Bare Knuckle Pickups Forum
Forum Ringside => Guitars, Amps and Effects => Topic started by: Lew on July 17, 2013, 02:57:50 PM
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Gonna be a longish rant 'cause I'm at a loose end this afternoon... :lol:
In the latest issue of Guitarist (I know, I only subbed for the free pedalboard) they blind tested a bunch of boutique amps and (from memory) most couldn't tell the difference between a HotRod Deluxe and a 3monkeys amp and it got me thinking.
I'm interested in peoples take on it all 'cause up to a few years ago I honestly really did buy into it all (mostly, I suppose from a lack of actual knowledge) but these days, not so much and the cost is getting out of hand. I'll preface this by admitting I'm a gearsnob. The cost of production gear keeps going up which I'm sure is partly thanks to the shiteeety economy and how hard wood is getting to source but also, I think it's being done to match the boutique market which in turn keeps going up to separate themselves as a superior instrument.
I think we have the big names to blame for the 'boutique' market (I even hate the word boutique) being what it is and even existing. Gibson when it comes to setneck guitars because the QC on non customshops has been abysmal and have gone hand in hand with price hikes and no, this isn't something I've read on the internet it's been from hands on experience, bad binding, splintered wood where the tailpieces screw in, excess glue on inlays etc etc. I mean a new Gibson VOS LesPaul is close to £4k and in my opinion all of those features and quality should be on a standard model for around or close to 2k. Why isn't it?
I think PRS are alot closer to getting it right with a custom24 costing around 2.3k (still a few hundred too much imo). But why do people pay 7k for a private stock or £8k for whatever 'tribute' Lespaul du jour is on offer. World guitars is 15mins down the road from me and they actually have £14k PRS collection guitars that sound and play like a well set-up custom24 or DGT. Who the $%&# is buying these? It sure as shite aint working musicians. I think those prices should only exist in the vintage market and to me it seems like nothing more than a pissing contest. And then you get the uber boutique market, £5k for a Huber lespaul,£4k for a Hartung lespaul, when you compare the prices to a VOSGibson the pricing seems fair.
I remember getting a private message from a rep of the american website DestroyAllGuitars on the gear page once when I was talking about Fibenare who blatantly told me to stop telling people how much they cost in the UK/Europe (because they clearly had them listed on their website at a massive markup), it was both disturbing and an eye-opener as to how these things can work.
I know quality costs and I don't want to confuse my take of boutique with the small independent builders like Feline, Jaydee, Sabre, Daemoness who I think have really fair pricing. My Daemoness was just over 2k and it pretty much destroys everything I've played (also the reason I haven't bought a guitar in over two years).
Same deal with amps, you can get a vintage british amp like Roost, Carlboro, Laney, Selmer, Soundshitey for stupidly low money. It's only really certain Hiwatts and Marshalls that have an inflated price. And these amps are total $%&#ing beasts and are 'handwired' (another buzz word that pisses me off). Have Partridge's, point to point or turretboard, chasis mounted valve-sockets etc etc... all things that are used as a huge markup and buzzwords to inflate the cost. Any british amp pre 1975 is about as 'boutique' as it gets.
Anyway, I think I'm done for now 8)
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Twinfan buys them :D
Personally I see it as a good thing that there are options and good supply out there. There are great instruments to be had in all price levels today, from £500-10000. Get what suits you best.
Apparently there is a market for really high end stuff, and what's so bad with that? It's the market that creates the different levels, and to me that's a good thing. It makes it possible for everyone to be able to buy stuff they want.
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at the end of the day its all sound I think. if it sounds good, then it is good! the boutique stuff can help achieve this in a more reliable way i think, but a mid-range squier into a ratty practice amp can work perfectly well.
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But that's my point, I think there's a market for the stuff because the big names have let standards drop on 'standard' equipment and charged through the roof for the premium gear thus making a big ass gap in the market, particularly around the 5k point. Look at early 90s Lespauls when Gibson were bought out, great great guitars and back then a standard was £1300 odd? what would you have to pay to get the equivalent quality from Gibbo now? You can't honestly tell me a 14k PRS is more reliable than a 2.3k custom24 tonewise or buildwise ;-p
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I personally think that for gigging a lot of gear is simply overkill, especially high-end guitars with nice finishes. Stuff gets trashed from gigging. Much better to have a cheap Epi SG with BKPs and some decent hardware on it that you can swap into another $300 guitar if that one gets broken than have the $10,000 Pete Townsend Custom Shop SG that most people in the audience would be hard pressed to pick (besides the few gear heads that turn up). High-end gear has a place: in the studio. There you can bring out the nuances of nice equipment. Even then the $$ need to be justified by the sound, IMHO.
This is the case at least in the genres I'm into, where most people either have earplugs in or are already deaf due to loud volumes in gig venues
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This could be an interesting discussion! :D
I have lots of thoughts, but no time at the moment to try to make sense of them..... I'll just say let's hope Twinfan contributes. :lol:
Oh, and:
I remember getting a private message from a rep of the american website DestroyAllGuitars on the gear page once when I was talking about Fibenare who blatantly told me to stop telling people how much they cost in the UK/Europe (because they clearly had them listed on their website at a massive markup), it was both disturbing and an eye-opener as to how these things can work.
I was genuinely shocked by that. Bloody cheek!
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Let me see if I can remember my gear page details and see if it's still in my inbox. edit: bah, deleted it :(
That's probably what it comes down to Agent. I can't exactly see myself getting a private stock putting it in drop G and playing Sleep riffs :lol: not that I could afford it even if I wanted it.
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If someone wants to pay £14K for a guitar, someone else will find a way to sell them a £14K guitar
Personally I think spending more than £2K is a waste since you can get an amazing guitar built to your specs so long as you don't go crazy with the options
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It wasn't that most couldn't tell the difference between a Fender Hot Rod Deluxe and a Three Monkey's amp - its that they thought the Fender was better sounding. I have no problem with that as I think Fender amps are the best sounding amps (especially the 63 Vibroverb), but it should come as no surprise that the Guitarist staff, many of whom who are studio musicians, are instinctively attuned to the Fender sound as it is very often 'the' studio sound.
I am become less and less of a guitar snob. Of my guitars my favourites are a Baja telecaster built in Mexico and an American Standard strat - my Custom shop 59 Les Paul is shamefully in its case - really I should sell it.
I also did a shoot out of my OD pedals between from the expensive to the Joyo - and my favourite was the Digitech Bad Monkey. That cured me pretty much of gear snobbery (still want the whole Effectrode range of valve pedals though....)
Bottom line - if you like to spend your money on gear, then that is your choice - but that is often different from an objective approach to something.
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But that's my point, I think there's a market for the stuff because the big names have let standards drop on 'standard' equipment and charged through the roof for the premium gear thus making a big ass gap in the market, particularly around the 5k point. Look at early 90s Lespauls when Gibson were bought out, great great guitars and back then a standard was £1300 odd? what would you have to pay to get the equivalent quality from Gibbo now? You can't honestly tell me a 14k PRS is more reliable than a 2.3k custom24 tonewise or buildwise ;-p
well, equally, if you like having nice things and don't mind to spend for the very best, then no reason why not if it inspires you or makes you happy.
i fully agree, the price vs performance at the top of the market is disproportionate to the lower part.. but no reason to rant about it ;)
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I essentially agree with Gwem's original point.
I've also built amplifiers for one of the people involved in that boutique amp test.
I'm thinking amps here, not guitars...
Big companies are out for profit which means reducing design costs, parts costs, and construction costs to a minimum. Which impacts the end product in various ways.
Vintage gear corksniffers drive up the cost and of obsolete parts thus making boutique amps made with NOS parts expensive compared to the same amp made with modern parts although how different the amps would sound would be subjective.
PCB, Eyelet and Turret construction doesn't really sound different if they are all laid out well. The main differences are how much work it is to build an amp using turrets vs PCB (hand populated PCB as well!). I've done both, so I know. PCB's in amps can be just as robust as turrets. Both can also be junk. Guitar amps probably don't need to be built to the exact same standard are Space Shuttles but I think people have trouble recognising nicely laid out and well designed amps if they haven't had to work on them.
HiFi corksniffers drive up the cost of amps too. That world where hifi crosses into guitar amps is a bit mental. Shock absorber mounted preamp boards, hand made coupling caps, gold plate leaded resistors.
Paying your workforce (or yourself) a fair wage rather than a team of chinese people next to nothing will factor in too if you build the amps as your main job.
and then 'Supply and Demand' can drive up a price. If youre the only person making something that people really want but you can only make a few units a year then at some point you're going to consider putting the price up to see what people are willing to pay? It's how markets work right?
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It wasn't that most couldn't tell the difference between a Fender Hot Rod Deluxe and a Three Monkey's amp - its that they thought the Fender was better sounding. I have no problem with that as I think Fender amps are the best sounding amps (especially the 63 Vibroverb), but it should come as no surprise that the Guitarist staff, many of whom who are studio musicians, are instinctively attuned to the Fender sound as it is very often 'the' studio sound.
It was quite interesting in that amp shootout that not only did they prefer the "cheap" Fender to some of the boutique amps, but that their attempts to guess which amp was which were way off the mark in some cases.
If it was me, of course, I'd have had absolutely no idea, but it was fascinating to see that the "pros" (or at least semi-pros) didn't actually fare much better.
I guess they were probably quite embarrassed, but I thought it was brave of them to have a go.
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Personally I think spending more than £2K is a waste since you can get an amazing guitar built to your specs so long as you don't go crazy with the options
I don't want to derail the discussion into "custom vs off-the-shelf", but I think the difference is that you can pick up an off-the-shelf guitar and you know straight away if it has "that certain something", whereas you could specify every last detail of a custom guitar, wait for it to be built, everything could be perfect.... but you can't guarantee that "something" will be there.
I know custom builders will say you can predict results with knowledgeable selection of timber etc, and I respect their opinions as well as their skills.... but I'm not 100% convinced. Sorry!
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I think the true measure of a guitar/amps value can only be found in the second hand market.
If you want to sell your Private Stock don't fool yourself into thinking it is "worth" more than £300 if that's the best offer on the table in an open market.
It's only ever "worth" what someone will pay.
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I heard someone trying out a Hotrod III in a shop recently and thought it sounded great. I had a play on the first series a few years back and thought it was okay for clean but had horrible overdrive channels. They really have improved a lot. I hear that they're not the best put together amps and maybe this is what you pay your extra cash for.
My own gear is:
Firebird Studio, second hand £625.
RY pups - £230 I think.
Cornford Roadhouse combo - about £700 new 5 years ago.
I'm really happy with my gear and I don't think spending thousands would make me any happier. See my post about the JCM 900, I got a GREAT sound out of a rather unpopular amp.
I'm not knocking guys like Feline for example because they'll build you a guitar to your specs for not a whole lot of cash but I'm okay with off the shelf stuff. If I was to get a new back up guitar my first consideration would be - will it sound good with RYs in it ?
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I might add, contradicting myself above, that the best playing guitar I have ever played was Johnny Mac's Feline.
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5 or 10k for some people isn't that dear, they're probably middle aged with their main purchases in life behind them. Frankly i wouldn't consider more than about 1500 for a guitar and if you choose carefully without being blinded by brand name you'll find a top player/sounder.
Second hand market can give an idea of real value but poeple often being sheeplike follow the heard and will buy a cr@ppy 1.5k gibbo say, over a <1k tokai or Yamaha. So fashion is very present in the guitar world.
Boutique builders like feline or ceriatone for example clearly give a lot for the money; value is everywhere for the discerning.
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Well that boutique stuff is really two different realities. On one side you have the genuine guys / small shops that try their best (and most often succeed) to build great gear for a decent price. It's usually at least as good as off the shelf stuff and often far better, obviously not cheap but not over the top neither - in fact usually just enough for these guys to make a living. Then there's the hype guys selling overpriced snake oil - gooped circuit to hide it's only the 45988th TS or Fuzz Face clone, "unobtainium" components (arf) etc, or even just mere clones of some old stupidly simple Fender tweed amps.
Also, the Hotrod Deluxe has very good clean / breakup tones when fitted with the right speaker and tubes, and I really think it could be made into a plain great amps with not much changes to the circuit. Now the most important point IMHO with (genuine) boutique stuff is not necessarily a much better tone (albeit it can be too and often is) but the customer service, customization and overall built quality.
And yes, from experience a good middle range second hand guitar with a few upgrades (and a well chosen and reliable amp) is much more bang for the bucks than a 5+K "Custom shop" guitar.
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I think PRS are alot closer to getting it right with a custom24 costing around 2.3k (still a few hundred too much imo). But why do people pay 7k for a private stock or £8k for whatever 'tribute' Lespaul du jour is on offer. World guitars is 15mins down the road from me and they actually have £14k PRS collection guitars that sound and play like a well set-up custom24 or DGT. Who the $%&# is buying these?
Me. I own a Collection V, bought new from World Guitars last October. Firstly, have you actually played a Collection guitar or are you guessing that it's the same as a regular USA model?
To me, it's the best guitar I have ever played and it's exactly what I would spec if I had the choice of anything in the world - therefore, it's worth every penny that I paid for it. Actually, I'm still paying it off :lol: It's not about reliability or tone per se, it's whether it meets your needs as a player. I want the maximum touch sensitivity that I can get, and the Collection is fantastic for that, it just has a touch 'more' of everything a USA PRS has if your playing style and ears are sensitive enough to appreciate it. The law of diminishing returns applies massively here of course.
Although I don't gig it due to its value (I use a PS Sig and an ME1 instead) it's one of two go-to guitars at home. Any guitar player who comes to my house gets it passed to them to see what they think of it. It's not stored in a glass case and worshipped.
Bottom line - it's all about finding the guitar that speaks to you. For some it's a Hello Kitty Squier with a DiMarzio Super Distortion. For me, it's "Sir Charles":
(http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r267/junkacct/Guitar%20stuff/cid_69A8F80C-1E32-4624-9B84-ACC6F7FA3643.jpg)
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Bottom line - it's all about finding the guitar that speaks to you. For some it's a Hello Kitty Squier with a DiMarzio Super Distortion. For me, it's "Sir Charles":
I wouldn't exactly say the guitar 'speaks to me', it was a cheap novelty guitar I got to get a few laughs with my non serious punk band :lol: Although it does play and sound better than it's price/cost/value would have you believe.
I'm fortunate enough to have gotten the guitars I've always wanted (Gibson LP Standard + PRS CU22) for £800 and £650 respectively, yeah they're not 'boo-teek' or massively high priced but they're fine for me and what I play. Both are solid, stay in tune, sound good and are reliable: what more do you need from a gigging and recording guitar!
I'm actually quite thankful that I don't have the taste for the more expensive stuff; I can't afford it even if I wanted to! :lol: I'd be lying if I said I wasn't slightly jealous of people that are in a position to be able to afford the 'better' stuff, but I can't, so I make the best out of what I do have.
I'm more than happy with what I have, some corksniffers may turn their noses up at my PRS that has a ding (shock horror!) in the top from being played, but sod it! :D
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Sorry Brow, I hope I didn't offend you! I forgot you actually had one of those :oops:
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Sorry Brow, I hope I didn't offend you! I forgot you actually had one of those :oops:
Nah, no offense taken Dave: I've got thick skin 8)
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Sorry Brow, I hope I didn't offend you! I forgot you actually had one of those :oops:
Nah, no offense taken Dave: I've got thick skin 8)
You need it when you own those peasant guitars :D
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Sorry Brow, I hope I didn't offend you! I forgot you actually had one of those :oops:
Nah, no offense taken Dave: I've got thick skin 8)
You better have with a hello kitty guitar :lol:
bah, beaten by Tony
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Sorry Brow, I hope I didn't offend you! I forgot you actually had one of those :oops:
Nah, no offense taken Dave: I've got thick skin 8)
You better have with a hello kitty guitar :lol:
bah, beaten by Tony
To be fair the guitar sounds pretty damn good and is incredibly fun to play.
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Hello Kitty is the WORST cat ever. She's no Top Cat.
I own an arguably overpriced amp, of which I built a copy which I believe is just as solid for much less money... but my OTT copy was still probably over a £1000. But really, I can't get my head around the differences in feel being much different between a £3K guitar, versus one that costs £8K or £10K or £14K. I can understand that the materials cost more and due to that you might want a more experienced person to build it totally by hand (unless you precision CNC it or something)... and an item can have some exclusivity which adds a markup and I can get my head around it being worth it due to the spec and all kinds of other personal sentimental stuff (after all, thats what justified my expensive amp purchase) but not all of those factors effect the tone or playability at all.
I know I've built an amp that that I'd say is the equivalent of my expensive one for a quarter of the price and I've made similar things for less and I can compare those side by side and corksniffers can argue about how it's not possible to achieve close to the tone of the real deal going DIY, but I've got the side by side comparison in my front room and I know the score.
What I actually plan on doing, is tracking down some mad expensive guitars and trying them out. I just hope I have the skill and ears to able to tell the difference. Otherwise if I can't, it's probably me that sucks.
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Sorry Brow, I hope I didn't offend you! I forgot you actually had one of those :oops:
Nah, no offense taken Dave: I've got thick skin 8)
You better have with a hello kitty guitar :lol:
bah, beaten by Tony
Tony's played it and thought it was awesome :guitar4: (well, for the price atleast :lol:)
Damn, he beat me to it too!
