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Post subject: Re: Guitars in General
Posted: Sat Feb 09, 2013 2:37 pm
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whd1952 wrote:
I make a tax free income of 6 figures


I'm more interested in this,,,,,,,And so is the IRS,,,

JailHouse Blues up next!


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Post subject: Re: Guitars in General
Posted: Sat Feb 09, 2013 2:41 pm
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whd1952 wrote:
I have been reading the forum for several years and I read nothing but disparaging comments about the Squire and MIM Fenders. I own a Squire and a MIM Strat. I have gone to the various music centers and tried out the cream of the crop. None I felt were worth the asking price. Your average person does not have $1500- $3000 laying around to spend on any guitar in which they are not making a living. When your buy a MIA Fender, all you are buying is the prestige and the name. You can take any guitar and if it is set up properly, play as well and sound as the high priced ones.
I make a tax free income of 6 figures and I play to entertain me and my friends. People don't care how much you paid or what the specs are, just you make music that is pleasing.
I do not own a guitar that costs above $700.00 and my best sounding Acoustic came from the Middle East.
The bottom line is you don't have to spend a lot to sound good and be satisfied.


I drive a used 2005 Toyota Corolla with roll-up windows and I can tell you for a fact that it does the job just as well as any other high end car on the street.

Then again, there is more to the ride than just getting A to B for some people.

I also make excellent money, so I bought myself an American Mahogany HSS Strat.

Love that thing - everything about it. I love American Strats and plan to get the 2013 Am Standard Strat with Custom Shop '54's in it this August.

And I'll drive my '05 Corolla to get it.

To each his (or her) own.

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Post subject: Re: Guitars in General
Posted: Sat Feb 09, 2013 3:00 pm
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I own a Few upper end fender guitars.. They are nice instruments. I also own some lower priced Asian guitars and they are also nice instruments. I don't own a customshop guitar but I will say over all of my guitars- my Squier Tele speaks to me the loudest and the best guitar I've bought in a while. Not to discredit my other guitars though- I have an Ultra, Strat Plus, Deluxe, MIM std Floyd Rose and a Takamine acoustic but I just seem to gravitate back to my squire tele.

It's what you can do on your guitar that counts more than that of where it was made.

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Post subject: Re: Guitars in General
Posted: Sat Feb 09, 2013 3:11 pm
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CRGuitarMan wrote:
whd1952 wrote:
I have been reading the forum for several years and I read nothing but disparaging comments about the Squire and MIM Fenders.
I have read the Forum for years, too, but for every "disparaging" remark about the Squier (correct spelling) and Mexican-made Fender guitars I have read, I have read another from another guitar player who loves his Squier or MIM Fender.

Surely if you have visited the Squier Forum you haven't heard nothing but bad.


+1
This topic always pops up and it's never everyone bagging on the MIM or squires. Just as many people love their MIMs as there people who prefer MIA


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Post subject: Re: Guitars in General
Posted: Sat Feb 09, 2013 3:47 pm
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To the person who questioned my 6 figure tax free income. I am a contractor in the Middle East, Iraq, and Afghanistan for the last 4 1/2 years. I support the US Military in their mission. I am going back to the Middle East for at least 2 more years. If you did the same thing I have done, you could have a tax free income also.
In case you are wondering, I own a 2012 Epiphone Dot, Epiphone SG, MIM 2011 Strat 2010 Squier Strat, Alvarez Acoustic, Iraq made Acoustic, a 1972 Yamaha Acoustic, Fender Mustang I, 2001 Marshall Valvestate Amp, and for giggles, a Gdec-Jr. My amp when I fly is a pignose.


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Post subject: Re: Guitars in General
Posted: Sat Feb 09, 2013 4:13 pm
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i bought an American Standard for 749 new ..i luv it


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Post subject: Re: Guitars in General
Posted: Sat Feb 09, 2013 4:29 pm
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You all know he's right, however I for one would rather get there in a PORSCHE, then a Kia. You can have gold or you can have fools gold, your choice.
:lol: 8)


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Post subject: Re: Guitars in General
Posted: Sat Feb 09, 2013 4:40 pm
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whd1952 wrote:
To the person who questioned my 6 figure tax free income. I am a contractor in the Middle East, Iraq, and Afghanistan for the last 4 1/2 years. I support the US Military in their mission. I am going back to the Middle East for at least 2 more years. If you did the same thing I have done, you could have a tax free income also.


