the wayside for much the same reasons. Most of my pedals I've bought in the last few years have been £20 Chinese cheapies, and they're often equally as good sound-wise as those on which I spent far more. (We'll see how they last, but as I'm not heavy on them and don't play out these days....). I could see spending more this sort of money if I were regularly gigging, though they'd have to have the right mix of effects, and they'd really need to offer *all* the f/x I'd want (OD, clean boost, verb, slapback echo, and trem) in order to take advantage of the design - little point if there isn't more than one or two that appeal. It's interesting looking at it from the business point of view as you have, because it really does explain how so many great ideas just don't take off for reasons other than design.

For years I bought into all that "palette of sounds" bollocks until I realised I just don't love me no humbuckers, I'm' not a big Gibson guy at all, and I'd rather have three Strats with minimal differences that I regularly played than six completely different guitars most of which ended up wall-hangers. The thing is, though, player experience is a big deal. I'm equally crap on every guitar I lift, but I'll stand different with a Strat or a Tele or a whatever. Even a different colour can put me in a different headspace (hell, how and what I play is as much about the shoes I'm wearing and how rock and roll I feel. As a wise man once said, "Like Trousers Like Brain"). Difference is in the feel under the fingers rather than the sound - and I agree, sometimes just feeling a difference under your hands is all it needs to try something else, new, different, seem to improve. On the matter of PRS, while I absolutely admire their quality and skill, only the Mira and the Starla actually really appeal to me. I'm not a figured woods guy, or a HB guy. I do rate an SG over a Les Paul, so that might well help. I'm unlikely to buy any of them, but those are the ones I could see me lifting to try given an opportunity. Were I putting together a 70s-punk project, they're the kid of guitar I'd go looking for - a step away from the obvious classics, SG-like (an SG is the only type of guitar I've ever managed to get that big 'Steve Jones' Bollocks Les Paul sound out of) but with enough of a difference to not be beholden to trad guitar hero imagery... almost an edge of the Soviet era Russian electrics you see on youtube. Stuff in a couple of pickups with a bit of a Brian Setzer feel and possibly a Bigsby for that agricultural equipment as weapon vibe.... The other PRS I really like visually is that run he did on the Strat as a sig model for that young fella - Meyer? (No feelings on him either way, never heard any of his stuff tbh). Clearly built on the old 90s era EG bolt on range that were PRS' first shot at a budget line (how I chuckled at a 'budget' guitar at £900 in 1994!), but with a closer Fender look. I can't say I'd buy one (at that sort of money I think I'd rather a Fender Custom Shop - not so much for the brand as the control over the spec), but I'd love the chance to play one, and I actually really enjoyed seeing someone else so passionate and knowledgeable about guitars show off their take on such an established classic. I have no doubt the Fender CS team quickly acquired and dissected one to see what they could learn from an objective take like that. PS OP: If you like it and you won't miss the money, just buy the damn thing and enjoy!

Dano are interesting that way: they do seem to have created a niche for themselves with something that does buck the overriding trend. I guess part of that is people wanting their unique sound, part of it the effect of photos of folks like Hendrix and Page wielding one... One of my big regrets is that when I moved to London in 1999 and went looking for a new, budget guitar. I didn't originally want to bring over my US Fender as I started out in shared accommodation. Very quickly discovered just how limited the budget market was for left handers in those days (these days it's be Hellooo, Thomann...). When it came down to it, I could have had a Dano U2 for about £180, but ended up buying an Epi LP Std for much more. The Epi I still have - one of the later Korean models, very nice indeed, would be 'Epi Plus' stuff now. Thing is, I'm kinda over Les Pauls and humbuckers in general; I'd rather have that Dano these days. Ironically, the Dano would probably be worth more now too. Dano are back doing short runs now; some really nice guitars, but very few lefties. I do love their aesthetic - there's something very scuzzy rockabilly - punk rock'n'roll about them.

Bravo!

Idly google while procrastinating a hefty marking task this afternoon, I chanced across Munson Guitars based in Norfolk. https://www.munsonguitars.com/ Mostly a little too 'modern' for my tastes, but they look really nice. £1300 or so and upwards, list of custom options. What caught my eye and I thought some folks might want to know round here is that not only do they ensure all their models are available left-handed (the owner is a left handed player), but there's a really cool bit on the website where it encourages left handed players to play left handed - and offers a 5% discount on all left handed guitars across their range. If I had the money available to spend on a guitar, I'd be very tempted to jump on one for that reason alone. Impressive! I was originally going to leave the thread at that, but thought it would be cool to have a thread dedicated to markers who produce nice, left-handed guitars, as there seem to be a few of we southpaws around these parts...

