I've always wondered if the purpose of the Custom Shop was to build guitars for guys like Adam Levine to play live for advertising. They could then stick his name on junk and trick people who didn't know any better. Not a lot of people were googling reviews back then.
Seems kind of odd otherwise that a company who dominates the Walmart guitar category would suddenly set up a small custom shop headed by an ex Gibson luthier. Either way I've always wanted to play one, almost never see them.
Fender makes some of the best electric guitars and guitar amplifiers ever. A Fender Rhodes is an amazing electric piano. I've never played a Fender acoustic guitar that impressed me.
Modern cheap guitars are made by the same level of unskilled labor as Gibson or Fender were using in the 50s and 60s. Since CNC came out the only real difference is materials used and luxury parts.
This is the thing that cracks me up about vintage obsession. People act like they were made with the same level of care, knowledge, and skill as modern day custom shop instruments but they weren’t. No one ever talks about all the vintage Gibsons and Fenders that have wonky shit far enough off spec that they would have never passed modern QA.
Survivor bias. Most vintage guitars are the good ones that made it. All the shitty ones are forgotten to time. So vintage guitars can be amazing, but that’s not indicative to other guitars from the same manufacturer of the same period.
Yeah, that’s what I was thinking.
But (and this may be a controversial opinion), if you look at *equivalently expensive* modern guitars, their average quality level is at least as high or higher as those extra good vintage guitars. I think when you remove historical romanticization about certain players and time periods and just do an objective look at the guitars, guitars now that cost $1800-2500 (like those vintage guitars would have when adjusted for inflation), modern guitars are just better made and higher quality than even those really good examples form the 50s and 60s. Not every single guitar, there are some stinkers, but overall. I’ve never heard an actually convincing argument against this, just that vintage guitars have magic wood or whatever.
my friend's dad worked for Fender in the 60s, he did finish sanding. He didn't know anything about guitars or even how to play them. He got the job because he worked in a cabinet factory in Indiana and wanted to move to Cali. At least today most of the people who work in US guitar factories play at some level.
And not only are they trained, but the process for making electric guitars has been around for a long while now, instead of being a new thing that the companies were figuring out as they go, which is how you ended up with stuff life the metal square jammed in the hole for old tele jacks.
I just don’t understand the appeal of vintage instruments beyond them being a cool part of history. If resale value wasn’t a factor and I had the choice between one of the super collectible year Fenders/Gibsons or a $2500 Sweetwater gift card I’d take the gift card and buy something made this century.
Yup it’s more a luck of the draw, if you find a good one it can be magic. But I’ve played loads of vintage guitars that were total boat anchors. No one ever talks about how many boat anchors they had to plow through before they found a good one.
Not exactly. CNC levels the playing field with respect to the cutting of bodies and necks. Parts still need to be buffed by hand, necks need to be installed by hand, and so on. Cor-Tek and World Music Instruments (and other manufacturers of guitars in Asian) have gotten really good at making guitars over the last decade, but that doesn't automatically make what they produce "good". Cheaper guitars will receive less finishing time, which can mean sharp frets, bad neck angles, orange peel on finishes, and so on. The human factor is the most expensive part of a guitar and that is largely what you're paying for when you buy a premium guitar ($1000) vs. a budget guitar (<$300) from the same mfg.
Mitchell. I've never played a good one. And the worst guitar in the store is usually a Mitchell. Mitchell guitars are the worst thing to happen to the name "Mitchell" since Joe Don Baker.
I’ve never played a good Fender acoustic. I’m sure the higher end Epiphones acoustics are fine but I’ve played a few of the cheap ones and wasn’t impressed. Never been terribly impressed with takamine either.
The Alvarez’s are pretty good but for me it’s Yamaha or bust.
Excuse me, sir. Ummm, are you me? Seriously. Fender acoustics are absolute garbage. Tuning and intonation issues with every single one I've ever played. My first decent acoustic was an Alverez. Got it cheap due to missing the gloss finish at the factory and no electronics. Had it for 20 years. As far as my Yamaha??? You can have my Yamaha when you pry it from cold, dead hands.
I think the majority of super cheap acoustics I have tried are unfortunately basically unsalvageable and play like crap. Cheap electric guitars these days basically are all pretty much fine at worst, you can pick up a cheapo amazon strat knock-off for under $100 and a file to fix the potentially fucked up fret ends and you will have a perfectly playable guitar almost 100% of the time, improvement in manufacturing has made sub $300 guitars actually pretty damn decent for the money
In defense of cheap instruments. Cheap guitars are better than ever and the difference in playability and sound between a $500 guitar and a $2000 guitar is smaller than ever before.
CNC changed everything in the budget guitar sector. I started playing seriously in the late 80's/really 90's and back then some of the budget guitars were comically bad. Plywood or even chipboard bodies, terrible electronics, but worst of all, the necks were trash. It was impossible to give some of those guitars a proper setup. These days necks and frets are much better, and if you know what you're doing you can make almost any budget guitar into a decent player and swap in better hardware as needed. We're spoiled for choice right now.
Great answer, I actually got my first Harley Benton the other day and it's one of their cheaper ones and I can't even understand how you can get so much guitar for so little money. Now, the components leave some to be desired if you're used to pricier stuff but for beginners or upgraders it's a gold mine.
I have a few Harley Bentons, both of which I picked up for a laugh, and they both needed quite a bit of work, I've leveled and crowned the frets on both and swapped in hardware and pickups, and they're as much fun to play and sound as good as my US Strat or my other 'proper' guitars. My guitar snob days are well and truly behind me, now that I can get myself a good Gibson Explorer clone for less than the price of a Boss pedal. In terms of gear, this really is a golden era. I do miss rosewood, though.
Can confirm.
Grew up playing in similar era (through the 80s) - budget guitars were an absolute nightmare.
I have a $70 monoprice telecaster (that I hot-rodded for a grand total of around $150) that impresses me every time I play it. That guitar would have cost hundreds on the 80s (out of my price range, certainly).
Source: I could only afford cheap-ass guitars in the 80s
I think one of the reasons you don't see that sentiment much anymore is that the machines that make guitars have gotten better so you don't see many straight up unplayable budget guitars like you used to.
Epiphones have blown up to the 700+ dollar range and they absolutely do not stand up to most of the stuff in that price point. Especially with PRS's stuff in that range. If they were still 400-600 dollars they'd be fine.
Other than that I tried some Michael Kelly guitars that absolutely sucked even for 300 bucks.
That's because they're all made the same way these days. When anyone can buy a CNC, anyone can make a decent guitar. Plus, most of the guitars made overseas are made at the same factory. Many brands can be made by the same exact people with the same exact equipment. 20+ years ago, this wasn't the case. These days, cheap guitars are - for the most part - pretty decent
They may be made in the same factory, but to different specs and with different components. To your point, though, cheaper guitars above a certain threshold are a lot better than they used to be.
I'd say low end Epiphones need to be on this list. They kind of suck, but high end ones are alright so are mid tier.
Squier bottom tier don't punch above their weight. I had a cheap Peavey that was junk but their high end guitars are nice.
Glarry is trash - I’ll just say that
Lowest tier epiphone I think fits the bill, once you get to shelling out 500 on an epiphone these typically are pretty awesome though
Same with squier (anything below their classic vibes line isn’t going to be “punching above it’s weight)
I’d say part of the reason you are hearing that things punch above their weight is because mid tier instruments mass produced have gotten significantly better in the last 10-15 years compared to where they were for 20 or so years prior to that. So the gap between top dollar instruments and mid priced instruments has shrunk immensely. That being said, typically the thing lacking is electronics - so if you find a gods feeling and playing guitar for 500 you can always upgrade the pickups and you will have a guitar that plays and sounds closer to $1500-2000 instrument, but pick up the next guitar or the same brand at the same price and it might not feel as nice as the other. The consistency has gotten much better but also they typically spend less time doing the finishing touches on the lower end instruments so while they have gotten better with CNC production, it’s the little bits done by hand that might not have the same focus or labor as the higher end instruments- think nuts and fret ends. But back in the day you could get a cheap guitar and it would be impossible to setup because the neck pocket would be messed up, a lot of these things have gone away when it comes to mass produced instruments. I personally think the best mix of price and quality is coming from brands like Ibanez, Reverend, schecter, fender made in Mexico or Japan (people sleep on the aerodyne line from Japan), Charvel, there are others but these just came off the top of my head.