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I think PRS are alot closer to getting it right with a custom24 costing around 2.3k (still a few hundred too much imo). But why do people pay 7k for a private stock or £8k for whatever 'tribute' Lespaul du jour is on offer. World guitars is 15mins down the road from me and they actually have £14k PRS collection guitars that sound and play like a well set-up custom24 or DGT. Who the $%&# is buying these?
Me. I own a Collection V, bought new from World Guitars last October. Firstly, have you actually played a Collection guitar or are you guessing that it's the same as a regular USA model?
To me, it's the best guitar I have ever played and it's exactly what I would spec if I had the choice of anything in the world - therefore, it's worth every penny that I paid for it. Actually, I'm still paying it off :lol: It's not about reliability or tone per se, it's whether it meets your needs as a player. I want the maximum touch sensitivity that I can get, and the Collection is fantastic for that, it just has a touch 'more' of everything a USA PRS has if your playing style and ears are sensitive enough to appreciate it. The law of diminishing returns applies massively here of course.
Although I don't gig it due to its value (I use a PS Sig and an ME1 instead) it's one of two go-to guitars at home. Any guitar player who comes to my house gets it passed to them to see what they think of it. It's not stored in a glass case and worshipped.
Bottom line - it's all about finding the guitar that speaks to you. For some it's a Hello Kitty Squier with a DiMarzio Super Distortion. For me, it's "Sir Charles":
(http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r267/junkacct/Guitar%20stuff/cid_69A8F80C-1E32-4624-9B84-ACC6F7FA3643.jpg)
No, pure guess work which does infact make me an asshole, however, I have owned a bunch of nice fiddles that I've posted pics of here in the past and this is the kinda thing that jars me "I want the maximum touch sensitivity that I can get, and the Collection is fantastic for that, it just has a touch 'more' of everything a USA PRS has", sure I'm down with that 100% but "if your playing style and ears are sensitive enough to appreciate it". It ain't gonna be anymore special than the Briggs, Fibenare, blah blah blah I've owned and is pretty much what I expect to hear from an owner of a £14k guitar. I know I'm gonna come across as a total tw@t if I continue and I don't want to. When an earlier poster said you owned one I was a bit worried about you reading it and getting offended haha :)
Let's bash Gibson, mmmk? :D
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Bottom line - it's all about finding the guitar that speaks to you. For some it's a Hello Kitty Squier with a DiMarzio Super Distortion. For me, it's "Sir Charles":
And it could be both!
Of the dozens of guitars I've bought and sold over the years, there are just a handful which I can pick up and they immediately feel "right". It could be a £350 MIJ Epiphone or a £2,500 Gibson (that's about as expensive as I've got.... so far).
Also, I can think of five times where I've owned two identical guitars (apart from their colours), and every time I definitely preferred one of those guitars to the other, for no reason I could really pin down.
And the beauty of it is, in every case the guitar which feels "right" to me could feel "wrong" to someone else. It's such a personal thing. :)
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My favourite Gibsons are Norlin era. I dunno what that says about me.
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Let's bash Gibson, mmmk? :D
No!
I know they have their faults, but..... I LOVE GIBSON!
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and Gibson love you :D
I can see me having to delete this thread :lol:
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Let's bash Gibson, mmmk? :D
No!
I know they have their faults, but..... I LOVE GIBSON!
Me too, rock on! :lol:
and Gibson love you :D
I can see me having to delete this thread :lol:
No-ones acting as if they've got sand in their mangina yet so I'm sure it'll be fine :lol:
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and Gibson love you :D
I can see me having to delete this thread :lol:
No thread should EVER be deleted. Historical documentation and all that.
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and Gibson love you :D
I can see me having to delete this thread :lol:
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Slightly off topic but says alot about "value" and "worth" plus it might just help some of you guys spot a golddigga...
http://www.policymic.com/articles/51981/how-a-clear-worthless-stone-with-a-brilliant-marketing-campaign-conquered-the-world (http://www.policymic.com/articles/51981/how-a-clear-worthless-stone-with-a-brilliant-marketing-campaign-conquered-the-world)
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and Gibson love you :D
I can see me having to delete this thread :lol:
hahaha I bow down to your photoshop skillz ;-p
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Slightly off topic but says alot about "value" and "worth" plus it might just help some of you guys spot a golddigga...
http://www.policymic.com/articles/51981/how-a-clear-worthless-stone-with-a-brilliant-marketing-campaign-conquered-the-world (http://www.policymic.com/articles/51981/how-a-clear-worthless-stone-with-a-brilliant-marketing-campaign-conquered-the-world)
I´ll read the whole thing another day, but when the article said "diamonds have no inherent value" right at the beginning I had to disagree already which I don´t think is a good sign. After all I like my vinyls a lot and for those I need diamonds.
Sure not exactly the point, but those little things get me sometimes ;)
Just wanted to rant a bit too....
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mangina
That some kind of tropical mango based refreshment like Orangina?
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"if your playing style and ears are sensitive enough to appreciate it"
That just means that you're not playing loud enough. That part of my hearing left me long ago.:?
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mangina
That some kind of tropical mango based refreshment like Orangina?
Unfortunately they don't make a sugar-free version.
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this post reminds me of mics, you can't honestly tell me that a samson C1 sounds better than a handmade Neumann U87
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Slightly off topic but says alot about "value" and "worth" plus it might just help some of you guys spot a golddigga...
http://www.policymic.com/articles/51981/how-a-clear-worthless-stone-with-a-brilliant-marketing-campaign-conquered-the-world (http://www.policymic.com/articles/51981/how-a-clear-worthless-stone-with-a-brilliant-marketing-campaign-conquered-the-world)
I'd read quite a lot about the De Beers company and its manipulation of the diamond industry before... strangely enough, I think it was in a Clive Cussler novel.
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Same deal with amps, you can get a vintage british amp like Roost, Carlboro, Laney, Selmer, Soundshiteey for stupidly low money. It's only really certain Hiwatts and Marshalls that have an inflated price. And these amps are total $%&#ing beasts and are 'handwired' (another buzz word that pisses me off). Have Partridge's, point to point or turretboard, chasis mounted valve-sockets etc etc... all things that are used as a huge markup and buzzwords to inflate the cost. Any british amp pre 1975 is about as 'boutique' as it gets.
Anyway, I think I'm done for now 8)
I thought 'handwired' meant wired...by HAND, it's not really a con or buzzword just to sell amps
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I've never tried but I'm guessing it's hard to wire an amp up with your feet. Maybe one of the more experienced amp builders here could clarify it though.
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Same deal with amps, you can get a vintage british amp like Roost, Carlboro, Laney, Selmer, Soundshiteeey for stupidly low money. It's only really certain Hiwatts and Marshalls that have an inflated price. And these amps are total $%&#ing beasts and are 'handwired' (another buzz word that pisses me off). Have Partridge's, point to point or turretboard, chasis mounted valve-sockets etc etc... all things that are used as a huge markup and buzzwords to inflate the cost. Any british amp pre 1975 is about as 'boutique' as it gets.
Anyway, I think I'm done for now 8)
I thought 'handwired' meant wired...by HAND, it's not really a con or buzzword just to sell amps
Usually when people see 'hand wired' they probably think of Turret boards, Eyelet boards, or real point to point and exclude Printed Circuit Board construction. However, they can all be made by hand, without the aid of machines, likewise you can have hand assembled parts in an amp that also include machine populated and wave soldered parts. A company's marketing team might blur the line between 'hand wired' and 'hand assembled' since a lot of amps will require some hand assembly to a varying degree.
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No, pure guess work which does infact make me an asshole, however, I have owned a bunch of nice fiddles that I've posted pics of here in the past and this is the kinda thing that jars me "I want the maximum touch sensitivity that I can get, and the Collection is fantastic for that, it just has a touch 'more' of everything a USA PRS has", sure I'm down with that 100% but "if your playing style and ears are sensitive enough to appreciate it". It ain't gonna be anymore special than the Briggs, Fibenare, blah blah blah I've owned and is pretty much what I expect to hear from an owner of a £14k guitar. I know I'm gonna come across as a total tw@t if I continue and I don't want to. When an earlier poster said you owned one I was a bit worried about you reading it and getting offended haha :)
Hey, I don't offend easily ( :) ) and I know I'm very much in the minority when it comes to gear and my experiences.
I'm not saying my guitar is any more special than a Huber/Briggs/Feline etc, it's just more special to me than any of those and that's why I could justify buying it. As Philly and others have said, it's very much personal preference and what you want from a guitar.
My comment about "if your playing style and ears are sensitive enough to appreciate it" wasn't supposed to come across as snobbish, that's not what I intended. I was trying to say that some folks are cursed/blessed with a sensitivity to all the tiny nuances of a guitar/amp and every little change is either good/bad. To others, these tiny details get lost and they can't see what all the fuss is about. I can't explain or justify my perception to them, and likewise they can't tell me it all sounds the same - we just see the same things differently.
Unfortunately I can spot the tiniest of differences in guitars, so nothing was ever quite good enough for me - I could always pick fault in some aspect of the tone/playing experience/sustain etc. The Collection V is truly faultless in my eyes, and so I had to have it. I wouldn't trade it for any other musical instrument on the planet.
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The term 'Boutique' is unhelpful when talking about guitar amps. I have a hand made amp, a Wienbrock Gaucho, designed and made by James Healey of Healey Amplification Ltd. which to me blows any 'major' manufacturer amp I have ever played out of the window - no Marshall, Blackstar, Orange, Mesa Boogie, Peavey etc. can compare with what it can do, It was well worth the money and has made me enjoy playing guitar and improve as a musician no end.
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I have a hand made amp, a Wienbrock Gaucho, designed and made by James Healey of Healey Amplification Ltd.
A familiar name - he used to be a regular, if infrequent, visitor to this forum.
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I don't know how much I can actually contribute here, fact is I only own one (quite new) piece of really expensive gear: my Custom Strat I got as a gift from my father for my birthday.
The guitar feels just right in my hands. Although it has a wider radius and rather vintage specs compared to the instruments one uses for heavy genres I always find myself going back to it. You can really tell the guitar was built by hand and no corners where cut. The last time I played a 3k Gibson it sounded and felt like a 400 bucks Indonesia made Ibanez to me, heck I own one of these and it's still better than most Gibsons that cost two grands or more! (Sorry Philly :lol:)
I just recently got my last guitar, at least I decided that I won't be buying any more. It's my bassists Made in Japan Jackson DK2M (I think it was the last of the line Jackson still built in Japan) as he wasn't playing it anymore whatsoever and I felt bad that such a nice instrument would stand around doing nothing but collecting dust. It's a great instrument and cost him new 700€ - rather cheap, innit? I even played a made in U.S.A. Jackson Soloist and although it was a great instrument the difference isn't obvious after setting up the DK2M and giving it some TLC. Also my 1993 Jackson Fusion Pro blows everything out of the water and I payed 400 bucks for it used. That guitar is 20 years old and still sounds and plays better than most new stuff I tried.
The point I'm trying to make here is that I don't think one needs to spend fortunes of money on stuff, there's lots of cheaper (and used) things that can deliver, and at the end of the day one solid instrument and rig can be more than enough. Also the feeling and connection one can make with an instrument is a big part of the game and as Philly pointed out that thing is totally subjective. Guitars others loathe are sometimes guitars I like and vice versa :)
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The point I'm trying to make here is that I don't think one needs to spend fortunes of money on stuff, there's lots of cheaper (and used) things that can deliver, and at the end of the day one solid instrument and rig can be more than enough.
Of course you're right, all anyone needs is something that can make a noise to make music. Look at Seasick Steve with his one stringed Biddly-Bo!
However, what works for you and what you feel is "good enough" wil vary widely from from what Philly Q, myself, Joe Bonamassa or Mark Tremonti think is good enough for the job. Therefore, one side can't chastise another just because they believe in something different.
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:) are they a limited run? So they will at-least hold or maybe even increase in value?
Jackson Pros are badass, used to have a red one 8)
However, what works for you and what you feel is "good enough" wil vary widely from from what Philly Q, myself, Joe Bonamassa or Mark Tremonti think is good enough for the job. Therefore, one side can't chastise another just because they believe in something different.
You are, ofcourse, right. I'm just sad that good guitars cost so much. Far eastern guitar prices are rising at such a fast rate too. It seems common to have the Blackstar build approach of 'designed in the UK and made in China' same with most of the Orange gear I think (?) and I wish they were all made here (I love Orange amps). Would it really be THAT massive a price jump if they were? I'm genuinely interested as I have no idea. Perhaps it just means that I'm a racist bar-steward.
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Usually when people see 'hand wired' they probably think of Turret boards, Eyelet boards, or real point to point and exclude Printed Circuit Board construction. However, they can all be made by hand, without the aid of machines, likewise you can have hand assembled parts in an amp that also include machine populated and wave soldered parts. A company's marketing team might blur the line between 'hand wired' and 'hand assembled' since a lot of amps will require some hand assembly to a varying degree.
Reminds me about a TV programme ages ago on similar 'sly' marketing tactics-- 'handmade' bread just meant that it had to have human contact, so a machine made it all, but as the dough came out on the conveyor on its way to the oven, a couple of lads just mushed their fingers into it for a second, no actual kneading or preparation at all.
I'd much rather take a wave-soldered through hole (or even an oven baked SMT) PCB over a human doing it, machine soldering like that is incredibly consistent.
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It seems common to have the Blackstar build approach of 'designed in the UK and made in China' same with most of the Orange gear I think (?) and I wish they were all made here (I love Orange amps). Would it really be THAT massive a price jump if they were? I'm genuinely interested as I have no idea. Perhaps it just means that I'm a racist bar-steward.
Don't worry, I feel that within our lifetimes we'll be making cheap tat in the UK with our low paid labour for sale in the Latin America/China/India market..
Trouble is you still won't be able to afford it unless you emmigrate.
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I've used china for building my own amp.
My personal amp I built has a pcb for the filter caps and some of the bias supply. The caps are EXCELLENT and way better spec than what you'll get in most amps but they are snap-in PCB mounted type. without wishing to try etching it myself and UK prototyping prices being too high, I could actually send the design files to china and get 5 prototype PCB's made at a fraction of the cost of getting one made here.
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The last time I played a 3k Gibson it sounded and felt like a 400 bucks Indonesia made Ibanez to me, heck I own one of these and it's still better than most Gibsons that cost two grands or more! (Sorry Philly :lol:)
You managed to find a Gibson with a skinny little neck like a toothpick? :? :P
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Lew - yes, the Collection is a limited run. Mine is one of only ~7 made and no more can be produced as thers's no pernambuco left at PRS.
You are, ofcourse, right. I'm just sad that good guitars cost so much.
Indeed, no need to rant about it though ;)
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It seems common to have the Blackstar build approach of 'designed in the UK and made in China' same with most of the Orange gear I think (?) and I wish they were all made here (I love Orange amps). Would it really be THAT massive a price jump if they were? I'm genuinely interested as I have no idea. Perhaps it just means that I'm a racist bar-steward.
Don't worry, I feel that within our lifetimes we'll be making cheap tat in the UK with our low paid labour for sale in the Latin America/China/India market..
Trouble is you still won't be able to afford it unless you emmigrate.
This is probably (sort of) true! As labour gets more expensive in India, China etc, and once you factor in transportation costs, manufacturing industry will - to some extent - return to the UK.
I heard recently that Hornby are now making some Airfix kits in the UK, having previously farmed it out to India or somewhere.
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The last time I played a 3k Gibson it sounded and felt like a 400 bucks Indonesia made Ibanez to me, heck I own one of these and it's still better than most Gibsons that cost two grands or more! (Sorry Philly :lol:)
You managed to find a Gibson with a skinny little neck like a toothpick? :? :P
last modern LP Standard I played felt like it had a narrow-ish and shallow neck, and it felt too light and therefore was probably weight relieved. It did have a cool top, but that was all. It didn't feel correct to me, in comparison to other LP's
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The last time I played a 3k Gibson it sounded and felt like a 400 bucks Indonesia made Ibanez to me, heck I own one of these and it's still better than most Gibsons that cost two grands or more! (Sorry Philly :lol:)
You managed to find a Gibson with a skinny little neck like a toothpick? :? :P
last modern LP Standard I played felt like it had a narrow-ish and shallow neck, and it felt too light and therefore was probably weight relieved. It did have a cool top, but that was all. It didn't feel correct to me, in comparison to other LP's
I think the current Standards have a neck with an asymmetrical profile (like a Music Man), can't remember the exact measurements but it's somewhere between the '50s and '60s necks. Custom Shop LPs have more traditional neck shapes, some fat, some relatively skinny. None of them are like Ibanez necks!
But what do you mean, "felt too light"? Guitars can't be too light! :P
My LP is just slightly less than 8 pounds, that's with a solid body, not weight relieved. :D
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I've got problems with the binding on the neck of my SG Standard, and it will hopefully be fixed under warranty without having to send it to Melbourne. Apparently the fretboard 'pops' slightly when glued in and the binding is pushed away from the frets ever so slightly, but enough to cause a problem with the high E string. After I called the dealer regarding mine he had another one come in just like it, so I'm assuming it was common around 2011 (when mine was made) with the last rosewood fretboard SGs before the woods were confiscated (and subsequently returned, apparently).
