Horseflesh
Joined: Feb 12, 2022
Posts: 11
Seattle-ish
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Posted on Feb 12 2022 02:03 PM
I am a rank beginner guitar player, and I could use some advice on picking out a new electric guitar that will let me get my toes wet in surf music.
I like all styles of music, so I am hoping to find an instrument that is kind of a generalist... but it's got to have an appropriate tremolo for surf bends. (I know amps/cabs/effects are the other half of the equation and I will make do with a Helix for all that. I already have some decent surf patches thanks to info I have read on forums like this.)
I'm not too fixated on emulating a super specific tone, and haven't yet developed strong opinions on various kinds of pickups and so on. I'm OK with the compromises I'll have in a do-it-all instrument.
FYI, my current electric guitar is a Squier Affinity telecaster w/ humbuckers. It's a fine beginner instrument but I doubt it is worth having a nice trem bridge installed. So, I am looking for something new/used with a budget of up to $600, though less is always nice.
I am open to a hollow or semi-hollow body if that's the right move, like a Gretsch Streamliner. I know they are bigger than my tele but I also practice on an acoustic dreadnaught so I think the size of a hollow electric would be fine.
Many thanks in advance for your ideas!
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ldk
Joined: Nov 08, 2017
Posts: 369
San Francisco Bay Area
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Posted on Feb 12 2022 02:43 PM
Hard to beat a Strat. Get a Fender American Standard or Professional if you can. A Squier Standard is also nice. Many companies make good Strat copies.
— If I'd stop buying old guitars to fix, I might actually learn to play.
Bringing instruments back to life since 2013.
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stratdancer
Joined: Dec 11, 2013
Posts: 2537
Akron, Ohio
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Posted on Feb 12 2022 04:26 PM
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Redfeather
Joined: Jul 30, 2016
Posts: 896
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Posted on Feb 12 2022 04:33 PM
A used G&L Legacy Tribute version (overseas construction with the same parts) will outstrat a Strat and is a killer value. Their 2-point vibrato is excellent.
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Horseflesh
Joined: Feb 12, 2022
Posts: 11
Seattle-ish
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Posted on Feb 12 2022 08:00 PM
Interesting to see a unanimous voice for strat style, that makes things easy.
Redfeather wrote:
A used G&L Legacy Tribute version (overseas construction with the same parts) will outstrat a Strat and is a killer value. Their 2-point vibrato is excellent.
I'm glad you mentioned G&L, I didn't really know anything about them. (Told ya I was new!) The Legacy Tribute HSS seems like an excellent contender for a guitar that does a little bit of everything. And everyone seems to love the trem.
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JohnnyMosrite
Joined: Jun 14, 2006
Posts: 907
New York City area
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Posted on Feb 12 2022 09:09 PM
Horse,
The G&L tribute "strats" are good start. If you get a guitar with a strat trem, try to get the six screw type, if possible. With the "two-point" trems, there isn't a whole lot of wood between the trem anchor posts and the bride pickup. So - the wood can fatique and crack -> instant firewood.
One of the best "all-round" guitars I've experienced over the years with a little bit of everything in appointments were the Peavey T-60s. You could get humbucking and single coil sounds; they played great - kind of like a Les Paul, Tele, and Mosrite rolled into one.
They're currently bucking a $1,000.00 but occasionally one pops up cheaper. And - they are built like tanks.
Happy hunting,
J Mo'
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jtrollmann
Joined: Jun 24, 2021
Posts: 135
South Bay, CA
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Posted on Feb 12 2022 09:49 PM
I bought my first electric guitar last summer -a Fender American Pro II stratocaster -after playing acoustic for the past 40+ years. I immediately got into learning traditional surf tunes, but now also play other 60's instrumentals, including a few Shadows songs. The stratocaster is a wonderfully versatile guitar that feels good and sounds great.