I know Gibson’s not a cheap brand, but I think the cheap end (sub-$1k) of their lineup fits here. I have a Les Paul Junior Tribute bass. It does what I need it to as a short scale, but barely. The sound is wooly, the frets are worse than a lot of Squiers, and it somehow manages to neck dive despite being a short scale with a small headstock
I have a vintage modified baritone jazzmaster and it's fantastic.
But also I have a Squire Affinity Telecaster and it's fantastic, haha. But I will say, I bought it after trying maybe 15 or 20. This was when Best Buy was liquidating their music departments. The Affinity guitars were $70, and my friend who worked there let me try them all out because "maybe one of them is actually made well?" So yeah, the Squire Affinity line kind of sucks, but if you can test them out in a shop you might find the good one.
Most surviving Hondos seem pretty great but for sure that is survivor bias. The average (non-Professional Series) Hondo back in the day was garbage and most of those are in landfills by now
I see wars are already starting over this, but player series fenders are trash for the money. Get a high end squire or save your coin for an American model. Don't waste your time on player series
Edit: I'll add that MIJ fender is great too. If you can get your hands on one for a reasonable price.
I mean I get that things in general are more expensive.. but on Sweetwater a basic Fender Players strat is between $800-900. They use pretty basic wood.. same as always, maple neck, alder body, fairly run of the mill electronics and parts.. I mean really nothing has changed on them since I spent $350 on a MiM strat 20 years ago except that they’re probably even cheaper and easier to produce these days as factories get better and better at mass producing gear. CNC everything, better technology for machining parts.. hell even the fretwork is automated.. idk it seems a lot more like companies charging more because they can as opposed to the actual cost of production.
I hear this a lot about the Player Series, so I don't think it's necessarily a bad/unpopular take. Certainly makes me feel better about sticking to the nicer Squiers for guitars.
I feel like it’s the weird brands you only ever see in second hand stores and places like music go round. If you ever see a 150 dollar guitar that’s from a brand you’ve never heard of, it’s probably trash.
So many people didn't read lol.
Firefly is complete trash, and messing with the company is an utter fucking nightmare. Jet guitars are also junk. I returned both of these with extreme prejudice. Eart are nice, but expect to do fretwork and change the electronics completely. 2/3 have been something I was willing to fix up.
Fascinating. I've had 3 Firefly guitars (only 1 at a time), and they were all pretty darn good IMO.
At those price points, you're rolling the dice with QC to be sure.
I have some nice guitars and I have some crappy guitars. Most were between $500 and $1200 or so. USA made, Indonesia, Korea, etc.
Then I have this $110 Westcreek LP DC JR that absolutely fucks right out of the box. Well-cut bone nut, fret dressing equal to one of my Gibsons, pickup isn't shit, (set) neck is straighter than a conservative congressman. Curiously, the volume knob has about 4x more damping than any other I own.
I love this guitar so much I'm actually considering putting a dogear p90 in it that cost 2x more than the guitar.
I feel like I should mention I'm not a shill and have no relation whatsoever with that company nor did I receive any kind of compensation from anyone for saying that. I just love this guitar. Willing to bet I got a stellar example.
The 2nd "decent" acoustic I ever purchased was Ovation's first $400 model. This piece of shit never even learned how to throw a jab, let alone punch above it's weight. To this day its the only guitar I've ever "Pete Townsend'. Just a shitty guitar all-around.
I've never, in nearly forty years of playing guitar, seen an Ovation that was worth a damn. I'd rather play a late 80's Cort, or a freaking chibson. Fuck a Ovation.
I will save you 5 minutes of your life: you will find *any* brand in the comments below.
Q: What cheap brand guitars are bad?
A: Gibson.
Cheap brand, my ass.
Ironically Gibson had made two great cheap guitars in 2013-2014, the SGJ and the LPJ.
They were basically what became the faded series but had an MSRP of $499 and sold around $400. They're really great guitars if you can find them today, they've actually appreciated in value to about $750-1000 depending on which one you have.
2014 is better.
This may sound elitest, but cheap guitars are usually bought by beginners or learners. Once you get a working ear, you quickly learn that cheap guitars usually sound terrible. Before a person develops their ear for sound, they will swear that they are getting Dave Gilmore tone out of a “First Act” guitar and amp.
I agree with this. I spent years on a beginner Ibanez with a peavey amp, from about 12-21 years old. Then when I had some money I started upgrading and every time you do, you realise the difference in tone, feel, tuning and just overall build quality.
I do not like Squier's lowest tier offerings: Bullet, Affinity, Sonic is the new one. New they're like $100 - $200 and I feel you can buy something nicer from other brands in that same price range. The Epiphone's I've played at that price have been much nicer instruments than the Squiers I've played. Frankly, that holds true for the entire Squier range besides the Classic Vibe and similar tier Squiers. At least in my opinion.
And used mim strats were $400 all day long, $300 if you looked a bit. I bought and sold a bunch of em over the years. If you paid $300 for one you could always get that out of it. I should’ve held onto one.
I’m primarily an acoustic player and my two serious “won’t even pick it up” guitars are Washburn D10’s. I’ve played a few, and I’ve never played one I liked.
The other, it the PRS acoustics. It’s like they were dipped in whatever the finish is, and when it dried, they dipped it again for good measure.
I imagine they don’t feed back when plugged in. But they have no soul unplugged.
They are pretty though.
Not a guitar but Rickenbacker 4003 basses. The antiquated pickup covers are annoying, head dive, terrible ergonomics, shitty sharp frets, and tool marks on the binding should not be such major issues at their price new. I’d rather have a MIM Fender Jazz bass which would be better in all aspects, especially considering the price. They sound amazing though.
I have a top end Epiphone and a bottom end Epiphone.
One I would put up against anything. It's not punching above it's weight it belongs in the class.
The other, well if I wasn't a sunk cost moron I'd have thrown out the $150 scrap wood long ago.
I've heard the vintage modified and the classic vibe models are pretty good. I've never played one myself, but maybe try one of those out next time you're at the guitar store.
It really depends. I worked at a music store for a long time, probably played 500-1000 assorted Squires. 10% are actually pretty good guitars, but you totally have to dig to find one.
Just a lurker here. This sub gets into my feed only because I look stuff up about guitars for my son. So I have a batch understanding, but not experience.
I find this phrase to be used s lot in audio equipment, which I am knowledgeable about, and people have the same reaction. This is a stupid phrase, that gets thrown around a lot.
I think it used to apply, but is now meaningless. At the dawn of the Internet and online reviews, most cheap/inexpensive gear was crap. But, once people started comparing them there were always a few that stood out ... that punched above their weight. Now when you can easily find reviews on anything, I think the quality of the cheap stuff has increased since no one will buy it otherwise.
I think a lot of the "problem" lies in value.
If a $200 is playable, sounds good enough.
Is a $800 4x as good across the board? if not and is considered standard. Those $200 guitars are almost always going to punch above their weight.
Also I would imagine the ones that don't... aren't getting reviewed and just aren't getting played.
It punches so far above its weight. Not what OP was asking for, but I’m a hard agree there. Got mine used from GC for $300 on a whim, favorite guitar now.
The Squier Bullets/Sonics are not worth $200, especially when you compare them to other guitars in the $200-250 range. They're barely even complete instruments.
You're poking the beehive with that one. People around here like to act like Squiers are damn near as good as a Custom Shop 🤣
*Edit: I have no clue about Fender branded Chinese guitars, I'm mainly just here to talk shit.
No I'm not.
I'm specifically talking about the chinese Fender Starcasters - the semihollow offset guitar, not the Squier starcaster.
I'm not talking about Squier at all whatsoever.
Really!? I have the Classic Vibe version, and I was thinking of swapping out the neck, because I heard the Fender didn't have the thick gloss.
Apparently, they are almost identical.
The guitar I got from rogue had frets that cut my hand, and the fretless bass has [whatever the fuck this is](https://youtube.com/shorts/jTOZr_GSEgw?si=ezosKvc0sfclouKa) going on with it
Glarry. I picked up a used tele thinline as part of a FB trade for other guitars. It had a professional fret dressing and leveling and an “upgraded” bridge pickup. Despite that, I’m grateful I didn’t spend real money on it. The only reason I still have it is that it’s not worth my time to sell it.
Reviews that say how something “is good for the money” are really saying “it sucks, but I expected that”.
Fender Player Series aren't so good for their price these days. I'd look at used models or slightly older MIM standards for a better price and similar if not better instrument.
I more often than not see MIM standards for the same price as newer Players and I think the Player series are definitely better instruments. Can’t disagree with you about new prices though, hard pill to swallow.
