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Post subject: Re: Confessions of an Ex-gear Snob
Posted: Sat Mar 07, 2015 10:49 pm
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01GT eibach wrote:
Let's go back to 1980 for a moment when I was a young 14-year old shredder ...

Back then an "entry level" Memphis or Hondo Les Paul copy cost around $150 (=$425 in today's dollars), and they were HORRIBLE guitars (sorry, Hondo fans, but they were). $425 is about what a MIM Standard costs today which is far better than any 1980 Fender Strat and was also ... equivalently ... 1/3 the cost of it. In today's world, you can buy amazing Squiers (especially the VM line, etc.) for the equivalent of 1980 $100 ... which was cheaper than what a horrible Memphis Les Paul cost back then.

In 1980, a new Strat cost about $400 ($1,134 in today's dollars which is about what new Am Std is today), and they were NOT very good guitars back then, definitely not as good as a new MIM Std today. Also at the price point was the Ibanez Artist which was a shockingly good guitar.

Also in 1980, for about $700 (which was ALOT of money back then) you could get a Gibson Les Paul (which is about $2000 in today's dollars, and also is what they about cost today ... and STILL is a lot of money). Although Gibson Les Pauls back in 1980 (unlike Fenders) were awesome guitars. I still have my 1979 Gibson SG standard (that I bought used for $350 in 1982 ... the same as spending $850 today (also about what you would expect to pay for a nice used one today)). Just keeping it real, the nice Gibson models (Les Paul, SG Standard, etc.) were extremely good and worth the money.

So, yeah, the lower end guitars of TODAY are AMAZING and equivalently VERY CHEAP. And if you don't think so, you were not a guitar player in 1980. Just saying ...

And I know people will be falling from the rafters how great 1980-eras Fenders, Hondo, and Memphis guitars were. Let me tell you, from someone that was there and spent every free moment playing guitar, and (effectively) LIVED in my local music store, they were NOT. The Memphis and Hondo stuff was JUNK, and the Fenders were just plain 'not very good' compared to Gibsons and Ibanez of the day. PERIOD.


WORD!

I'd add only that Peavey's Made-In-USA T60 was released during this era and for the money, it was a solid guitar with quality features and a very attractive price point.

Arjay

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Post subject: Re: Confessions of an Ex-gear Snob
Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 2:56 am
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Yes, I have played some pretty good non-MIA Fenders but I have played some real dogs, too. I own a very lovely player seen in my tag-pic. Korean Koa Strat. It wasn't always a lovely player though. The physical parts are great. The electronics needed some reworking. I know a young woman with a mid 90s Squier Tele. Same thing. There are no flaws that you can see or touch until you plug it in and play.

As with all things, try before you buy.

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Post subject: Re: Confessions of an Ex-gear Snob
Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 8:50 am
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I'll admit that when cruising Ebay, I skip over the cheap guitars, so I'm still a snob. But if I was to start looking at Squires and such, it would take me all day.
My Thinline Tele that was built in Indonesia, ($600 new), is one of my best guitars. I had to do some upgrading, but it was a solid build to start with.

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Post subject: Re: Confessions of an Ex-gear Snob
Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 11:39 am
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Retroverbial wrote:
Martian wrote:
(No flame wars need apply.)


Too late, Martian.

Our resident dissident has already lit and thrown his daily molotov cocktail.

It would seem that proggies prefer sturm-und-drang over a friendly discussion.

Karl Marx would be proud.

:roll:

Arjay

Hmmmmm...so I'm not the only one having made that observation.

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Post subject: Re: Confessions of an Ex-gear Snob
Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 11:43 am
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My MIM Strat plays better and sounds better than my friends MIA. He agrees. Not saying this is the norm, but I do love mine! (His looks better though. Kind of a metallic tourquoise. I love that color. Mine's black.)

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Post subject: Re: Confessions of an Ex-gear Snob
Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 1:02 pm
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01GT eibach wrote:
...I know people will be falling from the rafters how great 1980-eras Fenders, Hondo, and Memphis guitars were. Let me tell you, from someone that was there and spent every free moment playing guitar, and (effectively) LIVED in my local music store, they were NOT. The Memphis and Hondo stuff was JUNK, and the Fenders were just plain 'not very good' compared to Gibsons and Ibanez of the day. PERIOD.

I agree with you...mostly :lol:

To me the guitars value is in the Neck...whether measured by Playability or Monetarily...

