Pristine Or Played?

[bluesstringer]

I can't imagine specifying a guitar that had relicing. But then I don't understand tatoos and piercing either. Must be a generation thing.

 

C'mon bro, while I gree with you about the guitars, I am around your age and have several tatoos..........LOL ! To each his own !

[dbirchett]

 

C'mon bro' date=' while I gree with you about the guitars, I am around your age and have several tatoos..........LOL ! To each his own ![/quote']

 

LOL! OK. maybe its not just generational. My son has several too. Maybe its just an ingrained fear of needles.

[snookelputz]

I take reasonable care of them, just like any tool. I'm disappointed when one is accidentally damaged, and suffer emotional distress just like everyone else. But its still a tool, and sometimes tools get damaged. You move on. Even when DBAR'd (my own accronym for Damaged Beyond All Repair), it only takes about 3 days before GAS for a replacement takes over.

[charlie brown]

No offense meant but a pretty actively played guitar can't possibly be pristine. Unless your playing with gloves on and are certain you aren't hitting the body in any way when you play.

 

Ain't it the truth! I'm constantly amazed/amused at the term "Near Mint," and "Pristine" when it

comes to E-bay auctions! One man's "Pristine" or "Near Mint," is another's "well used!"

LOL!

 

CB

[Everdying]

9 of my current 11 guitars have been bought used, so arent exactly mint condition.

i only have 2 pristine guitars, cos they were the only 2 i bought new.

a epi G-1275 and a cheap $100 SX strat SRV ripoff copy.

 

i dont even play the SX strat cos its suppose to be my beaten up SRV no.1 lookalike project

 

from this...

 

to SRV no.1 is going to take alot of work

[pohatu771]

At Guitar Center today, I played a 1974 Gibson Les Paul Custom they had for sale...

 

It was in pretty good condition (it was mint compared to a 1971 Strat I played once...), though the gold hardware was a bit faded after thirty years.

 

Whoever owned it definitely took care of it, but there were a few knicks and scratches.

 

It was only $2400, too... played great. If I had the money to spend, I would have owned it.

 

I was upset, though, at Guitar Center... they apparently sold the floor model Valve Junior head, so the cab sat there. I had to play through a Fender DeVille (maybe...) instead.

[Ricochet]

SX strat SRV ripoff copy.

 

i dont even play the SX strat cos its suppose to be my beaten up SRV no.1 lookalike project

 

 

That SX is looking nice. Someone recently stated they were made in the same factory as the Epiphones. Is the quality comparable? The lefthanded tremolo is a nice detail.

[Everdying]

 

That SX is looking nice. Someone recently stated they were made in the same factory as the Epiphones. Is the quality comparable? The lefthanded tremolo is a nice detail.

 

i cant say if its the same factory as the epiphones, since i never tried a epi strat.

 

but the quality, yea the neck is very nice.

slim, 14" radius, slightly rounded edges.

feels more like a shredder neck than a typical strat style neck, just have to get the frets flattened a little.

no sharp protruding frets anywhere, unlike the squiers i've tried.

[ant7629]

The people who want to keep their guitars pristine, I can understand. I buy my guitars to play, but I really do look after them. However, not to a point where I am replacing a pickguard because it has some scratches on it... its a SCRATCHplate!!!!

 

What I have never really understood is the guitars have arrive new, out of the box with scratches, marks and "aging". There will never be point when pay hundreds of pounds for something that looks battered from new. I just don't see it. I would rather buy the guitar, and let it gather it own flaws through years of playing. Thats when it means something. Like

 

"Yeah, it got that scratch after playing a great gig in London".... or something like that.

[stan 58]

All of my guitars look better now then when I bought them, so I guess i'm pristine.Stan.

[Notes_Norton]

To me it's like a new car. The first scratch is a bummer, and after it has a few miles on it, the minor dings don't matter that much anymore. After all, you can't use a car without it showing some wear (and I generally buy a new car and then put over 200,000 miles on it before I trade it in).

 

I take care if my instruments, but they are tools, and the tools are going so show wear. Like the car, that first scratch bums me out, but I'm going to put quite a few more on it before I'm done. There are some things I find are not worth worrying about, like scratches on a guitar or what is going to happen to my mind after I die. If I can't change it, I'm not going to worry about it.

 

I bought a used Gibson ES-330 back in the late 70s or early 80s. Without any participation from me, it turned into a collectors item. Now the axe I bought for $300 is worth between $3000 and $5000, so I don't want to put any more dings on it. It has a few, nothing major.

 

So I bought a Casino to use on stage (most people have heard this one already so pardon the redundancy). I practice on the Gibson at home and play the Epiphone on stage. It has fallen off the strap once (thankfully, nothing major) and even though I wear a "Mechanic's" belt (with no buckle), it has gained a few more scratches on the back, I replaced the pickguard and it has quite a few pick-scuffs on it (but isn't that what a pickguard is for?), and I've even put a few more very minor scratches on it. Some day it may have that worn look to it, time will tell (actually the poly finish is quite durable).

 

I wax it when I change the strings to help protect it, I oil the fretboard lightly 4 times a year, and I try to handle it carefully on stage, but when changing from sax to flute to guitar to wind synth many times per night, sometimes with very little time to do so, I just have to accept the fact that the instruments will get marked, I call it "soul".