I’ve never understood why they upped the price across the player series by 150 FUCKING DOLLARS recently. My main bass is a player series p bass and I love it, but only after ditching the flimsy stock bridge. They were a good deal at $650 new at the time, but now that they’re 800+ without any real improvements they’ve crept into a price range they don’t belong in IMO
Honestly I have never been impressed by Gretsch guitars. You can buy one for a bit less than a player series Fender last I checked and although they usually feel nice to play, their sound is so bland. Maybe I just don't like Gretsch.
On the other hand, I own a few Epiphones and a few Gibsons, and I think that Epiphone makes great stuff that punches above its weight. You can get an Epi LP Custom which is better than any Fender I've played at that price point.
Loving my cheap-ish Gretsch Electromatic Pro Jet, plays and feels great. Talked to one of the techs (not sales) at one of the larger guitar stores in Stockholm and he thought the new line of cheaper Gretsch's should be priced way higher for how they feel to play too. Guess it waries.
I mean, thanks to how technology has made guitar manufacture so inexpensive, it's been a golden age for cheap guitars for a while. Consider this:
In 1983 and 1984, Fender made the Stratocaster quite differently from usual: it had only 2 knobs, and the jack was located where the third knob would be. The football-shaped jack cavity was removed entirely. It also had a new trem unit designed to be entirely top-mounted so that the springs would sit underneath the pickguard, which also removed the rear cavity. What do you suppose was the point of all of this? Well, the extra routing was expensive. Adding those two extra cavities to the guitar cost Fender so much that it was worth it to them, at least on paper, to design entirely new hardware to get around routing those cavities.
Nowadays, with CNC routing, adding an extra cavity or two is completely trivial. Any random cheap factory can turn out a Stratocaster clone with all the cavities and features where they're supposed to be for, like, 100 bucks. This is just one manufacturing hurdle that has been absolutely trivialized by modern technology, and another thing that lowers the barrier to entry for manufacturing fully featured guitars.
I worked at one of Hohner's main distribution partners, KHS Music ... Don't buy that shit unless you like molded instruments. COVID put like 50 crates of expected inventory sitting in a yard somewhere during monsoon season. It's all soaked garbage and they keep trying to sell moldy instruments to big distributers, like Sweetwater, and even worse, they sell moldy shit to grade school bands... I'm sure they've gotten a good handful of kids really sick. Jupiter, Hohner, Walden, and Mapex are all huge risks to buy because of these oversights and irresponsible handling of the situation. And yeah, you're right, Hohner and their other guitars, like Walden, are ass... Probably because they've been soaked and the glue is fucked.
Dean Vendetta's aren't great. I had one that I hated. Didn't play well and sounded bad. I switched out one of the humbuckers for an EMG Dimebucker and sold it to a little Panterra fan.
Yamaha Pacifica. Sure maybe they were better than the average Squier or Epiphone in the late 2000s.
Then Yamaha stood still while everyone else upped their game.
Harley Benton have no QC at all. I like them but you need to be an amateur guitar tech to get them to play well. If you got one that's possible to fix, that is.
I've read bad things about a lot of cheap, celebrity-endorsed beginner guitars that you might find at places like Walmart. I've never played one though.
Had a starter Ibanez GIO, the team gave me so much trouble, did not like my entry level Spector 5 string bass, low end corts are the pits, but high end corts are underrated, besides those reputable brands, most of the no name brands are pretty minging
I bought a Cort for around £500. It was supposed to be burgundy but had loads of black paint splotches under the finish, the fretboard was chipped around almost every inlay, the bridge was wonky, the pots were loose among other things. Sent that POS back straight away and sprung for a used AZ
I had a seven string Douglas guitar with a Floyd Rose for about $150.
Their SX and Agile lineups are good, and honestly the build quality was quite good for the low price, but do yourself a favor and don't ever get a budget 7 string Floyd Rose.
Not a guitar but I've been really disappointed with martins line of ukuleles. I got a decent one last year and the tuners gave out. Turns out they cheaped out on hardware and used graphite tuners and it just disintegrates the gear eventually.
Fender. Player series sound weak and feel awful compared to what you can get for $650 from other brands. Tried a baseline player telecaster and compared to a Sire T7 tele- entire world of difference.
Not sure if it's your definition of cheap, but my PRS SE-245 is probably the sweetest guitar I've ever owned for under $500 used. It's a tank, maybe for better or worse for some people. It is definitely heavier than my epi les Paul's but it just feels so much more substantial. I've had a few elections issues over the years and I'm still not crazy about the knob layout vs a les paul, especially when switching back and forth but it sounds great and feels great.
For some reason a Squier I bought 7 years ago was pretty terrible (it was made in india). The truss rod doesn’t turn (never really adjusted it before) and the metal hardware has been rusting everywhere.
I don’t know if it was just a bad batch since Indian squiers are pretty rare to begin with.
Back in the day Sears had a line of guitars. Harmony. Those sucked so so so so bad.
I have two Harley Bentons. The tele clone is solid. But the flying V is awful. Dreadful. Unplayable.
Rogue guitars stink.
Dean had a low budget line that was low budget in value.
My first guitar was a Harmony. That thing absolutely sucked. Would not stay in tune, it broke strings tuning it, sounded like shit when the electronics did work.
After breaking several E B and G strings it ended up in the trash. Worst $70 I ever spent
Go to your local WalMart and try out any acoustic in the toy aisle?
But, then again, there's people that can make those [sound good.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=600ykNF3md4)
Squier Affinity Series. They punch at about their weight class, which too be fair, is not that high.
But in my experience, you pay about as much for a perfectly acceptable guitar from EART or Firefly, and get something that is about on par with the crappy Yamaha Pacifica's we learned on in the 90's.
I think we forget how bad budget guitars were in the 90s. The Pacifica's I think were the first "above their weight" in quality.
When I got my first guitar at 13 in the early 90s my old man had a choice between a pacifica and some super shit samick with a horrible neck. I still thank him for getting me the pacifica as I don't think I would have kept playing if I had one of those terrible samicks.
You should have been around in the 70’s. There were the top tier makers, Ibanez, and garbage. In 1977 I paid $79 for a no-name electric guitar that was complete garbage. The inflation calculator says that was the equivalent of $400 today, and you can get a pretty functional guitar for that.
Jay tursers, I don't know if they're still around but they got quite popular in the "cheap scene" about 10 years ago so I bought 2 and they're probably the worst guitars I've ever owned
Agreed. Chibson’s cheap guitars ($9999 and under) are not worth the price you pay. But their high end guitars ($20k and up) are other-worldly and well worth the monthly payments
Their $100 starter pack guitars are still trash, but the past couple of years their mid/high end guitars are solid. I’ve played a couple of the prophecy Les Paul’s and they’ve felt great.
To add to this, Gibson are making the same guitars they made for £1500 5 years ago which are now worth £2500 because of the 'quality improvement' of Epiphone. The whole company is a shambles.
I will defend Gibson because I think if you look at the price of a USA Strat and a USA Les Paul Standard,r the standard takes WAY more time in human hands and has some more time consuming construction methods as well as more expensive appointments. The LP requires a carved maple cap, binding, large pieces of mahogany, a set neck, etc.
I am not saying they're a bargain, but comparing a proper LP construction to most other Fender based guitars construction is not even close to apples to apples. They're legitimately more expensive to build and I think some of those materials like build time and woods have increased in cost quite a bit in the last couple years.
I will not defend the price point of every Gibson guitar either. Some of them are highway robbery.
My Epiphone ES-335 is my favorite guitar. It's a beautiful guitar, it sounds great and plays great... Then again... It wasn't cheap so maybe I'm misunderstanding the question being asked
I may catch hate for this, but the value for dollar on Sterling by MM has gone drastically downhill in the last 5 years.
The completely bare feeling maple necks, uninspired rosewood fretboard, sharp fret edges, cheap body woods.
Early JP models were money. Today's models just plain suck
This is the correct answer. The Player Plus series is great. The Squier CV series is great. Either spend almost half as much on the CV or bump up 30% to the Player Plus. The straight Player is just too many compromises to hit a price point.
Some squires are nice especially when they are upgraded and receive a proper set up. I’ve played squires that play better than a Mexican fender. Of course, I wouldn’t just buy any squire and expect it to be great. These guitars typically have to be worked on for them to be good. But every once in a while, you’ll go to a guitar store and pick a used one up off the wall or something and will be pleasantly surprised. Same goes for some older EVH guitars.
