Thinking of going electric.

Guitar that is. A couple years ago I picked up the cheapest acoustic they had at the local pawn shop. It's a real mess. And a finger killer, but it holds a tune fairly well.

Anyway, I've been thinking I need to pick up an electric guitar. I'm not a guitar player, I'm a banjo picker. But I do enjoy playing around on a guitar after work. The torture device is really no fun at all to play.

I've looked on the Craigslist and there doesn't seem to be much that interests me that I can afford right now.

I have a local Guitar Center and they have a Squier Bullet Strat on sale for $99. They also have an Epiphone Les Paul special II on clearance for $129. I'm leaning towards the Squier even with it's lack of humbucker pickups.

I know some of you probably have one or two of each, which way would you go?

I had an Epiphone LP jr that I bought after walking into a guitar center to buy a distortion pedal to use with the crap Hondo II Professional strat copy I'd made the mistake of buying. That guitar was my primary for fifteen years and two bands, and the only thing I did was eventually swap the bridge pickup for a Super Distortion. It played unreasonably well for being as cheap as it was. I only recently gave it away after getting a Gretsch Pro Jet and the band going on hiatus.

In summary, I recommend the Epiphone.

EDIT: I get my LP submodels mixed up, but mine was $190 when I got it, bolt-on neck, slab body.

I'd go for the Squier Bullet Strat. My buddy (lead guitarist, I'm on hiatus as lead singer right now) has been rocking one for four years now, and that thing can belt out some beautiful notes. The Epiphone our rhythm guitarist used to use was great, but for some reason it wasn't quite as crisp, even with the same tone, pickup, and volume setting, same cable, same amp, same amp settings.

I've found that most of those cheap guitars have the potential to be pretty decent, but what they mostly lack from the factory is a proper setup. If you can find an independent luthier(not one at Guitar Center) who can set it up properly you'll end up with a decent guitar for $150-$200.

This guy is only a couple blocks away from me. It's an Squier Affinity strat with a fender frontman 15G amp. I think it probably was a starter pack which would also mean that it has an agathis body instead of an alder body. It should also have different tuners to the bullet. He's asking $150 for all of it with some extras included.

Worth it?

Nick (Bo) Comstock wrote: This guy is only a couple blocks away from me. It's an Squier Affinity strat with a fender frontman 15G amp...Worth it?

I wouldn't pay that much for a starter kit like that. The amps that come with those packs are awful. If I were searching for a cheap Strat I would wait for a "good" Squier to turn up or find a beat one for $50 and set it up it myself. Sometimes you can find one that somebody has tweaked into good shape. (like this, for example) Then get a decent amp and you'll probably be much happier in the long run. There are good cheap amps out there but they aren't the amps that come with the starter pack guitars.

I got one of these amps 3 years ago. It was on sale so I paid $60 including shipping and it's good enough that I still use it for smaller gigs sometimes.

In reply to BlueInGreen44:

LOL, you're about a half hour too late. I bought it. What can I say, I'm impatient.

It has very little fret buzz but I can probably tweak it a little and I had to set the intonation but otherwise it seems pretty solid. I'll definitely play around with it some more as I become more familiar with it.

Have fun with it! I think of Fender/Squiers as the Miata of the guitar world. Simple, sturdy, fun, and easy to modify when you get bored.

Hard to go wrong with a used Mexican made Stratocaster. Please don't buy a $100 "beginners" guitar as they are a frustrating waste of money and time.

If you want to by new I like the Squier Telecasters. They are a couple hundred. I bought a squier classic vibe custom telecaster a few years ago and made my own '52 hot rod tele clone.

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I would never have the money for anything more than a $100 beginners guitar. I'm not one to save up money because once I get more than $150 or so saved up my mind sees that as car part money, or the wife sees it as "our money" and I lose all rights to it. I'd rather have a cheap beginner guitar than no guitar at all which was the choice. I could have waited for a better deal on a better guitar to come along but I'm not patient enough for that and I would have already spent the money on car parts anyway.

It was this weekend or never and it was a cheap beginner guitar or nothing.

On a whim I stopped into the local pawn shop and they had a large selection of guitars. A really large one. They had a couple Squiers and I was looking at them just to compare to mine. They had a really crusty beat up one marked at $39. I said man that things pretty beat, the guy said I'll take $20 for it so I bought it

The red one is a very solid player as it sits. This one, which has been identified as an SE, will be my project. The SE is nice because it has a full thickness body meaning the full size Tremolo block will fit without modification. Lot's of work ahead of me but it's a solid foundation for a very nice guitar.

I was hoping to do a sunburst finish on it but the grain is not so nice in the center. I've got a couple ideas.

Late to the party, but just picked up this thread. The best part is that your are getting started. Conceptualizing, designing and building guitars has been a lifelong thing for me, and like you, it started with a $10 acoustic that destroyed my hands. I was too little to know that was even a problem. This is another one of those journeys....extremely similar to my automotive ones. Enjoy it!
I've watched one Mr David Wallens go down this path and I now rate him as one guitar ULTRADORK. Extremely Excellent.

And....with guitars at this price range, you can't really depend on one being better than the other, quality wise. There are good ones, and bad ones. Of both. Most around neck issues. Anything else is easy enough to deal with or fix. But if the neck has a twist or hump, it's frustrating. You're a picker, so you probably know what your looking at. If you don't, take a friend with you to point out the weak links to look for.

In reply to jh36:

Both of these have nice necks. I spent some time smoothing the ends of the frets on the black one last night. The red one was already addressed or came from the factory nicer. The only thing is the truss rod on the black one is somewhat suspect. We'll see once I get it restrung.

In reply to Nick (Bo) Comstock:

I will be interested in seeing what you findw hen you get there. I've got an old Tele bass with a non functioning truss rod myself. One of these days.

I didn't check this thread until now because I assumed it was about electric cars

I started with a Squier Affinity - the same stop dreaming, start playing pack that Nick bought.

The neck's a bit thinner than a typical Strat, which is good if you have small hands. Mine was pretty nicely made, although the frets needed a bit of dressing. It responded well to a bit of DIY setup. The body's a bit thinner, but that's only a problem when you try to stuff a different trem block inside. My biggest complaint was the electronics. The pots didn't have a lot of range of adjustment and were scratchy. Not difficult to fix. I tend to prefer a clean sound, it may not have been as obvious if I was trying to melt faces.

Luckily, if you come from cars, guitar parts are ridiculously cheap. As noted, Strats are really modular and easy to work on, so if you like to tinker they're a great toy. I started with that Squier and replaced every part of it piece by piece. Twice. So now I have the complete Squier in parts, ready to go around the wheel once again. I might put it back together in stock form just to see the difference.

In reply to Keith Tanner:

Funnily enough, it was your thread about your fancy wall mounts that got me thinking about them.

I've tried to find that thread again but have had no luck. Can anyone link it for me?

Ha!

https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/build-projects-and-project-cars/guitar-frames/125157/page1/