I expected Gibson QC to be better than that on the Standard series, but apparently it isn't
Thankfully prices have been discounted here for a while, so I only paid $1650, nothing too outrageous, but you expect to be getting something decent in a Standard series Gibson.
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you expect to be getting something decent in a Standard series Gibson.
The trouble is though it's not like the old days where there was one pile of maple, one pile of mahogany and one team of builders. Every raw material is graded into Studio/Standard/CS or Mexican/USA Std/CS and the time allocated to finishing is restricted. Everything is built to its respective price point.
"You get what you pay for" has never been more true.
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The last time I played a 3k Gibson it sounded and felt like a 400 bucks Indonesia made Ibanez to me, heck I own one of these and it's still better than most Gibsons that cost two grands or more! (Sorry Philly :lol:)
You managed to find a Gibson with a skinny little neck like a toothpick? :? :P
last modern LP Standard I played felt like it had a narrow-ish and shallow neck, and it felt too light and therefore was probably weight relieved. It did have a cool top, but that was all. It didn't feel correct to me, in comparison to other LP's
I think the current Standards have a neck with an asymmetrical profile (like a Music Man), can't remember the exact measurements but it's somewhere between the '50s and '60s necks. Custom Shop LPs have more traditional neck shapes, some fat, some relatively skinny. None of them are like Ibanez necks!
But what do you mean, "felt too light"? Guitars can't be too light! :P
My LP is just slightly less than 8 pounds, that's with a solid body, not weight relieved. :D
I don't think it was asymmetric and it wasn't a current one, just a second hand one from recent years. It felt like it must have been semi hollow. its was most likely this kind of setup which was on '08s...
(http://www.themusiczoo.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/gibson-weight-relief-chambered.jpg)
I didn't like the neck shape, it felt wide and thin. I also didn't like how it resonated acoustically and how that fed back into my fingers (sounds cheesy but its the best way I can explain it). It just wasn't comfortable to play. I don't mind heavy-ish guitars and I always play standing up. But when a les paul is super light I just think it's odd.
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With big brands you are also paying for their marketing/advertising/endorsement programs, and though some of that might make you feel more "special" for owning one it does impact on price.
Nothing wrong with that at all but if you can get one of these 20th anniversary Felines for just under £3000, I don't ever want to spend more for a name on the headstock & brand perception.
https://bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=28587.0
I'm not talking about re-sale values when branding once again matters but owning a thing for itself.
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The trouble is though it's not like the old days where there was one pile of maple, one pile of mahogany and one team of builders. Every raw material is graded into Studio/Standard/CS or Mexican/USA Std/CS
I really think this is a urban legend. Grading woods takes more time (hence money) than just taking the first plank from the pile. Well, CS might be a bit different indeed - they would at least select the maple for it's figures (which don't add anything to the tone FWIW).
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I have quite a lot of different things from very expensive vintage instruments (which fortunately I didn't pay a lot for!), to very cheap guitars. For me (like Twinfan and others), it's the feel and the acoustic properties I care about. My 53 Les Paul is really light and has had the neck shaved so it is not as baseball bat like. That and the conversion to 58 spec stops it being a collectors item, but to me it is a brilliant guitar with a ton of mojo and unique character. I was lucky enough to get it for $2k before the used market went haywire and it will be one of the last guitars I ever sell (just before my 1960 strat!). I also have several custom made instruments from WezV, Will Scott, Nieal McDunnough and Bravewood, with an anniversary Feline Lion and a double neck WezV on the way. I know that these guitars cost me more than I will get for them, but it's the same with the Warmoth builds I've made. I'm lucky enough not to worry about resale value (because I hate to part with guitars), but I do care how much I pay. My Feline 2012 Anniversary will be my most expensive guitar in terms of cost, however I have been talking with Jon for years and love the feel of the Lions, so when this limited run came up and I was able to have a small mod made (using a wrap around rather than stop & bridge), that decided me. I also loved the look of #7 and playing it last month before it went for spraying felt like it was one of my old guitars.
With amps I have pretty much the same view. I have old Fenders and Marshalls and also Ceriatones, MJW and McIntyre custom amps. I started to get into them with John McIntyre many years ago and have worked on his stand at NAMM many times in the 1990's. At the moment my go to amp is my Class 5, but that is because I lost most of my speaker cabs in hurricane Sandy, and I'm still trying to get the house fixed before I replace them. My original quest with custom amps was to get the sound I wanted at a lower volume for recording and because I lived in an apartment. My favourite full rig is a 2 amp set up with a Silver Jubilee 50w Combo & a Fender Deluxe Reverb, however that's not really a practical set up for many reasons and so I started to look at other options (begining with a Sholtz Power soak on a Princeton Reverb and going through a few rack mounted pre-amps).
I have Bare Knuckles in many of my guitars and have known Tim for many years and go down to his place at least once a year. This is my decision as I prefer the sound of his pickups to many others that I have tried and I like his tone choices. Because I don't go for mint vintage guitars, many times they'll have SD's or DiMarzios fitted, so pulling the pickups and putting in BK's is really a no brainer. Same with my custom made guitars, practically all of them are BK's. It helps the the makers also like BK pickups, so they have an opinion too, which I can take into consideration. I've made some c--kups with custom pickups too (AV Apaches don't sound great - that's why Tim doesn't make them, but I convinced him to make me a set a long time ago!). It's all part of the learning process and I think boutique gear falls into the same space. Some are great and some are not.
I've probably wasted a lot of money through the years, but I don't regret it, as I have had a lot of fun too and met many people who share my views and passions. To me there is a point at which I have to say woah that's too much, and unfortunately the PRS Private Stocks are probably in that category. However, if people have the money I don't begrudge them the opportunity to own them (and truth to be told I could sell some guitars and get one if I wanted). I still like vintage instruments, so most of my money does go there (and into the house just recently). I was debating between one of the PRS Signatures and a 1971 LP Custom and 72 55 Special a couple of years ago, and went for the 2 vintage ones. I may still go for an artist model or modern eagle in the future, if I find one that suits me, but everytime I look at the cost of the private stocks I start to look at vintage guitars again!
I'm still interested in the reviews, just because I like guitars and amps in general, and I hope that they will save me some money by steering me clear of things I won't like. Though to be fair, I really like to try something for myself before I buy it.
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I have a hand made amp, a Wienbrock Gaucho, designed and made by James Healey of Healey Amplification Ltd.
A familiar name - he used to be a regular, if infrequent, visitor to this forum.
James is a good friend of mine and yes he was a regular on here. He put forward his ideas of starting an amp company and a few scoffed at the idea saying his pricing was too high and questioning the quality. He didn't come back too often after that.
He now owns his own company and his doing rather well for himself since leaving Wienbrock.
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No, pure guess work which does infact make me an asshole, however, I have owned a bunch of nice fiddles that I've posted pics of here in the past and this is the kinda thing that jars me "I want the maximum touch sensitivity that I can get, and the Collection is fantastic for that, it just has a touch 'more' of everything a USA PRS has", sure I'm down with that 100% but "if your playing style and ears are sensitive enough to appreciate it". It ain't gonna be anymore special than the Briggs, Fibenare, blah blah blah I've owned and is pretty much what I expect to hear from an owner of a £14k guitar. I know I'm gonna come across as a total tw@t if I continue and I don't want to. When an earlier poster said you owned one I was a bit worried about you reading it and getting offended haha :)
Hey, I don't offend easily ( :) ) and I know I'm very much in the minority when it comes to gear and my experiences.
I'm not saying my guitar is any more special than a Huber/Briggs/Feline etc, it's just more special to me than any of those and that's why I could justify buying it. As Philly and others have said, it's very much personal preference and what you want from a guitar.
My comment about "if your playing style and ears are sensitive enough to appreciate it" wasn't supposed to come across as snobbish, that's not what I intended. I was trying to say that some folks are cursed/blessed with a sensitivity to all the tiny nuances of a guitar/amp and every little change is either good/bad. To others, these tiny details get lost and they can't see what all the fuss is about. I can't explain or justify my perception to them, and likewise they can't tell me it all sounds the same - we just see the same things differently.
Unfortunately I can spot the tiniest of differences in guitars, so nothing was ever quite good enough for me - I could always pick fault in some aspect of the tone/playing experience/sustain etc. The Collection V is truly faultless in my eyes, and so I had to have it. I wouldn't trade it for any other musical instrument on the planet.
I do wonder if we recorded your collection PRS and say a SE and a cu24 with the exact same pickups and setup and played them back without anyone knowing which was which if anyone including yourself could really tell the difference.
Personally i doubt it.
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I do wonder if we recorded your collection PRS and say a SE and a cu24 with the exact same pickups and setup and played them back without anyone knowing which was which if anyone including yourself could really tell the difference.
Personally i doubt it.
I too bet we couldn't tell the difference..
But... I think a specific intrument can "feel" better and bring out the best in the player so Twinfan/Dave might be inspired to play in a way he simply wouldn't be on an Epiphone.
So, I think the lack of sonic difference is not the killer argument.
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Toe-Knee, apparently most people aren't cursed with the ability to hear these nuances and a recording would not demonstrate the feel or touch sensitivity. You might have to go find some private and collection PRS' and test em out and hope you can perceive the differences.
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I don't think it was asymmetric and it wasn't a current one, just a second hand one from recent years. It felt like it must have been semi hollow. its was most likely this kind of setup which was on '08s...
(http://www.themusiczoo.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/gibson-weight-relief-chambered.jpg)
I didn't like the neck shape, it felt wide and thin. I also didn't like how it resonated acoustically and how that fed back into my fingers (sounds cheesy but its the best way I can explain it). It just wasn't comfortable to play. I don't mind heavy-ish guitars and I always play standing up. But when a les paul is super light I just think it's odd.
Not cheesy at all, I know exactly what you mean. Personally I like it when you can feel the resonance "feeding back" through your fingers in that way!
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I do wonder if we recorded your collection PRS and say a SE and a cu24 with the exact same pickups and setup and played them back without anyone knowing which was which if anyone including yourself could really tell the difference.
Personally i doubt it.
I too bet we couldn't tell the difference..
But... I think a specific intrument can "feel" better and bring out the best in the player so Twinfan/Dave might be inspired to play in a way he simply wouldn't be on an Epiphone.
So, I think the lack of sonic difference is not the killer argument.
Im not debating feel at all. I'm just trying to think where these tiny details actually become completely irrelevant.
Personally i don't appear to be blessed with golden ears/fingers because i've played a fair few PRS guitars from differing pricings granted the most expensive was £5k which oddly enough played and sounded the worst and then the only one i actually enjoyed is whatever Brow has.
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STOP!
Listen..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFZKlfRrGbw (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFZKlfRrGbw)
Ahh isn't that better...
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Im not debating feel at all. I'm just trying to think where these tiny details actually become completely irrelevant.
From the point of view of someone listening to a recording, or to a band on stage, they are completely irrelevant. The relevance is only to the person actually playing the guitar.
As a listener, I shouldn't think I could tell the difference between a Squier Affinity and a Nik Huber Dolphin. But if I played them, I'd know which I preferred. Who knows, it might be the Squier, but if - for the sake of argument - it was the Huber, it's up to me whether I think those tiny details make it worth paying the extra.
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The question is: how boutique is BKP? We all want them, don't we?
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I think there are definitely diminishing returns- to a certain extent it's subjective (and often dependent on the specific requirements) as to where the returns diminish too much (i.e. it's not worth it any more).
Also I agree that I'd differentiate between "good quality" (where the increase in price is justifiable) and "boutique" (where it often isn't, or is based on mythology/rarity/hype/etc.).
I was genuinely shocked by that. Bloody cheek!
I don't think anything at TGP can shock me :lol:
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From the point of view of someone listening to a recording, or to a band on stage, they are completely irrelevant. The relevance is only to the person actually playing the guitar.
As a listener, I shouldn't think I could tell the difference between a Squier Affinity and a Nik Huber Dolphin. But if I played them, I'd know which I preferred. Who knows, it might be the Squier, but if - for the sake of argument - it was the Huber, it's up to me whether I think those tiny details make it worth paying the extra.
This. The little things that make your playing a little better. If you e.g. improvise a lot of your leads, you'll probably play a better one on the guitar that doesn't fight you (in the wrong way!), but feels like an extension of you and feeds back at you. Sounds cheesy but that's how it is. Inspiration.
Of course, when you're playing a bar gig and just try to hear yourself over the beating drummer..:D At those moments it doesn't really matter what you have in your hands, as long as the playability is good it and it sounds good to the audience. They most likely won't hear (or notice) the difference anyway.
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if your playing style and ears are sensitive enough to appreciate it.
Psychoacoustics and expectation bias.
People pay thousands for glorified kettle leads for the same reasons.
Double-blind testing is a very, very interesting thing ;)
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pernambuco
Think I saw that in Starbucks? :P
Indeed, no need to rant about it though ;)
Yes. Yes, there is. That's what forums are for! That and passive aggressive trolling to ease my own feeble existence :P
The trouble is though it's not like the old days where there was one pile of maple, one pile of mahogany and one team of builders. Every raw material is graded into Studio/Standard/CS or Mexican/USA Std/CS and the time allocated to finishing is restricted. Everything is built to its respective price point.
"You get what you pay for" has never been more true.
The sought after vintage Fenders are all just Mexican strats with a few years on 'em :lol:
Stuff
I'd LOVE to see your collection. I'll settle for pics?
I do wonder if we recorded your collection PRS and say a SE and a cu24 with the exact same pickups and setup and played them back without anyone knowing which was which if anyone including yourself could really tell the difference.
I doubt we could and if we did it would likely be luck. But I bet we would all feel it in our hands, well, between the SE and CU anyway. The CU and Privatecollection, I'm guessing not so much.
STOP!
Listen..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFZKlfRrGbw (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFZKlfRrGbw)
Ahh isn't that better...
Good god I remember that.
The question is: how boutique is BKP? We all want them, don't we?
mmmm I would say they're good value. Go get a $550 pair of Throbak PAFs and compare em to Tims anniversary model or whatever the closest comparison would be, bet there aint anything in it.
Toe-Knee, apparently most people aren't cursed with the ability to hear these nuances and a recording would not demonstrate the feel or touch sensitivity. You might have to go find some private and collection PRS' and test em out and hope you can perceive the differences.
:lol: meow
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IT'S OK GAIS I MADE A CHART :lol:
(http://i.imgur.com/9hjkBq8.jpg)
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Double-blind testing is a very, very interesting thing ;)
Ever since I saw this, I've wanted to get a Squier!
BLINDFOLD TEST - Telecaster Squier vs Fender vs Custom Shop - Part 2 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCEdT2d43jU#ws)
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From the point of view of someone listening to a recording, or to a band on stage, they are completely irrelevant. The relevance is only to the person actually playing the guitar.
As a listener, I shouldn't think I could tell the difference between a Squier Affinity and a Nik Huber Dolphin. But if I played them, I'd know which I preferred. Who knows, it might be the Squier, but if - for the sake of argument - it was the Huber, it's up to me whether I think those tiny details make it worth paying the extra.
This. The little things that make your playing a little better. If you e.g. improvise a lot of your leads, you'll probably play a better one on the guitar that doesn't fight you (in the wrong way!), but feels like an extension of you and feeds back at you. Sounds cheesy but that's how it is. Inspiration.
Yep. got to agree with both of you. Whatever I play, I pretty much sound like me, but I don't get much joy playing a PRS SE even though it'll do the job. No inspiration to me whatsoever.
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BKP started as a "boutique" brand with just Tim and a couple of others winding.
Now Tim has more guys winding and some employees are called "sales manager" and "production manager" , but they are still in contrast to some companies a "boutique brand"
But how many people will they need to have on board before they are just another brand.
When he is the biggest employer in Cornwall I guess he won't be boutique
Most start up businesses in music industry get to grow out of a home business or hobby business and if they become popular face the dilemma of staying boutique or growing into a major player.
Come to think of it PRS were a boutique brand that grew and then got bigger again - maybe at some point had some serious capital invested in it from outside.
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IT'S OK GAIS I MADE A CHART :lol:
I LOL'ed. Did you really make that up? :lol:
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Yea MS paint haha
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IT'S OK GAIS I MADE A CHART :lol:
I LOL'ed. Did you really make that up? :lol:
LOVE the Devries track... Can't beat a little "Rhythm in jump. dancing close to you" :lol: :lol:
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It does sometimes amuse me how people look at spending money on guitars 8) Now, the most I've spent on a single guitar is 2600 euros (3415 US dollars, said the currency converter just a moment ago), so I don't have VERY expensive guitars. Yet some people (non-playing friends mostly) sort of question these actions.
Buy a newish good quality car, and *poof*, you've probably spent more money than I currently have invested in musical gear. Or start a motorcycle hobby, pretty much the same thing happens. Yet that is 'accepted'. I know, it's the relative cost. But still. I do own a car, but if I could do without it, I would sell it immediately. I hate the amount of money it takes to own it, use it and to maintain it.
Some people use more money to pimp their cars than I've spent on a single guitar. That doesn't even increase their resale value, it actually makes it non-existent :D A small exaggaration but you get the point.