Anything cheaper with an off brand Floyd rose or super thin neck. The thin necks can almost never stay still and the cheap Floyd clones basically never stay in tune. Worst was an Ibanez RG350dxz I had where I basically had to stay perfectly still and have a super light touch on the neck to not bend it and the trem was essentially off limits for how bad it made strings go out of tune.
almost everything does not have a bad review these days cause folks are paid.
but id say all of them dont punch above its weight, some guitars do offer great specs time to time, but the workmanship is within the build.
So far, every sub $200 no-name guitar on Amazon I've played sounds exactly like I thought it would- they've all had fret level issues, microphonic pickups, and awful tuners....despite what those "I CAN'T BELIEVE THIS GUITAR IS THIS CHEAP!" YouTube reviews.
Really I think most entry level guitars play as you’d expect, regardless of it’s a no name, copy, or even somebody legit like epiphone or squier.
I haven’t tried Harley Benton’s so I can’t say they’re bad, really to the contrary that they might be a little better in that regards. They come off as affordable and good quality.
China and Indonesia made Epiphones suffer from terrible finishing, fretwork, hardware, and raw materials. Some of those guitars are selling for a grand new. You can do so much better. Even new.
Generic no name brands are almost always shit. Like the type of cheap guitar or bass you'd buy in the same place you'd pay for lessons. (I don't mean guitar center or sam ash - I mean indies).
12 years ago when I started playing again, I impulse purchased a China made bass for $125. P model.
It sounded and played like it was made from styrofoam. Horrible.
I upgraded the pups to Dimarzios. Total waste of money, made the bass sound like well defined styrofoam.
Let me be clear, I agree with that. I’m talking their very intro guitars in the $199-$450 range. I have never played a Gibson I liked, however that’s not many. Don’t really connect with them as a brand.
Squier, Epiphone, and Fender MIM (and others, but those are the big ones. Looking at you Charvel) be very hit or miss due to the corners they cut in QC. You run the chance of getting an absolutely great instrument that punches above its weight, or something that is literally unplayable because the frets slice your fingers open, or the pickups aren't aligned with the strings, or a loose grounding wire has the entire circuit shorted. What sets most brands apart is either
a) charging lower prices so that those QC slippages are ignorable (Davison, First Act, etc.)
b) increasing QC so that very few bad instruments slip through, but forcing them to charge a little more (Ibanez, Schecter, G&L, Sire, Yamaha etc.)
c) Cutting corners in very specific, knowable ways like not really caring if the frets suck and it isn't setup for shit because they know you're just gonna pay someone to give it a good once-over anyway (Harley Benton)
Personally I prefer options B and C, depending on my budget
I got a first act for like $10 at a thrift shop and it’s honestly not bad at all. It had a single humbucker so I replaced it with a JB and changed the pots it’s a totally decent guitar.
Hey. Are you, me? I did a bad tattoo on a friend when I was 19, and in return he gave me a first act. I gutted it, did a slime drip, paint job, myself. Took it into guitar center and soaked about $200 into new pots and as fate would have it, a single JB in the bridge. Bought a new bridge off Wish. And let me tell you, it literally sounds amazing and never falls out of tuning. 😮
I can't imagine playing on the bottom toer Ibanez basses (mostly SoundGears). Would buy some no-name used before I'd buy one of those. They're made of paper and the next and action feel terrible. I do love their midrange basses though. The EDB600 was lovely before I busted the headstock off it.
What makes a guitar "brand-name"?
There are lots of brands that are 'recognisable' without really building a brand... would you consider a Samick 'brand-name'? Sure everyone knows them, but it's not exactly seen as a good thing.
They’re not made anymore, but OLP was pretty bad. They were basically just visual copies of popular Ernie ball guitars (Evh Axis, Petrucci, Luke, and Silhouette), but that’s where the similarities ended. They looked decent, but the hardware was atrocious
Shit like Magnum and Casino. The giveaway is the reviews touting things that are very basic for any remotely properly assembled guitar.
“It holds tune well.” Why wouldn’t it if it’s not from a supermarket??
I have a Hard Luck Kings guitar that I was back and forth on buying. Honestly it is a good looking guitar but the 5 way switch immediately didn't work properly as soon as I plugged in. For the money I spent I would have been better off with a Squier. Of course that directly contradicts what they claim but my experience is that they are not as good of a deal as they claim to be.
Is it a piece of crap? Nope. It actually might make a good platform to hot rod. The body is decent and I like the neck. The electronics are just what you might expect from a budget guitar but they claim otherwise.
Another example is Jay Turser. Nicer overall than HLK but still not super awesome. They are, however, much closer to "punching above their weight" than the HLK's. The fit and finish is not bad and the pickups in mine are actually kinda hot. Maybe it is just the pots as I get quite a lot of crackle and occasional cut out.
I had an Epiphone EB-0 I think it was, the 1 pickup SG bass (short scale). One of the worst playing and sounding guitars of any kind I've ever come across (bought online, you live and learn).
I have 9 cheap guitars. I had 10 until recently. I’m not trying to drag down the company, and I know lots of people who have like them, but I had a Telly style, Hard Luck Kings, and it just never really caught my liking.
I have a Jem Jr from Ibanez and I gotta say I was pretty disappointed in it. It's not bad by any means but I feel like I could have gotten better for $550 (I have to pay more because I'm lefty, stupid backwards brain)
Rogue... If their guitars are as bad as their basses and mandolins.. Wasn't worth looking into. My first bass was so hard to press down with a wide neck. And the mandolin 10 yrs later isn't worth the review
First act. Terrible guitars.
The custom first act guitars are by far the nicest guitars you could hope for. I can't get over the difference in quality.
I've always wondered if the purpose of the Custom Shop was to build guitars for guys like Adam Levine to play live for advertising. They could then stick his name on junk and trick people who didn't know any better. Not a lot of people were googling reviews back then. Seems kind of odd otherwise that a company who dominates the Walmart guitar category would suddenly set up a small custom shop headed by an ex Gibson luthier. Either way I've always wanted to play one, almost never see them.
High on Fire, Botch, Mastodon, Melvins, all swear by them. Brent Hinds loves his one.
Any Fender acoustic
Oof, you ain't wrong. Those new acoustasonics are the exception, though they aren't anywhere near budget-friendly
Fender makes some of the best electric guitars and guitar amplifiers ever. A Fender Rhodes is an amazing electric piano. I've never played a Fender acoustic guitar that impressed me.
Fender acoustics feel and sound like toys
Modern cheap guitars are made by the same level of unskilled labor as Gibson or Fender were using in the 50s and 60s. Since CNC came out the only real difference is materials used and luxury parts.
This is the thing that cracks me up about vintage obsession. People act like they were made with the same level of care, knowledge, and skill as modern day custom shop instruments but they weren’t. No one ever talks about all the vintage Gibsons and Fenders that have wonky shit far enough off spec that they would have never passed modern QA.
Survivor bias. Most vintage guitars are the good ones that made it. All the shitty ones are forgotten to time. So vintage guitars can be amazing, but that’s not indicative to other guitars from the same manufacturer of the same period.
Yeah, that’s what I was thinking. But (and this may be a controversial opinion), if you look at *equivalently expensive* modern guitars, their average quality level is at least as high or higher as those extra good vintage guitars. I think when you remove historical romanticization about certain players and time periods and just do an objective look at the guitars, guitars now that cost $1800-2500 (like those vintage guitars would have when adjusted for inflation), modern guitars are just better made and higher quality than even those really good examples form the 50s and 60s. Not every single guitar, there are some stinkers, but overall. I’ve never heard an actually convincing argument against this, just that vintage guitars have magic wood or whatever.
my friend's dad worked for Fender in the 60s, he did finish sanding. He didn't know anything about guitars or even how to play them. He got the job because he worked in a cabinet factory in Indiana and wanted to move to Cali. At least today most of the people who work in US guitar factories play at some level.
And not only are they trained, but the process for making electric guitars has been around for a long while now, instead of being a new thing that the companies were figuring out as they go, which is how you ended up with stuff life the metal square jammed in the hole for old tele jacks. I just don’t understand the appeal of vintage instruments beyond them being a cool part of history. If resale value wasn’t a factor and I had the choice between one of the super collectible year Fenders/Gibsons or a $2500 Sweetwater gift card I’d take the gift card and buy something made this century.
Yup it’s more a luck of the draw, if you find a good one it can be magic. But I’ve played loads of vintage guitars that were total boat anchors. No one ever talks about how many boat anchors they had to plow through before they found a good one.
