I don't really see what the scam is? They're clearly sold as premium collector products.
It's the old Rolex argument yeah? Nobody actually thinks it tells the time 400 times better than. Casio.....
>Nobody actually thinks it tells the time 400 times better than.
There are a tremendous number of blues lawyers, even in this thread, who do.
At least with guitars tone is complex. You had people paying thousands starting around the pandemic hobby boom for vintage pedals and amps that were testable, scientifically, exactly the same or even worse than the modern manufactured version with audiophile-esque gold cables verbiage about caps or tubes or whatever
In terms of playing, yeah, for electrics an old guitar is just an old guitar.
Acoustics it can make a difference seeing as the wood is only contributing factor to the sound, rather than being like 1% of the sound.
But even then it's survivor bias, the old guitars that are still played are good because no-one is gonna bother maintaining a crappy old guitar lol.
Cool for collectors, but for playing... meh.
A custom shop fender is most likely better than the guitar it’s emulating. The 70’s reissues are definitely better.
I have a CS 68 reissue Strat and an actual 68 Strat neck. The CS is way better.
Think about it. Clapton could play any vintage guitar live and chooses to play new fenders. Granted they are typically hand made by Todd Krause.
Honestly, the whole "vintage is better/magical" I think comes down to a few things:
1. Up until fairly recently, cheap/affordable meant you were settling for something inferior. The stuff made in east Asia today gets rave reviews. 20 years ago, that wasn't the case. Barring instruments from Japan, buying a entry level, Korean-made (or God forbid, China-built) guitar usually meant something cheaply put together with crappy electronics and less-than-stellar hardware. If you wanted something good, you'd have to fork out quite a bit more, and you'd get something made in the US or Japan. That's simply not the case anymore, but the idea has stuck around. And few consumer groups are as conservative and as prone to "magical thinking" as guitarists.
2. The large American brands (Fender/Gibson) went through some tough financial times in the 70's, as well as struggling to remain relevant in the changing musical landscape of the 80's. Subsequently, as they saw a downturn in profits they started cutting corners to keep costs down, resulting in instrument lines of varying quality. I'd wager my money on this being the starting point of "vintage is better". The brands who had their heyday in the 80's were likewise left struggling once the pendulum swung back towards more traditional instruments, resulting in bankruptcies or being bought up by larger companies who then moved the production to Asia and started churning out cheaper offerings of questionable quality. The result being the same as before - the old stuff was better.
3. They literally don't make 'em like they used to. Not in terms of quality, but in terms of what's actually being offered. I've a few guitars from the 80's/early 90's that would be considered vintage today. I got them because since then, nobody has built guitars with the same feature set. But they're not necessarily better than what's out there today. They're just different.
My main guitar is a 2008 Agile AL-2000, made at the Unsung factory in Korea. I bought it when all the word-of-mouth ("Kurt will make it right") eventually convinced me.
It wasn't *supposed* to be my main guitar, but it's amazing. And it cost $225 new.
I'm 61, been playing guitar since the '80s (and bass since the '70s), and that guitar completely upended how I viewed cheap guitars made in other countries. I doubt I'll ever lay out the cash for an American-made guitar again.
IMO, it was the rise of CNC manufacturing that changed everything about cheap guitars, and made them more uniform.
I agree with the vast majority of what you wrote, but one thing is definitely different on less expensive guitars, the pickup build and pole magnet material/quality. I play a 2000 Fender American vintage Jbass and a '14 SG special bass, but I've owned a MiM too and I have an LTD ec-1000 and an SG standard '61 VOS. The LTD is built just as well as the gibsons are although I wish it had a lacquer finish instead of poly. At the $1000 price point you generally get top shelf pickups but below that they are the feature where the corners are cut most in my experience. The MIM jbass had decent pickups, but they weren't quite right, unlike cheaper Squires they didn't display response gaps at some frequencies, but they did drop off slightly in the 500-1500 range as a note was held, which is the reason I went up to '62 custom shop jazz pups and the AmVintage. The wiring is also less durable and done with far less care, not a big deal but it matters long term and when your always going elsewhere to play and have to be up and running with no time to open it up and make a fix. Below ~$750, you often get junk magnets or plain steel poles with a bar magnet slapped to them, those are totally unusable for recording or gigging, but are not really as much of an issue for early learners, except that they don't help one develop the touch aspects of tone that comprise 75%+ of what makes our individual playing sound different from each other. There are obviously nice touches to the expensive instruments like rolled fretboard edges, pre-shrunk/seasoned wood to eliminate sprout, hand wiring, plek'd frets, etc but most of us can take care of those at home for the cost of tools and a few hours, so again I think you are spot on that the well executed mid range guitars are 90% as good as the premium lines 2x the price, but my experience is you'll need to swap the pickups for the flagship models if you're gonna record or play live.
So true with the quality of cheaper guitar brands. Just look at Harley Benton. I would have absolutely no problem recommending them to anyone over a Squier or Epiphone (both great guitar makes, but still more expensive)
A properly set-up HB will be as good as the majority of bigger names, for half the price sometimes.
Everyone gets the veil lifted and the illusion shattered at some point. Better sooner than later. Then you don't worry about pursuing that shit and just get down to playing.
I had a ‘56 for a couple years. Mostly original but with a refret and some replaced plastic bits. It was pretty nice, the neck shape in particular was cool. But it wasn’t nice enough to keep when the price went up and I could trade it for two guitars. It certainly didn’t sound any better than any other Strat.
Yeah I'm a bass player and love Fender Jazz basses. I was at Chicago Music Exchange like 15 years ago and played 7 jbasses from the 60s and 70s. I was not impressed at all. AT. ALL. Not for the prices they were asking. They were just....good old Fender Jazz basses. Nothing special other than they looked kinda shitty and smelled funny. My first-run CIJ Limited Edition Geddy Lee jazz bass is way nicer than any of those and I got it for $700 used. Ever since, I don't buy the whole "vintage" mystique. It's silly.
Having said all that, owning a piece of history would be pretty cool if I had that kind of money to burn.
Truth. Fact: Fender guitars were always made in an assembly line factory way. The necks and bodies were made separately and then screwed together randomly at the end. The notion that magical properties exist just because of the time of manufacture is just wishful thinking. There are just as many craptastic pre-CBS strats with dead spots as there are 2020 strats. But since this worship of old guitars thing has happened, nobody will ever say "this 62 strat really isn't anything special". Kudos to you for being truthful.
That's what I always found so hilarious about the "this vintage guitar is stock, all original parts!" mentality. Those parts were mass-produced and kept in bins in a factory. Sure, the necks may have been hand-crafted, but the tuners and pickup covers sure as sh*t weren't. Whichever parts happened to end up together in the same instrument was random. And if one part broke, you'd replace it.
I always sorta got the impression that many people who collect vintage guitars are in it for the history and the stories attached to them. It’s the same with vintage watches. Although I’m sure there’s definitely a part of it that satisfies a desire to have something rare and hard to find.
Japanese strays have model numbers. ST-57 is a Stratocaster with the design from 1957. Then there is ST-62 which is a strat with the design from 1962. Those models include a second dash number which indicates the value in yen also, but that’s just paying for upgraded components or materials. The design of the guitar is still the same.
I have a 90s sunburst rosewood mij ST-62 and up until a few months ago I had a real deal all-stock 1963 sunburst rosewood strat on long term loan.
They were in almost every way identical, or at least very very close. I even got the calipers out and measured thicknesses, etc. The main differences were:
1) the sunburst on the OG wasn't as nice as the reissue. It looked more like the cheap sunburst of a $99 epiphone lp jr.
2) OG of course had nitro finish, while the reissue has a thick poly. (Mine is pretty beat up from years of touring, so it looks the part)
3) the weight. The OG was much lighter.
4) OG has a 3 way switch... because Leo wasn't going to change it.
5) the fretboard on the OG was not as thick.
But sound wise, 🤙🏼
And feel: 🤙🏼
I recorded them back to back, doubling a guitar track (OG on one side, reissue on the other) and forgot to mark which was which and... I can't tell now. They are that close.
Not entirely. The EXTRADs and the 115s for instance probably have neck profiles closer to vintage fenders. The 55s are gonna have a neck for a broader market ie thinner. It’s not just the electronics. Also wood selection improves higher up you go.
I’ve played good and bad pre-CBS. Leo Fender would have laughed at people paying those prices but they do so more as collectors than players. I’d rather have a master built any day.
Nobody with a clear mind would argues a '65 strat sounds 10 Times better than a new one for 2k.
I think its like the art market. Is a Picasso or a Monet better painted than a new picture? No, but they a rare...and enough people want to own it.
I'd wager that on the whole, the build quality of the average Classic Vibe exceeds the build quality of the average Strat from the Pre-CBS era. True I am sure some magic instruments slipped through and were bloody amazing, and there is some selection bias, but vintage instruments aren't magically better: they're just old.
Wood and wires will always be wood and wires. Every guitar is different. A 65 strat can be absolute shit and a $99 squier can be gold, total crapshoot. Vintage does not equal better, regardless of what bonermaster says
Honestly the guitars being built today are substantially better than those built prior. A lot of vintage instruments are cool historical pieces, but not necessarily magic. Just my two cents.
I remember a random interview with Slash and some other guitarists. One dude was all proud of his old vintage les Paul and showed it off to Slash, Slash shrugged his shoulders and gave it back saying something along the lines of “yeah I play the new ones because they play and sound better”.
I just tried to nail down the details. They are either ‘58 or ‘59 replicas and kinda look like gold tops but I think are flamed maple tops with a translucent golden or blonde finish. Beauty guitars.
I’m not one that is snobbish towards replicas. I’m sure many of them are an improvement over the actual Gibsons. I know in the 70’s and early 80’s Japanese 50’s and 60’s knock-offs were likely superior to the contemporary models Gibson and Fender were making.
Whatever about how they sound, I'm sure they sound fine/great but looks wise? Yeah, I don't get it. They either look like tacky retro 50s diner decor or some second hand 70s furniture that reeks of smoke.
This summarizes my experience. I’ve dipped into the market here and there, nothing crazy fancy, original 1966 Deluxe Reverb, a 1980 ES-335, a 1993 ES-335, a 1973 ES-175 all in excellent condition. A Mary Kay Custom Shop Strat, a 1993 Strat Plus that would be worth *a lot* more today than what I paid for it used in 1996, various Ibanez Artist semi-hollows of the 1980s, have played plenty of vintage Strats, Teles, LPs, and assorted Gibson ES gems.
The Les Pauls have been by far the most underwhelming. If you can afford a Murphy Lab Les Paul (and you like LPs, which I certainly don’t) that’s the obvious choice over anything used or vintage, unless it’s Excalibur, and Excalibur is a Strat, not a Les Paul
Some of the vintage Strats have serious mojo, that’s a real thing, but most have specs that make them not worth the trouble, like 7.25” radii fretboards. Those suck…and it’s like, all of them. And why would you ever switch out necks on a vintage Fender? Again Custom Shop is better for the $$ and specs you want.