If you're fortunate, you won't end up like those hotrods from Dyncorp who got themselves greased in Fallujah then hung from a bridge like somebody's long-forgotten dry-cleaned polyester leisure suit.

:lol:

Are you scrimping on guitars so you can pour money into having the most accessorized M-4 carbine in "the box" among your corporate peers?

:roll:

Arjay

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Post subject: Re: Guitars in General
Posted: Sat Feb 09, 2013 5:28 pm
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Retroverbial wrote:
whd1952 wrote:
To the person who questioned my 6 figure tax free income. I am a contractor in the Middle East, Iraq, and Afghanistan for the last 4 1/2 years. I support the US Military in their mission. I am going back to the Middle East for at least 2 more years. If you did the same thing I have done, you could have a tax free income also.


If you're fortunate, you won't end up like those hotrods from Dyncorp who got themselves greased in Fallujah then hung from a bridge like somebody's long-forgotten dry-cleaned polyester leisure suit.

:lol:

Are you scrimping on guitars so you can pour money into having the most accessorized M-4 carbine in "the box" among your corporate peers?


:roll:

Arjay


+1
Outstanding Arjay


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Post subject: Re: Guitars in General
Posted: Mon Feb 11, 2013 11:35 am
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whd1952 wrote:
I have been reading the forum for several years and I read nothing but disparaging comments about the Squire and MIM Fenders. I own a Squire and a MIM Strat. I have gone to the various music centers and tried out the cream of the crop. None I felt were worth the asking price. Your average person does not have $1500- $3000 laying around to spend on any guitar in which they are not making a living. When your buy a MIA Fender, all you are buying is the prestige and the name. You can take any guitar and if it is set up properly, play as well and sound as the high priced ones.
I make a tax free income of 6 figures and I play to entertain me and my friends. People don't care how much you paid or what the specs are, just you make music that is pleasing.
I do not own a guitar that costs above $700.00 and my best sounding Acoustic came from the Middle East.
The bottom line is you don't have to spend a lot to sound good and be satisfied.



While it goes without saying that a lot of people are going to slam you for this, dude...I'm with you 110%. I dunno...I guess part of it is just human nature or something but I've just come to the conclusion that for most folks all the hype is more about trying to justify or rationalize all that extra money they spent as apposed to the instrument itself. I've played a couple of American Strats that I actually did like (one or two vintage reissues or something) and as a whole they're not "bad" instruments by any means, but they're just not THAT good either and for the most part I just don't care for the "features" that they charge so much extra for. As I've said before...hand rolled fretboards...pphhttthhh...big whoopee. If I -really- wanted that, I'd rather save the money and do it myself anyways. Just doesn't justify the instrument being double the price. And as far as issues such as workmanship/craftsmanship go, again (and again and again) you just can't tell me that the Fender trained guy loading those bodies into the CNC machine down in Mexico is any less of a "craftsman" than the guy doing the exact same job on an identical machine up here in the US. Yea, some of the imports (not all but some) may use a lesser quality hardware...I recently noticed the the Squier bridge plates are just a bit thinner than my Mexi's. That said, we're not talking a terribly significant difference...if you look at something like a lowely Squier Affinity, they still use sealed tuners. A sealed tuner is pretty much a sealed tuner regardless of what the decal on the headstock says! LOL!!! Even the Ping's that I get off Ebay for $1 a piece do a perfectly fine job of keeping the guitar in tune. Honestly, if I have any niggle about the less expensive imports, it's usually just the pickups. Most of the import pups I've heard over the years typically sound a bit thin to my ears (most...not all). That said, I don't like the American pups either...for the most part they usually sound very flat to me...just no sparkle at all. So why pay extra for something I'm going to have to change anyways?

