Guitar decisions....

Hello,

I thought I'd pop in here to get some good advice before I bought a new guitar. Let me give you some background. I've been playing guitar on and off for five or six years but have never really taken it to a serious level. I've got a low-end electric guitar, tiny amp and low-end pedal, and when I put it all together it doesn't sound good at all.

Now I want to take my playing up a level and I want to get some kit. I don't want anything too fancy - I want a decent guitar that sounds clean and crisp, an amp with a simple clean sound, and an effects pedal that works and has a few varied and common effects.

My budget is 800euro/1000dollar/£550UK. I want to get a good, clean sound for playing by myself and recording my own stuff. I really don't know anything about what's availible on the market, having had the same guitar for years and never having picked up a guitar magazine.

Does anybody have any advice about how I should spend my money? If I can get a decent recording device for that money to it would be great, but the most important thing is the guitar, amp and pedal. How should I spend my money to get the cleanest and best sound?

Thanks

SG

I think it is probably futile to recommend an axe as everyone likes slightly different things however if you rally were to force me i'd say...How about a nice Strat?

You want to go round as many guitar stores as you feet will allow and play as many new/used axes as you can.

Best of luck

S

First of all, the guitar is a matter of personal preference....
Just don't get one just because you like its looks, or one of your pros plays it.
Make sure you test it out before you get it, it could save you from wasting hundreds of dollars.

For the pedal, I'd go with whatever you can afford in the RP series by Digitech... They have nice clean amp models, and distorted ones, plus great onboard effects, I've always thought they were great.

If you end up getting one of those pedals, then you should get an amp that you can use as apeaker, as the footpedal will give most of your tone. Any solid - state inexpensive amp can do this. (actually you don't really need to get an amp, just any speaker that sounds nice, one time I've even used computer speakers)


Good luck man

if u want reviews go to harmoney central and get them there. If you want popular guitar picks for under a grand, those are les paul epiphones, fender strats mexican & highway editions, and fender tele mexican, ibanez's low end guitars i wouldnt recommend, mark tremonti PRS ... of course this is not an exhaustive list just a good place to start.

Make sure you play as many guitars as possible and try as many amps as possible!

Try a cort. You might like the G250P.
http://www.cort.com/guitars/g_models/index.html

Cort is the company in Korea that makes guitars for Epi, Fender (subsidies, not the main fender line), Schecter, BC Rich, Conklin, Ibanez, and a couple other I can never remember. Their own line of products is awesome and very well priced because there are way less middle men.

The pickups cort has aren't my favorite, but they definitely work very well clean and they sound very righteous through effects and different amps. They're very versatile, if you don't play death metal.


Strats are good. I think they're definitely overpriced, but at the same time they are a very excellent line of products and I would be proud to own one (american made) if I had the spare $$.

For clean many people think fender is by far the best option for amps. I've never owned a fender amp, so I won't pretend to know the answer to that issue. I will say I like the sound of tube amps for clean over solid state by a huge margin and I know I'm not the only person who feels that way, but that's a personal preference I can't make for you.

For clean stuff another company I would whole-heartedly recommend would be Carvin. You might look at the TL60-FA or AE185. I'm actually thinking of investing in an AE185 if I can get a decent job over the summer.

I have no idea if these links will work or not..if not go to http://www.carvin.com and go to the jam room (product sound samples).
http://www.carvin.com/jamroom/rooms/tl60.html
http://www.carvin.com/jamroom/rooms/ae185.html

I hope that helps. :)

I think Rrhoads154 has it right. Put most of your budget, maybe all of it, into the guitar and the effects peadal.

I would make the guitar the first priority. If you get a good one, it'll last you a lifetime. My personal recommendation is Yamaha, but as others have already said, that's a matter of personal preference. My point is, I bought something I really liked back in '84, I still have it, and I'm not about to part with it. It's [u]very[/u] important to personally inspect the actual guitar you're about to buy. Prowl every music store and pawn shop you can get to, trying out every new and used guitar that's within reach.

For the pedal, do some research on places like Harmony Central to get a firmer idea of what you want, and what you don't want. Then you can keep your preferences in mind while you're looking for your guitar. Unlike guitars, there's very little variation from one unit to another one of the same model. This makes things like shopping on eBay more acceptable. Basically, as long as all of the functions work, a used Model XYZ RiffRipper bought online will sound the same as one you buy over the counter. But you can save a bundle of cash.

I would recommend making a new amp your lowest priority - maybe even postponing that purchase for a while. You will need some time with your new axe to see where it's going to take you, and the effects pedal will help to give you a better idea of what kind of sound you're going to want. A good amp is a major expense, which could take up all of the budget you have at the moment. Something less than good is not what you want to spend your money on.

you could also spend 1000$ on a really nice acoustic...

but if you really want an electric/amp/pedal combo I would definatly check out a fender blues junior/ peavey classic 30
for an amp

both are around 400$ and are really nice sounding, and they can get quite loud

my first guitar was a 250$ peavey which for its price, was a very descent guitar, it played great (better than my 52 telecaster), and when tweeked slightly it could produce a nice tone

I don't know anything about multi effects pedals, i'm guessing they're in the 150 and up $ range