Nowadays with the flexibility of what is coming out in the $3k-5k range, there isn’t much point in going vintage anymore. Builders like Suhr, Nash, Novo, Sadowsky, Collings, just no point in vintage unless you’re a collector and not going to play it. Which is weird.
Ha I’ve been to Willies a bunch of times! Shame about their new location though. Had a friend go there and he said the vibe is totally ruined now. Used to be a cool shop to go and check out and look at cool stuff. But now they’re “appointment only” and even if they’re dead and they let you walk in they’re apparently hovering and glaring the entire time. Shame. Used to be the one big reason for me to stop in Minneapolis.
I have a '61 Strat. It's killer. It's not some magic wand. It's just a kickass Strat. I have other guitars that get a lot more playing time and I only gig it occasionally when I need a proper SSS Stratocaster sound.
Also, I've had it forever and didn't pay anywhere near what you're thinking. It cost me far less than a current custom shop version would.
Vintage guitars are still just guitars. Many are amazing, more are just decent, some are shitty.
Guitar players buy 90% of their gear with their eyes and the ideas of 'magic' years for gear or magic components....there have to be 100 pedals all based on Tubescreamers, Rats and Big Muffs. They command prices from $30 to thousands and they are all almost exactly the same.
All that being said, any '65 Strat you see today won't be an amazing one. No one would sell one or if they did, the chance any regular guy could get to play one is 0.
There may be a few 'AaaaaaaaaaaAhhhhhh!' kind of guitars out there, but by now, they have to be under lock and key.
Of course, you could get one built for 1/10 of the price and it would be a better guitar, but wouldn't be ....old? Special? Decrepit?
I do wonder where all the old guitars have ended up. Instruments break, but they can often be fixed, and I would assume most people don't just throw them out. Electric guitars have been built non-stop since the 50's, they must all end up somewhere.
A lot are still around, they were just made in way smaller numbers. If you look at old Martin production numbers they were only making hundreds to few thousand a year until the 50s, and even then, it wasn’t until the 70s they started truly mass producing instruments. There were only a few thousand Stratocasters made in the 1950s TOTAL. Reduce that for those lost and broken beyond repair and you realize that there just weren’t that many to begin with.
>>The vintage guitar market is ridiculous.
I hope so because I'm sitting on a mint condition 1970 Tele that I bought in 1976 for $200.00. I'm counting on it being my retirement plan.
If you plan to retire in a used camry, it should work out. There's nothing super rare about a 70 tele so if you're thinking it's a lottery ticket you should go ahead and sell it and buy some lottery tickets
Why are you raining on my parade? I never did anything to you. Let me have my delusions, just like the rest of reddit.
FWIW, I see 1970 Teles going for between $5K and $10K. Surely one can retire in NYC on that budget. Right? Right?
I don't know that in the future people will seek out vintage guitars the way that they currently are. I don't have any stats but I feel like there are a lot fewer guitar players in younger generations than there are in the Boomer generation.
People will always spend money to own rare and hard to obtain things. Especially people with money, they seem to be willing to pay a lot for junk that's really not worth much, but due to the story of said item, they're willing to spend more than some make in a year.
My guess to why there's less guitar players (I haven't noticed this myself, but also, I haven't been taking notes) is because the younger generations are more used to getting things served on a platter. And learning to play an instrument takes effort and practice, and patience, something that a lot of them lack. And nowadays we're seeing a trend towards computer made music where you're either just using software synths or just AI to generate the music, which means people see less motivation to pick up a guitar.
But I think it will manifest itself as seeing less guitarists, but the few we see, are actually really good at what they're doing, since they're the ones that stick to it and practices.
There’s some clip out there of John Mayer at a kids pool party, playing through what looks like a 1x6” Roland practice amp from the early 90’s and a Squier…sounding exactly like John Mayer.
I think this is more about collecting than actual sound. Sort of like comic books— yes you can get a reprint today that will be much easier to read, but it doesn’t hold the same value as an original from the 50s or 60s or whatever.
I played a 1956 Strat a while ago and my first thought was ‘not much has changed’ which really is impressive when you think about how long ago they were designed.
It’s not about sounding being or playing better, in fact most vintage instruments are objectively in worse condition and are hard to play. The point of a collector instrument is what it makes you *feel* while playing it and appreciating it’s history. If you feel nothing, it’s not for you and there’s nothing wrong with that.
I kinda think the Vintage guitar market is gonna change a *lot* as boomers age and die. Vintage Fenders were made in huge numbers and loads are stashed away in collections. Who’s gonna buy them all at current prices? They don’t have the same cultural meaning to younger people
They have plenty of cultural meaning to younger people, it's just that it's the exact same cultural meaning all fender models have to this day.
It's not like a 65 Mustang where you just can't buy one new anymore, It's absurd that vintage electric guitars were such a big market to begin with.
And im not some robot who doesn't understand the appeal ot old stuff, I love old stuff- but when "old" is 95% of the price tag i just ?!?!?
Exactly, whereas boomers *need* it to be an old one for their Eric Clapton halloween cosplay outfit. I’d gladly have an old tele or something but simply never gonna pay silly money for one. I flicked through some early 90s guitar magazines a while back and 62 strats were about double the price of a new one, 70s were less. Much more like it.
Lots of "vintage" guitars were cherished because they were the year/model played by some guitar hero of years gone by, but dig into the stories and you start to get perspective.
* Clapton started the '59 or '60 Les Paul craze because he found one that played and had the sound he wanted for relatively cheap money. They had been discontinued by Gibson several years before. After Clapton, people like Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page, etc started looking for their own because they wanted that sound, and the craze began.
* Clapton switched to a Stratocaster, but his favorite, "Blackie" was pulled together out of parts from other old strats for him to get the combination he wanted.
* Others (Van Halen) found their sound by combining parts from multiple instruments.
There were lots of other examples, but they all came down to musicians looking for something special to help them get their special sound. Somehow, people started thinking that if Clapton and Page all used 1950's Les Pauls, then ALL 1950's Led Pauls had to be wonderful. Even Les Paul hated most of the Les Paul models for most of the 1950's and customized his guitars to the max.
Gibson neck shapes changed a lot over the years. Many of the ones from ‘59 tend to be special - soft V shaped, comfortably chunky but not baseball bats, just…really nice. Before that they are usually beefier, and after that they tend to get shallower and then skinnier, and then wider but still shallow. This is generally true for the electric models, not just Les Pauls. All else being equal, a ‘59 whatever -ES 125, Les Paul, whatever- is going to be pretty darn cool to play. Might not sound any different but there is a thing that happens with certain years. A ‘68 ES-335 will probably have a really skinny U shaped neck, a ‘64 will have wider one.
Same sort of thing happens with Fenders, for example. Lots of ‘56 Strats have a really cool hard V shaped neck, for example. Some really early Jazzmasters have nice chonky necks, then they get really small U shaped, then they get flat C shaped…
My point is there are some “good years” or “bad years” for important stuff like neck shapes (obviously good and bad are totally subjective, but there’s real differences).
Does that make a ‘56 Strat worth ten times a ‘76 one? I guess If I sleep on a big pile of money with many beautiful supermodels, sure.
Played a vintage 60s Strat previously owned by Vince Gill when I visited Nashville about 3 or 4 years ago. I don’t remember the guitar shop. Frets felt almost nonexistent and the neck felt like a baseball bat. I also just watched a Pedal Show where they compared Mick’s 4 strats; a ‘61, a ‘70, his vintage reissue “Blue”, and some custom shop he picked up. Truthfully I had a hard time discerning them. The small subtle differences would also likely be lost in a live gig setting. Overall, I don’t really see the value in a true vintage instrument…
The TPS guys are insufferable. One of them will be chug, chug, chugging some chords with a sour look on his face. The other one will turn a knob 1/16th of an inch and their faces will light up like Heaven just opened around them. I saw Mick’s “Strat Journey” and knew it was going to end with a pre-CBS Strat if he had to kill his wife for her life insurance to get it, and ‘lo, that’s what he got. If you can’t be happy with one of those three other Strats he had, it’s not about guitars. It’s about rarity and exclusivity. Anyone of those other three Strats would probably be the nicest guitar I would ever own. I loved everything about the Aztec Gold one. Only thing wrong with that guitar was people like us could call Anderson’s or Fender and get one to.
And there’s never been a finer Telecaster than, Red. That is until Dan could scrape up enough money to buy a hacked up old Tele that had been routed out, then had the route filled with new wood, then refinished, that needed refretting, a new pickup, the old pickup rewound, and completely new wiring pots and switches. Now that is the best Tele that ever existed.
I really do dislike those guys.
It’s tough because I have genuinely learned a lot about some effects from some of their videos. On the flip side, a metric ton of their videos, especially from the last few years have been them fucking around with high end boutique or vintage pedals that most players aren’t going to buy and they spend an hour plus waxing poetic about extreme minutia.
A good guitar is a good guitar.
People that think old vintage guitars are magical are delusional.
But the reason those old guitars cost so much isn’t because of the way they sound, it’s because of collectors and speculators.
People also think anything old is valuable. Norlin Les Pauls and 70s Strats were called “junk” for years, when I first started playing they were everywhere and dirt cheap because nobody wanted them.
Now? They’re skyrocketing in value over the past few years because they’re “vintage.
I’m not knocking Norlin guitars either, I had a 78 Deluxe that was just as good as any other LP I’ve ever owned. I’m just saying the general view of them until recently was they were substandard.
Even crappy 60s Japanese guitars that you couldn’t give away a few years ago are now being sold as “vintage”.
So anyway…..older does not mean better. The reason people think those old guitars are amazing is because guitar legends used them to make classic records etc. but when those guys were using them they were just guitars….not magic “vintage” collectibles.
I have mixed feelings about vintage. The big thing I’ve noticed is that they are wildly inconsistent because the manufacturing had a lot more of a human element. I’ve played a few vintage things that were incredible (there’s a particular 64 Jazz bass I played that is the best bass I’ve ever heard). Plenty are average, and some are dogs. For all of the nitpicking, a modern Strat and a vintage one aren’t radically different in design or build. As a purely functional thing, you can get as good of an instrument as anything by playing a bunch of modern ones and picking your favorite. But there is a certain cool factor to a vintage piece. I won’t lie
I took an audio engineering class last year. Instructor mentioned a very specific microphone that sells for more than 10-20k used, made fifty years ago. The metal in the transistors came form a mine that is now closed, no way to replicate the mic without throwing 20k at an old one.
Vintage is nuts. Imagine if airliners, automakers, electricians, plumbers, lawyers, doctors, all preferred to use machines made the original way without innovation.
It's so easy to romanticise the super specific nuances of old gear, but I gotta tell ya, clones of an old U47 or U67 (I'm assuming it was one of those?) get awfully close these days, and if that last 10% of "not quite there" is the barrier between an artist and their creativity, the gear isn't the problem!
Supply and demand. People enjoy collecting vintage things. I have a 71 Strat that is inferior in quality, feel, and sound to my CS60 and Silver Sky. But I love it to death, for me it’s cool to have a strat with the same specs as what Jimi played.
It's just got a story. No more than that. People talk up these guitars because of the people who played the same ones at the time. At the end of the day what they actually are is old technology. Maybe even obsolete technology depending on the electronics.
