(Part 2) Reddit mentions: The best solid body electric guitars

I can't speak to the quality of those two kits, but I wanted to put in my two cents:

When I started playing, my dad and uncle had pitched in together to get me a little Marshall solid state combo amp from a pawn shop and a Dean Michael Schenker V for Christmas. It was a pretty sweet first guitar. A friend of mine that same year got a Squier starter pack and when I played his Squier versus my V, the difference was night and day. I felt like I had to "fight" with the Squier and it was never really as comfortable to play as the V, nor was it as fun. Since rock/metal are what drove me to play guitar in the first place, I had wanted an electric guitar - I bought myself an acoustic some years later that I love, and I really enjoy playing it, but I truthfully will always be more of an "electric" player. So if that's what speaks to you, I'd go electric personally.

Another example. When my younger brother decided he wanted to learn to play bass I found a LTD 4 string (B-204 I believe) used for $180 on Craigslist and I bought it for him - He loves it still, 5 years later.

My point is, if you're interested in playing, I would honestly suggest you find something that you're going to like to play and be a little flexible as to what you'd like to spend. I am NOT saying you should go drop $600 on a guitar right now, but maybe be willing to spend a little more to get something you're going to have fun playing. You're going to spend a lot of time practicing, and if you have to fight your guitar so that practicing isn't a reasonably pleasant experience for you, it's going to suck. Also, if you buy something decent now, you probably won't be as inclined to upgrade within a year or whatever.

A quick peek at a couple sites turned these up, to get you an idea. Alternatively you could purchase used through craigslist or a local music store. I picked up my Schecter that way almost 7 years ago for half of the retail price. And I recently got a Blackstar HT1MC for only $120 that way. So it's worth it to look around.

A couple of reasonably priced electric guitars - Jacksons are pretty sweet instruments.

http://www.amazon.com/Jackson-JS22-Dinky-Metallic-Blue/dp/B00EDSCTO0

http://www.amazon.com/Jackson-2910110503-JS11-Dinky-Black/dp/B00EGHMOPM/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top?ie=UTF8

And a couple of amps.


http://www.amazon.com/Marshall-MG10CF-Series-10-Watt-Guitar/dp/B005ODB1YM

-The 10 or 15W would be a good option, just depends on what you're willing to spend. Not sure how the 6.5" speaker will sound, but I'd be willing to bet that either of those would beat the pants off of an amp from a starter kit.

http://www.amazon.com/Peavey-Vypyr-VIP-Instrument-Amplifier/dp/B00B5OY84Y/ref=pd_sim_sbs_267_5?ie=UTF8&dpID=516Bu6ZFboL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR160%2C160_&refRID=04HCWFHQAKW4QBPNATZN

-As a previous owner of a Vypyr I can say that I really like them for what they are. I owned one for about 5 years FWIW.


So, for anywhere from 100-150 dollars more, you have the potential to get some much higher quality stuff, if you decide to do so, especially if you buy used. If you wanna go with a starter kit, then more power to you, just saying that in my experience a good guitar and decent amp that make playing FUN from the beginning make a whole world of difference. Good luck!

I'm going to take a slightly different line of thought than a lot of the people in this thread. I disagree with the "cheapest thing possible" route. A very cheap and crappy guitar and amp will make it less fun to play, sound less good than you are, and all around be less encouraging to play. If you're comfortable spending $700, I don't think that's a bad idea.

You asked about break down between guitar and amp. Here's my thoughts. Amplifiers scale very clearly with cost. More expensive amplifiers are louder and sound a lot better (e.g. tube or high quality SS vs. cheap solid state). When you're just starting out, you don't need much of an amp. It's best (for your neighbors) if you're not too loud, and honestly you'll wind up replacing it at some point in time. Guitars scale in a little more vague of a way. There are plenty of professional musicians guitars in the $400-$600 range who would never think of upgrading. Guitars north of that price range generally have a nicer fit and finish, maybe more desirable wood, but the differences aren't as noticeable. I've played guitar for a long time, built and engineered my own effects pedals, and have a good ear for sound. I've played my slightly modified(Lollar pickups) mexican telecaster and guitars 4X the cost and can't tell the difference other than the look.

So I suggest getting a guitar that can grow with you, and a cheap amp that will be great for trying out different styles. For the amp, I'd go with a mustang I. It's a good amp, that will let you try a wide variety of sounds and not drive your neighbors up the wall. It even has a built in tuner, so you save that cheddar.

