Driven Back to Electric by Prices

[Davis Webb]

The title says it all. I simply cannot afford a good sounding acoustic. I can afford a good sounding electric.

With ticket prices starting at $1K for the cheap seats and luxury class running 2k$ and up, lots of us can not get on the bus.

Acoustic guitar prices are ridiculous. Unless you have a lot of money, they are out of range, under 1K they all sound the same, blech. I kept the Ovation so I had something to play.

Yeh I know the arguments, it costs a lot to produce, blah blah blah...

Just saying, I am a pure electric player now because, in a word, I cannot offer the Martin/Guild/Taylor/Gibson deities their tithe.

The prices are through the roof. Like cable companies who have normalized 300 bucks a month for internet, phone and cable, guitar companies have normalized 2K as an entry point.

Things have reversed. In the old days, an acoustic was a poor working mans instrument. Now they are the domain of the wealthy.

Sad but true. The acoustic manufacturers have kicked me out of the stands.

Amazing what quality I get for $400 for an electric. Astounding how awful a thing you get for that in an acoustic.

They are marketing to retired boomers. But not all of us are sitting on a pension.

Start making some guitars for the rest of us, please.

That is all. "Sadface emoticon".

[TBman]

There are a lot of under $500 guitars that sound decent, you just have to hunt around and play a few.

[Bowie]

Makes no sense to me. You can get very good, used, acoustics in the $400 to $600 range. There's decent electrics for $400, but nothing so amazing that I'd say I have to quit playing acoustics and go electric. That's like saying beef is too expensive, I'm only eating fish. They're two different things and you just need to stick in your price range. As has been told to me many times, a poor craftsman blames his tools.

[joemcg]

You didn't look hard enough.

[ljguitar]

OK DW...

Having been 'spoilt' by good tone, I'm not going to settle for lesser quality whether I play electric or acoustic.

But let's just suppose I drink your kool-aid and jump into the electric world and plan to do so for between $1000-$2000…

I'm stretching to see how I'd be happy with less than a fairly high quality electric (my 1993 Strat Plus with Lace pickups, roller nut, and hip-shot springs for instance) used for only $1200.00.

Now I need a decent quality tube amp. I'm willing to settle for a Fender Blues Jr. with the upgraded speaker package, and only $200 worth of mods to bring it up to snuff (Total $700).

Then with about $400 in pedals, I've got a cooking rig, and have spent beyond of the upper end of that $1000-$2000 budget...for which I could have owned a really decent used Taylor, Gibson, Martin, Kronbauer, etc.

I don't see electric guitars as a cost savings if quality is actually at issue.

[grim83]

Kind of hard to compare electrics with acoustics since as long as you like the feel and playability of a guitar you can make it do anything with electrics. Acoustics not so much if you don't like the sound of your guitar your choices are suck it up or sell/trade it. I agree with Lj though you still have to spend the money on the electric side its just in all the additional stuff like amps and pedals. I also assume you've not looked very hard to find a nice acoustic under 1000, unless your requirements are it must be new, made in America and have Gibson/Taylor/Martin/Guild on the head stock. There are quite a few brands making killer instruments below a grand and I've seen some dip below 500 new prices. Eastman, alvarez, Yamaha, recording king, seagulls, blue ridge, guild gad series. You just need to be willing to accept made in Asia as the real deal.

[turkey_sandwich]

Seagull or used 15 series.

[wcap]

Originally Posted by turkey_sandwich

Seagull or used 15 series.

Indeed. All the Seagulls I've played have been pretty nice, and some have been really nice. And, say, a good 000-15 Martin can compete tonally with some of the big boys costing much much more (I have a 000-15 and a Goodall, and the Martin gets equal playing time).

Or some of the nicer Yamahas (e.g. the handbuilts).

Or a Blueridge, or a nice Eastman...

