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fullroundaction posted:Bit more of a learning curve on Rocksmith than I was anticipating, being that I consider myself a Guitar Hero/Rockband SUPERSTAR. Does your guitar have a Floyd Rose/double tremolo? De-tuning a Floyd Rosed out guitar takes more work than just loosening the pegs and can be kind of a bastard for someone without a lot of practice doing it.
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Feb 27, 2015 05:42
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The Kinks 
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fullroundaction posted:Bit more of a learning curve on Rocksmith than I was anticipating, being that I consider myself a Guitar Hero/Rockband SUPERSTAR. They just reissued Lola vs Powerman and you should all get that album. Or at least listen to the track Powerman.
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Feb 27, 2015 08:49
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Hi all, I've been reading through this thread for the last couple of months and just wanted to say thanks to everyone for the advice, help and general guitar chat  Though, now I know what GAS is I'm having to fight urges. Strong urges. The Blackout 2015 looks beautiful to me. I'm just glad it's not out yet.  I'm limiting myself to trying to get the same look by putting a black pickguard on my cheapo black tele Affinity (yeah I know).
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Feb 27, 2015 09:49
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Minto Took posted:One of my good friends is left handed, but plays right handed. He plays for a living, so it's possible.
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Feb 27, 2015 10:11
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DeathSandwich posted:Does your guitar have a Floyd Rose/double tremolo? De-tuning a Floyd Rosed out guitar takes more work than just loosening the pegs and can be kind of a bastard for someone without a lot of practice doing it. No I'm just lazy. Plus I've never owned a guitar where you don't have to tune all strings several times after doing something simple like dropping to D. If you're concerned about it being perfect, anyway. Also, blackout Tele look owns. Do it.
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Feb 27, 2015 14:18
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Why the hell didn't they match the headstock on that? Seems like a miss on an otherwise awesome looking guitar. Love the big seventies headstock.
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Feb 27, 2015 14:32
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I am spending most of my lunchtimes wandering around Denmark Street/Guitar-mecca and I still can't come up with a good argument for 355-alike vs. solid-body SS like a CV 50's Telecaster. In terms of mutual exclusivity it seems that the Tele would do better for high-gain, surf, funk and country and the 355 would do blues-rock-jazz-soul-rnb better, but there's nothing that one can do that the other can't - is that right?
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Feb 27, 2015 14:39
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Buy both. A Tele and a 335 is close to a perfect double.
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Feb 27, 2015 15:20
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Southern Heel posted:I am spending most of my lunchtimes wandering around Denmark Street/Guitar-mecca and I still can't come up with a good argument for 355-alike vs. solid-body SS like a CV 50's Telecaster. In terms of mutual exclusivity it seems that the Tele would do better for high-gain, surf, funk and country and the 355 would do blues-rock-jazz-soul-rnb better, but there's nothing that one can do that the other can't - is that right? Basically, but most guitars are only limited by the person playing them anyways
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Feb 27, 2015 16:38
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wizkid posted:Hi all, http://www.guitarfetish.com/XV-870-Darkside-Special-Edition-Black-with-White-Hardware_p_1243.html I'mma gonna leave this here. Slightly different from a Blackout. It's a Floyd tribute. Warcabbit fucked around with this message at 16:54 on Feb 27, 2015 |
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Feb 27, 2015 16:50
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Those of you who do your own setups: am I better off buying a general set of feeler gauges or one of those speciality guitar-specific credit card shaped things?
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Feb 27, 2015 20:04
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fullroundaction posted:Those of you who do your own setups: am I better off buying a general set of feeler gauges or one of those speciality guitar-specific credit card shaped things? You can just use a regular credit card and you don't need feeler gauges. By setup, are you talking about string action, neck relief, nut slots and/or intonation? On another subject,  NEW GUITAR DAY I wanted something under 500 for an upcoming rock gig which is just piano and guitar instrumentals, and I couldn't pass on the possible range of tones here. I have never seen a cheap guitar ($399) come from the store this nice. I always set up my instruments - the whole shebang including fretwork if it needs it - and look for good deals. Everything here, fit and finish, is 10/10 perfect except the intonation on the low E string. It is so resonant - I'm not sure if it's the pine body or what but I've never played something that resonates like this at this price point. Have the factories just gotten this good at churning out instruments? I don't think so because I tried a bunch of guitars from 400-700 at Guitar Center and they all had their share of retail store instrument problems. It's hard to capture the finish in a picture, and the neck finish looks like glass. It is so pretty. And has a comfort contour on the back! And is like 4 lbs.    I am debating on swapping out the neck pickup for a burst bucker I have sitting around....a MIM tele that I have mysteriously was routed for a humbucker at the neck even though it came with the standard single coil. If this has the route I might have to do it 
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Feb 27, 2015 20:30
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rio posted:You can just use a regular credit card and you don't need feeler gauges. By setup, are you talking about string action, neck relief, nut slots and/or intonation? Yes rio posted:On another subject,
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Feb 27, 2015 20:34
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rio posted:
Which Tele model is this? I've wanted a Tele for a while, and cheap is nice. Of course, I haven't had the opportunity to give my new JM baritone the love it deserves, so I'll probably wait a while for a new instrument.