As for a guitar, based on your diversity of interest, I'd recommend a stratocaster. They're very versatile, and they're amazingly modifiable. They have a swimming pool route, enabling you to later put in humbuckers, or a combination of humbucker and single coils, or whatever your heart desires as your tastes and interests change. I'd go with a fender standard strat. The resale value also holds well, so if you ever decide you hate guitar you wont be out much. A G&L Legacy may also be a good call like this. The guys who started fender left fender and made G&L, so they're not really knock-offs. Strats are like the honda civic of the guitar world. They do anything you need it to, look decent doing it, can take abuse, and resell well.

That puts you at $600. With the remaining $100 you could get a hardshell case, a gig bag, or upgrade the amp to this. You could also use that money to either a.) buy tools and learn how to set up your guitar (let me know if this is something you want to do... I'll point you in the direction). Or pay someone to set it up. A proper setup is far and away the most important thing to having a good playing and good sounding guitar.

You could also get an HSS strat, if you really want to have that beefiness for metal, here's one.

If you have any questions or otherwise let me know... happy to help!

I just had to make this decision, though for me it was just a matter of how much I was going to spend on one guitar. I got the bug again after not playing for many years and mostly just wanted something to noodle around on.

Also, I'm left-handed. There are reasonable options out there but the selection is guite a bit more limited.

At the low end I was interested in something from Squier's contemporary line, which look like traditional Teles and Strats but have dual humbucker pickups. Street price for these guitars is in the $300-$350 range and I'm sure they're a decent value.

In the end I went with a whale blue left-hand PRS SE Custom 24 for $800. It looked fantastic in person and it played great. It also has dual humbucker with 3-way switch, this time with a coil split on the tone control knob. PRS re-did the SE line in 2017 and I can say that I just love the sound of the new pickups. In fact they sounded so great I bought the guitar on the spot.

Here's the youtube review that got me interested in this particular guitar.

One other thing. After not playing for several decades I am really impressed by the advances in electronics. It used to be that tuning was something of an ordeal, but I picked up a little clip-on electronic tuner on Amazon for $11 that's incredibly easy to use. I also got a Boss Katana 50 modeling amp for ~$220 that has a bunch of effects built in. Back in the day that variety of tones would have meant a more expensive tube amp along with a bunch of pedals. I know this is no big deal nowadays but I was pleasantly surprised.

Edit: typos.

This beautiful lady right here. Just gorgeous. Great reviews, too, and yeah I'm shocked by the price tag. I've been playing almost 2 years, trying to get into a gig band or jam group or something at the moment! My current bass is a flipped righty held together with duck awesome tape, and I can't reach anything past the 10th fret because of the cutaway/strap, lol. It's ghetto but works. What do you play?

There's a cool pizza place near me run by an awesome Canadian brother and sister pair that has used English book sales from time to time. No proper English used book stores near me though, but when I was a teenager in the States, I used to go to ones all the time that had big comfy couches and coffee. LOVED that place.

Right now I'm reading the Song of Ice and Fire (Game of Thrones) series by George R.R. Martin and it's brilliant. I grew up reading and re-reading Isaac Asimov and Frank Herbert. Recently I've been hitting the design and coding books, but I love diving into a good fantasy/sci fi! How about you? Reading anything good?

Here’s my recommendation:

The guitar: this it’s really an excellent guitar, for price you can’t beat that.

The strings: used for The Wall

Additionally you could replace the pick ups depending on your amplifier: with these personally i would not recommend it on the specific strat I recommend for you to buy cause it cost twice the guitar. But if you get one, try to find one second hand!

Also remember its not all in the equipment, you also they way you play the guitar! Learning the proper style of playing can get you a long way!

Now pedals and amps:

I personally think this is the most important no matter what guitar you have, if you put it threw a good amp it really does miracles!

I personally have a Fender M-80 amplifier, the distortion on that amp sound extremely good so I don’t really use disto pedals!! But I do have 2 disto pedals that sound like him,

1: Real Tube Overdrive: this

2: Big Muff: here ya go

3: Definitely get an Echo Pedal thats a must! Any one should do! like this

Just use a decent amplifier, if you already have one it’s probably fine, around 200-300 Watts is great.

Additional links:

This website called Gilmourish is excellent if you want to find the exact correct pedals and techniques! Here: http://www.gilmourish.com

And this video:

this! and this

Hope this helps!

Edit: if you dont have an amplifier, try looking for a second hand Fender amp, either on ebay, craigslist, facebook market place! You can send me a pm if you found one and I could tell you about it!

Edit 2: really depending on your budget I can tell what to get so feel free to pm always happy to help a fellow Floydian.

I've ordered many times through Sweetwater, no problems, but I am not crazy about them like some people are. Frankly I find it annoying that my rep still calls me BEFORE shipping out my order (against my previous communications to them too), I find that the call adds another day of processing to my order whereas other companies ship out right away.

