Discussion: Living With GAS

[ilÿti]

I haven't bought a guitar for over a year and I've had the same amp for all the years I've been playing electric guitar. I still consider myself a victim of GAS, even though it's not as severe as with other guitarists. I don't have a high income, but I don't have great expenses either so if I saw a guitar I liked (within a reasonable price) I could buy it, but I have to limit myself to one per year. I do have several guitars in mind at the moment that I waaaaaaaant    My girlfriend plays guiar too so I don't have the problem of justifying gear purchases to her, more so than I do to myself. And I like to think I've got pretty good selfcontrol. I could live with one guitar and one amp if I was suddenly in financial trouble, but we'll see if it comes to that.

I don't think there's anything wrong with buying what you like when you like it, but it can become a serious problem if the price of your GAS is that you can't suport yourself or your family. However, I haven't heard of anyone that this happened to. Lots of loaded guitarists around I supose.

Then there's the musical (down)side to GAS. I used to play in a band with someone who'se musical philosophy was that he had to work a lot in order to buy gear for himself and the band (PA, studio stuff, mics etc). But the more he worked the less he practiced so in all the time I was in the band, we never got good use of all the expensive gear. I would have prefered if we had more time to write and practice. Luckily, he changed his priorities and he's writing better music now.

[WezV]

one Bravewood Strat that I waited about 15 months for,

and that little thing has been responsible for my strongest attack of GAS since i started building them myself...

Never really been much of a strat man, or been that keen on red ones tbh... but phils bravewood strat blew me away and i seriously started to consider gathering the funds for one.

Now that has to be GAS at its worse because i have no need of one, can hardly play, and can make most of the things i do want to have a play with.. but somehow i found myself trying to justify why it would be worth it

strangely i have also been GASing for Danelectros recently - but thats the other end of the scale.. it was the shear perfection and authenticity of the bravewood i would be hard pushed to copy... its the cheapness of a danelectro i would struggle with - always be tempted to put a flamed maple top on instead of the hardboard and then its missing the point!!!

[PoshCollins]

Little off my own topic but I officially hate my parents.
They won't let me order online, or from someone overseas (as they find it untrustworthy)

So on eBay I found someone who lives in Northern Ireland! Selling a PAUL REED SMITH! FOR CHEAP AS CHIPS COMPARED TO RETAIL PRICE (around £800)!

Guess what they said..

NO.

For $%&# sake.

Would this overseas thing happen to be the Ibanez PGM link I sent you?

[noodleplugerine]

As someone who has severe AS (not just guitar stuff, but CD's, stereos, LP's and computers), I am the wrong person to tell anyone what to buy and what not to buy!  I currently have over 60 guitars, about 20 amps and more recording gear than some studios!  I used to play and have very limited money, so I would constantly trade gear, which ended up in me getting rid of some very nice guitars and amps (not to mention a great 1962 P-bass).

Once I started to make some money, I started buying without selling or trading other gear (though I have sold some recently, but that was to get some original guitars - I sold custom shop Firebird 1 & 7 to get an original 63 Firebird 3).  At this point it probably is crazy the amount of stuff I have versus the space I am trying to keep it in.  I was once a full time gigging musician, but that was over 30 years ago.  Having said that, I can't imagine not playing.  One of my friends gave up when he had a family and I still can't figure out why he doesn't want to play every day.  I am lucky in that I don't have kids to worry about and my wife hasn't given me gyp over it.  I still think of things I would like to get if I had the money, but original Les Pauls are out of my range!  Over the last month I have picked up 3 new guitars, one Bravewood Strat that I waited about 15 months for, a 5 sting custom Will Scott bass that took about 4 years to come to life and a strat with all base plate equiped Apache's that I put together from Warmoth parts.

If I was rational about this I would trim it down to 15 or so guitars and 10 amps, but I am not, so at this point I am looking to get a bigger house!   Over the next year I already know that I have another 5 or 6 guitars coming that are being built for me.  I also have my eye on a couple of vintage instruments that I would like to buy and I am seriously thinking of picking up a PRS Mira!  Antd that doesn't look at the amps and recording gear!