Even as a hobby - which it is for me, bread to the table comes from elsewhere - this is a cheap one. Especially if you buy second-hand and can spot a good deal when you see one. And unlike many other hobbies, this one can actually bring some money back :mrgreen:
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Double-blind testing is a very, very interesting thing ;)
Ever since I saw this, I've wanted to get a Squier!
BLINDFOLD TEST - Telecaster Squier vs Fender vs Custom Shop - Part 2 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCEdT2d43jU#ws)
That was brilliant.
Not double-blind, mind you. But it was pretty fairly done anyway.
I doubt anyone here would fare any better. I know I wouldnt. I try not to listen with my eyes, or with my wallet, but we all do to various degrees. Its unavoidable.
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Chappers has a few videos comparing middle of the road guitars to the top end stuff, generally speaking the only difference I hear is the more expensive one is brighter and has much better sustain although I doubt the finer details come through on youtube but then they won't on a recording let alone in a mix. Even with expensive headphones that need an amp I can't tell the difference between a 128Kbps mp3 and a music file format that isn't compressed.
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I can definitely tell the difference between a 128kbps or 160kbps MP3 and a 192kbps MP3. Once you get above that it becomes more a matter of how good the equipment you are listening to with is. In a car stereo for example with road noise etc 192kbps is absolutely fine.
In that video they don't plug the Teles into an amp, it's just a comparison of feel and unplugged sound, but as everyone here has pretty much swapped out pickups, pots, etc I didn't think that was much of an issue.
From a $$ and ding-paranoia perpective I'd rather have a Squier Tele with Piledrivers than a Fender Custom Shop Tele with Piledrivers!
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From a $$ and ding-paranoia perpective I'd rather have a Squier Tele with Piledrivers than a Fender Custom Shop Tele with Piledrivers!
No ding-paranoia if you get a Relic. :wink:
It would have to be the Custom Shop for me (funds permitting) because I really dislike the neck profiles on the vast majority of regular Fenders (and Squiers).
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Exactly. Straight away that would probably help me identify which guitar was which.
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I knew someone with a Tele with a really round neck profile like a baseball bat, but the ones I've picked up in shops didn't feel as bad as that. Or maybe that round neck is what people like? I just remember thinking I didn't like the neck on his Tele like that on my Explorer.
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horses for courses. Some people like massive necks and some don't. I don't like the feel of the Custom Shop strats I've played. I don't really like super skinny generally small necks but I don't like the biggest ones either. Hence why I like Norlin era Gibsons maybe? The cost of a guitar obviously doesn't mean you get a 'better' neck profile.
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I can definitely tell the difference between a 128kbps or 160kbps MP3 and a 192kbps MP3. Once you get above that it becomes more a matter of how good the equipment you are listening to with is. In a car stereo for example with road noise etc 192kbps is absolutely fine.!
How did you come to that conclusion though?
Did you know which was which beforehand?
I don't question that you can do it, I'm just curious how you came to the conclusion. I can tell those differences fairly easily, and the difference between 320kbs LAME mp3 and FLAC, but I know that I can because I've done ABX testing with the same songs in different file formats using this http://www.foobar2000.org/components/view/foo_abx (http://www.foobar2000.org/components/view/foo_abx)
That told me that I can tell the difference, but while it wasnt that hard most of the time, it was harder than I thought and while the stats showed that I could, on the whole, tell the difference, I got quite a few wrong.
FWIW I cant tell the difference between the best Vorbis encoding and FLAC, but I thought that I could before I double-blind tested it :). Differences that I believed were there just vanished when the only thing I had to go on was purely sonic information, with no idea what I was really listening to. Granted I was impressed with vorbis beforehand and the differences I thought I could hear were small, but small or not I genuinely heard them...but only when I knew which was which before listening ;).
If you know which is which beforehand, you will be biased. You can't avoid it; you will actually hear differences that aren't there. You will still hear differences even if you are aware of perception bias.
With guitars, there is a feel-factor of course. But then, if your hearing can be so easily fooled by your eyes and preconceptions, how reliable is feel? You see a multi-thousand pound pricetag, and of course you expect better 'feel', but do you actually perceive there being a difference because you expected it? Bearing in mind that your interpretation of your sensory experience will be distorted by your expectation (you really will feel a difference if you expect to), theres no way to tell but double-blind.
The same sort of thing happens with wines as well.
http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2011/10/you-are-not-so-smart-why-we-cant-tell-good-wine-from-bad/247240/ (http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2011/10/you-are-not-so-smart-why-we-cant-tell-good-wine-from-bad/247240/)
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With guitars, there is a feel-factor of course. But then, if your hearing can be so easily fooled by your eyes and preconceptions, how reliable is feel? You see a multi-thousand pound pricetag, and of course you expect better 'feel', but do you actually perceive there being a difference because you expected it? Bearing in mind that your interpretation of your sensory experience will be distorted by your expectation (you really will feel a difference if you expect to), theres no way to tell but double-blind.
Who really cares if you get 'deceived' by your eyes and hands and the preconceived bias? If you've bought a nice guiyar/amp and it gives you that warm glow when you play then it's all good, right?
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With guitars, there is a feel-factor of course. But then, if your hearing can be so easily fooled by your eyes and preconceptions, how reliable is feel? You see a multi-thousand pound pricetag, and of course you expect better 'feel', but do you actually perceive there being a difference because you expected it? Bearing in mind that your interpretation of your sensory experience will be distorted by your expectation (you really will feel a difference if you expect to), theres no way to tell but double-blind.
Who really cares if you get 'deceived' by your eyes and hands and the preconceived bias? If you've bought a nice guiyar/amp and it gives you that warm glow when you play then it's all good, right?
Sure, if you like. it all comes down to if you like it at the end of the day. But, I prefer to have some foundation or confidence in the reality of a benefit from a piece of kit, so wherever I can I try to strip it down to just hearing, and if I can hear the difference and like the difference then all the better. I like to know that I like a thing for reasons that really exist. Tricking yourself is fine for a while, unless for whatever reason the rose tinted glasses come off and you wonder what the hell you were thinking :lol: (been there, done that!).
I don't require anyone else to agree. I do think its important to be aware of this sort of thing, because it can very easily change your decisions. Up to any given person as to whether they want to use the information though.
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I can definitely tell the difference between a 128kbps or 160kbps MP3 and a 192kbps MP3. Once you get above that it becomes more a matter of how good the equipment you are listening to with is. In a car stereo for example with road noise etc 192kbps is absolutely fine.!
How did you come to that conclusion though?
Did you know which was which beforehand?
I don't question that you can do it, I'm just curious how you came to the conclusion.
I can always hear a whooshing mushy sound in 160kbps and lower. I don't know the technical term for it. 192kbps and above I can't hear that. I can pick differences, sure, but it generally depends on the quality of the speakers and the noise in the environment. But 128kbps and 160kbps always sound awful to my ears.
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I prefer to have some foundation or confidence in the reality of a benefit from a piece of kit, so wherever I can I try to strip it down to just hearing, and if I can hear the difference and like the difference then all the better. I like to know that I like a thing for reasons that really exist.
Making music is much more about emotions than science though?
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horses for courses. Some people like massive necks and some don't. I don't like the feel of the Custom Shop strats I've played. I don't really like super skinny generally small necks but I don't like the biggest ones either. Hence why I like Norlin era Gibsons maybe? The cost of a guitar obviously doesn't mean you get a 'better' neck profile.
I agree, not "better", it's down to personal taste. But with Custom Shop models you do at least get a choice - not in the sense of "pick your body wood, pick your colour, pick your neck profile", but they do make guitars with a wide variety of different neck shapes.
Whereas with virtually all Fender American Standards your choice is "Modern C" profile or nothing. Squier and Fender Mexico are similar. Pretty much the only cheaper Fender models with chunky necks are the Baja Tele, Robert Cray Strat and Kenny Wayne Shepherd Strat (there are probably others I haven't tried).
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adding more bends and playing blues licks doesn't make it more emotional, it just means it has bends in it
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You've missed my point JDC. I'm saying that playing a song for any genre is all about the emotions and feel of the song in question and how you as the player gets that across. Part of that is how inspired you are to pour your heart out via your gear.
That sort of emotional stuff is not really measurable in a scientific way.
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horses for courses. Some people like massive necks and some don't. I don't like the feel of the Custom Shop strats I've played. I don't really like super skinny generally small necks but I don't like the biggest ones either. Hence why I like Norlin era Gibsons maybe? The cost of a guitar obviously doesn't mean you get a 'better' neck profile.
I agree, not "better", it's down to personal taste. But with Custom Shop models you do at least get a choice - not in the sense of "pick your body wood, pick your colour, pick your neck profile", but they do make guitars with a wide variety of different neck shapes.
Whereas with virtually all Fender American Standards your choice is "Modern C" profile or nothing. Squier and Fender Mexico are similar. Pretty much the only cheaper Fender models with chunky necks are the Baja Tele, Robert Cray Strat and Kenny Wayne Shepherd Strat (there are probably others I haven't tried).
I didn't realise that about fender. The CS I played just didn't sit right with me. I'm not up on guitars so much. I just know what I like when I play it. I think the most expensive guitars I've played where probably in the region of 12K, but they sucked to play although they were vintage instruments. I didn't know their worth til after I'd played them either. After owning a few amps and guitars due to impulse buys and so on, I'm pretty settled on what I know works for me now, which is something I'm kind of glad about.
It's also cool knowing I can spend a bit and build an amp myself that would otherwise cost in the region of £4K and be incredibly close soundwise to the original (valve differences probably causing most difference soncically) and so far I've prefered that circuit to any other amp I've played, so if I want another... I can make my own! People who haven't heard my amps side by side will winge and come up with wild ideas about how they can't possibly be similar sounding or as good quality as each other, but they are wrong.
I have no problem with paying money for something that makes you feel good for whatever reason, I got my SLO for more reasons than just tone ,reliability and playability but I'm under no illusion I can get the same sound etc out of something that costs much less (though still not cheap). A few pages back there was an argument to say that even up to and over £10K for guitar there are still perceivable differences in feel, sustain and tone although you might have to be blessed or cursed to make them out. That is surely a physical thing, rather than an emotional thing?
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For me the emotion of a song is more down to the overall scale of the song and the overall tone of that family of instrument, ie an electric guitar can never sound as sad as a piano
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Dmoney - I think it's a physical thing, but MDV is saying my eyes, ears and hands are playing tricks on me ;)
JDC - I dunno, anything played in D minor on any instrument is sad. it is, after all, the saddest of all keys...
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I prefer to have some foundation or confidence in the reality of a benefit from a piece of kit, so wherever I can I try to strip it down to just hearing, and if I can hear the difference and like the difference then all the better. I like to know that I like a thing for reasons that really exist.
Making music is much more about emotions than science though?
I think the art and science of it are one and the same.
Our senses play tricks on all of us all the time. Its just a fact.
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I can definitely tell the difference between a 128kbps or 160kbps MP3 and a 192kbps MP3. Once you get above that it becomes more a matter of how good the equipment you are listening to with is. In a car stereo for example with road noise etc 192kbps is absolutely fine.!
How did you come to that conclusion though?
Did you know which was which beforehand?
I don't question that you can do it, I'm just curious how you came to the conclusion.
I can always hear a whooshing mushy sound in 160kbps and lower. I don't know the technical term for it. 192kbps and above I can't hear that. I can pick differences, sure, but it generally depends on the quality of the speakers and the noise in the environment. But 128kbps and 160kbps always sound awful to my ears.
me too, it drives me mad when people say they can't hear it...I don't even like listening to mp3's even at 320kbps it doesn't sound good enough. WAV and FLAC are the only things I'll listen to, I can also hear distortions in the low levels and noise floor of mp3 files and less resolution. I don't agree with MDV that I'm 'imagining' it...
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me too, it drives me mad when people say they can't hear it...I don't even like listening to mp3's even at 320kbps it doesn't sound good enough. WAV and FLAC are the only things I'll listen to, I can also hear distortions in the low levels and noise floor of mp3 files and less resolution. I don't agree with MDV that I'm 'imagining' it...
it depends on the track in question, but yes - i can often hear those compression artifacts very clearly as well at the rates you are talking about.
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Personally I can't tell much difference between 128kbps and 196kbps and none after that - so I guess I am lucky compared to you more sensitive souls as I can download 'my' music from YouTube :lol:
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I can definitely tell the difference between a 128kbps or 160kbps MP3 and a 192kbps MP3. Once you get above that it becomes more a matter of how good the equipment you are listening to with is. In a car stereo for example with road noise etc 192kbps is absolutely fine.!
How did you come to that conclusion though?
Did you know which was which beforehand?
I don't question that you can do it, I'm just curious how you came to the conclusion.
I can always hear a whooshing mushy sound in 160kbps and lower. I don't know the technical term for it. 192kbps and above I can't hear that. I can pick differences, sure, but it generally depends on the quality of the speakers and the noise in the environment. But 128kbps and 160kbps always sound awful to my ears.
Yeah, thats the highest frequencies getting cut off.
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I'd say the "can you hear the difference when it's recorded?" thing is possibly missing the point... I bet I could play a cheaper guitar and a more expensive guitar (with similar construction/woods/pickups) and make them sound pretty darn similar. What the recording wouldn't show you is that I was struggling to play it on the cheaper guitar and yet it was a breeze to play it on the more expensive one. [I'd also point out that dearer isn't always better- Mesa gear is cheaper in the USA than Marshall normally, whereas here in Europe it's the other way round. Does that mean Mesa is better in Europe but Marshall is better in Europe? :lol: ]
That being said, I also agree with the double blind thing Mark's talking about. Our senses do play tricks on us all the time.
I dunno how to double-blind test playing a guitar, though. It'd be so obvious, even blindfolded, what guitar you were playing, that it'd instantly be pointless- and as I said, listening to recordings is sorta missing the point, at least to a certain extent. It'd be a bit like trying to do a double blind test of shoes by looking at how comfortable a model looks while wearing them, lol.
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I'd say the "can you hear the difference when it's recorded?" thing is possibly missing the point... I bet I could play a cheaper guitar and a more expensive guitar (with similar construction/woods/pickups) and make them sound pretty darn similar. What the recording wouldn't show you is that I was struggling to play it on the cheaper guitar and yet it was a breeze to play it on the more expensive one. [I'd also point out that dearer isn't always better- Mesa gear is cheaper in the USA than Marshall normally, whereas here in Europe it's the other way round. Does that mean Mesa is better in Europe but Marshall is better in Europe? :lol: ]
That being said, I also agree with the double blind thing Mark's talking about. Our senses do play tricks on us all the time.
I dunno how to double-blind test playing a guitar, though. It'd be so obvious, even blindfolded, what guitar you were playing, that it'd instantly be pointless- and as I said, listening to recordings is sorta missing the point, at least to a certain extent. It'd be a bit like trying to do a double blind test of shoes by looking at how comfortable a model looks while wearing them, lol.
I'll give you a challenge then, find a squier strat that isn't modified in any way and a fender strat from 1963 and see if you can hear a difference!
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I A/B-d my Fender American Series Telecaster to four different CS-tele's. Two of them 52 relic's with the batnecks. Amp: Fender Twin Reverb 65 reissue. The CS's sounded thicker with more weight behind the notes. Especially the 52 and 58 relic. They roar in a different way, hard to describe. Tonally the Custom Shops beat my Fender. I liked my neck better then most of the CS's (I think bec I'm not used to those thick necks). Are they worth three (and-a-alf) times the price of my seriemade Tele? I didn't think so, but I can see why people buy them. Those Custom Shops I played, had better timbers and - to my ears - more soul and character.
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I dunno how to double-blind test playing a guitar, though. It'd be so obvious, even blindfolded, what guitar you were playing, that it'd instantly be pointless- and as I said, listening to recordings is sorta missing the point, at least to a certain extent. It'd be a bit like trying to do a double blind test of shoes by looking at how comfortable a model looks while wearing them, lol.
Double blind just means what it is is recorded somewhere, but the tester and subject both dont know what is what to avoid any possibility of bias influence. Easy with sound files, as a PC is 'blind' already; it cant offer any kind of unintentional hints. I suppose with guitars they could just be handed to a blindfolded person silently. Wouldnt be very amusing to watch though.
I agree on the playability and better performance when not fighting the guitar, but that doesnt take a hell of a lot of money. You can get very cheap guitars that are very playable, and otherwise its just a matter of how much setting up you want to do. Also, thats very variable person to person. I'll play better on the cheapest RG than the most expensive LP! (assuming both are well set up).
Just to be clear, when I've been talking about 'feel' before, I've assumed a basically decently put together guitar thats set up well. I think everyone has, but I thought I'd better make that explicit.
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Speaking of ears playing tricks - here's the trick mine play. Whenever I hear a chorus pedal I feel physically sick. It really makes me want to throw up. Anyone else have a vomit reaction to a particular sound ?
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I'll give you a challenge then, find a squier strat that isn't modified in any way and a fender strat from 1963 and see if you can hear a difference!
I suppose it depends on whether or not the player is trying to disguise what the guitar is. if the player accentuates the differences, you could probably/possibly hear the differences.
(a) Double blind just means what it is is recorded somewhere, but the tester and subject both dont know what is what to avoid any possibility of bias influence. Easy with sound files, as a PC is 'blind' already; it cant offer any kind of unintentional hints. I suppose with guitars they could just be handed to a blindfolded person silently. Wouldnt be very amusing to watch though.