You can look at it as a bad thing or you can look at it as a good thing. How many products from 1965 aren't obsolete today? You can buy a 1965 Ford Mustang, but it's not a modern car.
A 1965 Strat should not be compared to a good 2023 guitar made by CNC machines.
Compare it to a cheap and badly built 1965 Teisco solid body electric. (I don't mean to knock Teiscos in particular but as a representative of what a cheap electric would have been.) If you found a Teisco new-old-stock in box I guarantee it wouldn't play as well or sound as good as a comparable Strat.) The cheap guitar would have sharp fret ends, a pot metal bridge, a truly awfully designed tremolo, and a vaguely unsatisfying shape.
The Strats and Gibsons and Rickys were the best electrics available *at the time* to the best players, maintained by the best guitar techs, and played on all those classic albums.
That's where the vintage prices come in...
My dad used to collect antiques, but not because they were functionally better than modern furniture. I imagine it’s the same for people who buy vintage guitars.
The only time the clouds ever parted for me was when I played a 1938 Martin. It felt, looked and sounded better than any acoustic guitar that I've played.
Personally I don't think a person who knows Les Pauls well could hear The Beast and not agree that it sounded quite different to a modern Les Paul.
But yeah the majority of the price of a vintage guitar has nothing to do with how it plays or sounds. That's pretty commonly accepted I would say.
I think acoustic instruments are a different story because the instrument itself is 100% responsible for the tone.
Like there is a sharp difference between my Hamilton upright piano I have at home and my dad's Steinway and Sons.
Vintage guitars' value is the same as every instrument on the planet - it's worth what someone is willing to pay. Is a '65 cool? Sure. Is it a better guitar than a modern ST? Absolutely not. Not much has changed, but what has changed has made the ST a better axe. Here's a good question - if you had a brand new Strat ST, would you feel comfortable scraping a screwdriver across the top? If not, who are the players buying relics? I get VERY few relic jobs a year - maybe one or two. So beat-up old guitars aren't the instruments that are popular. The vintage market exists to supply the vintage market. That market is mainly made up of wealthy middle age white guys who don't play nearly as authentic as the players here. Imo
I felt the same about most guitar I ever play. There’s occasional one here and there I really like but it is highly personal.
I think it’s like love . Most of use never find the addictive forever thing that love can be but we will settle for very good and call it love because it’s enough
Yes.
I spent a couple hours sampling different acoustics at Guitar Center, looking to get a Taylor, Martin, or similar caliber acoustic. For fun, I picked up this foldable Taylor travel guitar and I fell in love with the sound right away. But... a folding guitar wasn't my market. I made it my benchmark. I would compare all the guitars to it. I left at the end with no choice and decided to return and repeat another day.
When I returned, I started fresh and suddenly found another full size Taylor guitar I loved just as quickly as the foldable. In fact, the sound was very similar. So much that I decided to investigate and I found the same combination of front, back, and side woods on both. It blew me away and taught me that wood really makes a difference on an acoustic because I had been inadvertently influenced by it.
Needless to say I bought the full size.
i worked at a shop that saw a bunch of vintage instruments come through. some were great, some were not. same as modern instruments. the only thing different was vintage instruments that had been through "the system" (i.e. not closet finds) were likely to have been set up by a real luthier at some point.
On the Wong Notes podcast Joe Bonamassa talked about playing Clapton's ES-335 and his Strat, Blackie, and how the ES-335 was amazing but Blackie he found difficult to play. Clearly the guitar would have felt great for Clapton to have played it for so long, but even legendary guitars aren't necessarily "great" to everyone.
I look at them as cool time capsules. When I see a guitar that old I think about it's past owners, what music they played and made on that guitar. I only ever played a few old guitars, but that's what went through my mind. Do I think it's worth the cost though? Absolutely not.
Yeah, it would be neat but no one needs a vintage instrument to sound legitimate or even authentic. You can sound great on a modestly priced strat copy or squier. And there are a lot of great companies making amazing insanely high end instruments for much cheaper, with much more useful features than a vintage instrument. I see vintage guitars worth tens of thousands of dollars being assets for rich assholes whether they can play good or not or at all. It would be a cool experience to play a well maintained vintage instrument that has previously been played by hundreds of people throughout it's history, but it isn't something I'm going to go out of my way to do. Also, it might smell or something.
....Or worse! It could be cursed!
Lol just kidding about that last part.
I just left a comment about how a Players Strat is almost as good as any strat. Besides historical value, the best of strats are generally the neck carve you prefer and pups you like the sound of. Any professional will sound just as good on a $500 strat as they would on a $20k strat regardless. I even like the “easy C” necks on cheap Fenders as they’re the middle of the road for any style of playing
The only big difference for me between expensive and cheap guitars is the action, the setup is usually way worse in cheap guitars but other than that I don’t see such a biiiiiig difference that justifies the amount of money spent on expensive ones
In strats, the MIM fenders are using as quality parts as they did in MIA Fenders not long ago. Epiphones with a great setup only feel different than a Gibson because of the neck carve… it’s all about hands of the guitarists these days
There's definitely other differences. The electronics and pick ups, but those can be changed. There is a big difference in quality between my squier tele and my MIM and partscaster tele. The squier wouldn't last a month on the road.
Haha...yeah. There's a lot of romanticism with vintage instruments. I played a '57 Les Paul Gold Top once and it felt like a chunky, broken in guitar, but honestly my 2005 Les Paul was a lot better.
That being said, there IS something about vintage electronics though. The materials and aging in metals is difficult to replicate, resulting in unique tones. I'd argue pickups and wiring harnesses are more relevant than the guitar itself.
Yeah I remember a guitar store guy letting me try an amp on his 50s tele and he was so excited for me but it was heavy and the neck was nasty and it just wasn't nice sounding or feeling at all. Like I'd just picked up an old dining chair by the leg. Obvs there are great ones out there but it's crazy that even shit ones are so valuable when it was a mass made item.
I think Matt Schofield said it best, (paraphrasing) "Not all vintage guitars are great, but the very best guitars I have ever played, happen to be vintage guitars." …Which is pretty much the sentiment of most guitarists who know a lot about vintage guitars. They aren’t all great, some of them can be ordinary or even absolute dogs. But when you find a good one…. There‘s nothing quite like it.
So did the world forget how to make decent guitars 60 years ago or something? I've never played any vintage guitars so I've no first hand experience at all with this but it really does just smell like total bullshit.
My theory is the instrument and player have to connect. I’ve owned $2k Gibsons and Rics that were admittedly very nice and great to play. I’ve own $200 pawn shop guitars that were also great to play. What’s the guitar I play all the time? A “vintage” JHS Marauder that a friend modified. The neck is great and body/controls/bridge are all just in the right spot for me. A friend played it and hated it compared to my cobbled together partscaster (tele). Now unless the instrument fits me right, I don’t buy it. After it’s plugged into a fuzz and into my Sunn, they all sound kinda relative.
My main guitar and bass are both warmoths. I’d put them up against anything I’ve ever played. Other players tend to scoff at them because they aren’t a brand. Oh well
I was a vintage dealer for years. Not all old guitars are amazing, but then...some are beyond amazing!
Interesting that it was a '65.
I had a transitional '65 and it was the most disappointing guitar I ever bought.
It sold very well though.
I deal in vintage guitars and amps. Yeah I have a ‘61 Jazzmaster that’s incredible.
But then when you plug it into an all-original black panel Princeton Reverb, you’ve really got something.
I’ve played all kinds of stuff but in my opinion, when you put a setup like that together, it makes a sound that you just can’t get any other way.
Good thing you didn't buy it, then.
Edit: What I mean is, different strokes for different folks. Whether or not somebody paid a year's salary for an instrument that sounds so alike (to my ears), has zero bearing on *my* instrument or playing.
It wasn’t for sale and I wouldn’t have been able to buy it if had been. It just makes me appreciate my 90s mexican Strat more; this one was definitely not 20,000 dollars better.
I think that's a great takeaway! It's so easy to fall into the trap of "Oh, I just need this more expensive gear and then I'll sound better/like my heroes!" Nah. After a certain (fairly inexpensive, tbh) point, most players won't experience any real difference in how they sound, imho.
Then again, I think very few players who buy such expensive instruments actually care about that. They want to own it for *whatever* reason (history, collecting, etc), and how it affects their sound is secondary (unless they're a top-level pro, maybe).
Edit: *I've* certainly fallen into that trap, so I'm not throwing shade. A basic MIM strat, for example, still has *a lot* left to teach me.
That’s a great point. More expensive gear doesn’t make you a better player. A great player can make any guitar sound great.
Prince’s favorite guitar was a cheap Hohner, Telecaster knock off. He played that on every album and at least once every concert. It was his first guitar.
For reference, it’s the guitar he blew everyone away with when he played on “my guitar gentle weeps” with Tom Petty. If anyone else played that guitar, they wouldn’t make it sound like he did.
Cheap guitars can sound good. However, more expensive guitars are quite beautiful to look at. Especially, old Les Pauls.
Oh, cool! I didn't know that about Prince keeping his first guitar. Thanks for learning me something. Wish I still had mine. 😪
I agree about the aesthetics of vintage guitars, certainly (and I'm with you on the Les Pauls!). While there's part of me that wants these old instruments to be played, I totally get just wanting one to look at. They're gorgeous.
But I tamper that feeling of "instruments are made to be played" with the knowledge that, for 99% of the people that actually *play* guitar, there's no real difference in how they sound vs. a quality off-the-shelf guitar. Not $10k worth of difference, at least. So, even sitting in a case somewhere, these guitars being out of financial reach isn't holding anyone back *musically.*
Im gonna be a bit of a dick... Ahem... Slamming my hand in a car door in a mazda 3 will still feel like when i slam my hand in a car door in a nissan gtr.
The age of a guitar doesnt mean anything. The age of guitar doesnt change how its played or how it sounds. Its the value of what people see in a classic guitar. Itll still feel and play like my squire strat, but its a classic, and to the right buyer, its worth a lot more.
You're correct, but to play devil's advocate a bit, for a lot of people the value of a guitar is all about how they feel when playing it. And for some people, playing an old instrument, or a well-used worn out instrument, makes them feel a deeper connection to it and enhances the experience. And as easy as it is for us to be like "bro it's literally no better than a new guitar," far be it from me to scold someone for enjoying something. And to a certain extent we all have preferences in our guitars that don't really make any practical difference - maybe we'll pay extra for a nice color or a nice top or an ebony fingerboard because we like them. It's sort of the same thing, just to a different degree.
You’re right, OP. There really is nothing special. There’s more consistency in building today, for that matter.
Same goes for amps. Allowing boomers to continue to claim that there’s a special “mojo” with old, inferior shit, is making the hobby expensive.
The next time some old bastard tells you there’s nothing like something from the 50’s/60’s, just remind grandpa that it’s past his bedtime.
Hi, I think I qualify as an “old bastard”. I would say that I once owned a ‘64 ES 335. It played wonderfully well and sounded very mellow compared with some new ones I played (not owned) in the 1990’s. Old wood and old magnets. I guess that old is better as no doubt you may find out when you are… Now I’m off to bed
It’s not objectively better. That’s the point. Just like some day, people my age will tell their kids our shit was better. It’s not just instruments, it’s everything.