For me personally if I'm looking at something like an MIM Standard vs. an American Standard, looking at the American, right off the bat I don't like the 2 point trems and I don't care for the pickups...and again the hand rolled fretboards just don't do anything for me at all. With the Mexi's however, no I don't like those pickups there either, but I -do- like the classic 6 point trem and I -LOVE- the Mexi necks...maybe it's the metric spacing and the fact that I do have smaller hands for a guy, I dunno, but they just feel better to me than the Americans. As such, for me personally I don't see -why- that makes the American's superior, let alone being worth double the cost for something I'm just NOT going to be happy with right from the git-go. If someone actually does like that stuff, great...but it doesn't make it a "better" instrument in any way. I just don't get it.

Of course there's -a lot- of people who just won't hear that...they have it in their minds that the expensive instruments are always somehow superior and that is the ONLY thing they will ever believe. That fanciful little voice will ALWAYS whisper in their ear "american is better". Personally I'm a working musician, I've been playing for many years now and have played A LOT of guitars along the way...I just won't throw my money away on utterly silly notions such as pride and snobbery, particularly when I honestly don't care for some of those so-called features to begin with. Yea, I'm the odd guy around here but as I recently stated in another thread, even at the same price, I would honestly take a Mexican Standard over an American Standard every time. I -know- what I like...and that has virtually nothing to do with where the instrument was made. Case in point, I don't like Les Paul's either...I don't care if it's a $400 Epi or a $4000 Gibson Standard...I don't like them. I would honestly rather have a $200 partscaster that I put together myself from parts that I know I like than the most expensive LP on the planet. Why? Because I would -play- the partscaster...the LP would sit on a stand or in a display case until I simply got tired of looking at it.

Maybe that's a big part of it too...at least for me. I really don't care how much a guitar is worth money-wise...I really don't. I've been playing for over 30 years now and to tell ya the truth, -if- I had of ever found a $3000 instrument that really curled my toes, I probably would have found a way to get it. I haven't. As such, perhaps some of this is just that whole Western mentality mindset that says "if it costs more, it must be better". For me, it's just not about how much that guitar is worth from a monetary standpoint, it's about how it feels in -my- hands and how it sounds to -my- ears...nothing else really matters. Again I'm an odd ball but perhaps it's just that some people simply can't see past the dollar signs stamped on the back of their eyes.


In any case, yea...you're going to get a lot of crap about the post here, but as for myself, I'm with ya bro!

Peace,
Jim


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Post subject: Re: Guitars in General
Posted: Mon Feb 11, 2013 11:41 am
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Oh...almost forgot...I -LOVE- Alvarez acoustics! Wonderful instruments with a very lovely tone! In fact the best sounding 12 string acoustic I've ever played was an Alvarez! That said, my favorite acoustics are actually Canadian made Seagulls...my S6 is simply one of the finest acoustics I have ever played. I -do- like my Ovations, but we won't go there for now :-).

And no...I don't like Martin's or Taylor's either. Lump them in there with the Gibsons....over-priced and flat sounding.

Jim


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Post subject: Re: Guitars in General
Posted: Mon Feb 11, 2013 12:25 pm
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Quote:
I drive a used 2005 Toyota Corolla with roll-up windows and I can tell you for a fact that it does the job just as well as any other high end car on the street.

Then again, there is more to the ride than just getting A to B for some people.


Ok...I just LOVE a good car analogy so I'm going throw another $.02 worth in here.


