The Official Guitar Thread

Have you looked into Carvin? I bought a bunch of parts from them years ago to build a strat-like guitar. But all their bodies are routed to support even three humbuckers.

Yea I looked at them (I think they are Kiesel now?) as well as Warmoth but they're really not in the price range (or time investment) for the whole project.

We'll see, maybe a really good deal pops up for something else on BF.

So wtf bros...

Went to GC because they had some of the new stuff in. They didn't have the Mustang 90 I was eyeing but they did have a close facsimile, the Duo Sonic HS. Same scale, roughly same body shape, overall very similar. Played well, monster sustain due to the string through with a fixed bridge. As expected the weak parts are the shitty plastic nut and the fretwork was not baby smooth on the edges.

Big disappointment though in the Gibson department. I fucking hate their QC, they are such a shit company. I looked at both an SG Standard T and HP models (HP has bunch of gay electronic shit like auto-tuning pegs = neckdive city) as well as the 2017 faded SG.

For an $800 guitar, the faded SG was a piece of shit. It was worse than a $300 Epi. Just terrible fit and finish, horrible fretwork that I wouldn't wish upon my worst enemy and thoroughly mediocre humbuckers (I think burstbuckers?). The Standard was even worse though. $1300 and the little plastic trim ring plate that goes between the neck and the pickup ring was on askew with the little screw sideways into the body and it sticking out about 1/8" on one side. Like what the actual fuck. The 14th fret had a weird point to it on the top as well but otherwise the neck was fine. The finish was super thin. Pickups were great (PAF/'57 style?) but the guitar assembly and finish was just abysmal. The only great thing was that the neck joint glue was only dried out a bit through the finish (lol) and at least the guitar was well balanced. The SG Standard is the one that belongs at the $800 price point and the faded one belongs in a dumpster.

What a disaster though, Gibson is such a disgrace at this point. I don't think I can stomach dropping the coin on a Gibson with all their QC problems.

Completely agree on the Gibson issues. I have a '76 and a '88 LP Standard that are both complete workhorses. The newer chambered bodies aside, they are literally a completely different guitar than anything made in the past 15 years. I've moved to PRS since that time and never looked back. For something I'm going to invest in, I don't mind paying the extra cash for significantly higher craftsmanship and quality.

I bought a Gretsch White Panther a couple of years ago. Gretsch's pro series are made in Japan and typically run in the $2,2200-$5k price range. Same as a higher end Gibson. The Gretsch is perfect, down to every last detail. The two Gibson's in the same price range I tried out on the same day seemed like they were thrown together with spare parts.

It infuriates me to see a brand that is such a staple in the guitar world go to shit like Gibson has.

Especially considering how goddamn expensive Gibson is. My 76 is a workhorse too

Noodleface said:

Especially considering how goddamn expensive Gibson is. My 76 is a workhorse too

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That's the thing, if everything was 50% cheaper it'd be like 'well gibson makes good guitars i don't know why they sully their name with this shit model but whatever' instead their expensive shit is typically just as bad. You should NOT have to inspect and go through a 3500 guitar to see if there are fucking defects in workmanship. None of them should have made it out the door. And I'm not saying you wouldn't, just that you shouldn't have to.

Fender is supposed to be the 'cheap' brand but I would put Chinese Fenders against American Gibson, they are just that lopsided in quality.

I have NEVER seen any Fender (not including the shit Squires because despite some really good Squires like the CV series some are shit) but never a guitar branded with Fender that I thought couldn't be played or fixed with a little elbow grease.

Heritage makes a pretty good Gibson (in the old Gibson factory).

Anyone ever play a Boden guitar? I'm intrigued by the ergonimics, but that seems like a lot of money for a World Music Instruments guitar.

McQueen said:

Anyone ever play a Boden guitar? I'm intrigued by the ergonimics, but that seems like a lot of money for a World Music Instruments guitar.

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Can't say that I have, though looking at pictures it doesn't really do anything for me. It's like a travel guitar?


Anyway, so after going back and forth all week, GC made my decision easy by offering 20% off the Mustang with P90s. Can't beat $400.

I think I'm going to bring it down to the local luthier to put in a tusq nut and smooth and sand down the fret edges before I start electronicsing it. After thinking about it the cutouts in the body work I may just order a custom pickguard cut for PAFs instead of minis at the same time. That'll give me a platform to just drop in a whole electronics swap and I can start piecing it together while I'm waiting to get it back.

Palum said:

Can't say that I have, though looking at pictures it doesn't really do anything for me. It's like a travel guitar?

