I disagree, though to be fair I’m having a hard time articulating it. I guess it’s this - can you argue that an alder body and jumbo frets are “a better value” than an ash body and medium frets? I have personal preferences there, but can you objectively say one is a waste of money at a certain price point while the other “offers good value”?
That’s kind of what I’m trying to get at. I remember when they first came out, the PRS SE’s - to my mind - offered pretty good value, because they were very well made guitars that looked and sounded a lot like a “real” SE, for $550, give or take. Note in passing that I don’t particularly care for PRSs. Or, back in the day, a RG550 was always a good “value” relative to a Jem, because it was made in the same factory out of (early on) the same materials, with the same bridge, and a very similar neck, for like a third of the cost, so even after swapping pickups it was still the better value. In any event - it’s less “I like this guitar more than this guitar,” and more "you get a lot for your money on this guitar, and you spend more money for a comparable guitar on this guitar, so the first guitar is a better value.
Especially with that in mind, I have a hard time with statements like “Fender’s artist signature models offer better value,” when for the most part it’s just slightly different assortments of fairly normal Fender specs (Yngwie’s scallops are maybe a notable difference, though I don’t know how much it costs to have a board scalloped, so who knows). An extra signature on the headstock doesn’t really make a guitar play or sound better, so that seems awfully hard to attribute to “value.”
Hey Drew, If you remember, both you Twangsta and I had a fairly lengthy discussion regarding the YJM strat many years ago. I can’t speak for all Fender signature models… and frankly I don’t like many of the $$$ i’ve played… but the YJM is exceptional, because it was crafted by the direction of the maestro himself.
The YJM strat along with scalloped FB, has the nitro finish, along with the brass nut, and a pretty specific neck bolt process that Twangsta explained is a standout feature. Not to mention his signature pups So, in this case the YJM offers alot more than just a scalloped neck with a extra signature on the headstock!
i’ver purchased/sold alot of guitars over the past 8-10 years. Brand to brand… a signature model will “sometimes” offer more value to a player who desires those specific appointments over a stock production line model. In some cases those specific appointments are an improvement over a stock model.
I have found this to be true many of the ESP/LTD models… and some Jacksons. The ESP-LTD Josh Middleton guitar has some very nice features that were styled by Josh… like the bolt-on variant and recessed bridge… But it’s up the player if they feel those specifics warrant the increase in price. Especially if they don’t want to perform any additional upgrades to a guitar.
Not to split hairs here, but this pretty much sums up my statement about values working on a variable. However one thing to note is the implied meaning of the term value. Here you are quite obviously attributing the term to “bang for the buck” vs what someone personally finds valuable to them which are not exactly mutually exclusive either, adding more layers to this.
If you are purely discussing bang for the buck, sure, but at a point those arguments even break down, get messy and get clouded by other factors by starting to introduce the other type of value.
If you are discussing personal values taken in the material sense, like ash/medium/laurel vs alder/jumbo/maple, nitro vs poly, good luck. I personally find no value in those discussions and only see preference being the dominant contributor. Those are hard to discuss, but people do find value in those, and usually these are the things that are the main drivers for guitar purchases, and companies know this.
Again trying to convert personal value to a dollar value is not easy to do objectively, and like I said is not easy to get a consensus on. You could argue that the extra tooling costs and jig required to machine scallop the finger board costs x amount to do, but some of that was a one time upfront investment cost. And it’s all in the value someone finds in it.
Same thing with nitro finishes. Some people will die on that hill. I personally despise them, so I find no personal value in them or any added steps required to apply them.
At least for me, the difference between a guitar of great value and just paying a premium to get exactly the features I want is pretty clear.
For instance, I find a lot of value in those 600-700-dollar Yamaha guitars that come with locking tuners, Duncan pickups and a Wilkinson bridge, and they usually play fantastic.
In contrast, my Richie Kotzen signature Tele, while a fantastic and beautiful guitar, features comparable hardware, electronics and construction for 2-3 times the price of the Yamaha but I am ok with that because I’m a Kotzen enthusiast.
In my mind, emotional value is kind of a different thing.
There’s at least a reasonably objective “bang for your buck” component to value, where you can look at the level of workmanship, the relative cost of some of the inputs (is one material cheaper or easier to work with than another), and that kind of stuff, and - regardless of if it’s the right guitar for you - at least be able to look at it and say “there’s good value in this guitar if you happen to get on with the features.”