(b) I agree on the playability and better performance when not fighting the guitar, but that doesnt take a hell of a lot of money. You can get very cheap guitars that are very playable, and otherwise its just a matter of how much setting up you want to do. Also, thats very variable person to person. I'll play better on the cheapest RG than the most expensive LP! (assuming both are well set up).
Just to be clear, when I've been talking about 'feel' before, I've assumed a basically decently put together guitar thats set up well. I think everyone has, but I thought I'd better make that explicit.
(a) I know what double blind is. :) I'm saying it's virtually impossible when trying (not listening to a guitar, I mean actually playing it) a guitar, because if you know anything about guitars, there will be clues even if you're blindfolded.
Compare a gibson versus an epiphone? Most guitar players will be able to feel the nitro finish, and smell the vanilla (?) that gibson sprays on its guitars. Ditto expensive fenders versus squiers (apart from the vanilla thing). Different hardware fitted to different guitars will feel different, as will different neck profiles, fret sizes, etc.
It can be done with listening, as you said, but I'm not convinced how much use that is (especially if the player is being a smart alec and trying to disguise what the instrument is; conversely, someone accentuating the differences between the two instruments could also be accused of not playing fair). Thinking back to music class at school, an awful lot of people couldn't tell a flute from a trumpet, that doesn't mean they sound the same, lol. Not to mention, the recording techniques etc. will affect the final sound of the thing as well (as you know more than I do :lol: ).
(b) to a certain extent, but then you're into personal preference regarding neck profiles etc.
I'd say more expensive guitars, generally (and excluding chancers like devries), play better than cheaper ones.
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I'll give you a challenge then, find a squier strat that isn't modified in any way and a fender strat from 1963 and see if you can hear a difference!
I suppose it depends on whether or not the player is trying to disguise what the guitar is. if the player accentuates the differences, you could probably/possibly hear the differences.
(a) Double blind just means what it is is recorded somewhere, but the tester and subject both dont know what is what to avoid any possibility of bias influence. Easy with sound files, as a PC is 'blind' already; it cant offer any kind of unintentional hints. I suppose with guitars they could just be handed to a blindfolded person silently. Wouldnt be very amusing to watch though.
(b) I agree on the playability and better performance when not fighting the guitar, but that doesnt take a hell of a lot of money. You can get very cheap guitars that are very playable, and otherwise its just a matter of how much setting up you want to do. Also, thats very variable person to person. I'll play better on the cheapest RG than the most expensive LP! (assuming both are well set up).
Just to be clear, when I've been talking about 'feel' before, I've assumed a basically decently put together guitar thats set up well. I think everyone has, but I thought I'd better make that explicit.
(a) I know what double blind is. :) I'm saying it's virtually impossible when trying (not listening to a guitar, I mean actually playing it) a guitar, because if you know anything about guitars, there will be clues even if you're blindfolded.
Compare a gibson versus an epiphone? Most guitar players will be able to feel the nitro finish, and smell the vanilla (?) that gibson sprays on its guitars. Ditto expensive fenders versus squiers (apart from the vanilla thing). Different hardware fitted to different guitars will feel different, as will different neck profiles, fret sizes, etc.
It can be done with listening, as you said, but I'm not convinced how much use that is (especially if the player is being a smart alec and trying to disguise what the instrument is; conversely, someone accentuating the differences between the two instruments could also be accused of not playing fair). Thinking back to music class at school, an awful lot of people couldn't tell a flute from a trumpet, that doesn't mean they sound the same, lol. Not to mention, the recording techniques etc. will affect the final sound of the thing as well (as you know more than I do :lol: ).
(b) to a certain extent, but then you're into personal preference regarding neck profiles etc.
I'd say more expensive guitars, generally (and excluding chancers like devries), play better than cheaper ones.
Sorry :oops:
I was just saying. On the double blind thing that is.
Yes, there will be definitive differences between things that you could feel, of course. Neck joins between epis and gibsons, too. You could tell a feline lion from a normal LP nearly instantly for the same reason.
I suppose the interesting part would be before you noticed any of those things :lol:
I dont' see that much of a correlation between price and performance/playability/whatever, personally. Its there, sure, but its more of a 'pay more take less chance' thing.
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Speaking of ears playing tricks - here's the trick mine play. Whenever I hear a chorus pedal I feel physically sick. It really makes me want to throw up. Anyone else have a vomit reaction to a particular sound ?
I know what you mean, I get the same thing with vibrato, it does something metaphysical to me that makes me feel weird, I'd never listen to it with a huge hangover
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As to the Squier vs 63 Fender thing = there was this (the plug ins no longer work on my computer) - and I remember that the Squier sounded pretty good. Likewise, corksniffing aside, I personally think a CV Strat would hold its own these days - after Fender were never a 'craftsman' guitar - more a Henry Ford production line thing.
http://www.21frets.com/squier_jv/jvvs63.htmhttp://www.21frets.com/squier_jv/jvvs63.htm (http://www.21frets.com/squier_jv/jvvs63.htmhttp://www.21frets.com/squier_jv/jvvs63.htm)
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Sometimes I think that if you take a couple of guitars - one production and one more high end, and have them both nicely fret dressed (where needed) and set up by the same tech and then did a comparison test it would be interesting .
You would be introducing a level of preparation intro both that may have been there in the high end guitar but missing on the production guitar.
Then you would be contrasting the underlying build and choice of materials and components.
We have had many cheap guitars come in that were freaking awesome , but needed some TLC to bring out the best in them
I have for example been very pleased with the Squier Classic Vibe strats and teles - ok they lacked a bit in the quality of hardware, but they had such a genuine feel of a strat/tele that they seemed more pure to the original than many higher end Fenders by comparison.
Here is a previous thread on a Squier CV revamp that came out really nicely
https://bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=24803.msg326386#msg326386 (https://bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=24803.msg326386#msg326386)
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Maybe if y'all do a meet again it would be the perfect chance to do some double blind tests
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Sorry :oops:
I was just saying. On the double blind thing that is.
Yes, there will be definitive differences between things that you could feel, of course. Neck joins between epis and gibsons, too. You could tell a feline lion from a normal LP nearly instantly for the same reason.
I suppose the interesting part would be before you noticed any of those things :lol:
I dont' see that much of a correlation between price and performance/playability/whatever, personally. Its there, sure, but its more of a 'pay more take less chance' thing.
No worries :)
And yeah. I suppose for the neck joint thing you could tell the blindfolded player that they weren't allowed to play above the 5th fret or something like that :lol: But then you'd still likely feel the difference in finish, neck profile etc.
Or if you really wanted to test the differences, I guess you could refinish both guitars the same way, and put as similar hardware as possible on each etc. But then you could probably (with some justification) make the claim that neither guitar was close to its original off-the-shelf state, which would probably render any findings almost moot :lol:
I still say better guitars tend to play better- have better fretwork, better fret material, better fretboard woods etc.- but as jonathan says, a lot of that can be fixed with some TLC after purchase (and you implied that, too- as you said, the dearer guitar should have more chance of being "right" out of the box, but of course you don't have to put up with a mediocre stock setup if you can do it yourself or pay someone else to do it for you). It would be interesting to try a cheap guitar which had been given a killer setup/fret dress by someone like jonathan versus an out-of-the-box more expensive guitar. Or maybe it'd be fairer to try both after that killer setup/fretdress.
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Got watching chappers on youtube again with his PRS custom 22 vs SE custom 22 video, difference in sound is obvious, the SE being darker and having less beef but then I got thinking, if you just turn up the bass and treble on the amp surely that'll mask those flaws to some extent
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I have a real 62 tele and a MIJ 62 tele custom. Other than the lacquer on the neck, the feel of them is very similar (they really got the neck shape correct on the Japanese version). I have original 62 pickups in the vintage and BK flatpole 52's in the MIJ. So the pickups sound different anyway. They both have an excellent sound, with the 62 sounding very like the Yardbird pickup set. When I let someone play them both, they think the 62 is the dogs bollocks and tend to ignore the MIJ. However I've had the MIJ longer than the 62 and used to play it a lot (it was my first tele). When I had nothing to compare it with, people used to tell me what a great tele it was. It still is a great tele, it's got all the feel the the 62 must have had when it was new. Some of the mojo of vintage guitars is the way they age. It's hard to emulate 50 years of sweat working its way through the lacquer and sealing the neck so that it's smooth but not a real satin finish.
If the basic guitar is right, with the correct pickups and set up, the price doesn't have to come into it.
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Or if you really wanted to test the differences, I guess you could refinish both guitars the same way, and put as similar hardware as possible on each etc. But then you could probably (with some justification) make the claim that neither guitar was close to its original off-the-shelf state, which would probably render any findings almost moot :lol:
That is going way beyond the original idea! If you start refinishing, changing hardware etc you're almost getting to the point where all you're actually "blind testing" is the difference between two bits of wood. :lol:
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I just watched that video with Chappers
I don't think there is such a big difference. Maybe you could get close with pickup height and pole piece adjustments etc. They do point out that extra like new pickups, but also I imagine a quality setup (which they don't mention) would cost more on top of the guitar, although lots of places offer free setups when you buy.
The CU 10 Top is £2944 and the SE is £625. Is the CU really 5 times better? Is a £14K Collection guitar really 22 times better than an SE? It's already been pointed out that price to the consumer has nothing like a linear relationship to quality of an instrument.
This has convinced me to try some obscenely priced instruments though when I get the chance.
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I would really like to see a comparison of 2 guitars with the exact same hardware and setup just to see how much difference the wood really makes. I wouldn't be surprised if most of the price difference between a £500 guitar vs a £2000 guitar is due to labour costs of different countries
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The CU 10 Top is £2944 and the SE is £625. Is the CU really 5 times better?
Yes.
Is a £14K Collection guitar really 22 times better than an SE?
Yes.
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The CU 10 Top is £2944 and the SE is £625. Is the CU really 5 times better?
Yes.
Is a £14K Collection guitar really 22 times better than an SE?
Yes.
Well the simple answer is no because that would suggest a linear relationship between the cost of an instrument and its quality and you've already spoken about diminishing returns with regard to items past a certain point but you can change your mind if you like. The Chappers video makes the 10 top and the SE sound pretty close although they may not be as pretty as each other and they may not play as well as each other out the box and they have different features (the sustain test is nonsense btw) and the complete tonal differences may not come out on youtube. I'm keeping an open mind and I do intend to try something like a private stock vs some other PRS guitars and hopefully take one of my guitars along too when I do, although I just hope I don't fall foul of the caveat that I need the ability to tell the differences anyway before I even start and I should find a place that also has a decent amp so they I don't ruin my chances by plugging it into something guff to begin with.
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Lets not forget the biggest limiting factor, the hands & head that play ! My vintage hands are certainly shown up by many contempory models!
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Lets not forget the biggest limiting factor, the hands & head that play ! My vintage hands are certainly shown up by many contempory models!
I don't think PRS' feel contemporary, although I've never played one with the thin neck they have as on option. The cool thing about them for me is they feel vintage, the trem feels vintage under you hand and with the way it moves, but the tuning stability and the couple of extra tonal options you get with the way they wire them up are actually pretty cool, say versus a normal 2 humbucker or 3 single coil based guitar. They are far from stuff like really modern shred machines, but they definitely hold their own against them. I don't think the hands and head are quite as big a factor as some people make out when it comes down to it. Maybe the head.
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The CU 10 Top is £2944 and the SE is £625. Is the CU really 5 times better?
Yes.
Owning both a SE CU24 and a CU24 I would also say yes. Without a doubt.
The cu24 is the best guitar I've played, I love it. But I feel it could be even better, and I bet a private stock could be the answer.
It's all about what it's worth it to us as a player, and I still maintain that it's a good thing that we a re spoilt of choice in all price categories.
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the difference from a korean PRS SE to an US made Paul Reed Smith is indeed huge in both build quality and tone (not to mention the woods grain, finish and hardware)
can't measure that by comparing proportional price numbers
if you were comparing the raw materials, hardware and labour costs, then an american Custom 24 would indeed be worth 5x the factory cost of a korean made one, but saying one is 5x better than the other is pure subjectivity
PRS (USA) is one of the very few mass producing brands that only puts out top luthier-like quality guitars even in their lowest ranges
on the other hand, there's many korean made guitars that cost half of a PRS SE while offering the same quality and features, so the price x quality argument shouldn't work for the SE lovers as well
personally, I'm a Les Paul guy, but I've never seen a Gibson with the build quality of an US made PRS
and I'm not bashing Gibson by any means
I don't believe the overpriced collector models are any better tonewise, although they may have unique finishes or some snake oil rare tonewood
they are expensive cause they are made for people that will pay whatever absurd price they put on
in the used market you can't beat the quality of a regular PRS McCarty, Custom or Singlecut in the US$1500-1800 range
one could argue that a used SE goes for $400, but I'd rather have one Famke Janssen than four Tilda Swintons :lol:
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I don't believe the overpriced collector models are any better tonewise, although they may have unique finishes or some snake oil rare tonewood they are expensive cause they are made for people that will pay whatever absurd price they put on
You don't know that if you've never played one, which I'm betting you haven't.
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but I'd rather have one Famke Janssen than four Tilda Swintons :lol:
Ouch, that's a bit harsh! :o
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We should do a BKP meeting and do a BKP blind test ("guess the pickup!").
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Well...i've enjoyed this thread so far :D. As for myself I own a Gibson LP Standard(2000) and I also have PRS SE Bernie Marsden which was not an expensive purchase but on the whole a very nice playing,sounding guitar to me anyway, which I play through an Orange Dual Terror and a 2x12 Zilla cabinet and all of this does the job well for me. I for one could not afford some of the stuff being talked about here and I don't for one moment blame anyone at all who spends that amount of money on things...it's up to the individual and good luck to them if they can afford those things. I would love to have a Kossoff,Beast,or a Sandy from the collectors choice and then again I would love one of the Feline 12 but sadly they are out of reach....well I can dream :D. Anyway good debate chaps :D
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We should do a BKP meeting and do a BKP blind test ("guess the pickup!").
That would be a brave thing to do, but the results could be interesting.
Of course it would depend on other factors like type of guitar, amp, speakers etc and the players' familiarity with said factors (......blah, blah, blah..... ad infinitum)
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We should do a BKP meeting and do a BKP blind test ("guess the pickup!").
That would be a brave thing to do, but the results could be interesting.
Of course it would depend on other factors like type of guitar, amp, speakers etc and the players' familiarity with said factors (......blah, blah, blah..... ad infinitum)
But imagine how it could revise your views of some of the pickups in the range? It would also help me to get a better grip on how much the guitar construction factors, etc.
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But imagine how it could revise your views of some of the pickups in the range? It would also help me to get a better grip on how much the guitar construction factors, etc.
That's a good point, I might find I actually liked some of the ones I tend to dismiss as "not my kind of thing", like the Nailbomb, HD or the highest-output models.
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That is going way beyond the original idea! If you start refinishing, changing hardware etc you're almost getting to the point where all you're actually "blind testing" is the difference between two bits of wood. :lol:
Oh yeah, I mean I was basically saying the entire thing is virtually pointless, as you're almost into trigger's broom type silliness. :lol:
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If only someone would build 12* identical spec guitars and put a different set of BKPs in each
https://bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=28587.msg384828#new (https://bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=28587.msg384828#new)
We're kind of just waiting on paintshop now and we can have them all completed
Sadly in a way as soon as they get done the new owners will want to have them in their eager hands - (although I must get a group photo)
Dont know if we could ever get a meaningful shootout of the pickups.
From memory
#1 had Abraxas (sold)
#2 had Emeralds
#3 had Black Dogs
#4 had Crawlers (sold)
#5 had VH2s
#6 had Stormy Mondays (sold)
#7 had Mules (sold) - Phil King)
#8 had PG Blues (sold)
#9 had Cold Sweat (mine)
#10 had Mules
#11 had Rebel Yells (sold)
#12 had Riff Raffs
#13Southpaw had Abraxas
* we made 13 as one wasn't going to be sold to the public but kept by myself for posterity so still leaving 12 to be sold.
Once we get the paintshop bit done I'll do a "Hall of Flame" posting
Anyway - back to boutique ranting (although my guitars do count as boutique)
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I do agree with MDV that often we are influenced by brand names and such and I do find that true for myself as well, though I believe I am much more resistant to it than most people (yes my ego wants out here).
For example when I went looking for an acoustic guitar I wanted to try everything, also Martins, which I had never played before but in my mind were like some kind of holy grail of acoustic guitars. Then I went to try some...god I hated them instantly, to me they all sounded bad. Yeah, they were loud, but sounded cheap, often britle...hated them. Setup was cool, playability too, but no, just no.
Actually I seem to not get on with 90% of high end acoutic guitars sound whise, dunno why. My favorites seem to sit in the 500-1000 range. In the end I tried everything, even did a double blind test and with that ended up with my Ibanez Satriani Signature Acoustic (the cheaper version even). Beat out anything else in the sound department. Also loved the playing feel as it was more electric. Sure, the octaves are not as clean as I would like em, but it sounded great and since I have improved on the basic character with different strings and bridge pins.
Double blind testing in a music store really is amazingly helpful. Tought me that I hate EMGs...well somewhat. I can dig the sounds they make when listening, but I despise playing them, just can´t work it.
