I saw several on ebay for a little under $300. Maybe the price is a little inflated in Europe?
Check on forums as well, as they usually have a sale or trade section for guitars. I know I'm constantly glancing over that section at sevenstring.org. There's probably plenty of strat forums where people are selling and trading them for reasonable prices.
On October 17 2013 00:06 Teoita wrote: Mexican fenders are fucking awesome, great value guitars imo.
With a proper setup they are quite solid guitars for sure, especially for the money. Not to mention due to the nature of of how easy they are to modify, you can turn them into very nice sounding and playing guitars for a proportionately small investment. My first guitar was a MIM Strat and I still have it because of how much I like how it plays. It's a great guitar. My 50s Precision Bass is also MIM and I would put it up against some much more expensive basses. The neck on it is superb. Really thick but insanely comfy. And I got that bass for I think something like $300 during a sale at a music shop because it is a kinda wonky colour (It is Honey Blonde, which is a light brown/white colour, which looks kinda funky with the golf anodized aluminum pickguard it has. I thought it was kinda ugly but the second I played it I knew I had to have it, ugliness and all. The neck was that good).
Right now I'm looking to either get a classical or a Jazz Bass. I owned a 5 string Jazz like 5 years ago, but the neck was too cumbersome plus the thing was insanely heavy. 5 string basses are not for me. I'd love to get a 4 string Jazz though. I loved the body shape. Even better if I can find a used fretless one.
Edit: Oh wow there's someone selling a Soloist like mine for a thousand on Ebay and it has kinda ticked me off. If it actually sells that's nuts. I paid $500 for mine 5 years ago. And his isn't even all original and in worse shape than mine. The bridge isn't original, The Soloist XL came with a Jackson branded JT-590, which was a very high quality licensed Floyd Rose made by Schaller in Germany at the same factory they made real Floyds, and they were basically on par with proper Floyd Rose bridges. It is not a low profile bridge. His has what appears to be a Jackson JT-580 low profile bridge. The newer version of that bridge is okay but the 90s ones were not good at all, especially compared to the JT-590. Even worse, the hex wrench holder on the back of the headstock is gone and someone has attempted to fill it in and match the paint, but it is very obvious where there were screwholes. That's just wrong. Defacing such a good guitar like that.
For you guys just starting out, just pick up something inexpensive man... no need for overkill. Nothing wrong with a Squire, I made one work when I was in the military in Sicily and me and my roommate formed a band with a couple of civilians, played a set in town that ended up on TV apparently lol. Mex Strat might be a good value, but imo may as well save up the extra for the USA Strat or just get a Squire if you're learning. My first guitar was a Harmony Les Paul copy that I threw some vintage Gibson pickups in. :D
I think it depends. If you have the budget for it, you can definitely go for a higher end guitar too. When you start it's important to buy a guitar that makes you want to play it, a lot. If you fall in love with a mexican fender/jackson/charvel or even a gibson and you can afford it, by all means go ahead and buy it!
That's a fair point too, I think for me though, playing on cheap guitars when I started out made it all the more easy to play better on higher end ones (and appreciate the quality more). Sort of like warming up in the batter's box with the weights on the bat... or like learning StarCraft on a rubberdome before a mechanical keyboard etc.
I bought that charvel. I'll be taking pictures tonight and posting them up. It's gorgeous. There's a few blemishes on it, but the paint isn't chipped in those blemishes so its hard to tell unless you're standing next to it.
I've never had a guitar with bare knuckle pickups and this one is loaded with aftermaths. I have to say, I'm incredibly impressed. I didn't think much of it when I was testing it out, but when I got home and blasted it on my triple rec, I was blown away. The attack! Holy crap. It's a progressive metal shred guitarists dream. I'll post some little recording clips and upload them to soundcloud or something.
On October 18 2013 03:25 renoB wrote: I bought that charvel. I'll be taking pictures tonight and posting them up. It's gorgeous. There's a few blemishes on it, but the paint isn't chipped in those blemishes so its hard to tell unless you're standing next to it.
I've never had a guitar with bare knuckle pickups and this one is loaded with aftermaths. I have to say, I'm incredibly impressed. I didn't think much of it when I was testing it out, but when I got home and blasted it on my triple rec, I was blown away. The attack! Holy crap. It's a progressive metal shred guitarists dream. I'll post some little recording clips and upload them to soundcloud or something.
Oh that is very exciting. I can't wait to see pictures.