Me, I'd love to see a high quality, solid body electric guitar.... made from plywood. I've come back to the material after years of looking down on it as a green, sustainable wood that actually looks great in the sort of furniture that appeals to me (mid-century modern; I hope to move house in the next few years, and my intention is to give it a very late 50s and earlier aesthetic). This has made me look back on the era of affordable, plywood guitars. When I first took up guitar in late 1991, plywood was the norm. Then Yamaha hit the marketing triumph of selling the Pacifica 112 with a natural finish to emphasise that they were solid wood, and everyone else soon followed suit. As I've come to find the ply aesthetically pleasing, I've come to wonder whether a truly great guitar could be made from it - an extension of the "tonewood is a superstition and nothing more" philosophy, I suppose. I'd love to see someone with crazy money have a Strat made from ply by Fender's custom shop, and then play it off against the one-piece, exotic swamp ash types. Of course it's not in the industry's interests at present to do something like that in case it undermines years of marketing expensive woods, but I can't help but wonder if necessity will bring it round again one day, perhaps from the environmental perspective. I mean, twenty years ago who expected bamboo guitars would be available now?

JUst spotted this after I posted: yes, it's very hard indeed to go past Vintage for a new guitar. Even these days when I'm looking at selling off a lot of what I have and buying just a few, nicer pieces, I'd still consider them. Hells, if they were better at donig left handers in their 'relic' type, I'd have a couple of those already.

Worth seeing what the kid's favourite players are and what they play; at that early stage, having a guitar you feel cool posing with can make a big difference in keeping 'em sticking with it, imo. An SG could be a good option there. I'd be inclined to buy carefully at the budget end with the guitar, and spend more money on the amp and maybe a couple of cool pedals - some of those £25ish Chinese mini pedals all over ebay, they can be very cool. If an SG style is what works, I'd be looking at the Vintage range. Their SG type - the VS6 - is phenomenally good for the money. A fair bit cheaper than Epiphone, and an Epi beater imo (qualifier: I've not had a chance to try the new headstock Epiphones). They have models from about £150 for the standard one up to some fancier vintage styles for £350ish. The RRPs are a fair bit higher than you'll find in a guitar shop. The vintage range takes some serious beating. The cheaper, Korean made Tokais can be worth a look too.

I started with 9 when I first played electric. I moved up to tens because I kept snapping the high e on a 9, and I liked that the 10s overall provided that bit more fightback. I've tried a lot of string brands over the years; as a non-pro and not gigging or playing out at all these days, I find whatever is cheapest works well enough for me. IMO, the chief thing with strings is to find a brand that works well for you in terms of durability and that don't snap all the time and whatever. Beyond that, I'm not convinced there's any difference made to the sound (unless a la Eric Johnson your dna has enough canine that you can hear a difference!). For my money, Ernie Ball, Rotosound, D'addario, Dean Markley... all decent, go for the cheapest one. I remember I stopped buying Dean Markleys years ago for no reason other than that I took offence at the tedious sexism in a lot of their advertisements, but the strings themselves were decent enough.

This is really coming together!

I have always worked on the basis of avoiding prescriptive fingering, and used whatever works... the most important point, surely, is how it sounds.... (unless, of course, you're in a tribute band and a particular physical movement is highly characteristic of the player you're performing as).

Not seen that particular brand before, but it does greatly resemble the Agile / SX types that were all the rage back in my Harmony Central days. Nicer headstock than many of the Far-East made guitars that are in the Gibson arena but seeking to avoid legal threats from the same. I don't think I've seen exactly that shape of fretmarker before. Clever choice - in the Gibson stylistic vein, but not one they have ever used, to my knowledge anyhow. I rather like it. Body shape looks quite close to the original save for the blunter horn.

I can't imagine Simple Minds will ever be forgiven where I hail from for daring to be "outsiders" with a view on "our problem"! That and Belfast Child was ,in the end, just a bloody awful song, bless them.

Yip, as said above, exactly like a five string bass - more low notes. As to Vai - technically a very gifted musician, though TBH not a player I take any pleasure in watching/ listening to. The Shred thing always left me cold. It's hugely impressive from a skill point of view, but as art it stirs nothing in me.

Nice. At one time I toyed with the idea of buying a used Tom De Long sig model and Hendrixing it; I'd definitely change the HB, though - possibly for a HB sized p90. I have a lot of love for the concept of a single pup guitar, though I don't current have one given the rarity of left handed models. Every time I see something like this, though....

Fender used it a lot on the Mexican line, at least until the "upgrades" that took the Standard to the Player Series. I think they're alder now, but the Standard models were poplar for years on end. I have a feeling some of the Squier range were poplar at a time when they switched from plywood to solid, though last I looked many of them were now Agathis (something in the mahogany family, I believe). Leo of course didn't much care what wood he used as long as it was available and hit the build budget; the first Teles were pine, then ash then alder... Course, the wood in a sense matters much less with a Fender style, given many of their pickups are mounted either in steel (Tele Bridge) or in plastic (Strat guard)... Basswood is another, softer wood that gets used a lot in the Far East. As I recall, a lot of Japanese guitars, including many Fenders, are basswood. It used to be particularly popular for a lot of Japanese and Korean superstrat types. I think it was prized for being light as well. Nuno Bettencourt had guitars in his sig line made from it - if memory serves, he was quite a tiny guy, so a hefty Les Paul would not have been histhing so much..

Yeah, that's the absolute best bit imo. If they did the right combination of effects for me and I were to get involved in a gigging project again I'd be well up for a few of these.