Also, Sweetwater (at least my reps) never seem to want to work on price. I can guarantee you'll get a better price almost anywhere other than Sweetwater. Case in point, Amazon is selling the white PDF35 for $430 whereas Sweetwater wants $499. Other sites list it for $499 too but will often discount it at least 10% if you call/e-mail and ask (I know for sure Musician's friend / GC / American Musical do this practice). Depending where you are tax may be an issue too.

http://www.amazon.com/Parker-PDF35WH-MaxxFly-Solid-Body-Electric/dp/B00CH7T9P6/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1406068437&sr=8-1&keywords=parker+PDF35

For most cheaper imports like this, it is my personal opinion that you should just strive to find the cheapest price available to you from a reputable online dealer for the model you want, and then use the money you saved to have it properly set up by a guitar tech in your area. I am fortunate that in my area I have a retired guitar tech who was the lead guitar tech for Line 6 for 20+ years. He can make practically an guitar, import or US Custom, play like a dream if it isnt already.

Pickups are crucial, everyone agrees. But pickups can be switched with post-market ones. A pair of Seymour Duncan JB - '59 won't cost you more than $160 nowadays. Those are top notch pro humbuckers that are the stuff on legend. If you have imagination, you can choose any other combo. Add that to the price of a well crafted Epi Les Paul, and you'll have a pro sounding guitar for a fraction of the price of a Gibson.

As for selected tone wood, I am in the "yes, wood affects tone in electric guitars" camp. However, it's worth remembering that Taylor has once built an acoustic guitar out of pallet wood... and it sounds great. So I'm not sure that "selecting" the tone wood justifies a five to ten fold increase in price...

However, the key words up there are "well crafted". Yes, pickups can be easily replaced. A warped or grossly crafted neck, a sloppy fret job, a crappy neck joint, incompetent binding -- that is the stuff that makes the difference more than anything else. This is stuff you need pro luthiers and high costs to fix, and it's simply not worth it. I've serviced tuning pegs, pickups, pots, switches, bridges -- it really is easy if you're not a complete hands-off person. But the other, mechanical, wooden things... difficult stuff.

I recently acquired a Dean Soltero Standard, but the Special version, which was only available in Germany: basically the Korean made Standard, but equiped with US Dean (DMT) pickups (Nostalgia neck, Baker Act bridge -- an absolutely fabulous combo), and no coil split. Got it half price (clearance, discontinued product). Impecable wood craftsmanship -- as I said, that is a must very hard to fix, if you want a stage and studio-worthy guitar, wonderful neck, very playable (for my taste), awesome fret job. Great tuners (Grover) and bridge. Strap-locks. But crappy electronics work -- pathetic soldering, broken 3-way toggle -- would stop working all together, or buzz/fizz/scratch, lose volume, or whatever -- you could hardly assess the tone of the instrument because of it. Got an original Gibson replacement switch, and fitted it. Also, installed a Dimarzio coil-split push-pull on the bridge. Well, this guitar came to life. It's got tone that you could easily take to the studio. It's solid reliability makes it ideal for stage. All in all, an awesome LP replacement, and more. I would not trade it for a Gibson. So look at other LP guitars, not just Epis.

TL;DR: Wood craftsmanship (including neck job, neck joint, binding), fret job, other mechanical/physical stuff is defining for the instrument, and having to repair it to the point of redoing it is not worthy. Electronics are paramount, but can very easily be fixed/improved. Don't buy a guitar simply for its pickups.

Traded my MIM strat for this. I loved the Strat, but I think I've lined up a replacement in my sonic arsenal, so I decided to turn it loose for the chance to own this beast. I've always dug the Korina line. I wanted a natural finish, but I'm pretty happy with what I got. Plays great, looks classy...win win.

I highly recommend Ibanez and epiphone. Jackson also has a good model at $200. Just make sure you don't get a Floyd rose. They're terrible for a beginner and a hassle for even experienced guitar players.

But if you can find one with a standard style bridge they're great for a beginner

You could go to a guitar store to get a feel for the different kinds of guitars, but I understand that's really hard to do as a beginner. It's hard to know how you like to play before you know how to play I guess is what I'm saying.

Also $150 can get you a perfectly fine beginner guitar. If you went up to $200 you'd have a lot more options, but $150 is doable.