Then there’s a much more subjective component where it’s more “does this guitar check all of MY boxes,” and I hate to sue words like “value” here because that’s an inherently relative metric, how any one guitar stacks up the the range of possible others… but it certainly can work in terms of preference. I guess as an example for me, I won’t buy anything that doesn’t at LEAST have medium jumbo frets, and at least a 10" radius or something like a 9-12" multiradius, because small frets and round radiuses don’t work for me since I like reasonably low action and the ability to really “grip” a string to do big bends without choking. But I wouldn’t describe that in terms of “value,” because it’s not like a 16" radius neck is more expensive to make than a 7.5" neck, or (in any meaningful sense, beyond maybe a couple pennies on the dollar since I guess jumbos are a little more material than vintage) jumbo frets are more expensive to install than vintage fretwire. If someone asked me if a Fender Custom Shop guitar built to 1958 specs was “a good value,” I would never say something like “oh, hard pass, that thing comes with a 7.5” radius neck and tiny frets, you’re getting ripped off, this Ibanez J Custom with jumbo frets and a 16" radius neck is a way better value." Because, well, they’re not really comparable instruments, and their specs have very little to do with their price.
I’m not sure it’s fair to talk about “value” in the objective, arms-length sense of the term, when what you’re really talking about is personal preference. That’s the thinking behind my first post in this thread.
Well you would hope, but reason doesn’t always prevail unfortunately. I’m likely not the best person to ask though. My only metrics for value are: reasonable action, reasonable pickups, frets don’t cut up the sides of my fingers and are leveled enough. Those three things are checked, the “suck” knob is probably not going to be automatically set to “10”, and I can reasonably assume I will likely play to the best of ability on it - it’s a good value.
I think it really is slightly more nuanced than purely preference driven subjectiveness because there certainly is advertising manipulation involved or maybe better yet an anecdotal based positive feedback loop that seems to feed itself. Some of it is emotional, some is tradition, most a dodgy and speculative value system that was established long ago. One example we talked about is paying a premium for a nitro finish. Nitro is not a good finish by any objective standards. Its time consuming to apply, It takes forever - sometimes tens of years - to fully dry, and by the time it does it cracks all over the place because it hates being on organic material subject to expanding and contracting, and looks like it has been sitting in some Keno or bingo hall with a bunch of middle aged and elderly people chain smoking Pall Malls all day. It’s like the dad’s track suit of finishes (though I admit that’s an inside joke to me that none of you will understand) Not to mention it becomes a sticky, gloopy mess on the back of a neck when you hand starts to wear it away. It was used because that’s what was available, not because it was the best of the best. Most companies ditched it for polyurethane and then polyester as soon as those were available, which are objectively better finishes that dry harder and faster, retain their clarity, and can be made thin, and take less time to apply and apply uniformly. But now nitro is a premium option, and you will see people claim up and down it’s because it makes the instrument sound and breathe better and is just better because that’s what the old instruments used and everything that was done and used back then was the best of the best. Companies latch on to this and it becomes a vicious cycle. Gibson still uses it due to market pressure, but chemically alters it, and I’m sure people complain about that. These things all go into the valuation or appraisal of the product in that usage of the term “value”. I don’t personally agree with it, but just because I don’t, doesn’t mean I can close my eyes and it will suddenly cease to exist. I just pinch my nose and look on.
Well that’s even a third layer to “value”. That’s people paying thousands and thousands for franky replicas type of value which at the end of the day was an fugly parts caster with its face chiseled out and spray painted with bicycle paint. It’s certainly valuable, certainly emotional, sentimental and even has or can have a para-social component to it, and there is some creep into the other types of “values” discussed (I think the YJM instruction to fender discussed in a thread earlier may be a small example of this creep). This is the extreme type of value that you cannot really rationally appraise purely by the sum of its raw parts. That’s a completely different ball game altogether.
I think nitro is probably a great example of “preference” vs “value,” actually. I’m not sure if it’s harder to produce or apply than a poly finish, but it’s something there are people out there who just like it, because of the way it wears over time. There are others, like, you, who don’t. I think all of my guitars are poly, though I suppose I’d have to check the spec sheets of my Suhrs - it wasn’t even on my radar when I ordered them, thouhg.
But, when you talk about action, pickups, and fret finishing… those three are all a direct result of quality of workmanship and I think workmanship relative to price IS a good way of thinking about value.