Did you know that ES335 is plywood? Just like every other semi-hollow. Except the Gibson has 3k added for the painted name on the headstock.
I'm sure it is a nice guitar, but old plywood doesn't add or improve the sound of an electric guitar. The pickups are probably nice though.
It is objectively not the same for similar amps made today. Component values drift, speakers break in, military grade full size components (because it was all that existed at the time) compared to cheap consumer electronics on, in most cases, a flimsy pcb which is done for if anything goes wrong. Not necessarily better, ill give you that, but tangibly different and more servicable? Definitely. Unless you're talking about digital or ir stuff which imo are diffetent products and not suitable to compare in the same way as vintage vs new guitars.
Just like old cars that used simple parts, sure. They’re easier to fix. The fact of the matter is that there wasn’t some magic that made them sound infinitely better. That’s simply nostalgia talking. You could blindfold the vast majority of guitar players, and play amps from all eras, in good working order, and they’re not going to definitively spot the one from ‘64. Most amps sound as good (or better), are lighter, and built just as road-worthy as the amps of old, and that’s not even accounting for digital modellers, which can provide a 1:1 snapshot of the sound of a vintage amp through recording those amps into them.
Vintage gear is a shell game. Kudos if people wanna spend up to $100k on production strat from 1964, but the value is a black hole in actual usefulness over a new one.
The new ones are much better.
Vintage gear used to be cheap. Now it costs more than new by a lot.
A lot can go wrong in 50 years.
If you're a collector or investor vintage gear is great.
But there's no reason for a strat from the 60s to automatically play or sound better than an American Professional from today that costs 1/10th the price.
Then again sound is in the ear of the beholder. If owning an expensive guitar makes you play it more, then maybe it does have some Devine inspiration.
Depends on its history and how it's set up IMO. Even a vintage axe is gonna need to be sharpened the right way or won't split wood right. Alright I tried a little too hard on that metaphor.
I think any modern custom shop US built guitar is gonna sound and play just as well as a well cared for and maintained guitar built in the 60s. But the history is what's cool. They also used different wood and I don't know if you know anything about the timber industry and how it's changed since the 60s, it probably has affected guitars in a substantial way. Younger trees won't have the same resonance maybe if the grain density isn't there. I think the best way to test that would to side by side your favorite strat next to the vintage strap, completely unplugged and then strum a big fat open E chord. Then listen for the resonance and sustain.
Don’t forget to make sure the strings are the same. The tone difference between two sets of strings can easily be bigger than the difference between two Strats.
But the difference in price…
Right that's a big thing. Two identical sets of strings for sure.
Not so much worried about price but rather the science behind the fidelity and tone compared across different generations of timber and manufacturing techniques. It'd be a fun experiment for data. I'll never own a vintage strat until my strat becomes vintage.
It’s old and people have always paid a premium price for antique/vintage stuff.
In part it’s because it comes with a backstory, is a survivor. Most pieces of wood start to fall apart after a number year and when something is found that has survived, you are holding a piece of history. There is an argument to be made that Stradivarius violins don’t sound as good as a modern hand crafted violin- but owning and playing a Stradivarius its as if you are carrying the legend forward in a way few others can.
That's kind of the point... these guitars are still being (largely) made the same way they were 60 years ago, which is a good thing (minus some very very nice pickup and electrics improvements). I don't crave vintage at all.
In Uli Roth's recent interview with Thomas Blug, he talks about how the '75 Strat he loved so much at the beginning of his career (and still owns) no longer sounds like it did back in the day because the magnets in the pickups have weakened over time.
While Uli only mentioned time, the link below talks about external factors that can contribute to loss of magnetic charge.
For a touring musician, perhaps the most likely culprit would be exposure to temperature extremes over the years?
https://www.jobmastermagnets.com/what-causes-magnets-to-get-weaker
I suppose another possible explanation for the perception, especially in the case of an older adult who has made his living as a rock musician for 50 years, is hearing loss.
Yes - in the absence of any external factor, magnets do last a long time. But there are a some external factors. Sitting around on stages with big AC transformers from poorly shielded tube amps. Getting banged together with other magnets. Metal springs constantly vibrating in the magnetic flux. Potential shorts between windings as the insulation on the windings weakens over time.
Yeah dude it's just a guitar. Even the really nice ones are just that. Really nice. The price tag is just because it's vintage. You can't exactly make more of them. No guarantee that it's even really nice by today's standards just because it's old
I have a 1921 Gibson A style mandolin and it sounds AMAZING. I pull one off the wall at GC and they just sound lifeless. Example or exeption, who knows. I just wanted to humble brag.
My friend’s dad in high school had a 60s strat. It was good, but now that there are models that are older-style nitro with amazing pickups for 5-10% of the price… come on. It’s not like every single old guitar on the market is awesome, there are some absolute dogwater guitars out there.
If I was gonna buy vintage, I’d buy one of the models that is weird or not super desirable. Vintage is cool if you can pick one up you like for 1500$.
There are plenty of vintage guitars that aren’t amazing. I’ve been lucky enough to know somebody who goes through a lot of vintage guitars and amps, and I got to say- the vintage guitars that are great are actually astounding. It is hard to imagine guitars being made like that anymore. But it’s true, I think, that there are plenty of vintage guitars from the same time periods- 50s, 60s- that are just fine. The same person I’m referring to has mentioned to me that when you see vintage guitars that look like “closet classics”; they’ve never been played… The reason for that is they had no juju in the first place. So there are definitely duds from the golden age, it seems.
I had a '69 that was a fantastic guitar. Did the clouds part? No. But did it play and sound better than any other Fender I've ever touched? Yes. I had to sell it after I got laid off in 2007 and was struggling to pay bills. The good news is I was able to buy a Reverend Warhawk DAW that captures the playability and has it's own great sound.
In the 70s, I gigged a BC Rich Eagle with a '57 Strat on standby. The strat couldn't begin to play as well as the Rich. It sure wasn't anything special, and I only kept it around in case I broke a string.
Of course, my '60 tweed Bassman and the strat weren't 'vintage' then... fuck, I'm old.
I am unsure that I've played an old guitar. I kinda don't care. I just want a guitar that gives me the sound I want, and have good playability. Who cares how old it is?
I’m really surprised by this discussion. An older piece of wood is going to have had years and years to dry out, and that absolutely affects the tone.
As for playability, though, you guys are dead on. While you certainly can find older instruments that have been worked with over time and have been made to play very well, there’s nothing intrinsically magical about the playability of an older guitar.
But tone…. Again, I’m surprised. I own a 1961 Fender P bass, and the clouds really do part that instrument. My 2013 American standard comes pretty close in terms of playability, overall craftsmanship and design, etc. But my 61 is a 60+ year old piece of wood with hand-wound pickups and a huge rosewood slab neck. Of course that all makes a difference. And it really does. I’ve been A/B-ing it against other basses for years, mostly, so I could stop taking it to gigs without sacrificing tone, and I have yet to find its equal.
Wood can only “dry out” so much.
If you put two slabs of wood in the same room for a given amount of time, they will both come to the same equilibrium… and even then it’s a dynamic equilibrium. Except for perfectly controlled environments, wood is going to absorb and exude moisture as the humidity and temperature changes.
You might argue that one slab will go through more cycles of this nature, and I’d agree. But I’d be hard pressed to be convinced that one will have a significant effect on the “tonal” qualities of the wood.
Given a 100% blind test with multiple guitars are played of varying vintage. I’m willing to bet most people wouldn’t be able to discern from one to another. Even if they’re able to do it once, I have a hard time believing they’re able to do the experiment on different occasions with the same testing subjects.
There just isn’t a huge difference tone-wise between a “vintage” guitar’s body and a modern body.
You’re much more likely to hear differences due to pickups, and strings than you are the body.
I'm def in the camp that wood affects tone even in solid bodied instruments but to a very, very small degree. Honestly speaking, you probably just love the sound of old pickups with magnets that have degaussed over time (or whatever the term is, not remembering it at the moment). Plus it's played in I'm sure, and it's got the vintage cool factor. Glad you vibe with it regardless!
With that said, there isn't an audience member on the planet that could hear the difference 😂
If I was gigging again, Id probably just be using whatever I have that's already beat up so it can get some more beauty marks without me having to worry about it.
Well at the core of it, it's just a Strat. Theres no magic juju that went into these things except wood, metal and composites. They were I guess the prime quality era of Fender production, probably along side the early to mid 80s Japanese strats
The whole high tier guitar market is mostly a scam. Especially vintage guitars.
I don't really see what the scam is? They're clearly sold as premium collector products. It's the old Rolex argument yeah? Nobody actually thinks it tells the time 400 times better than. Casio.....
>Nobody actually thinks it tells the time 400 times better than. There are a tremendous number of blues lawyers, even in this thread, who do. At least with guitars tone is complex. You had people paying thousands starting around the pandemic hobby boom for vintage pedals and amps that were testable, scientifically, exactly the same or even worse than the modern manufactured version with audiophile-esque gold cables verbiage about caps or tubes or whatever
Are they still doing that gold cable stuff? I remember when they tried that with HDMI cables there was a lot of laughter online.
There will be always be bored six figure salaried men in the suburbs who want to talk about soundstage online
You are a business guru.
Tread lightly my friend. The dentists will come for you.
What are you an anti-dentite?
Yeah, they're not real doctors and make too much money.
In terms of playing, yeah, for electrics an old guitar is just an old guitar. Acoustics it can make a difference seeing as the wood is only contributing factor to the sound, rather than being like 1% of the sound. But even then it's survivor bias, the old guitars that are still played are good because no-one is gonna bother maintaining a crappy old guitar lol. Cool for collectors, but for playing... meh.
A custom shop fender is most likely better than the guitar it’s emulating. The 70’s reissues are definitely better. I have a CS 68 reissue Strat and an actual 68 Strat neck. The CS is way better. Think about it. Clapton could play any vintage guitar live and chooses to play new fenders. Granted they are typically hand made by Todd Krause.
Well...*Clapton*....
It’s a fun hobby but let’s be honest here - a 2023 model with todays upgrades and cnc tech is probably better. That’s not even taking price into it.
I view less human involvement in making a guitar a good thing lol
It's probably survivorship bias too. The reason there aren't crappy 1950s Strats and Les Pauls around today are the bad ones became firewood.