Main thing I learned is that with both low and high end factory guitars it is hit and miss. Sure, usually at the higher end you chances are better, but still we all know the Epiphone LP that sounds and feels so much better than the high end Gibson. So much comes down to woods. The tonal qualitys of each piece used and how those pieces come together makes such a large difference. Thing is that it can´t really be taking into acount with factory guitars, so you end up with a lottery.
Luthiers can work with this and use it, which is why their guitars are so amazing.
That is also the reason why I have no doubt that Twinfans PRS is utterly amazing. Pernambuco is not a snake oil wood in my mind (they use it for violin bows for a reason) and when that is properly picked and combined...man.
Of course hardware, craftsmanship, etc all come into making a guitar too, but those all can be adjusted after the fact to certain degrees and the woods remain at the core.
I love my Feline semihollow I got second hand just as much as my cheap (little over 200 quid) Dean Vendetta 1.7 7 string. The first is just amazingly crafted and just has that mojo. The second is not crafted as well, but the feel still fits nicely and I got very lucky with the woods, they just work great with each other and create and nice character and resonance. So lucky to have both.
You can get great cheap guitars, but you gotta search to find one that works and then do setups, probably exchange hardware, etc.
Or you can get something like a Feline and be sure to always get an amazing piece right from the start.
Plus with the high end range (and especially Luthier made stuff) you can hit the point where everything that makes the guitar melds together in a way I have never experienced on a factory made guitar, where really takes a live of its own, sings as one. Really hard to describe but if you have ever experienced it you know what I mean. Twinfan for example has the same thing with his PRS I think.
Well that was a strange ranty thing. Poorly written, so I feel somewhat sorry for anyone reading it all already. Stream of thought really. sorry^^
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Plus with the high end range (and especially Luthier made stuff) you can hit the point where everything that makes the guitar melds together in a way I have never experienced on a factory made guitar, where really takes a live of its own, sings as one. Really hard to describe but if you have ever experienced it you know what I mean. Twinfan for example has the same thing with his PRS I think.
That's exactly it Kiichi, a mate of mine described my Collection V as "like a harp" as all the strings sang in unison - no bass overpowering the treble, or clashing frequencies, just a sweet, sweet sound. I've owned over 60 guitars across lots of manufacturers and prices and I've never known a guitar like it. There's no way you'll get a Korean SE Cu24 (or even a USA PRS) to sound like it by just setting it up and fret dressing it. It's all to do with the wood selection and construction, making sure all the pieces and fitted together exactly and they work together in harmony. A 'normal' mass produced instrument will only achieve this very rarely and highly randomly, especially now that factories grade all the raw materials prior to build and rush through manufacture.
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A cynic might say that a USA PRS is pretty dear to be considered a "normal" mass produced instrument :lol: I mean for that kind of cash you can get a luthier-built guitar, which does have the kind of wood selection you're talking about. It won't have the PRS signature on the headstock and whether you like it as much is a whole other question, but yeah.
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I've not seen too much (if anything) mentioned in this thread so far about 'Boutique' amps, so just thought I'd bring it up.
I've always been a big believer that the amp is the biggest tone shaping tool in the sound chain: you can have the 'best', most expensive, massively expressive guitar in the world but if you're plugged into a Marshall MG combo (just to pick something as an example, other brands are available) you're not going to be getting the best out of the guitar.
Plug something 'normal' like a Gibson/Fender etc or even lower level like my own modified Indonesian built Hello Kitty Strat into an SLO or Splawn (again other 'better' amp brands are available, I picked what I have for ease) and I'm 100% certain you'd get a better overall end result. Yes the guitar may not play to the standard you like or are used to, which would affect your enjoyment on 1 level, but I don't think anyone here would argue that tonally it wouldn't be better. The overall better tone would also, for me atleast, make up for slight inperfections in the playability of the instrument.
As to what classes as a 'boutique' amp brand I'm not so sure. If you go by price, then over here in the UK MESAs are very expensive, but they are also relatively mass produced. Whereas my Splawn, again just an example, is cheaper but also made in alot smaller numbers.
Then there's the guys that build amp clones etc, of which I know of a few on here. They're often built to very high standards, and also in low numbers, so would you class that as boutique even though they may not cost as much as the amp they're cloning? Again I'll use my own SLO Clone as an example of this.
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A cynic might say that a USA PRS is pretty dear to be considered a "normal" mass produced instrument :lol: I mean for that kind of cash you can get a luthier-built guitar, which does have the kind of wood selection you're talking about. It won't have the PRS signature on the headstock and whether you like it as much is a whole other question, but yeah.
Think you have to factor resale into it too. I bet I couldn't shift my custom even if I wanted to 'cause it's so unique to me but a CU24 will keep alot of the value?
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Yea, I touched on this earlier. The word boutique has come to mean something different, like a mark of quality - that's how I see the word used alot anyway. To me boutique should mean made in a very small quantity (cottage) but at master level but I've seen it used as a justification for high priced production gear.
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Yea, I touched on this earlier. The word boutique has come to mean something different, like a mark of quality - that's how I see the word used alot anyway. To me boutique should mean made in a very small quantity (cottage) but at master level but I've seen it used as a justification for high priced production gear.
I know it had been mentioned a little bit earlier, but nothing to the same amount as guitars. So just thought I'd try and shift the topic a little bit for a change :lol:
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Yea, I touched on this earlier. The word boutique has come to mean something different, like a mark of quality - that's how I see the word used alot anyway. To me boutique should mean made in a very small quantity (cottage) but at master level but I've seen it used as a justification for high priced production gear.
I think its now used as a bit of a buzzword really. It might mean a product from a small company (Splawn, Soldano, JPF, Lazy J, Sommatone etc) but there are loads of small companies making amps. It SHOULD in theory mean a higher quality product with more time paid to each amp and not as much pressure to bean count from managers... but actually people are quite prone to building in legacy "faults" from old amps like poor ground schemes and poor power switching/fusing. In short, I don't think it's easy to guarantee the highest levels of quality in a boutique amp without knowing what you are looking at.
I also think I mentionend elsewhere in this thread the nonsense surrounding NOS resistors or caps driving up the cost of building more vintage accurate amps... this even gets as daft as looking for certain PVC insulated wire in particular colours because the chemicals in the insulation effect the tone. Solid Wire vs Stranded Wire. On the other end of the scale there is the HiFi Influenced amps with all kinds of expensive resistors and caps. Kiwame, Halco, Shinkoh or Audio Note Tantalum resistors. Teflon Tin Foil Capacitors. Basically there are all kinds of companies selling snake oil and it doesn't matter about the price or the quantity of amps they produce and like guitars there is a point where the higher cost isn't really getting you anything more apart from crazy componants and rhetoric. That is what I think.
I've attached two MP3's.
One is an SLO costing over £4k
The other is a well built high spec clone which is probably around £1k (maybe a bit under) but could likely be done cheaper.
Same valves in both amps rebiaed to the same point.
Controls set by measuring the resistances across the pots using a Fluke Multimeter.
Which do you think is which?
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It's a bit different for amps though, as if you get high tolerance caps/resistors/transformers you can pretty much build the exact same amp every time. Yes, valves may differ a touch but there's very little in it. For example, I have two unchanged from new 65 Amps Empire heads. I can't tell them apart when playing them on the same settings.
Each piece of wood is different though, so replicating a guitar EXACTLY is almost impossible to do. I owned two identical McCarty rosewood neck models (except for fretboard inlays) at the same time in the past and they sounded very different.
I guess I'm trying to say that building that 'special one' is easier and more consistently reproduced for an amp when compared to a guitar.
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Dmoney - I haven't listened to the clips as I think it's pointless. Sound isn't the whole story, as with guitars it's a bout feel and whether you're inspired by it.
Playing the two back-to-back in a room I'm guessing I may be able to spot a difference, but whether I can tell you which is which is another matter. You should see the Guitarist magazine blind test last month for a similar exercise.
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It's a bit different for amps though, as if you get high tolerance caps/resistors/transformers you can pretty much build the exact same amp every time. Yes, valves may differ a touch but there's very little in it. For example, I have two unchanged from new 65 Amps Empire heads. I can't tell them apart when playing them on the same settings.
Each piece of wood is different though, so replicating a guitar EXACTLY is almost impossible to do. I owned two identical McCarty rosewood neck models (except for fretboard inlays) at the same time in the past and they sounded very different.
I guess I'm trying to say that building that 'special one' is easier and more consistently reproduced for an amp when compared to a guitar.
I can see what you're saying and that's kind of reflected in the fact that you don't see many amplifiers over £4k (unless you're talking about non production amps that are collectable) and when it comes to high tolerance resistors etc, that doesn't necessarily matter because the more complex an amp and the more components you put in it, even with a 5% tolerance in the individual parts the differences even out through the amp. Also high tolerance parts tend to be what you might call 'non vintage' construction or materials. People who might want a really vintage sounding amp could want carbon comp or something else, and then you might get into a process of hand selecting parts by testing each componant for its value. You often get people claiming to use Carbon Comp in the 'signal path' and metal film elsewhere to reduce noise. I'm not sure how much difference that makes.
As I've said before, I know about the guitarist magazine test because I've built two amps for one guy that was part of the test, and I have parts at home to build two more for him.
As for being inspired, I use my clone 98% of the time when playing at home. I can tell the difference between the real amp and otherwise, although they have different types of power valves in now so it's a bit easier. However you just made the point that it's easier to build amps to the same spec and get the same results every time! So do you think If I built two identical amps (according to your criteria of matching values in the circuite etc) one would inpsire you more than the other regardless of the inherent similarity in sound? You seem to be contradicting yourself somewhat. If you want to get the detail, my clone has the same type of pots and resistors (same series from the same manufacturer) and they both have polyester orange drop caps rather than Polypropelene. Not all orange drops are equal but I chose a type based on some research around the web to be close as I could get that wasn't hunting NOS caps. I went through each coupling cap by hand and marked the leg with the outer foil and lined that up with the lowest impedance path to ground to help with noise. The filter caps in my clone are higher spec. Both amps use Panasonic filter caps. The main difference is the transformers. The OT is still a large wide bandwidth 'high def' transformer which is probably a little bigger than the real SLO's OT and it's by no means junk... its top notch, and the PT is specified to compliment it. So yes, there is a difference but it's DAMN close for the sake of an extra £3k and I have the two side by side to prove that and I'm not the only one who believes it.
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However you just made the point that it's easier to build amps to the same spec and get the same results every time! So do you think If I built two identical amps (according to your criteria of matching values in the circuite etc) one would inpsire you more than the other regardless of the inherent similarity in sound? You seem to be contradicting yourself somewhat.
That's not what I was trying to say, sorry! I'm sure your clone sounds very close to an SLO, and I reckon you could build another one just as good quite easily. The price difference between yours and the real thing can be explained by US labour costs & healthcare, research and development, taxes, RoSH and CEE testing, marketing, brand image, price positioning for the market etc. Soldano are a company looking to making a profit, you're a one-off copyist.
The "inspiring" part comes from the design, so get that right and you can churn them out all day long.
Doing the same thing with a guitar, I'm suggesting it's pretty damn impossible. Can you clone Pearly Gates or SRV's #1? Can you do it 20 times? Do you have access to 500/1000 planks of the correct spec maple/mahogany to find the right pieces?
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I'm not suggesting you can. I'm just talking about amplifiers. I agree about the labour costs and price positioning (Soldano amps don't meet RoHS though I don't think since they use optocouplers for switching) and they are small company still and if pricing their amps accordingly means they can pay their staff well then thats great. I'm not trying to make a profit when I build stuff for myself and I'm in a fortunate position in that I have the knowledge and the skill to be able to build an amp as close to an SLO for a fraction of the price although its still a lot of money if you don't want to cut any corners. It's the same 'design' between the too obviously, so for me because I love that circuit, both amps are as inspiring as each other.
Not just from a playing point of view either. From a design viewpoint the SLO is awesome. Leaving the actual circuit for a minute, the choice of parts is awesome and the chassis layout is great (where the iron is placed and how it's placed, where the valve sockets are placed in relation to the controls and input jacks and how that effects the wiring layout etc). The standby and power switching could be better, but really, everything most people think is irrelevant in an amp is addressed in the SLO. I really think it's the first amp designed to such a level and that's partly the reason why I own a real one. I can't spare the money again for a second one (although I would like one with all the options) but I'm happy to make myself something to tour with and use as a backup knowing how similar I can build one. In turn that just means I'm not really taken in by the argument that it isn't even possible to get close to building an SLO unless you're mike soldano or bill sundt.
It doesn't have as many bells or whistles as an XTC or Diezel but I like that. I like a solid single channel amp that does what it does and does it really well. I've not played an XTC, I'm sure they're good though. I've played a Diezel Hagan and a VH4 and those are great amps, but for me I prefered the SLO tone over what those amps offered in the similar high gain vein. If I ever needed a 3 or 4 channel amp I've no idea what I'd do. Probably end up building my own. ha!
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A cynic might say that a USA PRS is pretty dear to be considered a "normal" mass produced instrument :lol: I mean for that kind of cash you can get a luthier-built guitar, which does have the kind of wood selection you're talking about. It won't have the PRS signature on the headstock and whether you like it as much is a whole other question, but yeah.
Think you have to factor resale into it too. I bet I couldn't shift my custom even if I wanted to 'cause it's so unique to me but a CU24 will keep alot of the value?
Not if you put the slightest mark on it it's not . PRS collectors seem to be obsessive about guitars being completely mint.
One small scratch or dent and it's basically worthless.
I owned a Custom 22 once and as a result of that attitude I think I only took it out of it's case 4 times which is complete madness.
Sold it on to have something that you can play without that worry instead.
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Doing the same thing with a guitar, I'm suggesting it's pretty damn impossible. Can you clone Pearly Gates or SRV's #1? Can you do it 20 times? Do you have access to 500/1000 planks of the correct spec maple/mahogany to find the right pieces?
I just had a thought about this too.
Why would you want to clone those or even claim to have cloned them? Without knowing the history of either and just picking one up surely you might think either are old junk? That has to be a possibility right? What makes some of these guitars extraordinary has to be extraordinary players that held them, other than that they might just be average guitars to anyone else. I can't believe that once upon a time someone was making a guitar and the planets aligned and all the woods happened to meld perfectly and years later on the anniversary of that guitars' birth it fell (with its perfect balance of woody goodness) into the virtuosic hands of Stevie Ray Vaughan or similar? That seems a little coincidental to me. Would it be the number one in anyone elses collection if it hadn't passed via SRV? I'm not so sure. So all those expensive Gibson models like the AFD etc... I really can't see why they would be better guitars to begin with, perhaps a lot of those reissues are better than the guitars them emulate. That wouldn't surprise me. It's just selling expensive guitars to Slash fans etc. Your PRS obviously doesn't fall into that class of guitar.
I think I've actually heard a story about an SRV strat (I'm not sure which) that was briefly tracked down. It had been painted over (not a pro refin, badly) and was being treated like a squire strat I think. The trail went dead a long time ago after the owner at the time refused to part with it (my memory of the story is hazy). So somewhere out there, someone has an SRV strat that probably looks like a pile of garbage.
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Doing the same thing with a guitar, I'm suggesting it's pretty damn impossible. Can you clone Pearly Gates or SRV's #1? Can you do it 20 times? Do you have access to 500/1000 planks of the correct spec maple/mahogany to find the right pieces?
I just had a thought about this too.
Why would you want to clone those or even claim to have cloned them? Without knowing the history of either and just picking one up surely you might think either are old junk? That has to be a possibility right? What makes some of these guitars extraordinary has to be extraordinary players that held them, other than that they might just be average guitars to anyone else. I can't believe that once upon a time someone was making a guitar and the planets aligned and all the woods happened to meld perfectly and years later on the anniversary of that guitars' birth it fell (with its perfect balance of woody goodness) into the virtuosic hands of Stevie Ray Vaughan or similar? That seems a little coincidental to me. Would it be the number one in anyone elses collection if it hadn't passed via SRV? I'm not so sure. So all those expensive Gibson models like the AFD etc... I really can't see why they would be better guitars to begin with, perhaps a lot of those reissues are better than the guitars them emulate. That wouldn't surprise me. It's just selling expensive guitars to Slash fans etc. Your PRS obviously doesn't fall into that class of guitar.
I think I've actually heard a story about an SRV strat (I'm not sure which) that was briefly tracked down. It had been painted over (not a pro refin, badly) and was being treated like a squire strat I think. The trail went dead a long time ago after the owner at the time refused to part with it (my memory of the story is hazy). So somewhere out there, someone has an SRV strat that probably looks like a pile of garbage.
I have one of the Gibson Slash AFDs here at the moment
It's a nice enough guitar but it's not all that
I feel that one of our custom builds completely wipes the floor with it.
Trouble is that a boutique make won't have the resale value of a well regarded major brand ...until the boutique brand gets recognition/ kudos like happened with Dumble or Trainwreck amps.
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Dmoney - I used famous guitars as an example. Cloning any guitar would be tricky, although if you're building two side-by-side you have a better chance of them being indistinguishable from each other if you're using blanks from the same part of the trees etc. Unlikely in a big factory, very possible if you're a small luthier or a Custom Shop.
I owned a Custom 22 once and as a result of that attitude I think I only took it out of it's case 4 times which is complete madness.