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Feb 27, 2015 20:36
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fullroundaction posted:Those of you who do your own setups: am I better off buying a general set of feeler gauges or one of those speciality guitar-specific credit card shaped things? I do about 3 or 4 setups a week, I use my feeler gauges to get stuff in the ball park, but I mostly go by gut/playing to figure out action. So if you're new to setting stuff up, they might come in handy, but they're not a must have. For action, I just got a cheapo ruler from harbor freight that measures down to 64ths and it works just fine.
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Feb 27, 2015 20:40
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rio posted:You can just use a regular credit card and you don't need feeler gauges. By setup, are you talking about string action, neck relief, nut slots and/or intonation? Oh thank god that's a reflection of a tiffany's lamp. I thought you put duct tape on it or dinged the poo poo out of it already and got really concerned why you'd ruin that nice guitar so quickly.
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Feb 27, 2015 20:41
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Golly that Dinosaur Jr book really doesn't pull punches, does it? Certainly a big step up from my 'Justin Guitar' and Sabbath tab books... how is everyone else faring? The syncopation in 'Almost Ready' is doing my head in.Xabi posted:Buy both. A Tele and a 335 is close to a perfect double. Twist: I already have a Jazz/59' equipped solid body and can only get one more guitar. For the 335 I'm looking at the Dot/Sheraton, (or maybe the new 335 Pro since it has the coil tap) and a variety of Ibanez full and semi-hollows (at least their A*93 range): Tele would certainly be the CV 50's.
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Feb 27, 2015 20:45
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rio posted:You can just use a regular credit card and you don't need feeler gauges. By setup, are you talking about string action, neck relief, nut slots and/or intonation? I was assuming he meant something like this. Apparently a normal credit card is around .030" inches thick which would be pretty high if you used it to set relief. I'd probably still go with normal feeler gauges, though. You'd also be able to use them to measure/adjust nut heights.The StewMac card has the advantage of being able to set saddle heights as well (which you wouldn't be able to do without stacking regular feelers), but my preferred amateur way of doing that is using a set of digital calipers. I zero them to the width of the string I'm adjusting, then set the height to whatever I want action to be, then put the calipers on top of the 15th (or wherever you're supposed to be measuring) fret and adjust the bridge until the top of the string just touches the calipers. I use the metal ruler thing at the bottom of calipers like these, if that makes sense.
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Feb 27, 2015 20:49
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fullroundaction posted:Those of you who do your own setups: am I better off buying a general set of feeler gauges or one of those speciality guitar-specific credit card shaped things? I use guitar strings as feeler gauges. Works fine for me.
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Feb 27, 2015 21:51
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firebad57 posted:Which Tele model is this? I've wanted a Tele for a while, and cheap is nice. It's a Modern Player Telecaster Plus. http://www.fender.com/guitars/telecaster/modern-player-telecaster-plus/product-0241102.html
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Feb 27, 2015 21:56
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I guess you can coil-tap the HB, right? I've heard differing responses if that's as one would expect, or a half-measure type act?
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Feb 27, 2015 23:42
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Southern Heel posted:I guess you can coil-tap the HB, right? I've heard differing responses if that's as one would expect, or a half-measure type act? Yep. The normal humbucker sound is great. The tapped single coil sound is legit but noticeably softer in volume. It is pretty obvious that I won't be getting a standard telecaster bridge sound due to the strat styled bridge and difference in pickup and orientation etc. but it is a useable pleasant sounding single cool sound. I may look into swapping out the pickup someday but I see no reason for the time being.
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Feb 28, 2015 00:50
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Those Chinese Modern Player Teles are absolutely some of the best kept secrets in the new market. The neck/HB bridge setting is massive. Still couldn't get some customers past the fact that it was MIC, though.
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Feb 28, 2015 01:22
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gang control posted:I'm left-handed and trying to finally stick with learning guitar. What's the hivemind thought on learning on a right-handed guitar vs. a left-handed one? Left-handed ones feel more natural but I'm guessing they present some challenges when you're learning from a right-handed teacher. I can see some upside to having my dominant hand on the frets, but I don't really know whether I'd be doing myself a disservice or making the learning curve tougher if I used a righty guitar. Anyone have input about this? As a left handed person who plays a left handed guitar, buy a right handed guitar. I definitely regret learning to play lefty, wayyy smaller selection and you can't play on anyone else's guitar.