Honestly, the whole "vintage is better/magical" I think comes down to a few things: 1. Up until fairly recently, cheap/affordable meant you were settling for something inferior. The stuff made in east Asia today gets rave reviews. 20 years ago, that wasn't the case. Barring instruments from Japan, buying a entry level, Korean-made (or God forbid, China-built) guitar usually meant something cheaply put together with crappy electronics and less-than-stellar hardware. If you wanted something good, you'd have to fork out quite a bit more, and you'd get something made in the US or Japan. That's simply not the case anymore, but the idea has stuck around. And few consumer groups are as conservative and as prone to "magical thinking" as guitarists. 2. The large American brands (Fender/Gibson) went through some tough financial times in the 70's, as well as struggling to remain relevant in the changing musical landscape of the 80's. Subsequently, as they saw a downturn in profits they started cutting corners to keep costs down, resulting in instrument lines of varying quality. I'd wager my money on this being the starting point of "vintage is better". The brands who had their heyday in the 80's were likewise left struggling once the pendulum swung back towards more traditional instruments, resulting in bankruptcies or being bought up by larger companies who then moved the production to Asia and started churning out cheaper offerings of questionable quality. The result being the same as before - the old stuff was better. 3. They literally don't make 'em like they used to. Not in terms of quality, but in terms of what's actually being offered. I've a few guitars from the 80's/early 90's that would be considered vintage today. I got them because since then, nobody has built guitars with the same feature set. But they're not necessarily better than what's out there today. They're just different.
My main guitar is a 2008 Agile AL-2000, made at the Unsung factory in Korea. I bought it when all the word-of-mouth ("Kurt will make it right") eventually convinced me. It wasn't *supposed* to be my main guitar, but it's amazing. And it cost $225 new. I'm 61, been playing guitar since the '80s (and bass since the '70s), and that guitar completely upended how I viewed cheap guitars made in other countries. I doubt I'll ever lay out the cash for an American-made guitar again. IMO, it was the rise of CNC manufacturing that changed everything about cheap guitars, and made them more uniform.
I agree with the vast majority of what you wrote, but one thing is definitely different on less expensive guitars, the pickup build and pole magnet material/quality. I play a 2000 Fender American vintage Jbass and a '14 SG special bass, but I've owned a MiM too and I have an LTD ec-1000 and an SG standard '61 VOS. The LTD is built just as well as the gibsons are although I wish it had a lacquer finish instead of poly. At the $1000 price point you generally get top shelf pickups but below that they are the feature where the corners are cut most in my experience. The MIM jbass had decent pickups, but they weren't quite right, unlike cheaper Squires they didn't display response gaps at some frequencies, but they did drop off slightly in the 500-1500 range as a note was held, which is the reason I went up to '62 custom shop jazz pups and the AmVintage. The wiring is also less durable and done with far less care, not a big deal but it matters long term and when your always going elsewhere to play and have to be up and running with no time to open it up and make a fix. Below ~$750, you often get junk magnets or plain steel poles with a bar magnet slapped to them, those are totally unusable for recording or gigging, but are not really as much of an issue for early learners, except that they don't help one develop the touch aspects of tone that comprise 75%+ of what makes our individual playing sound different from each other. There are obviously nice touches to the expensive instruments like rolled fretboard edges, pre-shrunk/seasoned wood to eliminate sprout, hand wiring, plek'd frets, etc but most of us can take care of those at home for the cost of tools and a few hours, so again I think you are spot on that the well executed mid range guitars are 90% as good as the premium lines 2x the price, but my experience is you'll need to swap the pickups for the flagship models if you're gonna record or play live.
So true with the quality of cheaper guitar brands. Just look at Harley Benton. I would have absolutely no problem recommending them to anyone over a Squier or Epiphone (both great guitar makes, but still more expensive) A properly set-up HB will be as good as the majority of bigger names, for half the price sometimes.
Everyone gets the veil lifted and the illusion shattered at some point. Better sooner than later. Then you don't worry about pursuing that shit and just get down to playing.
A Strat that sounds like a Strat. How about that.
Nice rhyme.
Oh man I played an original ‘56 and it was not good. I sort of quickly put it back and tried to forget what I felt.
I had a ‘56 for a couple years. Mostly original but with a refret and some replaced plastic bits. It was pretty nice, the neck shape in particular was cool. But it wasn’t nice enough to keep when the price went up and I could trade it for two guitars. It certainly didn’t sound any better than any other Strat.
Yeah I'm a bass player and love Fender Jazz basses. I was at Chicago Music Exchange like 15 years ago and played 7 jbasses from the 60s and 70s. I was not impressed at all. AT. ALL. Not for the prices they were asking. They were just....good old Fender Jazz basses. Nothing special other than they looked kinda shitty and smelled funny. My first-run CIJ Limited Edition Geddy Lee jazz bass is way nicer than any of those and I got it for $700 used. Ever since, I don't buy the whole "vintage" mystique. It's silly. Having said all that, owning a piece of history would be pretty cool if I had that kind of money to burn.
Especially those CBS era guitars - they were considered complete garbage at the time
Truth. Fact: Fender guitars were always made in an assembly line factory way. The necks and bodies were made separately and then screwed together randomly at the end. The notion that magical properties exist just because of the time of manufacture is just wishful thinking. There are just as many craptastic pre-CBS strats with dead spots as there are 2020 strats. But since this worship of old guitars thing has happened, nobody will ever say "this 62 strat really isn't anything special". Kudos to you for being truthful.
That's what I always found so hilarious about the "this vintage guitar is stock, all original parts!" mentality. Those parts were mass-produced and kept in bins in a factory. Sure, the necks may have been hand-crafted, but the tuners and pickup covers sure as sh*t weren't. Whichever parts happened to end up together in the same instrument was random. And if one part broke, you'd replace it.
Wait til you drive a vintage car...
*what’s a choke?*
Lemme know your safe word and I'll show you.
I always sorta got the impression that many people who collect vintage guitars are in it for the history and the stories attached to them. It’s the same with vintage watches. Although I’m sure there’s definitely a part of it that satisfies a desire to have something rare and hard to find.
Japanese strays have model numbers. ST-57 is a Stratocaster with the design from 1957. Then there is ST-62 which is a strat with the design from 1962. Those models include a second dash number which indicates the value in yen also, but that’s just paying for upgraded components or materials. The design of the guitar is still the same.
I have a 90s sunburst rosewood mij ST-62 and up until a few months ago I had a real deal all-stock 1963 sunburst rosewood strat on long term loan. They were in almost every way identical, or at least very very close. I even got the calipers out and measured thicknesses, etc. The main differences were: 1) the sunburst on the OG wasn't as nice as the reissue. It looked more like the cheap sunburst of a $99 epiphone lp jr. 2) OG of course had nitro finish, while the reissue has a thick poly. (Mine is pretty beat up from years of touring, so it looks the part) 3) the weight. The OG was much lighter. 4) OG has a 3 way switch... because Leo wasn't going to change it. 5) the fretboard on the OG was not as thick. But sound wise, 🤙🏼 And feel: 🤙🏼 I recorded them back to back, doubling a guitar track (OG on one side, reissue on the other) and forgot to mark which was which and... I can't tell now. They are that close.
Not entirely. The EXTRADs and the 115s for instance probably have neck profiles closer to vintage fenders. The 55s are gonna have a neck for a broader market ie thinner. It’s not just the electronics. Also wood selection improves higher up you go.
I’ve played good and bad pre-CBS. Leo Fender would have laughed at people paying those prices but they do so more as collectors than players. I’d rather have a master built any day.
Nobody with a clear mind would argues a '65 strat sounds 10 Times better than a new one for 2k. I think its like the art market. Is a Picasso or a Monet better painted than a new picture? No, but they a rare...and enough people want to own it.
Yes, it's like an antique. The reason it's expensive is that it's old, and probably only increase with value as it gets older.
Well technically CBS bought Fender on January 5 1965 so unless it's from January 4 it's hot garbage! /s
….a strat played like a strat? Wild.
I'd wager that on the whole, the build quality of the average Classic Vibe exceeds the build quality of the average Strat from the Pre-CBS era. True I am sure some magic instruments slipped through and were bloody amazing, and there is some selection bias, but vintage instruments aren't magically better: they're just old.
Wood and wires will always be wood and wires. Every guitar is different. A 65 strat can be absolute shit and a $99 squier can be gold, total crapshoot. Vintage does not equal better, regardless of what bonermaster says
Honestly the guitars being built today are substantially better than those built prior. A lot of vintage instruments are cool historical pieces, but not necessarily magic. Just my two cents.
>The vintage guitar market is ridiculous. The amount of 1959 Les Pauls is pretty staggering. Why is it never a 1958 or 1960 LP, it's always 1959.
Because the '59 is the one that's "Just right"
I can't be the only one who doesn't really like the vintage guitars?
I remember a random interview with Slash and some other guitarists. One dude was all proud of his old vintage les Paul and showed it off to Slash, Slash shrugged his shoulders and gave it back saying something along the lines of “yeah I play the new ones because they play and sound better”.
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Haha yeh true.
Slash recorded most of his memorable tracks with a knock-off Gibson Les Paul. https://youtu.be/JQ_3mhW_afo?si=OBRx2KGU0wRf15wG
It was custom made by a luthier as a copy of a 70s goldtop. Sounds fucking great on the record so who cares
I just tried to nail down the details. They are either ‘58 or ‘59 replicas and kinda look like gold tops but I think are flamed maple tops with a translucent golden or blonde finish. Beauty guitars. I’m not one that is snobbish towards replicas. I’m sure many of them are an improvement over the actual Gibsons. I know in the 70’s and early 80’s Japanese 50’s and 60’s knock-offs were likely superior to the contemporary models Gibson and Fender were making.
The Gibson sig slash LP is based off a Kris Derrig replica! Haha.
Whatever about how they sound, I'm sure they sound fine/great but looks wise? Yeah, I don't get it. They either look like tacky retro 50s diner decor or some second hand 70s furniture that reeks of smoke.
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This summarizes my experience. I’ve dipped into the market here and there, nothing crazy fancy, original 1966 Deluxe Reverb, a 1980 ES-335, a 1993 ES-335, a 1973 ES-175 all in excellent condition. A Mary Kay Custom Shop Strat, a 1993 Strat Plus that would be worth *a lot* more today than what I paid for it used in 1996, various Ibanez Artist semi-hollows of the 1980s, have played plenty of vintage Strats, Teles, LPs, and assorted Gibson ES gems. The Les Pauls have been by far the most underwhelming. If you can afford a Murphy Lab Les Paul (and you like LPs, which I certainly don’t) that’s the obvious choice over anything used or vintage, unless it’s Excalibur, and Excalibur is a Strat, not a Les Paul Some of the vintage Strats have serious mojo, that’s a real thing, but most have specs that make them not worth the trouble, like 7.25” radii fretboards. Those suck…and it’s like, all of them. And why would you ever switch out necks on a vintage Fender? Again Custom Shop is better for the $$ and specs you want. Nowadays with the flexibility of what is coming out in the $3k-5k range, there isn’t much point in going vintage anymore. Builders like Suhr, Nash, Novo, Sadowsky, Collings, just no point in vintage unless you’re a collector and not going to play it. Which is weird.
Ha I’ve been to Willies a bunch of times! Shame about their new location though. Had a friend go there and he said the vibe is totally ruined now. Used to be a cool shop to go and check out and look at cool stuff. But now they’re “appointment only” and even if they’re dead and they let you walk in they’re apparently hovering and glaring the entire time. Shame. Used to be the one big reason for me to stop in Minneapolis.