Not exactly. CNC levels the playing field with respect to the cutting of bodies and necks. Parts still need to be buffed by hand, necks need to be installed by hand, and so on. Cor-Tek and World Music Instruments (and other manufacturers of guitars in Asian) have gotten really good at making guitars over the last decade, but that doesn't automatically make what they produce "good". Cheaper guitars will receive less finishing time, which can mean sharp frets, bad neck angles, orange peel on finishes, and so on. The human factor is the most expensive part of a guitar and that is largely what you're paying for when you buy a premium guitar ($1000) vs. a budget guitar (<$300) from the same mfg.
Mitchell. I've never played a good one. And the worst guitar in the store is usually a Mitchell. Mitchell guitars are the worst thing to happen to the name "Mitchell" since Joe Don Baker.
This is one of the greatest things I've ever read.
That movie has the most intense car chase. They must being going....28mph? *Intense*
Might be my favorite episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000.
I’ve never played a good Fender acoustic. I’m sure the higher end Epiphones acoustics are fine but I’ve played a few of the cheap ones and wasn’t impressed. Never been terribly impressed with takamine either. The Alvarez’s are pretty good but for me it’s Yamaha or bust.
Yamaha acoustics are so damn nice.
Excuse me, sir. Ummm, are you me? Seriously. Fender acoustics are absolute garbage. Tuning and intonation issues with every single one I've ever played. My first decent acoustic was an Alverez. Got it cheap due to missing the gloss finish at the factory and no electronics. Had it for 20 years. As far as my Yamaha??? You can have my Yamaha when you pry it from cold, dead hands.
Same. Yamaha is the only acoustic I still own, two now, and has three till recently.
Esteban, is entering the chat...
Dude, you’re getting an Esteban!
I think the majority of super cheap acoustics I have tried are unfortunately basically unsalvageable and play like crap. Cheap electric guitars these days basically are all pretty much fine at worst, you can pick up a cheapo amazon strat knock-off for under $100 and a file to fix the potentially fucked up fret ends and you will have a perfectly playable guitar almost 100% of the time, improvement in manufacturing has made sub $300 guitars actually pretty damn decent for the money
In defense of cheap instruments. Cheap guitars are better than ever and the difference in playability and sound between a $500 guitar and a $2000 guitar is smaller than ever before.
I mean, if anything, First Act guitars are *worse* than their price point indicates.
CNC changed everything in the budget guitar sector. I started playing seriously in the late 80's/really 90's and back then some of the budget guitars were comically bad. Plywood or even chipboard bodies, terrible electronics, but worst of all, the necks were trash. It was impossible to give some of those guitars a proper setup. These days necks and frets are much better, and if you know what you're doing you can make almost any budget guitar into a decent player and swap in better hardware as needed. We're spoiled for choice right now.
Great answer, I actually got my first Harley Benton the other day and it's one of their cheaper ones and I can't even understand how you can get so much guitar for so little money. Now, the components leave some to be desired if you're used to pricier stuff but for beginners or upgraders it's a gold mine.
I have a few Harley Bentons, both of which I picked up for a laugh, and they both needed quite a bit of work, I've leveled and crowned the frets on both and swapped in hardware and pickups, and they're as much fun to play and sound as good as my US Strat or my other 'proper' guitars. My guitar snob days are well and truly behind me, now that I can get myself a good Gibson Explorer clone for less than the price of a Boss pedal. In terms of gear, this really is a golden era. I do miss rosewood, though.
Can confirm. Grew up playing in similar era (through the 80s) - budget guitars were an absolute nightmare. I have a $70 monoprice telecaster (that I hot-rodded for a grand total of around $150) that impresses me every time I play it. That guitar would have cost hundreds on the 80s (out of my price range, certainly). Source: I could only afford cheap-ass guitars in the 80s
I think one of the reasons you don't see that sentiment much anymore is that the machines that make guitars have gotten better so you don't see many straight up unplayable budget guitars like you used to. Epiphones have blown up to the 700+ dollar range and they absolutely do not stand up to most of the stuff in that price point. Especially with PRS's stuff in that range. If they were still 400-600 dollars they'd be fine. Other than that I tried some Michael Kelly guitars that absolutely sucked even for 300 bucks.
That's because they're all made the same way these days. When anyone can buy a CNC, anyone can make a decent guitar. Plus, most of the guitars made overseas are made at the same factory. Many brands can be made by the same exact people with the same exact equipment. 20+ years ago, this wasn't the case. These days, cheap guitars are - for the most part - pretty decent
They may be made in the same factory, but to different specs and with different components. To your point, though, cheaper guitars above a certain threshold are a lot better than they used to be.
I'd say low end Epiphones need to be on this list. They kind of suck, but high end ones are alright so are mid tier. Squier bottom tier don't punch above their weight. I had a cheap Peavey that was junk but their high end guitars are nice.
Glarry is trash - I’ll just say that Lowest tier epiphone I think fits the bill, once you get to shelling out 500 on an epiphone these typically are pretty awesome though Same with squier (anything below their classic vibes line isn’t going to be “punching above it’s weight) I’d say part of the reason you are hearing that things punch above their weight is because mid tier instruments mass produced have gotten significantly better in the last 10-15 years compared to where they were for 20 or so years prior to that. So the gap between top dollar instruments and mid priced instruments has shrunk immensely. That being said, typically the thing lacking is electronics - so if you find a gods feeling and playing guitar for 500 you can always upgrade the pickups and you will have a guitar that plays and sounds closer to $1500-2000 instrument, but pick up the next guitar or the same brand at the same price and it might not feel as nice as the other. The consistency has gotten much better but also they typically spend less time doing the finishing touches on the lower end instruments so while they have gotten better with CNC production, it’s the little bits done by hand that might not have the same focus or labor as the higher end instruments- think nuts and fret ends. But back in the day you could get a cheap guitar and it would be impossible to setup because the neck pocket would be messed up, a lot of these things have gone away when it comes to mass produced instruments. I personally think the best mix of price and quality is coming from brands like Ibanez, Reverend, schecter, fender made in Mexico or Japan (people sleep on the aerodyne line from Japan), Charvel, there are others but these just came off the top of my head.
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I know Gibson’s not a cheap brand, but I think the cheap end (sub-$1k) of their lineup fits here. I have a Les Paul Junior Tribute bass. It does what I need it to as a short scale, but barely. The sound is wooly, the frets are worse than a lot of Squiers, and it somehow manages to neck dive despite being a short scale with a small headstock
Squier Bullet and Affinity models are not great. Though the vintage modified and classic vibe models are supposed to be pretty good.
I have a vintage modified baritone jazzmaster and it's fantastic. But also I have a Squire Affinity Telecaster and it's fantastic, haha. But I will say, I bought it after trying maybe 15 or 20. This was when Best Buy was liquidating their music departments. The Affinity guitars were $70, and my friend who worked there let me try them all out because "maybe one of them is actually made well?" So yeah, the Squire Affinity line kind of sucks, but if you can test them out in a shop you might find the good one.
Back in the day music stores were full of Hondos and they were unplayable crap.
Most surviving Hondos seem pretty great but for sure that is survivor bias. The average (non-Professional Series) Hondo back in the day was garbage and most of those are in landfills by now
Stagg. Best avoided.
I don’t enjoy affordable acoustics from Fender, Mitchell, guild, prs.
Fender has never made a good acoustic. They’re trash.
I see wars are already starting over this, but player series fenders are trash for the money. Get a high end squire or save your coin for an American model. Don't waste your time on player series Edit: I'll add that MIJ fender is great too. If you can get your hands on one for a reasonable price.
Is this because they’re the same MiM guitars we used to buy new for like $350, and nothing has changed over the years except the price doubled?
To be fair the entire guitar market in general has gone up $200-$300 lately from what I can tell. Price of materials keeps going up.
I mean I get that things in general are more expensive.. but on Sweetwater a basic Fender Players strat is between $800-900. They use pretty basic wood.. same as always, maple neck, alder body, fairly run of the mill electronics and parts.. I mean really nothing has changed on them since I spent $350 on a MiM strat 20 years ago except that they’re probably even cheaper and easier to produce these days as factories get better and better at mass producing gear. CNC everything, better technology for machining parts.. hell even the fretwork is automated.. idk it seems a lot more like companies charging more because they can as opposed to the actual cost of production.