This one would probably be good

https://www.amazon.com/Ibanez-GRX20ZBKN-Electric-Guitar-Black/dp/B000N2Q6WG/ref=mp_s_a_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1549471554&sr=8-6&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_FMwebp_QL65&keywords=ibanez&dpPl=1&dpID=41p9paleFIL&ref=plSrch

But not anything with a bridge like this:

https://www.amazon.com/Ibanez-JEMJRWH-Signature-6-String-Electric/dp/B00SMYD40O/ref=mp_s_a_1_8?ie=UTF8&qid=1549471554&sr=8-8&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_FMwebp_QL65&keywords=ibanez&dpPl=1&dpID=419LVBSMfoL&ref=plSrch

Haven't played in a while but looking to get back into things. Was wondering which of these three you all would recommend:

Option 1 - Ibanez AS53

Option 2 - Epiphone Les Paul 100

Option 3 - Ibanez AG75


Any major differences between the two Ibanez models other than color and extra knobs? Will the semi-hollow body of the Ibanez models impact the sound in a major way? Any thoughts much appreciated :)

So I've been highly considering getting into electric guitar lately and i'm indecisive on the guitar I should purchase. Lately I have been eyeing this one:

https://www.amazon.ca/Epiphone-ELPVVWCH-Special-Electric-Vintage/dp/B01G26RELI/ref=sr_1_3?s=musical-instruments&ie=UTF8&qid=1491078619&sr=1-3

Looks nice aesthetically and the reviews seem good overall. I have also looked up a video on it, and within the video it definitely seems to be worth it. I want to be able to play the guitar in this song:

https://youtu.be/mYd0QVPYuG8

Any help?

Nice. The one thing I always liked about the show, since I play guitar, is Yui using that Les Paul Cherry Sunburst. It's a guitar that I've always wanted and it was awesome seeing it in the show.

Gonna put a feeler out since I'm new to this sub and I don't want to add a thread.

So I'm moving to the USA very soon. Back in my home country I'm a guitar player of sorts specializing in the post-rock/shoegazing genre (IOW I use a lot of reverb, delay, fuzz and drive), but I'm leaving her behind and thinking of getting one when I'm settled in. So I'm thinking of an upgrade and seeing if anyone here can suggest a guitar.

My current guitar is a Squier Affinity Telecaster but with a humbucker middle pickup instead of a single coil in the model. I saw some nice looking Thinline Telecasters that are just under my budget but I'm wondering if anyone has any better suggestions for something under $500. Thanks.

DO YOU PUSSIES KNOW WHAT ITS LIKE TO SHRED METAL WHILE YOU WATCH YOUR FRIEND VOMIT THEIR SPLEEN!!!!!!!!.

Epiphone Riviera Custom P93 Semi Hollow Body Electric Guitar would you say this is something solid to jump on? Or should I go $100 cheaper with Epiphone DOT ES Style Semi-Hollowbody Electric Guitar? Would it be a waste of my money replacing the pick ups to try and get a better matching sound as well?

Thanks for the reply!

For $150 you can get an epiphone les paul special which is downright gorgeous for a first guitar. Made by a reputable company as well (albeit their chinese-made division).

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01G26RM3S/

I second justinguitar.com.

I'm not sure you can plug your guitar directly into your computer, but you can buy a Vox amPlug (or similar product) that'll allow you to jack into a set of headphones for a reasonable price.

Both Epi's are similar
Les Paul Special II
Les Paul Special VE

Alright, thanks. I was looking at a cheap Squier bullet strat or a Squier hss, this model specifically.
https://www.amazon.com/Fender-Affinity-Stratocaster-Beginner-Electric/dp/B00287W9DE?tag=guitarfcom-20&th=1

Here's an example of an entry level guitar that would be perfect for Rocksmith:

https://www.amazon.com/Epiphone-Special-Solid-Body-Electric-Guitar/dp/B01G26RM3S/ref=sr_1_6

You could probably pick one of these up used for under $100.

I think he's selling it to me cheaper because I'm using it for our band.. like 7/800 ish. Haven't decided on a price yet.

Is this the guitar about which you're talking? I was actually looking at that guitar before you had mentioned it.

Link

Same guitar in black is going for $599. Nice find.

I agree. Might even save some money in the process! (Search "Squier" for more traditional models; I matched your Yamaha config, HSS)

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00E2P9QM2/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1509683272&sr=8-1&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_QL65&keywords=ibanez+as53&dpPl=1&dpID=51MmqmBvX1L&ref=plSrch

This is that beautiful guitar? Holy crap I can afford it.

I want to buy this http://www.amazon.com/Epiphone-Standard-Plus-Top-Collection-Cherryburst/dp/B0002CZURY

mostly because I cant afford this http://www.amazon.com/Gibson-Paul-Traditional-Electric-Heritage/dp/B001AK5GSA

in terms of sound and quality I can't go wrong right? right guys?

I've been thinking about buying the Ibanez JEM jr.

http://www.amazon.com/Ibanez-JEMJRWH-Signature-6-String-Electric/dp/B00SMYD40O/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1456970290&sr=8-1&keywords=ibanez+jem+jr

Is it worth it without doing any mods to it?

my dream guitar

Glen Burton GE47 Solid Body Electric Guitar, Camo https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00CPLQLKU/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_IRmFzbA47TWET ?