I have my own horse in this race… but turn of the century, you could get an American Standard Strat for $999 in a solid finish or $1099 in a trans finish, and QC was generally pretty consistent from guitar to guitar. Or, you could get a comparable American made Les Paul for, what, $2500-3000, and QC was NOT as good as what was coming out of Fender, for close to triple the price.
Gibson’s QC has definitely picked up since then, ironically since the private equity takeover so chalk one up for the bloodthirsty financiers, but back then… Fender was a far better value than Gibson if you wanted a “traditional” American made electric guitar.
All words have different meanings in the dictionary, and can mean a lot of different things. That doesn’t stop us from using them to have meaningful conversations, and certainly doesn’t make any of us fools.
Well on top of that both factories were known to borrow parts from each other for sometime.
There are also some… umm… other connotations kind of alluded to I guess.
Well not useless, it has its purpose, but the dictionary definitions do encompass more than just those two, and encompass everything we have been talking about. I would say since it does encompass everything discussed in its multiple uses and definition, it’s the most apt word here. It simplifies everything to one word, but you just have to translate it based on context. It’s really kind of just a matter of it’s inflection. (Yes I know I’m being figurative on purpose with inflection and making a subtle tonal reference since we are all musicians here. Of course we are reading it, and figurative contexts in general are sure to confuse the hell out of any non-native speaker, even including native ones from different areas. it’s really the implied use case that queues the meaning in context).
And you are exactly correct on the valuation part. That is an aspect of this whole discussion! And even the valuation context implies different things, and isn’t too removed from the utility definitions either.
Back in the day (man I feel old), a Standard Strat would be 21 frets and a 6-point trem, and an American Standard would be 22 frets and a 2-point. This is 100% preference more than a “value” assessment, and if you were compairing same-spec American-made guitars with 21 fret necks and 6 point trem, especially towards the end of the Standard/American Standard models, the Standards were awfully well-made guitars for the money. But, for me, I wanted 22 frets, and I DO think 2-point trems are more stable (certainly, easier to set up to float smoothly) and it’s a spec I prefer.
Now that you have Mexican-made Strats with 2-point trems and 22 frets, though… Yeah, I wouldn;t hesitate to buy one. I’d probably still want to play before you buy, though again Fender’s QC was ridiculously good back in the mid-teens in my experience, so I probably would be confident in rolling the dice on a Mexican Strat.
Ensinada is a fucking awesome part of mexico, too - I’ve spent a lot of time in the Guadalupe Valley, and we’ve had enough time to get to know that area well enough that we’ve started asking bartenders and waiters for recommendations for their favorite places… and so many of them rave about spots down there, that our next time in the area we’re going to spend a couple days there as well.
I have a MIM strat made in that time period. Fine guitar. It’s pretty heavy for what it is. The only thing I don’t like about it, and part of my bang for the buck preferences, is that the fret tangs are not recessed cut, and the fingerboard is super susceptible to sprout due to the weather conditions. I typically always prefer trimmed tangs, and a lot of companies at the time like Ibanez and others were offering that as standard on their budget friendly instruments.
Maybe a vintage spec choice with the 21 fret neck, but honestly I feel that one thing that can stay in the past.
Do you file the edges when fret sprout happens? I mean, when one of my guitars does that, it’s only taken a little filing once to get rid of the problem for good.
I do, and round them, but because of where my guitars are and the the extremes Massachusetts goes through, it does sometimes show itself more than once.
Honestly it’s not a huge deal for companies to recess cut the fret tangs so I’m kind of at a loss why fender couldn’t seeing as the rest of the guitar is on point, and even their budget MIC Jackson models do. The cheapest $100 ibanez does it. It likely is a traditional choice. I have a 1988 MIA YJM (yeah it has the shitty nitro, and it went from sonic blue to a puke green) and that guitar also has the tang to the end of the finger board.
Do they do it on their American guitars? I can check my Am Standard/Deluxe mutt and see what the neck looks like, but on my old Am. Std. the frets were replaced years ago so I don’t remember.
It’s not too hard to dress them yourself, I’ve since learned, at least, though that guitar didn’t have any fret sprout problems.
And yeah, some people love 21 fret necks. I generally prefer 22, but I suppose I could get on board with a 21 fret neck now that I’m used to having a couple guitars with different specs and different purposes around. Back in the day, with my Strat being my only guitar, I wanted the extra range so I could at least have a manageable bend to a high E.
Back in the day, that extra fret implied an additional $400-500 premium with Fender. That kind of made me learn to appreciate playing in Gm, where I don’t really feel the need for that bend at the 22nd fret to reach the high E.