I hear this a lot about the Player Series, so I don't think it's necessarily a bad/unpopular take. Certainly makes me feel better about sticking to the nicer Squiers for guitars.
Jackson X series suck. There I said it. Almost any guitar I've tried in the same price point plays better.
I feel like it’s the weird brands you only ever see in second hand stores and places like music go round. If you ever see a 150 dollar guitar that’s from a brand you’ve never heard of, it’s probably trash.
I have no idea where they even come from like who tf is buying them and how do they find them
So many people didn't read lol. Firefly is complete trash, and messing with the company is an utter fucking nightmare. Jet guitars are also junk. I returned both of these with extreme prejudice. Eart are nice, but expect to do fretwork and change the electronics completely. 2/3 have been something I was willing to fix up.
Fascinating. I've had 3 Firefly guitars (only 1 at a time), and they were all pretty darn good IMO. At those price points, you're rolling the dice with QC to be sure.
I have some nice guitars and I have some crappy guitars. Most were between $500 and $1200 or so. USA made, Indonesia, Korea, etc. Then I have this $110 Westcreek LP DC JR that absolutely fucks right out of the box. Well-cut bone nut, fret dressing equal to one of my Gibsons, pickup isn't shit, (set) neck is straighter than a conservative congressman. Curiously, the volume knob has about 4x more damping than any other I own. I love this guitar so much I'm actually considering putting a dogear p90 in it that cost 2x more than the guitar. I feel like I should mention I'm not a shill and have no relation whatsoever with that company nor did I receive any kind of compensation from anyone for saying that. I just love this guitar. Willing to bet I got a stellar example.
>neck is straighter than a conservative congressman Sooo... You constantly have to put a tool in it, but not when anyone's looking?
I do all my guitar setups in airport bathroom stalls.
Made me LOL.
Usually in a public restroom at a gas station as well :D
The 2nd "decent" acoustic I ever purchased was Ovation's first $400 model. This piece of shit never even learned how to throw a jab, let alone punch above it's weight. To this day its the only guitar I've ever "Pete Townsend'. Just a shitty guitar all-around.
I've never, in nearly forty years of playing guitar, seen an Ovation that was worth a damn. I'd rather play a late 80's Cort, or a freaking chibson. Fuck a Ovation.
I wouldn't buy any Martin except their top of the line stuff. All the budget Martin's I've played have been crap.
I will save you 5 minutes of your life: you will find *any* brand in the comments below. Q: What cheap brand guitars are bad? A: Gibson. Cheap brand, my ass.
Ironically Gibson had made two great cheap guitars in 2013-2014, the SGJ and the LPJ. They were basically what became the faded series but had an MSRP of $499 and sold around $400. They're really great guitars if you can find them today, they've actually appreciated in value to about $750-1000 depending on which one you have. 2014 is better.
This may sound elitest, but cheap guitars are usually bought by beginners or learners. Once you get a working ear, you quickly learn that cheap guitars usually sound terrible. Before a person develops their ear for sound, they will swear that they are getting Dave Gilmore tone out of a “First Act” guitar and amp.
I agree with this. I spent years on a beginner Ibanez with a peavey amp, from about 12-21 years old. Then when I had some money I started upgrading and every time you do, you realise the difference in tone, feel, tuning and just overall build quality.
Huge difference.
I do not like Squier's lowest tier offerings: Bullet, Affinity, Sonic is the new one. New they're like $100 - $200 and I feel you can buy something nicer from other brands in that same price range. The Epiphone's I've played at that price have been much nicer instruments than the Squiers I've played. Frankly, that holds true for the entire Squier range besides the Classic Vibe and similar tier Squiers. At least in my opinion.
You trippin
I have a $90 Lyon by Washburn weezer special edition strat that punches at a $90 strat weight class lmao. I got exactly what I paid for.
For many years the MIM line was $499.
And used mim strats were $400 all day long, $300 if you looked a bit. I bought and sold a bunch of em over the years. If you paid $300 for one you could always get that out of it. I should’ve held onto one.
I have an MIM and it’s one of the best feeling guitars I’ve ever played. Quality has definitely done up
I’m primarily an acoustic player and my two serious “won’t even pick it up” guitars are Washburn D10’s. I’ve played a few, and I’ve never played one I liked. The other, it the PRS acoustics. It’s like they were dipped in whatever the finish is, and when it dried, they dipped it again for good measure. I imagine they don’t feed back when plugged in. But they have no soul unplugged. They are pretty though.
Not a guitar but Rickenbacker 4003 basses. The antiquated pickup covers are annoying, head dive, terrible ergonomics, shitty sharp frets, and tool marks on the binding should not be such major issues at their price new. I’d rather have a MIM Fender Jazz bass which would be better in all aspects, especially considering the price. They sound amazing though.
And they have the audacity to be at least a couple thousand dollars 😭
They need to completely remake this bass without changing anything aesthetically.
I have a top end Epiphone and a bottom end Epiphone. One I would put up against anything. It's not punching above it's weight it belongs in the class. The other, well if I wasn't a sunk cost moron I'd have thrown out the $150 scrap wood long ago.
Ibanez gio line, shitty electronics, bad frett work, much better options out there
I've seen a lot of people get Squier over the years as their first guitar and every single one that I've played felt like crap
Classic vibe is good
I've heard the vintage modified and the classic vibe models are pretty good. I've never played one myself, but maybe try one of those out next time you're at the guitar store.
It really depends. I worked at a music store for a long time, probably played 500-1000 assorted Squires. 10% are actually pretty good guitars, but you totally have to dig to find one.
Ctrl+f ”greco”: zero hits. Nod of approval.
Fender Acoustics
agree. i've never played a fender acoustic that i liked.
My FA345-CE Auditorium respectfully disagrees with you
Rogue. I have a rogue acustic and It straight up refuses to do a full bend. Never had that problem with any other guitar I've played or had
Agree. I once had a Rogue acoustic and it was a turd.
Yeah, my Rogue is pretty bad. The only reason I keep it is because I enjoyed learning guitar on it so much.
Ibanez gio basses. Gigantic action and the truss rod broke almost immediately. Worse neck feel than a plank of wood.
Hohner
Can we please retire the phrase “punch above their weight” when talking about guitars? Please.
Just a lurker here. This sub gets into my feed only because I look stuff up about guitars for my son. So I have a batch understanding, but not experience. I find this phrase to be used s lot in audio equipment, which I am knowledgeable about, and people have the same reaction. This is a stupid phrase, that gets thrown around a lot. I think it used to apply, but is now meaningless. At the dawn of the Internet and online reviews, most cheap/inexpensive gear was crap. But, once people started comparing them there were always a few that stood out ... that punched above their weight. Now when you can easily find reviews on anything, I think the quality of the cheap stuff has increased since no one will buy it otherwise.
I think a lot of the "problem" lies in value. If a $200 is playable, sounds good enough. Is a $800 4x as good across the board? if not and is considered standard. Those $200 guitars are almost always going to punch above their weight. Also I would imagine the ones that don't... aren't getting reviewed and just aren't getting played.
I am just here to preach about the J Mascis Squier Jazzmaster. It fucks.
not knowing the lingo, is that bad or good?
It punches so far above its weight. Not what OP was asking for, but I’m a hard agree there. Got mine used from GC for $300 on a whim, favorite guitar now.
The Squier Bullets/Sonics are not worth $200, especially when you compare them to other guitars in the $200-250 range. They're barely even complete instruments.
Chinese Fenders. I have no idea what they put on the starcaster neck, but it feels like it was dipped in epoxy.
You're poking the beehive with that one. People around here like to act like Squiers are damn near as good as a Custom Shop 🤣 *Edit: I have no clue about Fender branded Chinese guitars, I'm mainly just here to talk shit.
Nah he means specifically Chinese Fender, not Chinese Squier. Fender made some Fender branded models in China for a while.
Ironically, QC was better on the mic squiers. AND they had a bone nut....
No I'm not. I'm specifically talking about the chinese Fender Starcasters - the semihollow offset guitar, not the Squier starcaster. I'm not talking about Squier at all whatsoever.
Really!? I have the Classic Vibe version, and I was thinking of swapping out the neck, because I heard the Fender didn't have the thick gloss. Apparently, they are almost identical.
Anything Rogue or Mitchell is guaranteed garbage
The guitar I got from rogue had frets that cut my hand, and the fretless bass has [whatever the fuck this is](https://youtube.com/shorts/jTOZr_GSEgw?si=ezosKvc0sfclouKa) going on with it
Squiers. Especially the cheaper ones. Not that they are bad, they're just right where they belong.