Sold it on to have something that you can play without that worry instead.
Some of us do actually play the snot out of our PRS's ;)
(http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r267/junkacct/Guitar%20stuff/20121207_095446.jpg)
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Oooof.
those are cool amps and made crazy expensive by the lack of anyone making them. Ken Fischer passing away and Howard Dumble building guns rather than amps these days. A lot of them were tweaked to suit the individual making the purchase. There is a LOT of snake oil and wild conjecture around those amps. There are a few companies making clones of those but they are expensive. Though not the $20k - $40k the real deal might set you back! How close they get I've no idea, but I've even less idea about how close each Dumble amp was to another Dumble or each Trainwreck was to the next. I'd love to have a go on a real Trainwreck. A know a chap whos Dad owns one, but he lives in the US.
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Dmoney - I used famous guitars as an example. Cloning any guitar would be tricky, although if you're building two side-by-side you have a better chance of them being indistinguishable from each other if you're using blanks from the same part of the trees etc. Unlikely in a big factory, very possible if you're a small luthier or a Custom Shop.
I know what you were getting at but I'd never really thought about it much before. I guess the assumption is that sometimes these legendary guitars are all going to play awesomely and so on... I bet a lot of them are pretty avaerage. Agreed about cloning any guitar too. As for making two side by side I also agree that it probably gives you the best chance of similar sounding guitars but (and maybe a luthier can answer) how much can wood vary over a plank? Would you be able to get a body blank from one section, and then the area right next to the last blank have a different grain or knots? I feel like that's a good argument but having no idea myself about the uniformity of timber I think its an interesting question.
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Not if you put the slightest mark on it it's not . PRS collectors seem to be obsessive about guitars being completely mint.
One small scratch or dent and it's basically worthless.
I owned a Custom 22 once and as a result of that attitude I think I only took it out of it's case 4 times which is complete madness.
Sold it on to have something that you can play without that worry instead.
I felt a bit like that when I had a Singlecut Trem with the Artist Package (gold hardware, "better than 10" maple top etc) - not that I'm someone who plays every day or beats guitars up anyway, but it just didn't feel like it was "meant" to be played (but who knows, the new owner in Poland may be gigging the hell out of it, of course!)
Whereas my Standard Satin 22 has a load of dings and an "ugly-beautiful" sunk into the grain finish.... and I'm very fond of it. It's not the "best" guitar, or the best PRS guitar, I've owned, in fact I'd say it's pretty bog-standard really, but I feel very comfortable with it.
It's true that PRS guitars don't seem to be holding their value very well at the moment, but I suspect in 20 or 30 years they will have vintafe values like Fender or Gibson.
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I think the PRS no-damage thing comes from collectors buying them more than players. More guys are playing them these days, especially in the US modern rock/metal scene by the look of the recent Download festival, but in the general public it's occasional players/collectors who seem to like them.
My main two gigging guitars are 'well used' and probably worth knack all! :lol:
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Not if you put the slightest mark on it it's not . PRS collectors seem to be obsessive about guitars being completely mint.
One small scratch or dent and it's basically worthless.
I owned a Custom 22 once and as a result of that attitude I think I only took it out of it's case 4 times which is complete madness.
Sold it on to have something that you can play without that worry instead.
And that's how I got my 97' CU22 for just over 600quid about 3 or 4 years ago :lol:
Luckilly I'm 1 of those people that buys guitars to play them, so resale value isn't too much of a concern. Plus none of my guitars are so expensive where it's much of an issue anyway.
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Which do you think is which?
F is the real SLO ;-p
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I agree with what brow's saying about the amps- while I'd say in an ideal world you wouldn't want to cheap out on anything in your chain, the amp (and i'd include speakers/cabinet in that) does make the most difference. A (reasonable quality, well set-up- i.e. not a dud/lemon which won't stay in tune) beginner guitar into an SLO or similar will generally sound better than a PRS into a beginner solid state practice amp.
Obviously that's an extreme example and I'd never advise doing that in the real world, lol.
Think you have to factor resale into it too. I bet I couldn't shift my custom even if I wanted to 'cause it's so unique to me but a CU24 will keep alot of the value?
yep, of course, agreed. I was actually gonna edit that into my post yesterday, but was too lazy and couldn't be bothered :lol:
Basically there are all kinds of companies selling snake oil and it doesn't matter about the price or the quantity of amps they produce and like guitars there is a point where the higher cost isn't really getting you anything more apart from crazy componants and rhetoric. That is what I think.
Agreed. Same goes for pedals (maybe especially pedals), and (possibly to a lesser extent, but still some of it applies) guitars.
I've said before, but I don't mind paying more for genuinely better quality or tangible improvements. I'm not best pleased if I find out I've paid more for snake oil or the placebo effect.
regarding the clips, when i loaded them up in media player the description told me which was which :lol:
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HA! you cheats.
I've tried to sort that out so you don't get given the answer should anyone else want to have a go.
I didn't use reamping for those clips obviously. Just played round twice. Reamping would probably have been fairer but I did those clips at the same time as doing two other amps just before I had to let one go. So I rushed it.
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The discussion of amps takes us back to the beginning of this discussion - which is that of all the hyper expensive amps played in the Guitarist blind test, high up in their favourites was the Fender Hot Rod - an amp that probably would only get derogatory comments from the majority of people here.
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I think that Y is the better sounding amp of the two, but there's certainly not much in it really.
Quite an interesting discussion going on too, nice to see a bit of activity here!
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The discussion of amps takes us back to the beginning of this discussion - which is that of all the hyper expensive amps played in the Guitarist blind test, high up in their favourites was the Fender Hot Rod - an amp that probably would only get derogatory comments from the majority of people here.
I used to own that amp and it really was good sounding, mine was a limited edition with a jensen speaker in and oxblood cloth, what a great amp.
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The Hot Rod's are a good cheap option if you're playing the clean channel, as the Guitarist guys were.
Try the gain channel though, especially at low volume - it's not that great. Very buzzy and flat like a bad distortion pedal.
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Doing the same thing with a guitar, I'm suggesting it's pretty damn impossible. Can you clone Pearly Gates or SRV's #1? Can you do it 20 times? Do you have access to 500/1000 planks of the correct spec maple/mahogany to find the right pieces?
I just had a thought about this too.
Why would you want to clone those or even claim to have cloned them? Without knowing the history of either and just picking one up surely you might think either are old junk? That has to be a possibility right? What makes some of these guitars extraordinary has to be extraordinary players that held them, other than that they might just be average guitars to anyone else. I can't believe that once upon a time someone was making a guitar and the planets aligned and all the woods happened to meld perfectly and years later on the anniversary of that guitars' birth it fell (with its perfect balance of woody goodness) into the virtuosic hands of Stevie Ray Vaughan or similar? That seems a little coincidental to me. Would it be the number one in anyone elses collection if it hadn't passed via SRV? I'm not so sure. So all those expensive Gibson models like the AFD etc... I really can't see why they would be better guitars to begin with, perhaps a lot of those reissues are better than the guitars them emulate. That wouldn't surprise me. It's just selling expensive guitars to Slash fans etc. Your PRS obviously doesn't fall into that class of guitar.
I know Dave's point was mainly about the impossibility of "cloning" any particular guitar, but I find the side-discussion about the qualities of famous stars' iconic guitars interesting.
I suspect if we got the chance to play Pearly Gates, or SRV's Number 1, or Slash's Derrig LP, or Dave Gilmour's black Strat.... some of those guitars might be amazing but most would probably be pretty ordinary. Their owners probably loved them due to familiarity as much as any other reason.
That's one of the things I like best about guitars - they don't have to be hugely expensive or brilliantly-made in any absolute sense in order for someone to appreciate them.
The discussion of amps takes us back to the beginning of this discussion - which is that of all the hyper expensive amps played in the Guitarist blind test, high up in their favourites was the Fender Hot Rod - an amp that probably would only get derogatory comments from the majority of people here.
To me amps are a completely different kettle of fish from guitars.
Guitars are very simple things, easy to modify and the way they feel is every bit as important as the way they sound.
Amps are complicated things, much more difficult to understand and to get to grips with. What a player needs from an amp depends not only on how "good" it is, but much more on the circumstances it's going to be used in - at home, in the studio, on stage. More so than guitars, I think it needs a decent, and experienced, player (i.e. not me!) to appreciate the subtle qualitiies of a good amp. In that blind test, they probably chose the "familiar" over the "best".
I'd be happy with whichever amp made me sound OK - and that's probably just as likely to be a cheap mass-produced amp as an expensive boutique one.
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More so than guitars, I think it needs a decent, and experienced, player (i.e. not me!) to appreciate the subtle qualitiies of a good amp.
I'd say the same applies to both guitars and amps - you need to be a decent enough guitar player to appreciate the differences. If someone very badly hacks Smoke On The Water through a Trainwreck they're not going to be blown away by the amp are they?
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More so than guitars, I think it needs a decent, and experienced, player (i.e. not me!) to appreciate the subtle qualitiies of a good amp.
I'd say the same applies to both guitars and amps - you need to be a decent enough guitar player to appreciate the differences. If someone very badly hacks Smoke On The Water through a Trainwreck they're not going to be blown away by the amp are they?
I dunno, I'm a rubbish guitar player but I think I can tell a good guitar from a bad one (subject to personal preference, of course), by virtue of having played a lot of the buggers.
Whereas I wouldn't know a good amp from a hole in the ground. I'm mostly just scared of how fricken loud they are. :|
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I think experience comes into it maybe more than ability. I know I'm more able than I think I am, but still I'm not the best player when it comes to certain stuff, but thats the same as everyone else. No guitarist is a master of all trades so to speak.
So, I think once you've been playing a while and had the chance to experience some nice guitars and some nice amps then you start to spot differences and get used to what you enjoy as a player and you forget the buzzwords that come out of magazines. Even if a bad player was playing a cheap guitar through a trainwreck, as long as they had it dialed reasonably well they could probably hear a difference between that and playing through a Crate Bluevoodoo or Pod and I'd hope they'd be excited by the difference.
I personally feel that I now have a really good idea of what tools I need when it comes to Guitars, Amps and Pedals and maybe it hasn't taken as much shopping around as it has done for some other people. When you start out and you have no cash you'll just play whatever you can afford and shop around for deals. When you get a bit more choice you can try more stuff out but often it takes a long period to make a final decision about what works in your hands. Longer than and hour sat in a shop trying stuff out. Maybe it has to be a personal voyage of discovery but I wonder if when people went shopping for amplifiers and such, if someone explained the basics in a practical way rather than talking about "touch sensitivity" or "3D sound" or other unmeasurable buzzwords then that voyage might be shortened a bit. Similarly with guitars by doing things like explaining action can be changed stuff can be set up... obviously it depends on the customer or it might seem patronising.
EDIT:
On Philly's point above. You can probably tell when an amp sounds good, but experience again might lead you to choose one amp over another, say if you'd had to get one repaired or whatever. Take a look at Frank's blog post on the Peavey Classis 30. Not a bad sounding amp and a fairly reliable one too... but if it does go wrong its a nightmare to fix and opening the PCB's out risks further damage every time it's done because the jumpers are electrical connetions, not just bits of wire holding the PCB's together. That's a potentially bigger repair bill than say a similar sounding amp that is easier to maintain... but how would you know that?
http://jpfamps.com/peavey-classic-30-repair (http://jpfamps.com/peavey-classic-30-repair)
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The Hot Rod's are a good cheap option if you're playing the clean channel, as the Guitarist guys were.
Try the gain channel though, especially at low volume - it's not that great. Very buzzy and flat like a bad distortion pedal.
yes that's the main reason I ended up selling it in the end, I honestly prefer my Fender Champion 600 re-issue even though it's only 5W, it sounds way better for cleans and filth because you can really crank it up.
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HA! you cheats.
They did sound a bit different, though. The real slo had more bass, (more obvious in the highgain side) and maybe a teeny bit less compressed. Either way both sounded great 8)
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HA! you cheats.
They did sound a bit different, though. The real slo had more bass, (more obvious in the highgain side) and maybe a teeny bit less compressed. Either way both sounded great 8)
They do sound a little different which is probably mostly down to the iron. Both have stupidly high quality output transformers but they are a different spec. I've actually sent a number of emails over the years to the chap who designed the one in my clone and he worked with the guy who made the Deyoung OT for SLO's, so the guy knows the exact spec and some time ago it looked like he might become the manufacturer for the SLO OT but between himself and Soldano I believe they decided the SLO should stay as it is. It was around then that Soldano switched away from Mercury Magnetics on all the amps in their line. A copy of the deyoung was never offered but instead another very high quality set iron was designed for use with the SLO circuit.
The OT on the copy does actually have a lot of low end. I can post another clip of the same circuit again this time with different orange drops and with different iron again. See what you think. I think that record is from a £700 ish amp (for parts). In the room with all the amps together this one sounded like it had the least bass to me.
Also, the clip now known as X is only a fair test up to about 3 minutes in I think, because I did use the 'haynes' mod at the end of that clip, which the other amps don't have.
These are the settings for all the clips dialled in using the multimeter... the recording is via a 16ohm Hotplate DI out into my macbook and recorded in garageband using Laconvolver Marshall 4x12 vintage 30 cab with a SM57 cap egde off axis impulse. No settings altered between channel switching, which is why the Clean is always quiet in comparison to crunch and overdrive. The guitar I used is my Vigier with Tonezone neck and Paf Pro bridge.
Same valves in all the amps and a rebias to the same idle current too.
clean gain 5.5
OD gain 4
bass 6
middle 6
treble 6
Clean MV 5.5
OD MV 4
Pres Depth 6
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On Philly's point above. You can probably tell when an amp sounds good, but experience again might lead you to choose one amp over another, say if you'd had to get one repaired or whatever. Take a look at Frank's blog post on the Peavey Classis 30. Not a bad sounding amp and a fairly reliable one too... but if it does go wrong its a nightmare to fix and opening the PCB's out risks further damage every time it's done because the jumpers are electrical connetions, not just bits of wire holding the PCB's together. That's a potentially bigger repair bill than say a similar sounding amp that is easier to maintain... but how would you know that?
http://jpfamps.com/peavey-classic-30-repair (http://jpfamps.com/peavey-classic-30-repair)
That was interesting, but you're right, I've no way of knowing how reliable or repairable an amp might be. Although I guess I'd make a general assumption (probably wrongly) that if it looks simple on the outside it's likely to be relatively simple on the inside.
I do read amp reviews, but not with the degree of interest I read guitar reviews - simply because they don't have the same appeal, and because I'm never going to buy and sell amps in the way I do with guitars.
That said, I do intend my next purchase to be an amp! I'm getting a bit guitar'd out, think I've reached saturation point unless I start getting interested in Gretsches or Rickenbackers. Which isn't going to happen.
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I think thats a pretty reasonable assumption. If an amp has two or three knobs of the front then unless something very wild is going on then it probably isn't a complex amp, though still if you found the cheapest amp you could like that then maybe it might not be robust. But then it's the old "buy cheap buy twice" rule and there really isn't much reason to spend ultra mega bucks to get something good.
I've not bought a magazine for ages so I'm not sure what lengths people go to in reviews. I've read some silly stuff in the odd one I've picked up in passing though that smacked of the odd reviewer just desperately trying to find something negative to say. I don't ever recall a review were the writer has gone into detail about construction other "yup, this amp seems tough because it's built on turrets", which is a pretty poor generalisation.
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I might add, contradicting myself above, that the best playing guitar I have ever played was Johnny Mac's Feline.
Thanks mate :-) I feel that way about it too. I knew it was going to be just right and it had more of that something than I ever thought possible
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The discussion of amps takes us back to the beginning of this discussion - which is that of all the hyper expensive amps played in the Guitarist blind test, high up in their favourites was the Fender Hot Rod - an amp that probably would only get derogatory comments from the majority of people here.
For what type of tones, though? I've always said its cleans were very good (especially for the price), just its od channels were rubbish (though I haven't tried the new one which supposedly has improved the od channels a little).
The Hot Rod's are a good cheap option if you're playing the clean channel, as the Guitarist guys were.
Try the gain channel though, especially at low volume - it's not that great. Very buzzy and flat like a bad distortion pedal.
ah there we go. agreed. :)
I'd say the same applies to both guitars and amps - you need to be a decent enough guitar player to appreciate the differences. If someone very badly hacks Smoke On The Water through a Trainwreck they're not going to be blown away by the amp are they?
What I find kinda weird though is that that kinda goes both ways. On the one hand what you're saying is true- but on the other hand, the better a player you are, the more you can put up with less than ideal kit. The longer I've been playing (I'm making the possibly inaccurate assumption that I've been improving over time :lol: ), the less fussy I find I get about gear. Things that I'd have sworn blind made a massive difference 5 years ago now I often think make a subtle difference at best.
That's not to say that I think that if you're a good player that you should play cr@ppy gear (which some people suggest). That's silly as well. The same player will generally play and sound better through better kit (assuming the better kit suits the player's preferences and music style(s) equally well), so you might as well play the best stuff you can afford. Just it's not always a massive difference, either, diminishing returns come into play...