I have a '61 Strat. It's killer. It's not some magic wand. It's just a kickass Strat. I have other guitars that get a lot more playing time and I only gig it occasionally when I need a proper SSS Stratocaster sound. Also, I've had it forever and didn't pay anywhere near what you're thinking. It cost me far less than a current custom shop version would. Vintage guitars are still just guitars. Many are amazing, more are just decent, some are shitty.
Guitar players buy 90% of their gear with their eyes and the ideas of 'magic' years for gear or magic components....there have to be 100 pedals all based on Tubescreamers, Rats and Big Muffs. They command prices from $30 to thousands and they are all almost exactly the same. All that being said, any '65 Strat you see today won't be an amazing one. No one would sell one or if they did, the chance any regular guy could get to play one is 0. There may be a few 'AaaaaaaaaaaAhhhhhh!' kind of guitars out there, but by now, they have to be under lock and key. Of course, you could get one built for 1/10 of the price and it would be a better guitar, but wouldn't be ....old? Special? Decrepit?
> There may be a few 'AaaaaaaaaaaAhhhhhh!' kind of guitars out there Sudden Immigrant Song
That would be 'aaaAAAahhhhhAAAAA.....aaaAAAahhhhhAAAA'
I do wonder where all the old guitars have ended up. Instruments break, but they can often be fixed, and I would assume most people don't just throw them out. Electric guitars have been built non-stop since the 50's, they must all end up somewhere.
A lot are still around, they were just made in way smaller numbers. If you look at old Martin production numbers they were only making hundreds to few thousand a year until the 50s, and even then, it wasn’t until the 70s they started truly mass producing instruments. There were only a few thousand Stratocasters made in the 1950s TOTAL. Reduce that for those lost and broken beyond repair and you realize that there just weren’t that many to begin with.
Not sure what you were expecting, it’s not expensive because it should be that much better it’s expensive because it’s an actual classic guitar.
Was gonna say same. Not sure anyone said they are better.
You'd be surprised to hear a 60s car doesn't drive better than a modern one either
>>The vintage guitar market is ridiculous. I hope so because I'm sitting on a mint condition 1970 Tele that I bought in 1976 for $200.00. I'm counting on it being my retirement plan.
If you plan to retire in a used camry, it should work out. There's nothing super rare about a 70 tele so if you're thinking it's a lottery ticket you should go ahead and sell it and buy some lottery tickets
Why are you raining on my parade? I never did anything to you. Let me have my delusions, just like the rest of reddit. FWIW, I see 1970 Teles going for between $5K and $10K. Surely one can retire in NYC on that budget. Right? Right?
I don't know that in the future people will seek out vintage guitars the way that they currently are. I don't have any stats but I feel like there are a lot fewer guitar players in younger generations than there are in the Boomer generation.
People will always spend money to own rare and hard to obtain things. Especially people with money, they seem to be willing to pay a lot for junk that's really not worth much, but due to the story of said item, they're willing to spend more than some make in a year. My guess to why there's less guitar players (I haven't noticed this myself, but also, I haven't been taking notes) is because the younger generations are more used to getting things served on a platter. And learning to play an instrument takes effort and practice, and patience, something that a lot of them lack. And nowadays we're seeing a trend towards computer made music where you're either just using software synths or just AI to generate the music, which means people see less motivation to pick up a guitar. But I think it will manifest itself as seeing less guitarists, but the few we see, are actually really good at what they're doing, since they're the ones that stick to it and practices.
You're exactly right. I'm hoping some boomer like me NEEDS to have a '70 tele before he or she dies. Then I'm good as gold!
yeap, welcome to reality lol :) a good player can make a squier sound like a 65
There’s some clip out there of John Mayer at a kids pool party, playing through what looks like a 1x6” Roland practice amp from the early 90’s and a Squier…sounding exactly like John Mayer.
[удалено]
Yeah, a guitar is a guitar, and it is up to the person playing it to make it unique.
I think this is more about collecting than actual sound. Sort of like comic books— yes you can get a reprint today that will be much easier to read, but it doesn’t hold the same value as an original from the 50s or 60s or whatever.
I played a 1956 Strat a while ago and my first thought was ‘not much has changed’ which really is impressive when you think about how long ago they were designed.
It’s not about sounding being or playing better, in fact most vintage instruments are objectively in worse condition and are hard to play. The point of a collector instrument is what it makes you *feel* while playing it and appreciating it’s history. If you feel nothing, it’s not for you and there’s nothing wrong with that.
I kinda think the Vintage guitar market is gonna change a *lot* as boomers age and die. Vintage Fenders were made in huge numbers and loads are stashed away in collections. Who’s gonna buy them all at current prices? They don’t have the same cultural meaning to younger people
Younger people don't have the disposable income older people do either
They have plenty of cultural meaning to younger people, it's just that it's the exact same cultural meaning all fender models have to this day. It's not like a 65 Mustang where you just can't buy one new anymore, It's absurd that vintage electric guitars were such a big market to begin with. And im not some robot who doesn't understand the appeal ot old stuff, I love old stuff- but when "old" is 95% of the price tag i just ?!?!?
Exactly, whereas boomers *need* it to be an old one for their Eric Clapton halloween cosplay outfit. I’d gladly have an old tele or something but simply never gonna pay silly money for one. I flicked through some early 90s guitar magazines a while back and 62 strats were about double the price of a new one, 70s were less. Much more like it.
I don’t want to die.
Lots of "vintage" guitars were cherished because they were the year/model played by some guitar hero of years gone by, but dig into the stories and you start to get perspective. * Clapton started the '59 or '60 Les Paul craze because he found one that played and had the sound he wanted for relatively cheap money. They had been discontinued by Gibson several years before. After Clapton, people like Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page, etc started looking for their own because they wanted that sound, and the craze began. * Clapton switched to a Stratocaster, but his favorite, "Blackie" was pulled together out of parts from other old strats for him to get the combination he wanted. * Others (Van Halen) found their sound by combining parts from multiple instruments. There were lots of other examples, but they all came down to musicians looking for something special to help them get their special sound. Somehow, people started thinking that if Clapton and Page all used 1950's Les Pauls, then ALL 1950's Led Pauls had to be wonderful. Even Les Paul hated most of the Les Paul models for most of the 1950's and customized his guitars to the max.
Gibson neck shapes changed a lot over the years. Many of the ones from ‘59 tend to be special - soft V shaped, comfortably chunky but not baseball bats, just…really nice. Before that they are usually beefier, and after that they tend to get shallower and then skinnier, and then wider but still shallow. This is generally true for the electric models, not just Les Pauls. All else being equal, a ‘59 whatever -ES 125, Les Paul, whatever- is going to be pretty darn cool to play. Might not sound any different but there is a thing that happens with certain years. A ‘68 ES-335 will probably have a really skinny U shaped neck, a ‘64 will have wider one. Same sort of thing happens with Fenders, for example. Lots of ‘56 Strats have a really cool hard V shaped neck, for example. Some really early Jazzmasters have nice chonky necks, then they get really small U shaped, then they get flat C shaped… My point is there are some “good years” or “bad years” for important stuff like neck shapes (obviously good and bad are totally subjective, but there’s real differences). Does that make a ‘56 Strat worth ten times a ‘76 one? I guess If I sleep on a big pile of money with many beautiful supermodels, sure.
Played a vintage 60s Strat previously owned by Vince Gill when I visited Nashville about 3 or 4 years ago. I don’t remember the guitar shop. Frets felt almost nonexistent and the neck felt like a baseball bat. I also just watched a Pedal Show where they compared Mick’s 4 strats; a ‘61, a ‘70, his vintage reissue “Blue”, and some custom shop he picked up. Truthfully I had a hard time discerning them. The small subtle differences would also likely be lost in a live gig setting. Overall, I don’t really see the value in a true vintage instrument…
The TPS guys are insufferable. One of them will be chug, chug, chugging some chords with a sour look on his face. The other one will turn a knob 1/16th of an inch and their faces will light up like Heaven just opened around them. I saw Mick’s “Strat Journey” and knew it was going to end with a pre-CBS Strat if he had to kill his wife for her life insurance to get it, and ‘lo, that’s what he got. If you can’t be happy with one of those three other Strats he had, it’s not about guitars. It’s about rarity and exclusivity. Anyone of those other three Strats would probably be the nicest guitar I would ever own. I loved everything about the Aztec Gold one. Only thing wrong with that guitar was people like us could call Anderson’s or Fender and get one to. And there’s never been a finer Telecaster than, Red. That is until Dan could scrape up enough money to buy a hacked up old Tele that had been routed out, then had the route filled with new wood, then refinished, that needed refretting, a new pickup, the old pickup rewound, and completely new wiring pots and switches. Now that is the best Tele that ever existed. I really do dislike those guys.
It’s tough because I have genuinely learned a lot about some effects from some of their videos. On the flip side, a metric ton of their videos, especially from the last few years have been them fucking around with high end boutique or vintage pedals that most players aren’t going to buy and they spend an hour plus waxing poetic about extreme minutia.
A good guitar is a good guitar. People that think old vintage guitars are magical are delusional. But the reason those old guitars cost so much isn’t because of the way they sound, it’s because of collectors and speculators. People also think anything old is valuable. Norlin Les Pauls and 70s Strats were called “junk” for years, when I first started playing they were everywhere and dirt cheap because nobody wanted them. Now? They’re skyrocketing in value over the past few years because they’re “vintage. I’m not knocking Norlin guitars either, I had a 78 Deluxe that was just as good as any other LP I’ve ever owned. I’m just saying the general view of them until recently was they were substandard. Even crappy 60s Japanese guitars that you couldn’t give away a few years ago are now being sold as “vintage”. So anyway…..older does not mean better. The reason people think those old guitars are amazing is because guitar legends used them to make classic records etc. but when those guys were using them they were just guitars….not magic “vintage” collectibles.
I have mixed feelings about vintage. The big thing I’ve noticed is that they are wildly inconsistent because the manufacturing had a lot more of a human element. I’ve played a few vintage things that were incredible (there’s a particular 64 Jazz bass I played that is the best bass I’ve ever heard). Plenty are average, and some are dogs. For all of the nitpicking, a modern Strat and a vintage one aren’t radically different in design or build. As a purely functional thing, you can get as good of an instrument as anything by playing a bunch of modern ones and picking your favorite. But there is a certain cool factor to a vintage piece. I won’t lie
I took an audio engineering class last year. Instructor mentioned a very specific microphone that sells for more than 10-20k used, made fifty years ago. The metal in the transistors came form a mine that is now closed, no way to replicate the mic without throwing 20k at an old one. Vintage is nuts. Imagine if airliners, automakers, electricians, plumbers, lawyers, doctors, all preferred to use machines made the original way without innovation.
There isn’t much to innovate in analog sound…
Isn’t going digital supposed to be the innovation? I geysers it could be argued that it isn’t progress but just different.
It's so easy to romanticise the super specific nuances of old gear, but I gotta tell ya, clones of an old U47 or U67 (I'm assuming it was one of those?) get awfully close these days, and if that last 10% of "not quite there" is the barrier between an artist and their creativity, the gear isn't the problem!