On October 18 2013 03:25 renoB wrote: I bought that charvel. I'll be taking pictures tonight and posting them up. It's gorgeous. There's a few blemishes on it, but the paint isn't chipped in those blemishes so its hard to tell unless you're standing next to it.
I've never had a guitar with bare knuckle pickups and this one is loaded with aftermaths. I have to say, I'm incredibly impressed. I didn't think much of it when I was testing it out, but when I got home and blasted it on my triple rec, I was blown away. The attack! Holy crap. It's a progressive metal shred guitarists dream. I'll post some little recording clips and upload them to soundcloud or something.
On October 18 2013 03:25 renoB wrote: I bought that charvel. I'll be taking pictures tonight and posting them up. It's gorgeous. There's a few blemishes on it, but the paint isn't chipped in those blemishes so its hard to tell unless you're standing next to it.
I've never had a guitar with bare knuckle pickups and this one is loaded with aftermaths. I have to say, I'm incredibly impressed. I didn't think much of it when I was testing it out, but when I got home and blasted it on my triple rec, I was blown away. The attack! Holy crap. It's a progressive metal shred guitarists dream. I'll post some little recording clips and upload them to soundcloud or something.
yea BKPs rock. I have a set of coldsweats myself
Nailbomb right here. Only wish I could afford to deck out all my guitars in BKs
On October 16 2013 19:24 SixStrings wrote: How would I find a used one for 300E? The ones on eBay sell for 500 used (620 new)...
My rent is so cheap because the uni covers most of it, usually it's about 15-20E per m2 where I live.
I got my mexi fender for about ~200 GBP, admittedly this was in 2009 or so. I got a MIM jazz bass for around that price, too, you just have to be diligent about scouring ebay every day.
Ok here it is, an 86 Charvel Model 5, with bkp aftermaths, ss frets, and sperzel locking tuners. Truly a vintage meets modern guitar, and boy does it shred.
I always forget how low the posts on Sperzels are. That's a good choice of tuners given the Kahler bridge.
Overall it appears to be in pretty decent shape. No big finish issues other than the usual headstock nicks by the looks of things (which are standard due to the nature of the headstock. Mine has 2 chunks of paint missing). Missing a couple small things like the truss rod cover, but that isn't a big deal. Normally I would point out that the string lock system on the headstock for the Kahler bridge are missing but since he replaced that setup with Sperzels, you should be fine since they both accomplish the same thing, except with the Sperzels it will be faster to do string changes. He definitely put thought into his modifications to the guitar.
Nice buy! I would buy a Model 5 or 6 like that in a heartbeat. Those are wonderful guitars. It's good you got one with a Kahler and not a JT-6 for a bridge. The JT-6 was okay, but they were cheap so they fell apart and weren't the most stable tuning wise (not to mention ugly as sin). A well maintained Kahler will stay in tune quite well. That one looks, at least from the pictures, to be in pretty good shape, not a ton of finish missing outside of the usual spots or anything to suggest it is heavily worn down, so you should be good.
And it definitely is an '86. After 1986, they came with the previously mentioned JT-6 until they switched naming schemes, then it would have come with a Schaller JT-590 bridge, which is also better than the JT-6. They switched the naming scheme so that the names were longer. That would have been the 550XL. The Charvel equivalent of my guitar would have been the 650XL. They also had a guitar called the 750XL, which is one of my dream guitars. Figured maple top carved into an archtop with an ebony fretboard. I've been watching for one to pop up for years now. They're very rare and very expensive. The last one to sell on Ebay was a year ago.
Well, this is recorded with the mic I use for when I go on TeamSpeak and such, so the audioquality is awful... But I tried just recording myself playing some random stuff that came to me (some improvisation, some melodies, parts of songs and stuff) just to hear what it sounded like..
If you go a page or two back you can see my pedalboard, but here only the Keeley Blues Driver is being used. The reverb is on at all the times. And sorry for the sloppy playing!
did i hear over the hills and far away for like a split second?
Overall your technique and tone with your playing is swell but the reverb or delay is a bit overwhelming I think. I used to have the same problem but I phased it out a bit and my playing feels a bit cleaner for the effort.
With the shameful self-publicity of my masturbatory but sloppy playing out of the way, back to gear.
Somewhat limited over here with stuff I can actually get my hands on and test, there aren't that many shops in Belfast, and many have pretty limited exclusivity deals My local had a big range of Charvels for a while and I was tempted, but alas they are gone, never to return.
I assume that in terms of sheer number of good guitar shops London is probably my best bet (my brother is studying there too), but any other UK denizens know of cities that may have a perhaps unexpectedly high density of guitar shops?
EPT
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