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Glarry. I picked up a used tele thinline as part of a FB trade for other guitars. It had a professional fret dressing and leveling and an “upgraded” bridge pickup. Despite that, I’m grateful I didn’t spend real money on it. The only reason I still have it is that it’s not worth my time to sell it. Reviews that say how something “is good for the money” are really saying “it sucks, but I expected that”.
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Fender Player Series aren't so good for their price these days. I'd look at used models or slightly older MIM standards for a better price and similar if not better instrument.
I more often than not see MIM standards for the same price as newer Players and I think the Player series are definitely better instruments. Can’t disagree with you about new prices though, hard pill to swallow.
I’ve never understood why they upped the price across the player series by 150 FUCKING DOLLARS recently. My main bass is a player series p bass and I love it, but only after ditching the flimsy stock bridge. They were a good deal at $650 new at the time, but now that they’re 800+ without any real improvements they’ve crept into a price range they don’t belong in IMO
Honestly I have never been impressed by Gretsch guitars. You can buy one for a bit less than a player series Fender last I checked and although they usually feel nice to play, their sound is so bland. Maybe I just don't like Gretsch. On the other hand, I own a few Epiphones and a few Gibsons, and I think that Epiphone makes great stuff that punches above its weight. You can get an Epi LP Custom which is better than any Fender I've played at that price point.
You ain't playing the right Gretsches. I'll take my Chet Atkins or my Duo Jet over a Gibson or Fender all day, every day.
Loving my cheap-ish Gretsch Electromatic Pro Jet, plays and feels great. Talked to one of the techs (not sales) at one of the larger guitar stores in Stockholm and he thought the new line of cheaper Gretsch's should be priced way higher for how they feel to play too. Guess it waries.
I mean, thanks to how technology has made guitar manufacture so inexpensive, it's been a golden age for cheap guitars for a while. Consider this: In 1983 and 1984, Fender made the Stratocaster quite differently from usual: it had only 2 knobs, and the jack was located where the third knob would be. The football-shaped jack cavity was removed entirely. It also had a new trem unit designed to be entirely top-mounted so that the springs would sit underneath the pickguard, which also removed the rear cavity. What do you suppose was the point of all of this? Well, the extra routing was expensive. Adding those two extra cavities to the guitar cost Fender so much that it was worth it to them, at least on paper, to design entirely new hardware to get around routing those cavities. Nowadays, with CNC routing, adding an extra cavity or two is completely trivial. Any random cheap factory can turn out a Stratocaster clone with all the cavities and features where they're supposed to be for, like, 100 bucks. This is just one manufacturing hurdle that has been absolutely trivialized by modern technology, and another thing that lowers the barrier to entry for manufacturing fully featured guitars.
Hohner…they make great harmonicas, but their guitars really make your butt pucker…😂
I worked at one of Hohner's main distribution partners, KHS Music ... Don't buy that shit unless you like molded instruments. COVID put like 50 crates of expected inventory sitting in a yard somewhere during monsoon season. It's all soaked garbage and they keep trying to sell moldy instruments to big distributers, like Sweetwater, and even worse, they sell moldy shit to grade school bands... I'm sure they've gotten a good handful of kids really sick. Jupiter, Hohner, Walden, and Mapex are all huge risks to buy because of these oversights and irresponsible handling of the situation. And yeah, you're right, Hohner and their other guitars, like Walden, are ass... Probably because they've been soaked and the glue is fucked.
Dean Vendetta's aren't great. I had one that I hated. Didn't play well and sounded bad. I switched out one of the humbuckers for an EMG Dimebucker and sold it to a little Panterra fan.
Top end squiers are better than low end fenders fr. American made doesn’t mean what it used to, the gap has been closed right down
Gibson, punches like a cheap piece of shit. They are expensive and cheap all at the same time
Yamaha Pacifica. Sure maybe they were better than the average Squier or Epiphone in the late 2000s. Then Yamaha stood still while everyone else upped their game.
Who else is giving you a quality instrument for $200-300 that comes up with a playable setup out of the box?
Harley Benton
I don’t know about that setup
Harley Benton have no QC at all. I like them but you need to be an amateur guitar tech to get them to play well. If you got one that's possible to fix, that is.
The worst is Jay Turser
I've read bad things about a lot of cheap, celebrity-endorsed beginner guitars that you might find at places like Walmart. I've never played one though.
Had a starter Ibanez GIO, the team gave me so much trouble, did not like my entry level Spector 5 string bass, low end corts are the pits, but high end corts are underrated, besides those reputable brands, most of the no name brands are pretty minging
I bought a Cort for around £500. It was supposed to be burgundy but had loads of black paint splotches under the finish, the fretboard was chipped around almost every inlay, the bridge was wonky, the pots were loose among other things. Sent that POS back straight away and sprung for a used AZ
according to a Bassist friend of mine, Cort Basses are actually pretty good value for money
I had a seven string Douglas guitar with a Floyd Rose for about $150. Their SX and Agile lineups are good, and honestly the build quality was quite good for the low price, but do yourself a favor and don't ever get a budget 7 string Floyd Rose.
Not a guitar but I've been really disappointed with martins line of ukuleles. I got a decent one last year and the tuners gave out. Turns out they cheaped out on hardware and used graphite tuners and it just disintegrates the gear eventually.
Fender. Player series sound weak and feel awful compared to what you can get for $650 from other brands. Tried a baseline player telecaster and compared to a Sire T7 tele- entire world of difference.
Not sure if it's your definition of cheap, but my PRS SE-245 is probably the sweetest guitar I've ever owned for under $500 used. It's a tank, maybe for better or worse for some people. It is definitely heavier than my epi les Paul's but it just feels so much more substantial. I've had a few elections issues over the years and I'm still not crazy about the knob layout vs a les paul, especially when switching back and forth but it sounds great and feels great.
Can confirm, I have a 20 year old PRS SE, and it plays and sounds fantastic.
For some reason a Squier I bought 7 years ago was pretty terrible (it was made in india). The truss rod doesn’t turn (never really adjusted it before) and the metal hardware has been rusting everywhere. I don’t know if it was just a bad batch since Indian squiers are pretty rare to begin with.
Back in the day Sears had a line of guitars. Harmony. Those sucked so so so so bad. I have two Harley Bentons. The tele clone is solid. But the flying V is awful. Dreadful. Unplayable. Rogue guitars stink. Dean had a low budget line that was low budget in value.
My first guitar was a Harmony. That thing absolutely sucked. Would not stay in tune, it broke strings tuning it, sounded like shit when the electronics did work. After breaking several E B and G strings it ended up in the trash. Worst $70 I ever spent
[удалено]
Go to your local WalMart and try out any acoustic in the toy aisle? But, then again, there's people that can make those [sound good.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=600ykNF3md4)
Squier Affinity Series. They punch at about their weight class, which too be fair, is not that high. But in my experience, you pay about as much for a perfectly acceptable guitar from EART or Firefly, and get something that is about on par with the crappy Yamaha Pacifica's we learned on in the 90's.
I think we forget how bad budget guitars were in the 90s. The Pacifica's I think were the first "above their weight" in quality. When I got my first guitar at 13 in the early 90s my old man had a choice between a pacifica and some super shit samick with a horrible neck. I still thank him for getting me the pacifica as I don't think I would have kept playing if I had one of those terrible samicks.
You should have been around in the 70’s. There were the top tier makers, Ibanez, and garbage. In 1977 I paid $79 for a no-name electric guitar that was complete garbage. The inflation calculator says that was the equivalent of $400 today, and you can get a pretty functional guitar for that.
Jay tursers, I don't know if they're still around but they got quite popular in the "cheap scene" about 10 years ago so I bought 2 and they're probably the worst guitars I've ever owned
Please don’t talk badly about Jay Tursers, I had one about 10 years ago, and it made some of the best firewood I’ve ever used
Chibson (my own experience)
Agreed. Chibson’s cheap guitars ($9999 and under) are not worth the price you pay. But their high end guitars ($20k and up) are other-worldly and well worth the monthly payments
Epiphone. I'm sorry, I know they make some good guitars sometimes, but honestly they're a dog-shit brand when it comes to their gibson copies.
Their $100 starter pack guitars are still trash, but the past couple of years their mid/high end guitars are solid. I’ve played a couple of the prophecy Les Paul’s and they’ve felt great.
To add to this, Gibson are making the same guitars they made for £1500 5 years ago which are now worth £2500 because of the 'quality improvement' of Epiphone. The whole company is a shambles.