— -John
"...enjoy every sandwich." -Warren Zevon
Fender Stratocaster American Pro II
Fender '65 Deluxe Reverb Reissue
Last edited: Feb 14, 2022 10:55:42
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synchro
Joined: Feb 02, 2008
Posts: 4542
Not One-Sawn, but Two-Sawn . . . AZ.
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Posted on Feb 13 2022 12:32 AM
There are a lot of choices. A Strat is a safe choice. If you go that direction, take some time to learn the various options and get something that works for your tastes. My personal preference would be one with 3 single coils and an S-1 switch that allows the neck pickup to be used with the bridge pickup. That would make for a nice basic Surf sound.
G&L makes great stuff, and had a wide range of choices. The Comanche is a unique guitar that has a degree of similarity to a Strat, bit is astoundingly versatile. The Doheny is sort of a Jazzmaster style axe, but with a different trem. Just some thoughts.
— The artist formerly known as: Synchro
When Surf Guitar is outlawed only outlaws will play Surf Guitar.
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Samurai
Joined: Mar 14, 2006
Posts: 2283
Kiev, Ukraine
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Posted on Feb 13 2022 12:57 AM
Horseflesh wrote:
I am a rank beginner guitar player, and I could use some advice on picking out a new electric guitar that will let me get my toes wet in surf music.
I like all styles of music, so I am hoping to find an instrument that is kind of a generalist... but it's got to have an appropriate tremolo for surf bends. (I know amps/cabs/effects are the other half of the equation and I will make do with a Helix for all that. I already have some decent surf patches thanks to info I have read on forums like this.)
I'm not too fixated on emulating a super specific tone, and haven't yet developed strong opinions on various kinds of pickups and so on. I'm OK with the compromises I'll have in a do-it-all instrument.
FYI, my current electric guitar is a Squier Affinity telecaster w/ humbuckers. It's a fine beginner instrument but I doubt it is worth having a nice trem bridge installed. So, I am looking for something new/used with a budget of up to $600, though less is always nice.
I am open to a hollow or semi-hollow body if that's the right move, like a Gretsch Streamliner. I know they are bigger than my tele but I also practice on an acoustic dreadnaught so I think the size of a hollow electric would be fine.
Many thanks in advance for your ideas!
I’ve got a row of strats, jag, jazzmaster and gretsches. But the guitar that really does a bit of everything is my telecaster with bigsby)
Strats are surely universal guitars so it may be a good option.
Concerning hollow body - new G2655T-P90 STREAMLINER with P90 is really good for everything from surf and rockabilly to some hard rock and sounds and plays great for its $500.
— Waikiki Makaki surf-rock band from Ukraine
https://linktr.ee/waikikimakaki
Lost Diver
https://lostdiver.bandcamp.com
https://soundcloud.com/vitaly-yakushin
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cosmonaut
Joined: Apr 02, 2019
Posts: 339
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Posted on Feb 13 2022 02:24 AM
with single coils, the most crucial sound to me is neck + bridge. A strat is very versatile, but the simple mod of engaging the neck pickup with the bridge adds SO much flavor to a strat. The rest you can get with EQ tweaks and gain.
I've played a strat in bands ranging from metal and punk, to shoegaze and solo ambient, to surf and lo-fi moody fingerpicked stuff.
Doing a neck+bridge mod on a strat can get you some of the lovely "middle position" tones from telecasters, Jazzmasters, and jags.
That said, if I were starting out today on guitar, I'd go for a telecaster with bigsby or a reverend with some kinda p90s and something like a bigsby. every reverend I've played or set up for friends has been a joy.