I have a Fender MIM Jimmie Vaughan neck that is almost as good as my Fender US Clapton neck costing roughly three times as much.

In this comparison the MIM blows the US out of the water on a Quality/Cost basis. :)

I agree on those copycat 80's MIJ brands you mentioned...

...but a great value in a vintage MIJ was...and still is...the Westone/Electra line made by Matsumoku for St. Louis Music...available up to the mid 80's...

...they were a nice combination of original models and copies of best sellers...and excellent quality...Especially their Necks...I collected them until the Strat Bug hit me...still have the hardtail in the middle w/brass Nut & Bridge...

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Post subject: Re: Confessions of an Ex-gear Snob
Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 3:30 pm
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Wow the Forum has become fairly civil when someone can praise a Peavey and not get savaged by gear snobs. I played a P-40 bass that I bought used in the 80's. It was solid but I traded it in for a new Fender because a Peavey wasn't COOL. And therein lies the problem with low-end guitars--they are never as COOL as the instrument that they are imitating. You feel kinda dorky on stage when the 'rock-critic-wannabes' in the audience see squier, knock-off brand X... On the headstock. Bottom line--a band with low-end guitars and high-end amps and speakers sound better than one with expensive guitars and weak amps and speakers.


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Post subject: Re: Confessions of an Ex-gear Snob
Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 6:45 pm
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Nothing wrong with Peavey at all. I have a lot of cheap oddball guitars. Some I made myself and gig with. One's even made out of a bedpan. I have an Ibanez AS73 MIC but a great player! My Supro is pretty cool too. My only Gibson is a Studio 60's Tribute with P-90's and one of my favorites, my only Fender is a 72 Strat, I still pay it, but it's overdue for a fret job. My only Tele is one I built and my two gigging amps I built myself. I was never a gear snob, I just play what I like.

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Post subject: Re: Confessions of an Ex-gear Snob
Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 7:19 pm
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danagos wrote:
..but a great value in a vintage MIJ was...and still is...the Westone/Electra line made by Matsumoku for St. Louis Music...available up to the mid 80's...

That is a good point. Not all Les Paul copies were bad. There were a handful of descent copies out there. The Ibanez Les Paul copies of the mid-70s were famous for how good they were. Even back then, they were hard to get a hold of. They are collector guitars now. Crazy ...

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Post subject: Re: Confessions of an Ex-gear Snob
Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 7:41 pm
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01GT eibach wrote:
danagos wrote:
..but a great value in a vintage MIJ was...and still is...the Westone/Electra line made by Matsumoku for St. Louis Music...available up to the mid 80's...

That is a good point. Not all Les Paul copies were bad. There were a handful of descent copies out there. The Ibanez Les Paul copies of the mid-70s were famous for how good they were. Even back then, they were hard to get a hold of. They are collector guitars now. Crazy ...


Slash's LP was a copy. Funny that Gibson released a high priced reissue of Slash's LPCopy. Somehow it doesn't seem odd for Gibson.

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Post subject: Re: Confessions of an Ex-gear Snob
Posted: Mon Mar 09, 2015 4:22 am
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Brandreaus wrote:
Wow the Forum has become fairly civil when someone can praise a Peavey and not get savaged by gear snobs.
I think you have that backwards. It's very rare that the gear snobs get flamey. I won't go out on a limb and say it never happens but it's pretty rare. They usually just state their case rather matter-of-factly. It's the anti-snobs who start the pissing matches. Happens every single time. Some gear snob will make a comment matter of factly and then watch the cheap guitar and cheap amp owners fly off the handle, ranting and raving about how the low end gear is just as good as the high end gear. Hell, we've even had people insist that low end gear is far superior to high end gear. That's when the entertainment starts.

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Post subject: Re: Confessions of an Ex-gear Snob
Posted: Mon Mar 09, 2015 5:24 am
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BMW-KTM wrote:
Brandreaus wrote:
Wow the Forum has become fairly civil when someone can praise a Peavey and not get savaged by gear snobs.
I think you have that backwards. It's very rare that the gear snobs get flamey. I won't go out on a limb and say it never happens but it's pretty rare. They usually just state their case rather matter-of-factly. It's the anti-snobs who start the pissing matches. Happens every single time. Some gear snob will make a comment matter of factly and then watch the cheap guitar and cheap amp owners fly off the handle, ranting and raving about how the low end gear is just as good as the high end gear. Hell, we've even had people insist that low end gear is far superior to high end gear. That's when the entertainment starts.