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Feb 28, 2015 02:52
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After The War posted:Those Chinese Modern Player Teles are absolutely some of the best kept secrets in the new market. The neck/HB bridge setting is massive. "Let me just look that up on my iPhone... ugh, made in China??? No thanks" How are the Chinese factories now? Are they up there with the Korean and Indonesian ones, challenging a lot of the MIM and MIA stuff?
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Feb 28, 2015 03:09
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baka kaba posted:"Let me just look that up on my iPhone... ugh, made in China??? No thanks" it wouldn't be very hard to rival the new mexi made strats. I've leveled and filed down fret ends on at least 6 in the last month. My 2002 mexi has immaculate frets, they have really gone down hill.
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Feb 28, 2015 03:14
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Where the guitar is made is not really as important as the QA standards and materials they choose to use.
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Feb 28, 2015 03:23
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Actually now I'm thinking about all this, what does make the factories better or worse? Like time was some of the Asian factories were synonymous with crappy guitars, right? And Mexico too earlier on, I'm guessing? And MIA was the holy grail, but now everyone's catching up. What's actually changing? Better tools, the workforce in each factory gaining experience, parent companies imposing stricter quality standards, more time allowed to work on each instrument? I mean like unlawfulsoup's saying, where it's made shouldn't really matter - guitars aren't exactly high tech, they need a bit of attention and craft and decent parts and materials, but you should be able to get that anywhere. I'm guessing the answer is going to be 'money' but why have things improved recently?
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Feb 28, 2015 03:34
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baka kaba posted:Actually now I'm thinking about all this, what does make the factories better or worse? Like time was some of the Asian factories were synonymous with crappy guitars, right? And Mexico too earlier on, I'm guessing? And MIA was the holy grail, but now everyone's catching up. What's actually changing? Better tools, the workforce in each factory gaining experience, parent companies imposing stricter quality standards, more time allowed to work on each instrument? Probably a ball busting supervisor.
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Feb 28, 2015 03:44
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There's a guy on YouTube that I can't find on my phone that does blind reviews of similar model guitars (J/M/A strats, Epi/Gibson LPs, etc). Like you can see him playing but can't see the actual guitar. Then he lets people argue in the comments which sounds best and which model is which and reveals what's what a few weeks later. Almost invariably I (and the commenters) like the non-MIA/premium versions either just as much or better. I say this as someone who has absolutely no idea what the actual difference is in the models being put out right now. So don't get mad at me.
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Feb 28, 2015 03:46
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My guess is that with improved cnc machines, machines that can do fretwork well etc. that the process is just cleaner all around. The best instruments coming out of the newest/newest renovated factories regardless of place of origin. I know that in the archtop world that made in China was a stamp of poo poo until last decade when those machines started to be used throughout the building process, factories needing less workers and and allowing more skilled workers. The guitar market is so different than it used to be and I hope the day will come soon when there is no excuse for a factory made instrument to come out with uneven frets, sharp frets, sloppy work etc. It always makes my stomach turn when I try a nice looking Gibson and some basic poo poo is wrong with a guitar that costs over a thousand dollars. On one side I've gotten guitars cheaper when I can talk the salesmen down because if flaws but on the other it is inexcusable that guitars and basses are getting through inspections in some of the conditions in which they are sold. Sorry, slightly off topic rambling over. Edit: yeah, brand doesn't matter so much as just nuts and bolts - pickup configuration, wood used and all that. What does matter though is playability and the majority of guitars being sold are not ready to play. Then someone tries a 2400 dollar les Paul and is like "Holy poo poo this is the Grail" when it is really just set up better than the others to make it seem AMAZING in comparison to other guitars. rio fucked around with this message at 03:57 on Feb 28, 2015 |
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Feb 28, 2015 03:52
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unlawfulsoup posted:Where the guitar is made is not really as important as the QA standards and materials they choose to use. It really sucks that this isn't common sense. I mean, if people were objecting to MIC or wherever because of human rights abuses, that would be one thing, but overall, the attitude seems to be closer to jingoism...