Last edited: Feb 13, 2022 02:26:55
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stratdancer
Joined: Dec 11, 2013
Posts: 2537
Akron, Ohio
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Posted on Feb 13 2022 05:04 AM
I'll just add a little more thought about why the stratocaster can be used as a singular guitar covering a multitude of music genres. I have many of them and some with humbuckers which is ultimately the best choice for hard rock and metal. One of strats has a late 70's Super Distortion pickup with a coil tap and a no-load tone control for the bridge pickup. This one guitar covers everything I could want to play but I don't use it for surf because it's strung with 9's. I have other single coil strats that are strung with 9's that can cover anything because they have a hotter bridge pickup. They are wired without the middle pickup on a tone control. This gives an amazing tone on positions 2 and 4 so they cover any genre.
My surf strats are all wired with vintage pickup arrays along with a blender pot and no-load tone control. No matter what pickups being used, I never have the tone control active. I want everything as bright as possible. I play a lot of blended neck and bridge along with just the middle pickup. Then there are songs where I just use the bridge. All these guitars are strung with 12s.
So there you go, one guitar that can be wired into a wide range of tone to cover any genre. Seems like a good investment!
— The Kahuna Kings
https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Kahuna-Kings/459752090818447
https://thekahunakings.bandcamp.com/releases
Last edited: Feb 13, 2022 05:05:20
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ldk
Joined: Nov 08, 2017
Posts: 369
San Francisco Bay Area
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Posted on Feb 13 2022 10:42 AM
I’ll add a couple of comments to previous posts. My 2011 American Standard Strat has the 2-point bridge and the tremolo has the best feel of all my guitars. It would be silly to worry about wood cracking. A Bigsby is a great thing when you want to add vibrato without routing, but it would not be my first choice for a guitar I was buying with a clean slate. Peavey made some nice guitars in the 80’s and I own a few. The T-60 has a fixed bridge.
— If I'd stop buying old guitars to fix, I might actually learn to play.
Bringing instruments back to life since 2013.
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DeathTide
Joined: Apr 13, 2018
Posts: 1378
New Orleans
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Posted on Feb 13 2022 11:49 AM
Horseflesh wrote:
Many thanks in advance for your ideas!
Are there any tracks you can point to and say “now THAT” is a killer guitar tone? For me, Original Surfaris’ Bombora! is a perfect tone. Being new is awesome! But it does help if you try to narrow your focus, even a little.
Also - it will help you to actually play these guitars and find out if a certain body type fits yours. Strats are not comfortable to me, and I always hit the volume when I’m doing muted picking on the high strings. And they have neck dive. A tele sounds so cool, but every time I’ve picked one up it felt like I just got in a fight with a guitar. Gretschs - forget it! I lost that fight in a millisecond. I could barely strum it.
If you get a strat, be sure to get that neck + bridge mod.
— Daniel Deathtide
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synchro
Joined: Feb 02, 2008
Posts: 4542
Not One-Sawn, but Two-Sawn . . . AZ.
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Posted on Feb 13 2022 11:55 AM
It seems like the neck + bridge mod has a fairly large following.
— The artist formerly known as: Synchro
When Surf Guitar is outlawed only outlaws will play Surf Guitar.
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Samurai
Joined: Mar 14, 2006
Posts: 2283
Kiev, Ukraine
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Posted on Feb 13 2022 01:08 PM
synchro wrote:
It seems like the neck + bridge mod has a fairly large following.
Sure! Two of my strats got it, one S1 switch and another blender pot. I use neck+bridge quite often, but mostly bridge or middle alone.
— Waikiki Makaki surf-rock band from Ukraine
https://linktr.ee/waikikimakaki
Lost Diver
https://lostdiver.bandcamp.com
https://soundcloud.com/vitaly-yakushin
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edwardsand
Joined: Jun 29, 2018
Posts: 801
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Posted on Feb 13 2022 01:17 PM
Stratocaster is certainly a safe choice for a versatile guitar, and it allows you to get a lot of sounds that are familiar from so much music out there. That being said, I'm not a big fan of the strat trem, and like Death Tide, I tend to hit the volume knob while playing.
On the other hand, Jaguars are rather stereotyped as only a surf guitar, but they are highly versatile, and can work great for garage, country, punk, alternative/indy, americana, and more. Not necessarily for metal, though.
