[Steve DeRosa]

Originally Posted by Warrenaines

...Thinking about first electric. A few considerations:

• Will just be for home use at least at first...unlikely I'll be looking for a ton of volume...
• Inclined towards melodic tones more than heavy distortion...though like a wide range of music including 90's grunge so don't want to get too narrow to start.
• Comfort/limited maintenance...the wide bout and thicker strings of acoustic dreads aren't always the most comfortable...not sure if a heavy Les Paul for example would be uncomfortable over time (also recognizing there are now lighter Les Pauls). Also don't want to spend a lot of time with a guitar that is likely to require a lot of personal maintenance, will have it professionally setup etc. ...
• No set budget. Don't want anything high-end at this point without dialing in what I like and dislike, but also don't want to go too cheap and buy again soon...
• Are iconic guitars like Teles, Strats, Les Pauls, SGs a good place to start?...Should I consider any semi-hollow bodies?...

In order:

• You might want to consider something with lower-powered pickups that won't automatically drive your amp into distortion; many vintage-style units - Gretsch Filter'Tron/Hi-lo'Tron, Gibson mini-bucker/P-90, Guild soapbar/LB-1, original-style Fender units - fill the bill...
• Unless you're specifically inclined toward the glassier Fender-type tonality, any of the Gretsch/Gibson/Guild units mentioned should give you what you're after - clarity with enough midrange/low-end weight to cover all but the heaviest styles effectively...
• If weight is a primary consideration, you'd probably be better off steering away from most solidbodies (the exception being the 2017 Gibson - not Epiphone - SG Special, where most examples scale in around 6 lbs.) in favor of a full- or semi-hollow instrument of some kind; although you're not a fan of larger-bodied guitars, my Godin CW II - a dual P-90 single-cutaway hollow in the mold of the early-50's ES-175 - scales in at just a hair over five pounds (about the same as many acoustics), uses the same neck/scale length as the Seagull acoustics (there's something to be said for familiarity), has tone for days (TMK Tony Bennett's guitarist is using one), has the customary Godin QC, and is no harder to negotiate than a 000/OM. If you're looking for a smaller body, the Guild Newark St. M-75 - a Les Paul-sized hollow-body with two soapbar pickups - also comes in just over five pounds, and either one would be a good choice in the $1K range, which leads me to:
• If you're used to playing high-end Gibsons and Martins you undoubtedly know something about what makes a quality guitar tick in terms of tone and playability, so you definitely don't want to go bargain-basement; that said, I'd be looking in the circa-$1K range new, $500-750 used - while there are some low-rent gems to be had IME the MIC Squiers, Epiphones, Ibanez, etc. can be spotty, so unless you're willing to take your time finding "the one" you'd be better off, as you said, doing it right the first time...
• The good thing about "iconic guitars" of whatever type is that they're tried-and-proven designs - for better or worse, you know exactly what you're going to hear when you pick up a Strat, LP, 335, Tele, etc. The bottom line here is whether or not that's what you really need: if your playing style/tone/touch/artistic vision/stage persona are markedly different from most of the musicians you jam with (as well as those you consider influences) then you may well require an equally out-of-the-ordinary instrument to free those tones you've been hearing in your head - back in the early-60's Gretsch was largely an also-ran outside of country-music circles and Rickenbacker/Hofner were virtually unknown, until these four kids from Liverpool turned the world upside down...