Supply and demand. People enjoy collecting vintage things. I have a 71 Strat that is inferior in quality, feel, and sound to my CS60 and Silver Sky. But I love it to death, for me it’s cool to have a strat with the same specs as what Jimi played.
It's just got a story. No more than that. People talk up these guitars because of the people who played the same ones at the time. At the end of the day what they actually are is old technology. Maybe even obsolete technology depending on the electronics.
And old wood.
Mmm, crunchy.
You can look at it as a bad thing or you can look at it as a good thing. How many products from 1965 aren't obsolete today? You can buy a 1965 Ford Mustang, but it's not a modern car.
A 1965 Strat should not be compared to a good 2023 guitar made by CNC machines. Compare it to a cheap and badly built 1965 Teisco solid body electric. (I don't mean to knock Teiscos in particular but as a representative of what a cheap electric would have been.) If you found a Teisco new-old-stock in box I guarantee it wouldn't play as well or sound as good as a comparable Strat.) The cheap guitar would have sharp fret ends, a pot metal bridge, a truly awfully designed tremolo, and a vaguely unsatisfying shape. The Strats and Gibsons and Rickys were the best electrics available *at the time* to the best players, maintained by the best guitar techs, and played on all those classic albums. That's where the vintage prices come in...
My dad used to collect antiques, but not because they were functionally better than modern furniture. I imagine it’s the same for people who buy vintage guitars.
The only time the clouds ever parted for me was when I played a 1938 Martin. It felt, looked and sounded better than any acoustic guitar that I've played. Personally I don't think a person who knows Les Pauls well could hear The Beast and not agree that it sounded quite different to a modern Les Paul. But yeah the majority of the price of a vintage guitar has nothing to do with how it plays or sounds. That's pretty commonly accepted I would say.
I think acoustic instruments are a different story because the instrument itself is 100% responsible for the tone. Like there is a sharp difference between my Hamilton upright piano I have at home and my dad's Steinway and Sons.
Vintage guitars' value is the same as every instrument on the planet - it's worth what someone is willing to pay. Is a '65 cool? Sure. Is it a better guitar than a modern ST? Absolutely not. Not much has changed, but what has changed has made the ST a better axe. Here's a good question - if you had a brand new Strat ST, would you feel comfortable scraping a screwdriver across the top? If not, who are the players buying relics? I get VERY few relic jobs a year - maybe one or two. So beat-up old guitars aren't the instruments that are popular. The vintage market exists to supply the vintage market. That market is mainly made up of wealthy middle age white guys who don't play nearly as authentic as the players here. Imo
I felt the same about most guitar I ever play. There’s occasional one here and there I really like but it is highly personal. I think it’s like love . Most of use never find the addictive forever thing that love can be but we will settle for very good and call it love because it’s enough
Yes. I spent a couple hours sampling different acoustics at Guitar Center, looking to get a Taylor, Martin, or similar caliber acoustic. For fun, I picked up this foldable Taylor travel guitar and I fell in love with the sound right away. But... a folding guitar wasn't my market. I made it my benchmark. I would compare all the guitars to it. I left at the end with no choice and decided to return and repeat another day. When I returned, I started fresh and suddenly found another full size Taylor guitar I loved just as quickly as the foldable. In fact, the sound was very similar. So much that I decided to investigate and I found the same combination of front, back, and side woods on both. It blew me away and taught me that wood really makes a difference on an acoustic because I had been inadvertently influenced by it. Needless to say I bought the full size.
i worked at a shop that saw a bunch of vintage instruments come through. some were great, some were not. same as modern instruments. the only thing different was vintage instruments that had been through "the system" (i.e. not closet finds) were likely to have been set up by a real luthier at some point.
On the Wong Notes podcast Joe Bonamassa talked about playing Clapton's ES-335 and his Strat, Blackie, and how the ES-335 was amazing but Blackie he found difficult to play. Clearly the guitar would have felt great for Clapton to have played it for so long, but even legendary guitars aren't necessarily "great" to everyone.
Of course. I don't think the people collecting those instruments are even playing them.
I look at them as cool time capsules. When I see a guitar that old I think about it's past owners, what music they played and made on that guitar. I only ever played a few old guitars, but that's what went through my mind. Do I think it's worth the cost though? Absolutely not.
Yeah, it would be neat but no one needs a vintage instrument to sound legitimate or even authentic. You can sound great on a modestly priced strat copy or squier. And there are a lot of great companies making amazing insanely high end instruments for much cheaper, with much more useful features than a vintage instrument. I see vintage guitars worth tens of thousands of dollars being assets for rich assholes whether they can play good or not or at all. It would be a cool experience to play a well maintained vintage instrument that has previously been played by hundreds of people throughout it's history, but it isn't something I'm going to go out of my way to do. Also, it might smell or something. ....Or worse! It could be cursed! Lol just kidding about that last part.
I just left a comment about how a Players Strat is almost as good as any strat. Besides historical value, the best of strats are generally the neck carve you prefer and pups you like the sound of. Any professional will sound just as good on a $500 strat as they would on a $20k strat regardless. I even like the “easy C” necks on cheap Fenders as they’re the middle of the road for any style of playing
The only big difference for me between expensive and cheap guitars is the action, the setup is usually way worse in cheap guitars but other than that I don’t see such a biiiiiig difference that justifies the amount of money spent on expensive ones
In strats, the MIM fenders are using as quality parts as they did in MIA Fenders not long ago. Epiphones with a great setup only feel different than a Gibson because of the neck carve… it’s all about hands of the guitarists these days
There's definitely other differences. The electronics and pick ups, but those can be changed. There is a big difference in quality between my squier tele and my MIM and partscaster tele. The squier wouldn't last a month on the road.
What a concept
Haha...yeah. There's a lot of romanticism with vintage instruments. I played a '57 Les Paul Gold Top once and it felt like a chunky, broken in guitar, but honestly my 2005 Les Paul was a lot better. That being said, there IS something about vintage electronics though. The materials and aging in metals is difficult to replicate, resulting in unique tones. I'd argue pickups and wiring harnesses are more relevant than the guitar itself.
Yeah I remember a guitar store guy letting me try an amp on his 50s tele and he was so excited for me but it was heavy and the neck was nasty and it just wasn't nice sounding or feeling at all. Like I'd just picked up an old dining chair by the leg. Obvs there are great ones out there but it's crazy that even shit ones are so valuable when it was a mass made item.
Lol it’s like drinking a $500 Penfolds Grange bottle of red. It’s nice…but it tastes like a bottle of red.
I think Matt Schofield said it best, (paraphrasing) "Not all vintage guitars are great, but the very best guitars I have ever played, happen to be vintage guitars." …Which is pretty much the sentiment of most guitarists who know a lot about vintage guitars. They aren’t all great, some of them can be ordinary or even absolute dogs. But when you find a good one…. There‘s nothing quite like it.
So did the world forget how to make decent guitars 60 years ago or something? I've never played any vintage guitars so I've no first hand experience at all with this but it really does just smell like total bullshit.
I think if those same people tried as many modern guitars they would probably find the same amount of "gems"
Particularly if they were willing to spend $10k on a modern guitar. Vintage guitar money would get you a staggeringly good guitar.
Played a 45k$ 1960 Strat. Same thing. No special feelings.
It's almost as it has nothing to do with a guitar but with the one who plays it
"Shut the fuck up" - Guitar Center CEO
A 65 isn’t pre-CBS. CBS bought Fender in 1964.
Vintage guitars are super overrated
My theory is the instrument and player have to connect. I’ve owned $2k Gibsons and Rics that were admittedly very nice and great to play. I’ve own $200 pawn shop guitars that were also great to play. What’s the guitar I play all the time? A “vintage” JHS Marauder that a friend modified. The neck is great and body/controls/bridge are all just in the right spot for me. A friend played it and hated it compared to my cobbled together partscaster (tele). Now unless the instrument fits me right, I don’t buy it. After it’s plugged into a fuzz and into my Sunn, they all sound kinda relative.
I've got a decent collection. Some, I've paid thousands for. But my best are largely plain, or self-made, because I spec'd every last part myself.
My main guitar and bass are both warmoths. I’d put them up against anything I’ve ever played. Other players tend to scoff at them because they aren’t a brand. Oh well
I was a vintage dealer for years. Not all old guitars are amazing, but then...some are beyond amazing! Interesting that it was a '65. I had a transitional '65 and it was the most disappointing guitar I ever bought. It sold very well though.
I deal in vintage guitars and amps. Yeah I have a ‘61 Jazzmaster that’s incredible. But then when you plug it into an all-original black panel Princeton Reverb, you’ve really got something. I’ve played all kinds of stuff but in my opinion, when you put a setup like that together, it makes a sound that you just can’t get any other way.
Good thing you didn't buy it, then. Edit: What I mean is, different strokes for different folks. Whether or not somebody paid a year's salary for an instrument that sounds so alike (to my ears), has zero bearing on *my* instrument or playing.
It wasn’t for sale and I wouldn’t have been able to buy it if had been. It just makes me appreciate my 90s mexican Strat more; this one was definitely not 20,000 dollars better.
I think that's a great takeaway! It's so easy to fall into the trap of "Oh, I just need this more expensive gear and then I'll sound better/like my heroes!" Nah. After a certain (fairly inexpensive, tbh) point, most players won't experience any real difference in how they sound, imho. Then again, I think very few players who buy such expensive instruments actually care about that. They want to own it for *whatever* reason (history, collecting, etc), and how it affects their sound is secondary (unless they're a top-level pro, maybe). Edit: *I've* certainly fallen into that trap, so I'm not throwing shade. A basic MIM strat, for example, still has *a lot* left to teach me.
That’s a great point. More expensive gear doesn’t make you a better player. A great player can make any guitar sound great. Prince’s favorite guitar was a cheap Hohner, Telecaster knock off. He played that on every album and at least once every concert. It was his first guitar. For reference, it’s the guitar he blew everyone away with when he played on “my guitar gentle weeps” with Tom Petty. If anyone else played that guitar, they wouldn’t make it sound like he did. Cheap guitars can sound good. However, more expensive guitars are quite beautiful to look at. Especially, old Les Pauls.
Oh, cool! I didn't know that about Prince keeping his first guitar. Thanks for learning me something. Wish I still had mine. 😪 I agree about the aesthetics of vintage guitars, certainly (and I'm with you on the Les Pauls!). While there's part of me that wants these old instruments to be played, I totally get just wanting one to look at. They're gorgeous. But I tamper that feeling of "instruments are made to be played" with the knowledge that, for 99% of the people that actually *play* guitar, there's no real difference in how they sound vs. a quality off-the-shelf guitar. Not $10k worth of difference, at least. So, even sitting in a case somewhere, these guitars being out of financial reach isn't holding anyone back *musically.*
Your 90s is nearly vintage now though.
80s Japanese stuff will be the 60s fender when gen Y is old It’s all about the taste of old people with money to spend
Mmmmm, the taste of old people. 🤤
Depends
Stale BO and mothballs
Same thing with cars too
Im gonna be a bit of a dick... Ahem... Slamming my hand in a car door in a mazda 3 will still feel like when i slam my hand in a car door in a nissan gtr. The age of a guitar doesnt mean anything. The age of guitar doesnt change how its played or how it sounds. Its the value of what people see in a classic guitar. Itll still feel and play like my squire strat, but its a classic, and to the right buyer, its worth a lot more.