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stratdancer
Joined: Dec 11, 2013
Posts: 2537
Akron, Ohio
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Posted on Feb 13 2022 02:28 PM
Heads up on the volume knob issue. I've fixed mine by adding a no-load pot to one of my strats and use rubber washers on the others by placing it under the knob. Never have the problem again.
— The Kahuna Kings
https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Kahuna-Kings/459752090818447
https://thekahunakings.bandcamp.com/releases
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edwardsand
Joined: Jun 29, 2018
Posts: 801
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Posted on Feb 13 2022 07:27 PM
stratdancer wrote:
Heads up on the volume knob issue. I've fixed mine by adding a no-load pot to one of my strats and use rubber washers on the others by placing it under the knob. Never have the problem again.
Thanks for the tip. I remember hearing this one before, but can you give specifics on the washer, like diameter and thickness?
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cosmonaut
Joined: Apr 02, 2019
Posts: 339
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Posted on Feb 13 2022 11:21 PM
I don't hit my strat volume knob when playing ever. it's in the best position for pinky volume swells too.
I've never personally been a fan of humbuckers in Strats, but they can absolutely do metal. I just happened to make mine work for metal with a single coil bridge and an eq pedal. I'm usually a Neck first player though. bridge is a rare foray for me. a humbucker there requires some very different gain staging and volume levels.
as for the jaguar being versatile: absolutely. Brian Molko from Placebo is one of the reasons I became obsessed with jaguars.
Last edited: Feb 13, 2022 23:23:34
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synchro
Joined: Feb 02, 2008
Posts: 4542
Not One-Sawn, but Two-Sawn . . . AZ.
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Posted on Feb 14 2022 12:08 AM
cosmonaut wrote:
I don't hit my strat volume knob when playing ever. it's in the best position for pinky volume swells too.
I've never personally been a fan of humbuckers in Strats, but they can absolutely do metal. I just happened to make mine work for metal with a single coil bridge and an eq pedal. I'm usually a Neck first player though. bridge is a rare foray for me. a humbucker there requires some very different gain staging and volume levels.
as for the jaguar being versatile: absolutely. Brian Molko from Placebo is one of the reasons I became obsessed with jaguars.
I’ve never had much of a volume know problem with Strats, but that just one data point.
Also, I’ve never been quite onboard with HBs on a Strat. It just seems out of place, sort of like jacking up the back of a BMW M3 and putting gnarly all-terrain tires on it. 
I used to use my Jaguar in place of a Tele, for Country. I remember chicken pickin’ a solo once and the other guitarist in the band was shocked, because I had out Tele’d his Tele. I could be mistaken, but I have a faint recollection that Leo Fender designed the Jaguar with Country sounds in mind, but it came out at exactly the right time for Surf and had a great Surf sound, so it became associated with that sound.
In talking about a versatile guitar, I will echo Samurai’s comment about a Tele with a Bigsby being a good choice, as well. As much as I love the Jaguar, the 24” scale feels a bit tight to me, so I tended to gravitate to longer scales. Most of the time, I play a Gretsch, of one sort or another, but I also have a couple of Telecasters which see a lot of action.
Most non-Bigsby Teles have a bridge design which gives a very strong sound, because the strings pass through the body and turn 90 degrees at the bridge pieces. This maximizes the downward pressure on the bridge and helps the Tele to deliver the crisp sound that these guitars are famed for. There’s a lot to be said for a stock Tele.
Adding a Bigsby changes the bridge to the Jazzmaster/Jaguar style bridge, but most Bigsby installations on Telecasters use a tension bar Bigsby, so once again there is a fair amount of downforce on the bridge. I’ve heard single-coil Teles play Surf and I really loved the sound.
— The artist formerly known as: Synchro
When Surf Guitar is outlawed only outlaws will play Surf Guitar.
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