[pjroberts]

Weird thread you've started Davis, and I agree with Larry that you're drinking your own koolaide. You should know with over 2,600 AGF posts that there are thousands of options and a diverse market, new and used. I've got a couple guitars in the $1200 range that rival craftsmanship and tone of instruments 3-4x cost, which of course is not news to you. At one point you even owned a D18, so what happened? If you want to play electric guitar 100% of the time it is your prerogative, but don't blame it an industry, you've got plenty of alternatives.

[jpd]

Originally Posted by Davis Webb

The title says it all. I simply cannot afford a good sounding acoustic.

Acoustic guitar prices are ridiculous. Unless you have a lot of money, they are out of range

The prices are through the roof. Like cable companies who have normalized 300 bucks a month for internet, phone and cable, guitar companies have normalized 2K as an entry point.

Aw...Come on man! There are PLENTY of top notch acoustics in the under $1000 range........heck, the $300 to $500 range has a bunch! I don't buy your rant, Davis. They're out there, you just need to have access. Maybe take a trip down from Canada and look around?

[ukejon]

Things have reversed. In the old days, an acoustic was a poor working mans instrument. Now they are the domain of the wealthy.

Sad but true. The acoustic manufacturers have kicked me out of the stands.

Amazing what quality I get for $400 for an electric. Astounding how awful a thing you get for that in an acoustic.

Suit yourself, Davis, but you could hardly be more wrong. As you have heard and will hear from countless AGF folks in the days to come, there are astonishingly good solid wood guitars for under $500. And in the used market, your options expand even more considerably. Setting aside brand lust, one can find great deals.

[Psalad]

I can't see how the OP could be any more wrong... There are some extremely playable and good sounding acoustics in the 500 range. They play far better than they ever did before at that price IMHO and sound quite respectable. I don't want to sound harsh, but if you can't sound good on a $500 seagull I don't think the guitar is the problem. We have reached the point where good qualtiy instruments are available for all, truly.

You might want gibson, Taylor, or martin, but.. When it comes to electrics, you can't afford a gibson, american made fender, etc either.

I have written and performed for years with my epiphone Masterbilt until I recently bought by Taylor... Not a problem.

[Oldguy64]

DW,
You've been here a whale of a lot longer than I
But friend, as has been said, if you are willing to buy a ticket on the used bus, you can get any of a number of very good guitars for the price of a good Tele, and a decent (not great) Peavey Trans-tune amp.

And if you go to the BTS & full of mojo side of things you can find some great, if not visually perfect guitars.

I played a Seagull that was indeed beat up (BTS).
It was a horrible LOOKING thing!
It sounded like angels singing. $300
I saw a Yairi mini jumbo (only one I've EVER seen) 12-string, $750.
I've seen Yairi's advertised all over the USA for under $500.

The Masterworks in my sig, was purchased near new, with a miniscule amount of belt buckle on its solid EIR back.
All solid, near new guitar I waited YEARS to find. $600.

If you want to go back to the easy playability of an electric, with its broad pallete of available, and possible sound...go for it. Enjoy it.
But if you wait till the next three day weekend, you can very likely pick up a 1 or 2 series Taylor for around $700. And if you're really lucky, GC might have a brand new DN3 hanging around for under $1000.

[bajawatt]

We are spoiled for choices of high quality sub-$1000 acoustics now more than ever. File this under "huh?"

[kydave]

Things have reversed. In the old days, an acoustic was a poor working mans instrument. Now they are the domain of the wealthy.

Not even close to true...

And a D-28 nowadays cost less that it did 40 years ago, if you look at how many minimum wage hours you'd have to work for it.

And as others have pointed out now, using that benchmark I just mentioned as an example, 40 years ago there were NO guitar that cost 1/5th of what a D-28 did that were worth a darn. Now, there are LOTs of very decent guitars in that price range.

Don't quite know what you're getting at...

Besides which, with an electric you need a good amp. Those are not nearly as inexpensive as the guitars.