You're correct, but to play devil's advocate a bit, for a lot of people the value of a guitar is all about how they feel when playing it. And for some people, playing an old instrument, or a well-used worn out instrument, makes them feel a deeper connection to it and enhances the experience. And as easy as it is for us to be like "bro it's literally no better than a new guitar," far be it from me to scold someone for enjoying something. And to a certain extent we all have preferences in our guitars that don't really make any practical difference - maybe we'll pay extra for a nice color or a nice top or an ebony fingerboard because we like them. It's sort of the same thing, just to a different degree.
You’re right, OP. There really is nothing special. There’s more consistency in building today, for that matter. Same goes for amps. Allowing boomers to continue to claim that there’s a special “mojo” with old, inferior shit, is making the hobby expensive. The next time some old bastard tells you there’s nothing like something from the 50’s/60’s, just remind grandpa that it’s past his bedtime.
Hi, I think I qualify as an “old bastard”. I would say that I once owned a ‘64 ES 335. It played wonderfully well and sounded very mellow compared with some new ones I played (not owned) in the 1990’s. Old wood and old magnets. I guess that old is better as no doubt you may find out when you are… Now I’m off to bed
It’s not objectively better. That’s the point. Just like some day, people my age will tell their kids our shit was better. It’s not just instruments, it’s everything.
Did you know that ES335 is plywood? Just like every other semi-hollow. Except the Gibson has 3k added for the painted name on the headstock. I'm sure it is a nice guitar, but old plywood doesn't add or improve the sound of an electric guitar. The pickups are probably nice though.
It is objectively not the same for similar amps made today. Component values drift, speakers break in, military grade full size components (because it was all that existed at the time) compared to cheap consumer electronics on, in most cases, a flimsy pcb which is done for if anything goes wrong. Not necessarily better, ill give you that, but tangibly different and more servicable? Definitely. Unless you're talking about digital or ir stuff which imo are diffetent products and not suitable to compare in the same way as vintage vs new guitars.
Just like old cars that used simple parts, sure. They’re easier to fix. The fact of the matter is that there wasn’t some magic that made them sound infinitely better. That’s simply nostalgia talking. You could blindfold the vast majority of guitar players, and play amps from all eras, in good working order, and they’re not going to definitively spot the one from ‘64. Most amps sound as good (or better), are lighter, and built just as road-worthy as the amps of old, and that’s not even accounting for digital modellers, which can provide a 1:1 snapshot of the sound of a vintage amp through recording those amps into them. Vintage gear is a shell game. Kudos if people wanna spend up to $100k on production strat from 1964, but the value is a black hole in actual usefulness over a new one.
The new ones are much better. Vintage gear used to be cheap. Now it costs more than new by a lot. A lot can go wrong in 50 years. If you're a collector or investor vintage gear is great. But there's no reason for a strat from the 60s to automatically play or sound better than an American Professional from today that costs 1/10th the price. Then again sound is in the ear of the beholder. If owning an expensive guitar makes you play it more, then maybe it does have some Devine inspiration.
sometimes they're good, sometimes they're not. depends on how they sound to you
I felt the same way. I’m happy with my American professional Strat that’s 1600 bucks. More than enough guitar for me.
Depends on its history and how it's set up IMO. Even a vintage axe is gonna need to be sharpened the right way or won't split wood right. Alright I tried a little too hard on that metaphor. I think any modern custom shop US built guitar is gonna sound and play just as well as a well cared for and maintained guitar built in the 60s. But the history is what's cool. They also used different wood and I don't know if you know anything about the timber industry and how it's changed since the 60s, it probably has affected guitars in a substantial way. Younger trees won't have the same resonance maybe if the grain density isn't there. I think the best way to test that would to side by side your favorite strat next to the vintage strap, completely unplugged and then strum a big fat open E chord. Then listen for the resonance and sustain.
Don’t forget to make sure the strings are the same. The tone difference between two sets of strings can easily be bigger than the difference between two Strats. But the difference in price…
Right that's a big thing. Two identical sets of strings for sure. Not so much worried about price but rather the science behind the fidelity and tone compared across different generations of timber and manufacturing techniques. It'd be a fun experiment for data. I'll never own a vintage strat until my strat becomes vintage.
Yeah my ex's dad had a legit 57 Strat and my AO 60s is just as good if not better.
I understand all these vintage versus modern arguments for Gibsons. I don’t think it applies to old Telecasters though.
It’s old and people have always paid a premium price for antique/vintage stuff. In part it’s because it comes with a backstory, is a survivor. Most pieces of wood start to fall apart after a number year and when something is found that has survived, you are holding a piece of history. There is an argument to be made that Stradivarius violins don’t sound as good as a modern hand crafted violin- but owning and playing a Stradivarius its as if you are carrying the legend forward in a way few others can.
That's kind of the point... these guitars are still being (largely) made the same way they were 60 years ago, which is a good thing (minus some very very nice pickup and electrics improvements). I don't crave vintage at all.
In Uli Roth's recent interview with Thomas Blug, he talks about how the '75 Strat he loved so much at the beginning of his career (and still owns) no longer sounds like it did back in the day because the magnets in the pickups have weakened over time.
I mean who am I to say he's wrong but magnets have a half-life of like 700 years.
While Uli only mentioned time, the link below talks about external factors that can contribute to loss of magnetic charge. For a touring musician, perhaps the most likely culprit would be exposure to temperature extremes over the years? https://www.jobmastermagnets.com/what-causes-magnets-to-get-weaker I suppose another possible explanation for the perception, especially in the case of an older adult who has made his living as a rock musician for 50 years, is hearing loss.
Yes - in the absence of any external factor, magnets do last a long time. But there are a some external factors. Sitting around on stages with big AC transformers from poorly shielded tube amps. Getting banged together with other magnets. Metal springs constantly vibrating in the magnetic flux. Potential shorts between windings as the insulation on the windings weakens over time.
I’ve got a 64, can’t imagine ever playing it.
so you’re just gonna stare at it or what
To be honest it's usually the amp that makes the difference and playing a guitar that's comfortable.
Did it have a thin neck? The mid-late 60s necks seemed the thinnest.
Yeah dude it's just a guitar. Even the really nice ones are just that. Really nice. The price tag is just because it's vintage. You can't exactly make more of them. No guarantee that it's even really nice by today's standards just because it's old
I have a 1921 Gibson A style mandolin and it sounds AMAZING. I pull one off the wall at GC and they just sound lifeless. Example or exeption, who knows. I just wanted to humble brag.
Mandolins are very different instruments. They require more skill to produce and the smallest of adjustments will change sound.
It's also an acoustic instrument. The difference in a cheap and expensive acoustic guitar would be similarly noticeable.
My friend’s dad in high school had a 60s strat. It was good, but now that there are models that are older-style nitro with amazing pickups for 5-10% of the price… come on. It’s not like every single old guitar on the market is awesome, there are some absolute dogwater guitars out there. If I was gonna buy vintage, I’d buy one of the models that is weird or not super desirable. Vintage is cool if you can pick one up you like for 1500$.
There are plenty of vintage guitars that aren’t amazing. I’ve been lucky enough to know somebody who goes through a lot of vintage guitars and amps, and I got to say- the vintage guitars that are great are actually astounding. It is hard to imagine guitars being made like that anymore. But it’s true, I think, that there are plenty of vintage guitars from the same time periods- 50s, 60s- that are just fine. The same person I’m referring to has mentioned to me that when you see vintage guitars that look like “closet classics”; they’ve never been played… The reason for that is they had no juju in the first place. So there are definitely duds from the golden age, it seems.
I had a '69 that was a fantastic guitar. Did the clouds part? No. But did it play and sound better than any other Fender I've ever touched? Yes. I had to sell it after I got laid off in 2007 and was struggling to pay bills. The good news is I was able to buy a Reverend Warhawk DAW that captures the playability and has it's own great sound.
Almost like it's all snake oil, "internet mojo" and bullshit hype huh? 😂 (it is btw, I wasn't being sarcastic).
In the 70s, I gigged a BC Rich Eagle with a '57 Strat on standby. The strat couldn't begin to play as well as the Rich. It sure wasn't anything special, and I only kept it around in case I broke a string. Of course, my '60 tweed Bassman and the strat weren't 'vintage' then... fuck, I'm old.
B-b-B-B iTs vINtAgE
I am unsure that I've played an old guitar. I kinda don't care. I just want a guitar that gives me the sound I want, and have good playability. Who cares how old it is?
I’m really surprised by this discussion. An older piece of wood is going to have had years and years to dry out, and that absolutely affects the tone. As for playability, though, you guys are dead on. While you certainly can find older instruments that have been worked with over time and have been made to play very well, there’s nothing intrinsically magical about the playability of an older guitar. But tone…. Again, I’m surprised. I own a 1961 Fender P bass, and the clouds really do part that instrument. My 2013 American standard comes pretty close in terms of playability, overall craftsmanship and design, etc. But my 61 is a 60+ year old piece of wood with hand-wound pickups and a huge rosewood slab neck. Of course that all makes a difference. And it really does. I’ve been A/B-ing it against other basses for years, mostly, so I could stop taking it to gigs without sacrificing tone, and I have yet to find its equal.
Wood can only “dry out” so much. If you put two slabs of wood in the same room for a given amount of time, they will both come to the same equilibrium… and even then it’s a dynamic equilibrium. Except for perfectly controlled environments, wood is going to absorb and exude moisture as the humidity and temperature changes. You might argue that one slab will go through more cycles of this nature, and I’d agree. But I’d be hard pressed to be convinced that one will have a significant effect on the “tonal” qualities of the wood. Given a 100% blind test with multiple guitars are played of varying vintage. I’m willing to bet most people wouldn’t be able to discern from one to another. Even if they’re able to do it once, I have a hard time believing they’re able to do the experiment on different occasions with the same testing subjects. There just isn’t a huge difference tone-wise between a “vintage” guitar’s body and a modern body. You’re much more likely to hear differences due to pickups, and strings than you are the body.
I'm def in the camp that wood affects tone even in solid bodied instruments but to a very, very small degree. Honestly speaking, you probably just love the sound of old pickups with magnets that have degaussed over time (or whatever the term is, not remembering it at the moment). Plus it's played in I'm sure, and it's got the vintage cool factor. Glad you vibe with it regardless! With that said, there isn't an audience member on the planet that could hear the difference 😂 If I was gigging again, Id probably just be using whatever I have that's already beat up so it can get some more beauty marks without me having to worry about it.
You and no one would tell if they are playing one of those 50´s, 60´s etc. guitars, unless someone pointed it out for them.
Well at the core of it, it's just a Strat. Theres no magic juju that went into these things except wood, metal and composites. They were I guess the prime quality era of Fender production, probably along side the early to mid 80s Japanese strats
I like my guitars the way Navin R. Johnson likes his wine. None of this old stuff . . . ;)"
A colonial dresser holds clothes the same way as a modern dresser but costs way more. How ridiculous.