Say it with me people...P-E-R-S-P-E-C-T-I-V-E. Some people like Chevy's, some like Fords. Personally I prefer my beat up Plymouth mini van (ok...Mopars in general, LOL!). I've seen the name "Porsche" pop here in a couple of these threads so let's go from there. I suspect that most people would probably argue that a Porsche is "better" than my Plymouth mini-van, yes? But let's look at this a bit closer... Sure, the Porsche goes "faster" than my minivan and it's certainly more "stylish"...but it's not like I can drive that thing at 150 mph anywhere here in Ohio! Can I load the full PA system along with all my guitar gear into the trunk? Can I really plop my fat white butt down in the seats of the Porsche comfortably for that hour and a half drive to the gig? And geezzz...what about other practical stuff like insurance? I only pay about $200 a year for liability for my minivan...can we do that with a Porsche??? What if something happens like an accident? For the $700 I payed for my Plymouth, if it gets wrecked, I can easy get another (actually the one I own now is my 3rd). Can we do that with a Porsche? In fact I got rear-ended in my first Plymouth minivan (a 1990) by a half ton Chevy pickup...drove myself to the hospital afterward. Would I even have survived in the Porsche? And what about parts and such...sooner or later that Porsche is going to need a "tune up" just like my minivan...can I get those spark plugs, air filter, fuel filter, etc., at Auto Zone (at least without a special order)? Are they going to cost the same?? As far as getting from point A to B goes, yea...my beat up minivan certainly does that and it's got all the "essentials"...decent heater for these cold Ohio winters, great ground clearance (again for the snowy Ohio winters)...the one I own now even has a front window defroster and a rear window wiper (and both actually work! LOL!!!). Can I even drive that Porsche in an Ohio winter?? Would I -really- want to???

Now with these practical issues aside for the moment, if I were interested in "performance" vehicle, sure Porsche's are nice, but for my money, I'd MUCH rather have something like a '68 Dodge Charger R/T! H_ll...give me one that needs a bit of restoring so I can build it up the way -I- want! No, I still couldn't drive it at 150 mph here in Ohio (except maybe out at Norwalk Speedway), but the thrill...the tingle that goes up the spine when you fire over that classic Mopar 440...you just can't match that with ANY Porsche! And for my money, you just can't beat the cool factor with a vintage Mopar...most Porsche's just don't even compare! Doesn't mean the Porsche is a "bad" car, but I like the old Mopars considerably more...and if I could find a Mexican knock-off of one for around $4000, I'd probably buy it! LOL! As with guitars, I -know- what I like :-).

So for me and -my- needs and my own personal taste, why exactly is the Porsche "better"? Should people really buy a Porsche just because a bunch of people on a forum say they're better?? From my point of view, that actually seems -incredibly- wasteful. Sure...some people really think they should have "the best". Snobbery issues aside though, "the best" is simply what any given person get's the most use out of. In my case, I not only don't "need" a Porsche, owning one would be rather counter-productive...so why pay THAT much extra for one? That just does NOT make sense at all...

Jim


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Post subject: Re: Guitars in General
Posted: Tue Feb 12, 2013 12:58 am
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:shock: :roll: :roll: :roll: :shock:

Well I will have to agree with the classic mopar
All the other stuff, if it works for you right on...I also know what works for me.

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Post subject: Re: Guitars in General
Posted: Tue Feb 12, 2013 5:03 am
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I have been here a bit and I don't think I noticed that many disparaging comments about MIM and Squires. I tried a few and some are quite great playing instruments.

Fender have a very large product portfolio and you can pick and choose what el guitar at what price point you are comfortable with which is great IMO. You have some companies which don't do that (I can think of duesenberg off the top on my head but there are others), they will only offer instruments at the higher end range. If Fender did that, a lot of learners would never be able to get one.

There is more to the el guit than just the setup. No point going into detail on that one as its been covered a lot.

However, I might be in the minority who think the pricing of the MIA Fenders isn't all that bad (no Fender corp. dont jack them up again!!). But when you compare how the much the price of some other things have gone up in the last 20 years (think housing, food, gas) -- electric guitars are pretty small time. Just my 2 cents.

whd1952 wrote:
I have been reading the forum for several years and I read nothing but disparaging comments about the Squire and MIM Fenders. I own a Squire and a MIM Strat. I have gone to the various music centers and tried out the cream of the crop. None I felt were worth the asking price. Your average person does not have $1500- $3000 laying around to spend on any guitar in which they are not making a living. When your buy a MIA Fender, all you are buying is the prestige and the name. You can take any guitar and if it is set up properly, play as well and sound as the high priced ones.
I make a tax free income of 6 figures and I play to entertain me and my friends. People don't care how much you paid or what the specs are, just you make music that is pleasing.
I do not own a guitar that costs above $700.00 and my best sounding Acoustic came from the Middle East.
The bottom line is you don't have to spend a lot to sound good and be satisfied.

