I went to see a guitar player called Larry Miller last night, who was great by the way, and it's put into place the final piece of the gear puzzle I've been pondering over recently. He played the whole night through a really straightforward rig:
* Stock early 90s Gibson '59 LP reissue
* Handful of 'regular' pedals - TubeScreamer, CryBaby wah etc
* Marshall Vintage Modern and DSL heads
* Marshall angled 4x12
Really simple, straight off the shelf stuff. He sounded SUPERB. Nice and bright and crunchy, the neck pickup on his LP had no flubbiness whatsover and the bridge was crisp without ripping my ears to shreds. Clearly he's very good at setting up his gear to work for him and getting the best out of it.
This struck a real chord with me as I've had enough of constantly buying and selling guitar gear, and losing cash every time in the process. What I've been doing is matching up guitars/pedals/amps (and I now have 3 dedicated rigs) and this seems to have removed the constant need to chase my all-in-one "holy grail" tone - which I'm now convinced doesn't exist. This approach works great for me as I get the best out of certain combinations, and the different setups give me some variety in tone/feel and bring out different playing styles.
So I'm going to stick with what I've got and stop looking for things to buy :roll: I'm very fortunate in that I have some great gear, so I'll sell a couple of things I'm not using any more (empty Matamp 2x12 and PRS SE Custom 24) and just enjoy the great stuff that I have.
There, I've said it. It will be done.