I prefer having a pickguard. I have a pretty accurate right hand attack these days, and don’t scratch up my guitars, but when I first started playing I was pretty heavy-handed. It would have been a bad idea for me to go without a pickguard back then.
It’s still a bad idea to go without a pickguard when other people play my guitars. I’m a fairly genial guy when it comes to letting other players try out my guitars; in fact, I really enjoy hearing them played by other accomplished musicians. But a pickguard is mandatory in those circumstances.
I’ve got one good friend and frequent musical partner who’s a much better guitarist than I am and has been playing considerably longer, yet he doesn’t have as precise a right hand attack as I have. When at a party I let him play the one guitar I own that doesn’t have a pickguard, sure enough, it got marked up.
Not badly, but noticeably.
I’d rather have my friends enjoy my guitars rather than hovering nervously over them when they play them, so for me it’s a good idea to have pickguards on my guitars.
As for clear pickguards, I’m sorry, but those just remind me WAY too much of the clear vinyl furniture covers several of my friends’ mothers had on their living room furniture when I was a kid.
Imagine this: it’s a hot, humid Kansas City summer in the late 1950’s or early 1960’s, it’s over 100 degrees Fahrenheit with 100% humidity, and none of the houses on our block have central air conditioning. Imprisoned by politeness and forced to visit briefly with my friend’s mother, I sit on a chair covered by a clear vinyl furniture cover, and in the muggy air I feel my skin gluing itself to the vinyl. When finally given leave to go outside and play with my buddy, I have to literally PEEL MYSELF OFF the vinyl.
No thank you. No thank you very much. I don’t want anything that reminds me of that anywhere within two miles of any of my musical instruments. As for the supposedly beautiful wood grain that I should be eager to keep ever within my sight: really? Spruce is not all that exciting, for the most part. Besides, I can still see most of it when I have a pickguard mounted on the guitar.
You know, in case I want to gaze adoringly at it or anything....
Wade Hampton Miller
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