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Post subject: Re: Guitars in General
Posted: Tue Feb 12, 2013 8:28 am
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Quote from lomitus....

Ok...I just LOVE a good car analogy so I'm going throw another $.02 worth in here.

Personally I prefer my beat up Plymouth mini van (ok...Mopars in general, LOL!). I've seen the name "Porsche" pop here in a couple of these threads so let's go from there. I suspect that most people would probably argue that a Porsche is "better" than my Plymouth mini-van, yes? But let's look at this a bit closer... Sure, the Porsche goes "faster" than my minivan and it's certainly more "stylish"...but it's not like I can drive that thing at 150 mph anywhere here in Ohio! Can I load the full PA system along with all my guitar gear into the trunk? Can I really plop my fat white butt down in the seats of the Porsche comfortably for that hour and a half drive to the gig? .... Quote

Well I guess we know where you stand concerning Porsche's ..... You didn't mention which Porsche BTW ..... The 914, 944, 924's are quite affordable, fun to drive and just as much fun to bring up to specs ..... But maybe you were referring to the Carrera 4S ( An AWD that will set you back a few pennies :lol: ) Although when it comes to the concern of Crashing, I'd rather be in my Audi S4 or a Porsche than a Minivan.
But I have a better alternative to your minivan. A B5 or B6 series Audi A4 Avant ( wagon ) in which you would be able to load all of your music equipment, could get your FWA in and out of the seats, ( which are heated so sweat a little :wink: ) and Quattro would allow you to go anywhere anytime it snows in Ohio . Oh & BTW ... They get around 30mpg's. Maintenance is a DIY and if you want bigger HP / Trq then just BT it....

:? :wink: :roll: There really was no need to go on a tirade about how you dislike German cars or whatever..... And as for the Toyota Corolla love, my better half has a Toyota Matrix ( Corolla platform ) it gets you here and there, it rattles, it's plastic, it's basically a throwaway , or as Chris Harris described a certain car as " A shopping Trolley " but it's still nevertheless impossible to get around when snow gets to 6+inches and in the WCS of an accident I'd rather not be in the Toyota...

This thread is about Fender guitars and the OP's premise that being a Tax Free 6 figure earner ( pontification award is adorned to the OP ) there is no way that a high end Custom Shop or Upper-End Deluxe or Standard justifies the cost. An Affinity or at least a Classic Vibe Squier is as good as the models aimed at the Pro player..... :roll: :lol:
I will aquiesce when I see my local pro players play the above instead of their Standards or Deluxes or CS's or 60's, 50's reissues. I'd like to see Mayer or Buddy Guy or Robert Cray or Mr Clapton play a gig with an out of the box Squier. ( That means not set up,just as it arrived from Fender ) . Or perhaps we'll be fortunate and Fender will have a limited run of Squier Blackie's or Brownies .... :idea:

I did a thread on this Forum on a budget rebuild of a Squier Strat, Hardware wise I still spent about $300+ for Trem, Pots, Pups, Tuners, refinishing ... etc ... etc ... If the labor cost were included from completely redressing and refinishing neck and body, we are up in the $500+ costs range. Added to the initial price of the Squier $150 + $300 + $500 = $950 :shock: :?:
Those are my own personal costs estimates, todo this for someone then at least add 50%
At this price point we are up in the MIA Standards . Deluxes if from the pre-owned market segment.

I can understand not wanting to spend above a certain amount, when dictated due to budget constraints then that is appropriate as well as from a 6 figure earner also.
But Boasting of Tax Free six figures and I choose to buy at low price point because the upper line is overpriced and not needed is Crass..... There was no need of bringing personal earnings nor for that matter Hatred for Porsche or Whatever.... Kinda Pointless.

However and fortunately so this overall argument has been adressed multiple times in other threads and the majority wins in that Pro level Equipment is worth the price and required to play... :idea: :arrow:

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