'Boutique gear' general grumpy rant.

[Elliot]

I might add, contradicting myself above, that the best playing guitar I have ever played was Johnny Mac's Feline.   

[gordiji]

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.     

[BigB]

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.

[Twinfan]

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":

[Brow]

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

[Twinfan]

Sorry Brow, I hope I didn't offend you!  I forgot you actually had one of those  :oops:

[Brow]

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)

[Toe-Knee]

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

[Lew]

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

[Toe-Knee]

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.

[Dmoney]

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.

[Brow]

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!

[Lew]

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":

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

[Philly Q]

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.  :)

[Dmoney]

My favourite Gibsons are Norlin era. I dunno what that says about me.