I think that any descriptions of the qualities of a guitar need to have two words added: "For me". I am sure that there are cases where a cheaper guitar is superior to high end gear - for a particular person. It could be the neck shape, it could be the weight distribution, it could be a lot of factors that doesn't necessarily reflect in the price that makes the guitar better than a high end choice - for that person.
Likewise, there are cases where "high end" really only differs in the finish. Which can be important to some, and not to others.
But overall, quality costs more. Old wood costs more than new wood that might change over time. Hand-testing instruments costs more. Smaller tolerance hardware costs more. It all adds up.

Personally, I am of the opinion that the variation is larger in cheaper instruments, precisely because the QC and stability of materials is lower. A higher variation means a bell curve with longer and fatter tails, meaning you will find more instruments that are worse than average, and more instruments that are better than average. But buying without trying will be a crap shoot.


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Post subject: Re: Confessions of an Ex-gear Snob
Posted: Mon Mar 09, 2015 6:00 am
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01GT eibach wrote:
danagos wrote:
..but a great value in a vintage MIJ was...and still is...the Westone/Electra line made by Matsumoku for St. Louis Music...available up to the mid 80's...

That is a good point. Not all Les Paul copies were bad. There were a handful of descent copies out there. The Ibanez Les Paul copies of the mid-70s were famous for how good they were. Even back then, they were hard to get a hold of. They are collector guitars now. Crazy ...


The Ibanez LP copies were called the "Lawsuit" Les Paul's. I almost bought one at the last guitar show here outside Philadelphia, Pa this winter but the guy wouldn't take credit cards and I didn't have enough cash on me. He only wanted $500 for it and it was in nice original shape. Maybe next time. There were a lot of great sounding/great playing copies around in the 70's. They're even better now. It's hard to believe the quality you can get for less than five or six hundred dollars. Funny thing was Norlin owned Gibson at the time Ibanez was sued. Those Norlin era Gibson guitars were real boat anchors and the quality was pretty poor. CBS, Fender eventually went the same way in the 70's.

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Last edited by 63supro on Mon Mar 09, 2015 8:22 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Post subject: Re: Confessions of an Ex-gear Snob
Posted: Mon Mar 09, 2015 8:11 am
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arth1 wrote:
BMW-KTM wrote:
Brandreaus wrote:
Wow the Forum has become fairly civil when someone can praise a Peavey and not get savaged by gear snobs.
I think you have that backwards. It's very rare that the gear snobs get flamey. I won't go out on a limb and say it never happens but it's pretty rare. They usually just state their case rather matter-of-factly. It's the anti-snobs who start the pissing matches. Happens every single time. Some gear snob will make a comment matter of factly and then watch the cheap guitar and cheap amp owners fly off the handle, ranting and raving about how the low end gear is just as good as the high end gear. Hell, we've even had people insist that low end gear is far superior to high end gear. That's when the entertainment starts.


I think that any descriptions of the qualities of a guitar need to have two words added: "For me". I am sure that there are cases where a cheaper guitar is superior to high end gear - for a particular person. It could be the neck shape, it could be the weight distribution, it could be a lot of factors that doesn't necessarily reflect in the price that makes the guitar better than a high end choice - for that person.
Likewise, there are cases where "high end" really only differs in the finish. Which can be important to some, and not to others.
But overall, quality costs more. Old wood costs more than new wood that might change over time. Hand-testing instruments costs more. Smaller tolerance hardware costs more. It all adds up.

Personally, I am of the opinion that the variation is larger in cheaper instruments, precisely because the QC and stability of materials is lower. A higher variation means a bell curve with longer and fatter tails, meaning you will find more instruments that are worse than average, and more instruments that are better than average. But buying without trying will be a crap shoot.


++++1

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Post subject: Re: Confessions of an Ex-gear Snob
Posted: Mon Mar 09, 2015 8:14 am
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For some reason, I've always had the best luck with Japanese-made basses. I had a Aria Pro Cardinal series, a Fender 50's reissue P-Bass, and a Kawai FIIB Alembic copy and I thought they were all excellent players, especially the P-Bass and Kawai.

The only reason I no longer have any of those is really the foolishness and impatience of youth. I will say my Schecter Diamond J Bass is also on par with those and that one is made in South Korea. It has the sweetest action of any bass I've played since the 50's reissue P Bass. I love it, especially strung up with flats. I only paid $325 or so for it, too. Of course, it was clearance marked. I believe they were usually around $500. I'm bummed to learn that they've stopped making them.

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