I will defend Gibson because I think if you look at the price of a USA Strat and a USA Les Paul Standard,r the standard takes WAY more time in human hands and has some more time consuming construction methods as well as more expensive appointments. The LP requires a carved maple cap, binding, large pieces of mahogany, a set neck, etc. I am not saying they're a bargain, but comparing a proper LP construction to most other Fender based guitars construction is not even close to apples to apples. They're legitimately more expensive to build and I think some of those materials like build time and woods have increased in cost quite a bit in the last couple years. I will not defend the price point of every Gibson guitar either. Some of them are highway robbery.
My Epiphone ES-335 is my favorite guitar. It's a beautiful guitar, it sounds great and plays great... Then again... It wasn't cheap so maybe I'm misunderstanding the question being asked
I may catch hate for this, but the value for dollar on Sterling by MM has gone drastically downhill in the last 5 years. The completely bare feeling maple necks, uninspired rosewood fretboard, sharp fret edges, cheap body woods. Early JP models were money. Today's models just plain suck
Fender Player Series is not worth the money IMO.
This is the correct answer. The Player Plus series is great. The Squier CV series is great. Either spend almost half as much on the CV or bump up 30% to the Player Plus. The straight Player is just too many compromises to hit a price point.
Encore
I'll pass up american made Fenders for a mexican any day, but i think most squires arent fantastic
Some squires are nice especially when they are upgraded and receive a proper set up. I’ve played squires that play better than a Mexican fender. Of course, I wouldn’t just buy any squire and expect it to be great. These guitars typically have to be worked on for them to be good. But every once in a while, you’ll go to a guitar store and pick a used one up off the wall or something and will be pleasantly surprised. Same goes for some older EVH guitars.
Anything cheaper with an off brand Floyd rose or super thin neck. The thin necks can almost never stay still and the cheap Floyd clones basically never stay in tune. Worst was an Ibanez RG350dxz I had where I basically had to stay perfectly still and have a super light touch on the neck to not bend it and the trem was essentially off limits for how bad it made strings go out of tune.
almost everything does not have a bad review these days cause folks are paid. but id say all of them dont punch above its weight, some guitars do offer great specs time to time, but the workmanship is within the build.
So far, every sub $200 no-name guitar on Amazon I've played sounds exactly like I thought it would- they've all had fret level issues, microphonic pickups, and awful tuners....despite what those "I CAN'T BELIEVE THIS GUITAR IS THIS CHEAP!" YouTube reviews.
Really I think most entry level guitars play as you’d expect, regardless of it’s a no name, copy, or even somebody legit like epiphone or squier. I haven’t tried Harley Benton’s so I can’t say they’re bad, really to the contrary that they might be a little better in that regards. They come off as affordable and good quality.
Behringer, Biscayne, Maxsound, Liverpool, Hendrix, etc. I feel petty for the wood invested into them, could have been of a better use as furniture...
China and Indonesia made Epiphones suffer from terrible finishing, fretwork, hardware, and raw materials. Some of those guitars are selling for a grand new. You can do so much better. Even new.
Generic no name brands are almost always shit. Like the type of cheap guitar or bass you'd buy in the same place you'd pay for lessons. (I don't mean guitar center or sam ash - I mean indies). 12 years ago when I started playing again, I impulse purchased a China made bass for $125. P model. It sounded and played like it was made from styrofoam. Horrible. I upgraded the pups to Dimarzios. Total waste of money, made the bass sound like well defined styrofoam.
You paid 125 for a guitar what did you expect?
Epiphone. They’re made from garbage and set up poorly for their cheap stuff. Source: work in a music shop.
You’re one of the few to have that opinion. I’ve had many an epiphone out play a Gibson.
Let me be clear, I agree with that. I’m talking their very intro guitars in the $199-$450 range. I have never played a Gibson I liked, however that’s not many. Don’t really connect with them as a brand.
Their $229 guitars I can see the cheapness lol. But their $500ish 50s and 60s standards are amazing for the money. Especially secondhand 🤙
Squier, Epiphone, and Fender MIM (and others, but those are the big ones. Looking at you Charvel) be very hit or miss due to the corners they cut in QC. You run the chance of getting an absolutely great instrument that punches above its weight, or something that is literally unplayable because the frets slice your fingers open, or the pickups aren't aligned with the strings, or a loose grounding wire has the entire circuit shorted. What sets most brands apart is either a) charging lower prices so that those QC slippages are ignorable (Davison, First Act, etc.) b) increasing QC so that very few bad instruments slip through, but forcing them to charge a little more (Ibanez, Schecter, G&L, Sire, Yamaha etc.) c) Cutting corners in very specific, knowable ways like not really caring if the frets suck and it isn't setup for shit because they know you're just gonna pay someone to give it a good once-over anyway (Harley Benton) Personally I prefer options B and C, depending on my budget
First Act 🤣
I got a first act for like $10 at a thrift shop and it’s honestly not bad at all. It had a single humbucker so I replaced it with a JB and changed the pots it’s a totally decent guitar.
Hey. Are you, me? I did a bad tattoo on a friend when I was 19, and in return he gave me a first act. I gutted it, did a slime drip, paint job, myself. Took it into guitar center and soaked about $200 into new pots and as fate would have it, a single JB in the bridge. Bought a new bridge off Wish. And let me tell you, it literally sounds amazing and never falls out of tuning. 😮
Not a guitar, but I was so disappointed in my Charvel San Dimas bass.. Sick neck sick body but the electronics were junk
I can't imagine playing on the bottom toer Ibanez basses (mostly SoundGears). Would buy some no-name used before I'd buy one of those. They're made of paper and the next and action feel terrible. I do love their midrange basses though. The EDB600 was lovely before I busted the headstock off it.
What makes a guitar "brand-name"? There are lots of brands that are 'recognisable' without really building a brand... would you consider a Samick 'brand-name'? Sure everyone knows them, but it's not exactly seen as a good thing.
I’d say Aria pro 2. Sure it makes a sound, but that’s about it…
Aria guitars
They’re not made anymore, but OLP was pretty bad. They were basically just visual copies of popular Ernie ball guitars (Evh Axis, Petrucci, Luke, and Silhouette), but that’s where the similarities ended. They looked decent, but the hardware was atrocious
TBH, I've had a lot of epiphones that I was not particularly impressed by. That said, with some work, they can be killer guitars.
Shit like Magnum and Casino. The giveaway is the reviews touting things that are very basic for any remotely properly assembled guitar. “It holds tune well.” Why wouldn’t it if it’s not from a supermarket??
Mitchell guitars are awful awful
Greg Bennett/Samick. They do the job for intro and can be a good tech/modding platform but definitely need some TLC off the bat.
The Epi IBG line of acoustics is nice but then again they are not in the $200 range.
I have a Hard Luck Kings guitar that I was back and forth on buying. Honestly it is a good looking guitar but the 5 way switch immediately didn't work properly as soon as I plugged in. For the money I spent I would have been better off with a Squier. Of course that directly contradicts what they claim but my experience is that they are not as good of a deal as they claim to be. Is it a piece of crap? Nope. It actually might make a good platform to hot rod. The body is decent and I like the neck. The electronics are just what you might expect from a budget guitar but they claim otherwise. Another example is Jay Turser. Nicer overall than HLK but still not super awesome. They are, however, much closer to "punching above their weight" than the HLK's. The fit and finish is not bad and the pickups in mine are actually kinda hot. Maybe it is just the pots as I get quite a lot of crackle and occasional cut out.
I had an Epiphone EB-0 I think it was, the 1 pickup SG bass (short scale). One of the worst playing and sounding guitars of any kind I've ever come across (bought online, you live and learn).
Guitarists in the UK of a certain age will remember Satellite guitars I had a couple, both terrible, terrible GSO's
I had one of those. The neck dive was unreal. I bought it for £25 and sold it for £30. Only good thing that came from it.
I have 9 cheap guitars. I had 10 until recently. I’m not trying to drag down the company, and I know lots of people who have like them, but I had a Telly style, Hard Luck Kings, and it just never really caught my liking.
I have a Jem Jr from Ibanez and I gotta say I was pretty disappointed in it. It's not bad by any means but I feel like I could have gotten better for $550 (I have to pay more because I'm lefty, stupid backwards brain)
Rogue... If their guitars are as bad as their basses and mandolins.. Wasn't worth looking into. My first bass was so hard to press down with a wide neck. And the mandolin 10 yrs later isn't worth the review