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The point about the Guitarist test is not that the clean tones of the Hot Rod were 'very good (especially for the price)' or 'a good cheap option' (both statements I can imagine being said with upturned noses - if I didn't know you both from here for years :D) but were preferred to the clean tones of amps costing 5 times the price in a blind test. The Hot Rod sounded boutique, the boutique amps didn't - and that to the ears of professional musicians. Now, I must confess I have never played a Hot Rod Deluxe, although I know the Blackface tone it based on - but if people who play and review guitars and amps for a living think by their ears alone that amp is the booteek amp, then, unless posh amp builders don't bother with their clean sound (which is hard to imagine), they aren't doing it right and thus the £$$$$££$£ is questionable.
It is interesting to note that the same magazine compared a Joyo UD with Fulltone OCD and came out the other end - stating that anyone with pro-musician ears could tell the difference.
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It is interesting to note that the same magazine compared a Joyo UD with Fulltone OCD and came out the other end - stating that anyone with pro-musician ears could tell the difference.
Was that a "blind" test, though? I remember the article, but skipped over it.
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Funny enough, I've been wanting a Joyo US Dream because I've always wanted a Suhr Riot.. Should I?
Any other Joyos worth buying too?
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I don't think the Joyo vs Fulltone was a blind test.
Dave - here's a side by side of the two pedals:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HyAOYu1OxpE (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HyAOYu1OxpE)
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I prefered amp 'Y', though there's not much in it. Which is which out of interest?
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The point about the Guitarist test is not that the clean tones of the Hot Rod were 'very good (especially for the price)' or 'a good cheap option' (both statements I can imagine being said with upturned noses - if I didn't know you both from here for years :D) but were preferred to the clean tones of amps costing 5 times the price in a blind test.
That's not quite true Elliot? From memory, Mick Taylor guessed what 3 of the amps were (and got it right) but I'm not sure he said the Hot Rod was his favourite? He said he knew it because he'd played one a lot...
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Good point Twinfan. How many people here have read the article and aren't just going off the discussion here for their info.
The Test wasn't cut and dry on the side of boutique, The HR crept in their a few times, but neither did it destroy (or even come close to) the (misunderstood) concept of "Boutique" (a word i'm starting to hate).
Pretty sure if i loved Marshall and only played them all my life, i'm going to pick it out as my fav in a blind test. whole point of boutique is having something tweaked in a direction that you just can't find on the market stock. Boutique is there for when the standard stuff isn't quite for you. And when you have a lot of optional mods or tweaks people ask you to make, i would imagine the one at a time construction methods make more sense than commiting to large runs of components. that costs more. depends what that 5% difference is worth to you
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And when you have a lot of optional mods or tweaks people ask you to make, i would imagine the one at a time construction methods make more sense than commiting to large runs of components. that costs more. depends what that 5% difference is worth to you
If people always ask for mods then it's going to be easier to make stuff a bit more bespoke, although to be fair if you were running a small company it's probably worth building a few amps at the same time, since that will give you stock exponentially faster than doing one amp after another in a consecutive process. Building 3 amps at once by hand is faster than building 3 one after the other (is what I'm getting at) and therefore uses time more efficiently. Being able to commit to larger orders of parts is actually good thing, it makes the parts cheaper since higher quantities get you better price breaks and that makes the cost per part cheaper, so you can make more profit. You could also stock certain parts and sell them to other people for projects/spares to make profit on the side since some parts may have minimum orders of 500 for example but may be desirable to others not in a position to buy that many.
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This customisation and amp talks makes me thing two things right now:
a) I want Dmoney to build me on of those SLO clones =)
b) I want someone to build me high quality Tiny Terror clone with a 3 band EQ and a effects loop.
Especially the second one would basecally be boutique, as it custom and small number. This just now made me really notice how much I like boutique stuff when it is not snake oil stuff.
Lot of people are satisfied with off the shelf things and yes those can be amazing.
I however am someone who likes to optimize (I also do sound tech work on the side). I love things with a lot of knobs, possibilities, etc.
I am someone who pays that extra money to get that extra 10-5%, things like a effects loop on a TT.
I also am one for feel and such but I think the problem with boutique comes in where the snake oil starts. That is a blurry line, I admit, but that line is what this discussion really comes down to, isn´t it?
I think no one is gonna talk badly about custom and boutique work in general, only about snake oil, or am I off on that assumption?
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Does the OR15H not take your fancy? The tone control in the Tiny Terror is a cross line 'hi cut' which you can find on old vox's and some Komet amps. It's a 'low loss' tone control and given that the amp is pretty minimalist for the tone you get out of it, it probably made sense to not have something like a Marshall tone stack which is high impedance stuck in the middle of the preamp. There are other interesting options for similar kinds of tone controls. They aren't that commonly used but I think they are cool. I'm yet to experiment with them. They pop up in things like Garnet amps and assorted retro stuff.
The Jim Root terror has a 3 band EQ and a Loop. Not sure how the circuit compares to a standard TT but a peak at one of those would be interesting to see what choices Orange made when adding those features and to see just how much they differ from a standard TT.
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Does the OR15H not take your fancy? The tone control in the Tiny Terror is a cross line 'hi cut' which you can find on old vox's and some Komet amps. It's a 'low loss' tone control and given that the amp is pretty minimalist for the tone you get out of it, it probably made sense to not have something like a Marshall tone stack which is high impedance stuck in the middle of the preamp. There are other interesting options for similar kinds of tone controls. They aren't that commonly used but I think they are cool. I'm yet to experiment with them. They pop up in things like Garnet amps and assorted retro stuff.
The Jim Root terror has a 3 band EQ and a Loop. Not sure how the circuit compares to a standard TT but a peak at one of those would be interesting to see what choices Orange made when adding those features and to see just how much they differ from a standard TT.
Actually had not heard of the OR15H. A quick glance makes it sure look tasty. Just gotta wonder how different the tone is from the TT. If it was the same it would be all I wanted. Will certainly do more research on that one.
The JR Terror is also something on my lift I want to give another try some time and maybe even get one. Once tried it in a store and was very impressed. I think with the TT and the JRT one is more of the Thunderverb voicing and one more the Rockeverb. I think the TT is the Thunder if I recall, but don´t quote me on that.
The JRT certainly strongly reminded me of the Stone Sour tone. Had a classic Orange feel, with great blues rock qualitys and amazing metal.
Can´t really tell how they compare exactly, but I think they were different enough for me to be able to have both.
Maybe the JRT was a little less dense and had the growl in a little higher frequency range while having generally more lows and highs and not being as middy as the TT. Long time ago...
Also you make me wonder how one could mod the tone controll on my TT...thought it being a hardwire version I would hesitate to do more mods than chaning the tubes...which I did.
Btw I do not regret exchanging my old china TT for the british hardwire. Saw them both in the shop and asked to do a blind test. Of course I got diminishing returns in terms of price, but the HW TT has more of the good things of the TT. Feels and sounds more alive. Also seems to have lower noise. I think this comes down to be the components being higher quality and lower tollerance. Effectivly it was a TT which has woken up. Not by a mile, but it was that step from a good amp to a great amp. Like going from a video of a pretty girl to the real thing. Extra dimension and that air they carry you just can´t get one video.
Hope you know what I am getting at.
It´s a lot of feel, but also a lot of tone.
It´s also the little things that bring me joy. The knobs on the TT were cheap china ones, the HW TT has double pots which move much more precise and smoother.
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Dave - you are right about Mick Taylor, but from memory he was the only one who could discern what was what. The others (iirc) put the clean from the HRD in the booteek category. In saying that, I might be misremembering and it is a testament to the decline of Guitarist that I used to keep them, but now I chuck them away after scanning Neville Martin's page - so I can't go and check.
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I think you're right Elliot, but what the blind test really told me was that the 3 Monkeys and the Morgan weren't that great. I wonder why they chose them instead of a Lazy J/Friedman/Divided by 13 etc? Why choose complete unknowns, small companies who could be cobbling anything together?
I'm guessing it's due to availability of what they could test, which again says to me they're not that great as they're not selling...
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I think you're right Elliot, but what the blind test really told me was that the 3 Monkeys and the Morgan weren't that great. I wonder why they chose them instead of a Lazy J/Friedman/Divided by 13 etc? Why choose complete unknowns, small companies who could be cobbling anything together?
That is a good point - being a bit dopey about amps I hadn't heard of those brands, but I assumed it was just me!
The thing that struck me most about the article wasn't about which amps were "better", it was the really bad job the "experts" made of guessing which amp was which. Pulling names out of a hat would've been just as successful.
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I believe Brad Whitford of Aerosmith uses a 3 Monkeys, amongst many other things, otherwise they're unknown. I don't know of anyone using a Morgan, and I only know of them through World Guitars' website.
Which is why I took the blind test with a pinch of salt, it told me nothing other than Mick Taylor is awesome! :lol:
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If people always ask for mods then it's going to be easier to make stuff a bit more bespoke, although to be fair if you were running a small company it's probably worth building a few amps at the same time, since that will give you stock exponentially faster than doing one amp after another in a consecutive process. Building 3 amps at once by hand is faster than building 3 one after the other (is what I'm getting at) and therefore uses time more efficiently.
I've seen at least one "boutique" amp company advertise the fact that they make their amps "one at a time".
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I believe Brad Whitford of Aerosmith uses a 3 Monkeys, amongst many other things, otherwise they're unknown. I don't know of anyone using a Morgan, and I only know of them through World Guitars' website.
3 Monkeys are pretty well know.
I've only recently become aware of Morgan amps.
Print journalism runs to very tight deadlines, and whilst it would be nice to have a "better" selection of amps for this type of shoot out you are often limited by what's available.
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I know of a couple of people playing Morgans, but not many. They like them.
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(a) The point about the Guitarist test is not that the clean tones of the Hot Rod were 'very good (especially for the price)' or 'a good cheap option' (both statements I can imagine being said with upturned noses - if I didn't know you both from here for years :D) but were preferred to the clean tones of amps costing 5 times the price in a blind test. The Hot Rod sounded boutique, the boutique amps didn't - and that to the ears of professional musicians. Now, I must confess I have never played a Hot Rod Deluxe, although I know the Blackface tone it based on - but if people who play and review guitars and amps for a living think by their ears alone that amp is the booteek amp, then, unless posh amp builders don't bother with their clean sound (which is hard to imagine), they aren't doing it right and thus the £$$$$££$£ is questionable.
(b) It is interesting to note that the same magazine compared a Joyo UD with Fulltone OCD and came out the other end - stating that anyone with pro-musician ears could tell the difference.
(a) Yeah I appreciate that.
I guess all I meant was that, for me, I can understand why the hot rod is on the cheap(ish) side of things, because I need a good distortion channel too- to me, there are better options than the HRD for what I want (and admittedly I'm more biased towards dirty tones). Not necessarily for more money than the HRD, of course, to me the traynor ycv is better and cheaper (on thomann, when they have them in stock).
But you do make a good point (which we possibly ignored), which is that, if you ignore the other channels on the HRD, and compare it to (often quite expensive) amps which only have a clean channel, it may well hold its own against them (or come out ahead).
But i'd be the first to admit that a lot of guitarists are full of it, and listen with their eyes (or wallets). Or maybe it's just people in general. :lol:
(b) yeah i read that article (it's the only guitarist mag I've bought in years). I actually didn't agree with some of the claims (not that I'm qualified to disagree, lol). I wondered at the logic of allowing someone who actually makes some boutique stuff (or who, at very least, is a self-confessed boutique fan) to be a supposedly independent or indifferent reviewer...
they also didn't mention about the bugera's mdf/particleboard (i assume) cabinet when comparing the bugera to the matchless. which was a pretty big oversight, i thought.
also regarding the point about the slightly weird choice regarding which boutique amps were picked (and not completely forgetting jpf's point about the tight schedules, which probably also played a large part in the choice), the cynic in me wonders if larger/more well-known boutiquers were approached and refused to take part :lol: if you're already well-known and selling well, you don't have much to gain by taking part in a test which may well conclude that your expensive amps actually aren't worth it :lol:
Funny enough, I've been wanting a Joyo US Dream because I've always wanted a Suhr Riot.. Should I?
Any other Joyos worth buying too?
most of them are pretty good, assuming they're not DOA (seems to be the main cause of faults) and assuming you don't need bombproof reliability. Some are better than others, of course, and there also might be better options on the cheap for specific pedals (for example, i'd get the digitech bad monkey over the joyo vintage overdrive- neither really sounds better, but the digitech has that bass control which is pretty handy).
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suhr custom shop v.s £50 chinese 90s squier... which one would win in a double blind test?
the cheapest epiphone LP v.s a 1959 Gibson Les Paul...which one would win?
a £10 charity shop violin v.s a stradivarius from 1721?
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suhr custom shop v.s £50 chinese 90s squier... which one would win in a double blind test?
the cheapest epiphone LP v.s a 1959 Gibson Les Paul...which one would win?
a £10 charity shop violin v.s a stradivarius from 1721?
Yup, You're right, there are definitely limits to which the boutique vs budget arguments will not stretch
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I think you're right Elliot, but what the blind test really told me was that the 3 Monkeys and the Morgan weren't that great. I wonder why they chose them instead of a Lazy J/Friedman/Divided by 13 etc? Why choose complete unknowns, small companies who could be cobbling anything together?
That is a good point - being a bit dopey about amps I hadn't heard of those brands, but I assumed it was just me!
The thing that struck me most about the article wasn't about which amps were "better", it was the really bad job the "experts" made of guessing which amp was which. Pulling names out of a hat would've been just as successful.
Something I forgot. The amps came from different places. Personal collections and also from stores in the UK. I know a Splawn was sent to that test from Toneworld in Manchester for example. The reason they didn't try a Friedman or whatever may simply be they were harder to get hold of. I doubt any companies backed out of being involved, I'd even doubt if any were really asked to take part! I'll try and find out a bit more about it.
The point about the cab construction is a good one. This is the stuff that should be mentioned in a reviews besides tone. The old Laney AOR headshells are particle board with glued joints. Not finger/dovetail joints. Just one board glued against another wraped in tolex with plastic corner protectors. Maybe that doesn't matter all that much, but a nice cab with proper joints and stronger materials is probably less likely to crack if dropped or something. I sat on my old laney headshell once and heard is make a loud cracking noise!
Along the same lines, a reviewer could also point out that a large transformer on a 1.6mm thick aluminium chassis is at risk of tearing holes in the metal where it's mounted. Other situations can occur when parts will sheer off metal in amps too.
You never hear reviewers point out stuff like that. They just open stuff up like the matchless Independence and say "isn't it beautiful! 10 out of 10!" when really that should say "Isn't it beautiful! Pray to god nobody ever has to work in there!"
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suhr custom shop v.s £50 chinese 90s squier... which one would win in a double blind test?
the cheapest epiphone LP v.s a 1959 Gibson Les Paul...which one would win?
a £10 charity shop violin v.s a stradivarius from 1721?
Yup, You're right, there are definitely limits to which the boutique vs budget arguments will not stretch
:D
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^ ^ yeah exactly. if you're not expert enough to write about that stuff, why am i buying your magazine again? :lol:
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I would consider myself as gear snob as well, but I would never go as far as going for a 5k guitar for sure.
You can reach definitely better effect by getting a decent mid-priced guitar around 1k or a little bit more and upgrade it yourself.
I went that road.
I bought Dean Cadillac Select (Korean) for about 500 and replaced/upgrade pretty much everything with the stuff I knew and knew its quality.
Upgrades:
-Sperzel locking tuners
-professionally cut bone nut
-Buzz Feiten tuning system
-stainless steel frets
-abalone markers
-BKP Naibomb
-BKP Cold Sweet
-Graph Tech brigde and tail piece
-Shaller strap locks
-and soon CTS pots and Jersen caps
Some work I`ve done myself, some professional luthier
After that that guitar became truly luthier top class instrument which plays waaaay better than some 2-3k or maybe more??? guitars.
All those things cost me another 1k, so spending around 1,5k you have a true gem with the stuff you find useful for yourself.
On the other side when you play live, during the gigs 99% of people who listen to you first of all dont give a $%^# what gear you play whereas its 10k some uber custom PRS or Chinese Strat copy for 300 as long as they enjoy themselves and can listen to some good music. First of all they dont care and what`s more most of them wouldn`t notice any difference as well as wouldn`t know any difference either.
And two funny situations come to my mind. Some time ago in my town there was a blues festival with loads of live music in some pubs.
At one of them there was some guitar player with loads of good gear kind of 'boutique-ish', once I was talking to people outside about the way he plays and gear he uses most of them agreed that he plays well, but didn`t care about the gear at all.
And the second situation was at the same festival. In one of those bands there was an truly amazing guitar player with absolutely OUTSTANDING sound, seriously that guy sounded brilliant. Once I came closer I started looking at his gear, `cause his sound stroke me being really immense.
And guess what?? Standard Gibson LP, Roland jc-120 stereo chorus and few ordinary BOSS pedals like overdrive, tuner ect. And without any custom boutique gear worth 13k that guy blew everything away within 10 miles with his sound!!!!! Was surprised must admit.
So what is the conclusion?
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Recently bought a used, but still like new, Boss BD-2. Great pedal for no money. Like the Bad Monkey, there are some cheap gems on the market.
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Recently bought a used, but still like new, Boss BD-2. Great pedal for no money. Like the Bad Monkey, there are some cheap gems on the market.
well, when it comes to Boss, I still find Boss CH1 as a really great chorus pedal, nearly iconic one even when without 'boutique' label on it.