I used to want All The Pedals. I've still got every pedal I ever bought - including a 1994 Sovtek-Electro Harmonix green Big Muff Pi, in the original wooden box, which I gather is now worth about ten times the £45 I paid as an undergraduate! Also have a DOD Phasor (vintage style, blue metal box), Boss BF3 Flanger, JD Crybaby, an of-brand OD pedal, a 90s eras Guyatone Tremolo... I've recently collected a knock-off Klone in a mini-format, a mini-Spark, and a couple of others. I'd like a classic verb (though most of my amps to date have it, I'm looking to sell them all and buy a small tube amp Champalike), and something approximating a tape-echo. In recent yeas, I've rarely pulled the pedals out - I've not played for anyone other than the cat (an even harsher critic than me) in years, and my main amp for some time has been a Vox AD120VT with built in F/X. My approach to playnig has also shifted; I find I don't care for loads of bellsand whistles now - I'll keep all my pedals because I might one day (doubtful, I'll be 50 in 2024...) be worth recording as a player, and it would be nice to use the odd effect. Mostly, though, in terms of what I want to play now it's all old school rock and roll via psychobilly; if ever I had the time and thought I wouldn't shame myself, I'd love to have a fun, for-kicks gigging band that sounded like the Ramones if they'd formed in 1959 and been taken under the wing of Vince Taylor... I've been sort of idly building up a new gorup of pedals with that in mind - the notion of having either a pedal (direct to pa) type preamp or a tube (or good sounding alternative) amp that gives me one, good sound (the reason I'm ultimately going to part with the Vox is I just don't use it's capacity; all I want is one, good clean / edge of break-up tone in the amp), a trem pedal, reverb, echo and a couple of different dirt pedals (an overdrive and a boost). I might well pick up a fair few different od pedals, especially given how many fun, cheap pedals there now are on the market. With that backdrop.... My fantasy pedal 'board' would be as follows: One small, strip (approx 12") with seven buttons on it. There'd be an on/off mains switch, and a mute which connected to a tuner, inbuilt (dial and needle, not a digital tuner). Each of the remaining five buttons would connect to a circuit inside which digitally reproduced a single effect. This could then be plugged into a laptop, on which I could use software to choose an effect to assign to each button, and then tweak the parameters to give me what I want (e.g. to get a decent slapback echo sound, or a useable overdrive, without having to buy a delay pedal where I'm paying for a whole capacity I'll never use). The sounds I'd want would be: 1] Clean boost 2] Classic od / crunch 3] slapback echo 4] Tremolo 5] Reverb There should also be a line out (with built in preamp) that cam go direct to the PA. No pots or settings on the box itself, just on/offs, though perhaps there could be an advanced version which allowed these sounds to be tweaked live on the fly by the sound man. That would be my holy grail unit. That and a good lead to plug between it and the guitar; if I ever played live I'd need nothing else.

Only real way is to try both. The HH model will be a very decent guitar, though it will never quite give you *that* Tele tone that you get with a "proper" Tele bridge pup. Might also be worth looking at the ClassicVibe 70s Telecaster Custom, which gives you the neck HB with a traditional Tele bridge. The traditional Tele set-up could surprise you, though: for years, I tried all sorts of HB guitars looking for that big, punk rock "Never Mind the Bollocks" LP sound. In the end, what made that sound in my hands turned out to be a 71RI Japanese Fender Telecaster.... Unsurprising, I suppose, when you bear in mid the debate over whether Jimmy Page played a Tele or a Les Paul on the early Zeppelin recordings - noone can tell the difference, and he can't remember... Oh.... and Jimi Hendrix recorded the lead parts for Purple Haze on a borrowed Telecaster.... These things are always subjective, but for my money the standard Tele set-up is one of those most versatile guitars out there- even, surprisingly, a little ahead of my Strats when it comes to the ballsier bridge pickup sound. Whichever one you buy will be a great guitar, but always best to try. FWIW, I tend to find singlecoil pickups better at a lowerprice than HBs, as the latter are much more prone to mud, but that's personal preference. If you're not wedded to buying Squier, I'd also check out the JHS Vintage brand guitars, especially the 'Vintage Reissue' series for some nice Tele types. The Vintage Icon series is fun too if you fancy an affordable guitar with a bit of the 'relic' look (I'd buy one for the fun of it myself were I right handed).

Lowdens are beautiful. Wanted one years ago, then got kinda put off by the "buy locally made product!" crowd back in NI (when you're 'from there', people falling all over themselves all the time to puff it up with all that "our wee country" crap gets really old really fast). These days, I'm more intrigued by them again. Big money, though. There is a new line he's doing with Ed Sheeran that are basically a budget Lowden. The one big downside for me is that they say "Sheeran" on the headstock (nothing against the fella personally, he seems a nice guy, but I'm very, very much not a fan of his stuff) instead of Lowden. Not that I would feel the "Lowden" with paying another grand or so for alone, but.... You of course may be less shallow than I am. I'm sure they are very nice guitars. Tanglewood and Simon and Patrick both make nice all-rounders.

Taking shape really well! Love to hear some clips once it's up and running!