Beware because once you start down the path it is really hard to stop (though if I had bought some expensive vintage guitars in the late 1990os rather than investing in the stock market, I would be a lot richer!!).

Would love to see pictures of those 3.

[Jonny]

Little off my own topic but I officially hate my parents.
They won't let me order online, or from someone overseas (as they find it untrustworthy)

So on eBay I found someone who lives in Northern Ireland! Selling a PAUL REED SMITH! FOR CHEAP AS CHIPS COMPARED TO RETAIL PRICE (around £800)!

Guess what they said..

NO.

For $%&# sake.

Would this overseas thing happen to be the Ibanez PGM link I sent you?

That including.

[ailean]

I think me and my wife (prozacbear) have a pretty poor reputation on here. The problem is we both get GAS for different things, and when the other is suffering an attack we don't say things like 'No it's probably not a good idea', we say things like 'I bet that sounds awsome', which really doesn't help.

The result is I'm pretty much broke, but we have some nice gear now, and I actually suffer GAS less now as I think we've got most of the bases covered, but I still get it (I know of a certain Marshall JMP up for sale that sounds interesting...)

[JDC]

I'd say I'm the opposite of gas, I spend time planning on buying things but never actually getting round to buying them, when I first started reading this forum, I would dream of having an engl fireball and got so close to buying one, but having never played live, logic finally kicked in

I spend too much time practising on my Jackson RR3 with amp emulation software, but I keep learning new things to improve tone and trying them in guitar rig and amplitube and usually they make a difference, my tone is pretty fixed now, so I can't see it improving much more without buying some real gear

right now I've been meaning to get a vox valvetronix xl combo for the past 3 months, then I'm going to get a tube screamer, then change the speaker for a vintage 30, then mod my RR3 with a real floyd, locking tuners, ceramic warpig bridge and coldsweat neck and a kill switch

I've tried lots of other peoples guitars but I've always liked my flying Vs best, some other guitars just feel huge when I sit down with them and don't have the high fret access of a V, I'm too used to the classical position for playing sat down as well

now if I won the lottery, I've pretty much decided already what I'd get

4 custom electric guitars, all rhoads Vs, two 6 strings, 1 in C standard, other in drop D, 7 string, 8 string

dean accoustic ML
engl powerball
peavey 5150
marshall dsl (to mod the hell out of)
bognor cab
orange cab
engl cab
a million different speakers to play around with
tc electronic g-system
tube screamer
some other pedal I can't remember the name of
wireless of some kind
power conditioner of some kind
random stupidly expensive cables
2 sm57s with other recording gear

[jpmaxxy]

I used to have huuuuge GAS for guitars but then realised that I disliked them once I seen them in lefty form. We just don't get much choice!

I still love JEM's in lefty style though and Bob is now on the job  :D

I found myself GASing for loads of stuff that I never really had time to implement such as a new speaker and tubes, whammy, fuzz... and I just kept in my bedroom with my Microcube instead of going out to play on my VC30 in the garage. Lets hope the warm weather and a Legra stocked with NB's + an IT will change that!

[ailean]

and I just kept in my bedroom with my Microcube instead of going out to play on my VC30 in the garage. Lets hope the warm weather and a Legra stocked with NB's + an IT will change that!

Put the VC30 in the lounge, much more practicle and I can't think of a better use of space  :twisted:

[hamfist]

I seem to go through different phases of GAS. I've had guitar GAS in the past - now apparently over. I've had effects GAS, also now apparently over. With guitars it was always pretty much a "one in and one out" situation. Settled on a Les Paul, and that's been my only guitar for about 9 months now. I have occasional minor urges to buy something with single coils and/or better high fret access, but these seem to be very controllable.
   My pedalboard is now pretty much finished (and full !). With pedals now it's still a "one in and one out" philosophy. I ALWAYS sell anything I am not using. I have one guitar, one pedalboard and one amp. It's the only way I could financially cope.
   My wife is a huge help here. She's actually usually very supportive with me and guitar stuff, because she knows how important playing is to me. But she is also a voice of reason at times.
   Amps are my real problem. Sorted on the cab, but the GAS for amps seems unabated.    Ridiculous really, as I already have pretty much the perfect amp.   The way I run it these days is to buy another amp, compare the new one with my current amp, and then sell one of them.  It's the only financially viable way of properly getting to try out new amps. I haven't got badly burned yet, and have always been able to sell off amps at similar prices to what I bought them for (or with a reasonable small loss).
   Living entirely on benefits is another good reason for my "one in and one out" policy on pretty much everything. In fact, considering our income, I am very blessed to have the rig I do.