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Feb 28, 2015 03:53
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CNC machining has evened the playing field considerably more than a lot of people want to admit. Coupled with strict qc, we end up with amazing stuff like that Tele coming out of China, something that just wouldn't have happened consistently before. Edit: Beaten worse than this poor thing pointlessone fucked around with this message at 04:12 on Feb 28, 2015 |
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Feb 28, 2015 03:58
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baka kaba posted:Actually now I'm thinking about all this, what does make the factories better or worse? Like time was some of the Asian factories were synonymous with crappy guitars, right? And Mexico too earlier on, I'm guessing? And MIA was the holy grail, but now everyone's catching up. What's actually changing? Better tools, the workforce in each factory gaining experience, parent companies imposing stricter quality standards, more time allowed to work on each instrument? You pretty much nailed it, guitars are not that hard to make. We are basically talking 50s era designs with the occasional minor upgrade. My guess is things have improved because there is a lot of competition and the bar has been risen. Squiers are not a joke anymore, things like CVs are basically up to part with MiM or better. Epiphone as well has been improving their QA from what I have heard (not from what I have seen personally though). A lot of these factories are pretty mature now, so companies in lets say Korea have been making quality guitars for a while. Basically the bar has been raised and there are higher expectations now in the lower end. Before you were basically told to lump it, because budgets lines were largely inferior pieces; you either fluked into good one or spent extra money upgrading. firebad57 posted:It really sucks that this isn't common sense. I mean, if people were objecting to MIC or wherever because of human rights abuses, that would be one thing, but overall, the attitude seems to be closer to jingoism... One part jingoism, second part ignorance. A lot of people who buy high end guitars would not 'lower' themselves to try a cheaper foreign made one. Naturally they are just inferior.
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Feb 28, 2015 04:00
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pointlessone posted:CNC machining has evened the playing field considerably more than a lot of people want to admit. Coupled with strict qc, we end up with amazing stuff like that Tele coming out of China, something that just wouldn't have happened consistently before. I think I problem is that CNC machines have convinced factory managers that skilled employees are no longer needed. CNC Machines can do a lot but they can't really do finish work and an instrument is only as good as the finish work. None of that has anything to do with anything other than supervision. for the record: My 2002 Mexi strat has better finish work than my 2007 American Tele. Though the Mexi Strat has worse electronics by a mile. Hollis Brownsound fucked around with this message at 04:08 on Feb 28, 2015 |
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Feb 28, 2015 04:06
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unlawfulsoup posted:One part jingoism, second part ignorance. A lot of people who buy high end guitars would not 'lower' themselves to try a cheaper foreign made one. Naturally they are just inferior. People tend to think that higher costs must mean higher quality materials or construction. It makes sense at first glance because there's no way something made in America can compete in terms of cost, so there should be something to make the American made stuff more attractive to buyers. This ignores the fact that coasting on reputation is a viable business strategy though, at least in the short term. On another topic, Guitar Fetish is having a site-wide sale until March 3rd. I've been feeling the urge to tinker with something lately so I'm tempted to grab some pickups to replace the ones in my Agile LP clone. Any reason this might be a bad idea? I've done soldering before, though not in the last few years, so it's not something I feel horribly uncomfortable doing.
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Feb 28, 2015 06:21
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Give it a try. Have fun. I never soldered before and managed to completely wire a strat with a p90 and humbucker over the course of a couple days. You are unlikely to hurt anything except maybe the pots by overheating them (not likely but easy and cheap to fix if you do). On the plus side you will likely get the IKEA effect and you will love the LP even more. On the downside, depending on your Agile model and amp situation, you may not notice much difference.
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Feb 28, 2015 07:04
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HollisBrown posted:I think I problem is that CNC machines have convinced factory managers that skilled employees are no longer needed. CNC Machines can do a lot but they can't really do finish work and an instrument is only as good as the finish work. None of that has anything to do with anything other than supervision. There was a period between about 98 and 04 where Mexican fenders were made better than American ones provided you didn't take the electronics into account. My strat is a 99 MIM and spending about what I paid for it originally ($250) on all new electronics made it easily comparable to a new $1000-$1500 strat.
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Feb 28, 2015 08:37
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plerocercoid posted:On another topic, Guitar Fetish is having a site-wide sale until March 3rd. I've been feeling the urge to tinker with something lately so I'm tempted to grab some pickups to replace the ones in my Agile LP clone. Any reason this might be a bad idea? I've done soldering before, though not in the last few years, so it's not something I feel horribly uncomfortable doing. GFS pickups in Agile guitars are a time-tested combo. The lead wires are on the thin side, though that's the same with any other pickup. They use the Seymour Duncan wiring colors. A Winner is Jew posted:There was a period between about 98 and 04 where Mexican fenders were made better than American ones provided you didn't take the electronics into account. My strat is a 99 MIM and spending about what I paid for it originally ($250) on all new electronics made it easily comparable to a new $1000-$1500 strat. For a while in the early-mid 90s MIM Fenders were actually fabricated at the Coronado plant then assembled in Mexico because the Ensenada plant burned down. Alec Bald Snatch fucked around with this message at 08:48 on Feb 28, 2015 |
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Feb 28, 2015 08:38
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A Winner is Jew posted:There was a period between about 98 and 04 where Mexican fenders were made better than American ones provided you didn't take the electronics into account. My strat is a 99 MIM and spending about what I paid for it originally ($250) on all new electronics made it easily comparable to a new $1000-$1500 strat. I have an '01 which was my first guitar and it is basically indestructible.
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Feb 28, 2015 09:00
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