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strandberg said:

The contoured body shape allows multiple comfortable seated playing positions and the low weight saves your shoulders and neck. The patented EndurNeck™ shape relaxes muscles, joints, and tendons in your hand, wrist and forearm, and encourages a more correct playing position.

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I couldn't care less about the body cuts, and the headless design is butt-ugly but makes it exceptionally lightweight. The EndurNeck sounds interesting though. It has what they call a torzal twist (???), slightly fanned frets, and a trapezoidal profile. The only reason I'm interested is that I'm overly susceptible to tendinitis.

If anyone wants a sick deal on a small tube amp, MMM has the 5W Vibro Champs on sale again for 135 for Cyber Monday. Missed the BF sale for 120 unfortunately. Great store and great deal.

Fender Vibro Champ XD 5w Tube Guitar Combo Amp

Had a friend bring a guitar over for an emergency pre show fix. Apparently he gave it to another friend to fix and the friend gave it to guitar center to fix. He had two 7 string emgs installed with a killswitch and no volume or tone knobs.

Whatever they did they charged him 100 bucks and the guitar was at low output and the killswitch only worked when pressed in.

I fixed it in about an hour and a half by completely rewiring the whole guitar and putting the killswitch wired directly to the output jack instead of on the pickups.

Worked 100%

The guitar center dude didn't even solder some wires, he just twisted and electrical taped them.

Hahaha fuckin GC.

So my Vibro Champ XD came in the mail today. Unboxed it and holy shit is this thing ballsy for 5 watts. Basic Fender voicings are done really well, Tweed settings in particular are fantastic. Has a great ragged edge tone that's pretty easy to hit at comfortable volumes (unlike my AC30).

The only negative in my mind is that the FX knob has a bunch of things like reverb/tremelo/delay/etc. and I would have just cut that knob completely and just made the FX level knob control vintage reverb.

For $135 though I don't think you'll find a better tube amp new at least.

I got one, too, and I'm really impressed with it. It sounds better to my ears than a Vox AC10 I used to have.

I didn't. I had it for just under a week and returned it. "Classic Vox" tone out of a little 10" combo sounded awful.

Heriotze said:

How do you guys like your Vox amps? I was always a bit apprehensive due to the distinctive Vox sound, which I liked when I played them in store, but can you push them out of that range? They always have a great, almost natural, fuzz tone when I've played on them but if I try to run a lot of reverb is starts to sound pretty bad and I always went back to a Fender with pedals that could mimic the crunch from the Vox but still take advantage of the clean side with sequenced reverb pedals.

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I can't really speak about the smaller Vox amps (besides the Night Train which is pretty funky).

I have an AC30 2x12 combo with Celestion Blues. It is an amazing clean tones amp and handles my Keeley Fuzz Head very well. It does not seem to like external overdrive (like my TS9) in the same way as a comparable Fender clean amp would, it is very hard to 'push' a low volume overdrive tone like a bluesy crunch tone out of it due to the massive headroom. If you push the amp naturally to the break up point it sounds amazing, however that requires significant volume which from a 30W tube amp may not be desirable/appropriate for the setting. Not saying it can't be done, but it's very finicky in this regard and for that type of tone I would go more along the lines of a Blues Jr/Bassbreaker style amp I think. Also, while the stock trem/reverb are amazing on a full size AC30, I believe it doesn't scale down well to fit in smaller cabinets so that might be why you have that particular problem if you are running through an AC10/15.

All that said, my experience is largely with hot single coils (or SC sized humbuckers). I don't have a full humbucker guitar (hence the new purchase) so YMMV. Certainly for a singing tone like Brian May or clean tones it's a great choice if you like its characteristics but I'm not sure I would choose it as an 'only amp' in retrospect, even if its ended up as my only tube amp until I got this Champ XD.

Just got the Mustang in as well - fantastic fit and finish. Really impressed once again with the Mexican Fenders lately. Neck is great - needs a full setup due to climate change and all that but no buzzing at all besides the action is super low. Only real negative if you were going to leave it stock is the P90s are ballsy but lack a bit of definition (expected) and the saddles are surprisingly don't even have string guides cut into them, they are super vintage which I don't like because bending tends to screw with intonation too much compared to modern style. Neck is amazing to play, headstock is gloss but the neck is satin finish and just smooth as hell.

So custom pickguard time - does anyone have any experiences with Terrapin/WD/etc.?

I need to order a replacement with routes for humbuckers instead of these horse sized P90 clones.

I got a new Ibanez RG652 from the Ibanez Rules guy on sale. It should be here Monday.