 

I'd never purchase one of those guitars that come out of the factory "distressed", I'd never pay extra for one of those bull's eye or slash or fool other hero-worship variations of a standard guitar, and I'd never buy a famous player guitar for the name on it - although I would buy one if it was the right guitar for me and if the same guitar was not available without the affinity name on it (for example: I might buy a BB King model if I really wanted the vari-tone on an ES type guitar). But that's just me. It's perfectly fine for others to do so.

 

I buy instruments because I like the way they sound and how they fit me personally first, and then when I find what I want to play for the music I want to make, I'll consider the color and finish. On the other hand, if I find the guitar just plain ugly to me (like those Dean Dimebag things), I wouldn't even consider one.

 

The Casino was chosen for the "touch-and-go" neck, the P90 pickups, the fact that it is an acoustic/electric, and the light weight. I do like the looks of archtop guitars, but the double-cutaway was not necessary. I tried quite a few Gibsons, Gretchs, Epis, Hagstroms, and other archtops before I settled on a Casino (I really liked the looks of an Ibanez Artcore, but I didn't like the neck and it didn't sound as good as those P90s). After I figured a Casino would be right for me, I decided that since I wear mostly black on stage, the light finish would be best (although I also like the cherry), and then I put the black pickguard and witch-hat knobs on it because I think it improved the looks. But if an LP or Strat fit my needs better, I would have gotten one of those.

 

If my Gibson didn't turn into a collectors item, I'd be playing it on stage. But I just can't see putting more dings on something that is worth over 10 times the amount I paid for it. Nothing else I've ever bought has appreciated that much.

 

Insights and incites by Notes

[pohatu771]

Looks are important to me when I'm buying a guitar... the first thing I notice is what it looks like.

 

Sometimes I have an idea of what I want, and then go looking for one that looks the way I like... like my Casino. I knew I wanted a Casino, and I also liked the look of Chuck Berry's guitars (most of the guitars I've seen him play are double-cut ES models in cherry), so I tried to find one in cherry.

 

On the other hand, when I bought my Strat, I thought I was going to buy a Classic 50s Player Series (or something to that effect), but instead I saw a three-tone sunburst with gold hardware hanging on the wall.

[frpax]

After taking a 30+ year hiatus' date=' I got started playing again. One night at a practice. I took off my Guild X-170 while standing under a ceiling fan. You would think that at 6'4" I would be used to looking out for objects overhead, wouldn't you? Well, I lifted the peghead right up into the fan. Fortunately, the Guild is a guitar that John Cameron Swayze would be proud of. It won the fight. The blade caught between the 4th and 5th tuners and left a [b']very[/b] slight dent. It did, however, take a nice divot out of the fan blade. Stopped the fan! Anyway, I have not been able to live down that moment among the rest of the band...

I was there that night. And YES, he will not live it down for some time to come!

 

...even though the other guitar player later did the same thing (also without serious damage).

This would be me.... :)

[wiltshire willy]

 

Yeah but can you imagine being able to finally get a $5000 dollar guitar how great it must sound/feel to PLAY?...I always felt that people who collect guitars for investment should consider real estate in Manhattan instead. It's a waste of a great instrument...Wanna stare? Go to an art gallery or subscribe to Playboy. Just my 2 cents...feel free to attack me collectors...Im standing my ground.

 

Guitars are meant to be PLAYED 50 bucks or 5000 bucks!

I totally agree with you bro ,it really pees me off to see guys speculate and buy guitars for investment only and lock them up never to be played.its almost a cult of guitar worship going on.OK holy grail guitars (we all know which ones) are rare and need to be looked after but they were after all meant to be played

Ive actually heard that in the early 90s major drug syndicates would purchase many vintage guitars from certain dealers only to leave them on the wall to be resold ,then once they were resold and comissions paid the cash they recieved had been "cleaned" .good work if you can get it!!!!:D

[Charles Obscure]

I'm not into fake wear on guitars, but I won't berate someone for doing it. I take care of my instruments, and they have a minimum of damage. I have a 1965 Jaguar that saw quite a few gigs before I bought it. I had the frets redressed a couple years ago and it plays like a dream. If only this thing could talk...

[jcwillow777]

I try to take care of my guitars, the best I can. I don't polish them down after every use and I have several guitars out on stands right now, but they are safe. We don't have any little kids running around. As a musician, I buy guitars to play, not to hang on the wall for decorations. (Although, some of them would look nice hung up, by my wife wouldn't go for that.)

 

I have some beautiful guitars, that have some unfortunate gouges and scratches in them from being used. I wished that the gouges weren't there, but that is a fact of life. Accidents happen. I will continue to keep my guitars in the best shape I can. I have no desire to make a guitar look like it's been through a war.

 

If, however, I was to come across a Gibson or Fender guitar at say a garage sale the was beat up for a good price, I probably wouldn't pass it up. But I wouldn't buy it just because it was beat up, it would be because it was a good deal on a guitar.

 

To don't get spending $5,000 on a reliced guitar. I'd invest the money in something else.