   As we all know, forums are bad for our GAS. But having said this, if I hadn't started being involved in guitar forums a couple of years ago, I'd probably still be playing a POD through a Marshall MG30 (tone to "die" for - yes, seriously so bad, you would desire death rather than listen to it !). Instead I now have awesome gear and tone, and enjoy my playing more. Now what else could I have done with the £3-£4000 I've probably spent on gear in that time - interesting thought.

[Roobubba]

I have bouts of GAS which are short-lived, but all-consuming.

Much of my spare time is looking into "the best computer components", "the best high-gain amps", tonewoods, effects, cables (someone mentioned these above - can i recommend not buying expensive cables, but getting ClearTone cables from Award Session instead?!) etc etc.

I've always been a 1-guitar-man - though I have a really bad spare guitar as backup for gigs, which doesn't really count! I'm looking at getting a new guitar which has more of the features I want, and it has taken a LONG time to get me to that stage.

I was bad for speakers for a while, but it's all to go in ONE rig, no spares or secondary rigs required - all about the MAIN tone.

Now I've almost completely nailed that tone, I don't have GAS for any other amps, cables, effects, speakers/cabs etc.

That makes it relatively easy on my bank balance, because I don't end up buying huge amounts of gear (and we are gigging, although now we've lost our vocalist so we won't be gigging for a while...).

Also having a financially responsible wife helps enormously!

Roo

[temps]

For a long time I've had a case of GAS that has been rather crippling.. once I added up how much I had spent on my ever-revolving collection of guitars, and it was far, far too much. I've let go of some guitars I really did like, my Musicman JP7 was one, to get guitars I ended up hating, like a ESP Custom Shop SRC7.. but on the positive side, I know what I want from a guitar now :D and hopefully I'll be able to slow it right down.

Other things I've realized - USA guitars usually aren't worth the premium since a good tech can set up a high end Japan made guitar to play just as nice.. they can all sound very good if you take the time to try a bunch and find one that sounds just so.. and so on.

[ToneMonkey]

I only have GAS for a decent acoustic now.  I have two wildly different electrics (errr, neither of which I can play at the minute) and my acoustic just doesn't suit me.  Been thinking about selling my old one and what ever else I can lay my hands on to get a Stew Mac Dreadnaught kit.

Other than that, I don't think I'll have any serious GAS until I can play the bloody things better.

[Tone_Freek_Lurch]

I have GAS. I've got two Strats and a Discontinued Dean. The deans my baby, one strats got by BKP and my first guitar, a peavy Raptor, which has it's third coat of paint on it. I'm about to re-paint that baby and test out my mad airbrushing skillzzzzzz I'm also considering getting an Epi Les Paul and replacing the broken neck, air brushing the entire guitar and maybe try some more. I hope to start getting some imported guitars, painting them, then selling them to shops to stock some eye poppers. as is... I need more wall hangers.... and walls....

[hunter]

Then there's the musical (down)side to GAS. I used to play in a band with someone who'se musical philosophy was that he had to work a lot in order to buy gear for himself and the band (PA, studio stuff, mics etc). But the more he worked the less he practiced so in all the time I was in the band, we never got good use of all the expensive gear. I would have prefered if we had more time to write and practice. Luckily, he changed his priorities and he's writing better music now.

This is a very good point! I think I am too guilty of spending more time feeding my GAS than actually practising/playing.

And I am not happy with my skills. To be honest despite all the gear I have, I am also rarely happy with my sound ...

Now on the positive side, on the rare occasions when the playing goes well and the tone kicks ass, life is unbeatably great, which more than makes up for it.

But I guess disabling the internet in my home could help my abilities as a musician a lot!

At the moment I think "just one last time" as I so badly want an SLO-100 ...