Don't get a Squire. They are one step up from a toy. Absolute junk with pots, wiring, pickups, frets, i could go on and on. These guitars are for kids starting out. Nothing more.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2014-04-02 20:05 by More Hot Rocks.

Quote
More Hot Rocks
Don't get a Squire. They are one step up from a toy. Absolute junk with pots, wiring, pickups, frets, i could go on and on. These guitars are for kids starting out. Nothing more.

Rubbish!
... and when was the last time you played one? wait, I'll answer that for you ...Never! because they're name is Squier.

of course there are entry level guitars of all manufacturers, but top of the line "Classic Vibe Squiers" are top notch in fit and finish, right out of the box. good luck trying that with a Mexico Standard.





Coming up in May, I think, is the poor man's Micawber with Alnico III pickups

[www.musiciansfriend.com]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2014-04-02 21:50 by open-g.

Quote
BluzDude
In your guys opinion, what's a better guitar, a Mexican Fender Tele or a Squire Tele?

IMO, all Squiers of the Classic Vibe Series are better than than a Mex Fender.
skip all the Bullets, Affinitys, vintage modified and what not series - CV's are better and still a bargain. only a Fender Custom Shop Teles will be better ...and a whole lot more expensive. ouch!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2014-04-02 21:38 by open-g.

I have a Squier Tele with a neck position humbucker and it sounds great.

Squier's Classic Vibe series are very well rated. I love the thin line

By the way, has anybody an opinion on Epiphone's Swingster??

Look for a nice second hand Mexican Classic Series 50s Tele.

Ash body, decent quality hardware and very well made.
The stock pickups are OK but a later upgrade to a top draw set will then give you as good a Tele as you could ever want.

Quote
More Hot Rocks
Don't get a Squire. They are one step up from a toy. Absolute junk with pots, wiring, pickups, frets, i could go on and on. These guitars are for kids starting out. Nothing more.

That is an absolute nonsence. Squiers can be great, as others already mentioned, especially the Classic Vibe series is a great value for the money. In shops I have seen expensive US Fenders that were horrible instruments with major flaws that I haven't understood how could pass the final control. On the other and I have seen great Squiers. Of course if you take 10 random Fenders and 10 random Squiers, you will end up with 8 or 9 good Fenders and 1 or 2 good Squiers and the good Fenders will be better than the good Squiers, but to say that Squiers are "absolute junk" means you you were either very unlucky with Squires so far or you have actually never played one. If you pick up a guitar and it sounds and feels right in your hands, than that is the right guitar for you. Simple as that.

Here is a great review:





and here is one man (among others) not ashamed to play that junk or toy or whatever you call it:









Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2014-04-07 15:54 by Happy24.

Happy makes some very good points.

The main thing to remember is that every guitar is bit different. It's the chance mating of two bits of wood which defines the character of a Fender type guitar and killer examples turn up at all price points.

There are two big factors which allow cheaper Fenders and copies to be as good as they undoubtedly are today.

One is modern computer controlled manufacture. This has ensured that [given half way decent materials and parts], there are virtually no "bad guitars" on the market today.

The second factor is Fender's genius in the original designs.
The designs didn't call for fancy exotic timbers or highly skilled luthiers to make them. Easy cost effective construction was the aim from the outset.

The way to find a killer Fender type guitar for not a lot of money is to get out and spend time playing as many as you can! You'll find some real gems among the Squires and Mexican ranges.

The other way to get a really nice Fender is to spend lots of money on a high dollar CS model.
Somebody else has then spent the time selecting the parts, leaving you to spend the cash

Quote
Elmo Lewis
I have a Squier Tele with a neck position humbucker and it sounds great.

I have a Squier Tele with a neck position humbucker too. And a Squier Strat. And a US Standard Fender Strat.

The Fender is by all means the best one, but it took me a couple of months of playing many Strats in shops before I bought the one that I really love and would not change a thing on it (well, after I have added one spring to the tremolo). When I was looking for that Strat, I played some really horrible US Strats in shops - really noisy pickups, gaps between body and the neck, crooked necks.... As I wrote, those 2 Squires I have can not match the US Fender, but I still love them both, play them a lot and I am happy I have them.

Quite recently I played that Classic Vibe Squier Tele in a shop and almost bought it. It just felt and sounded really great. I didn't buy it only because I would have too many similar guitars. I have been looking for a good Gibson Les Paul Studio for over a year now, still haven't found an instrument that I would really like to buy.

Ignore what it says on the headstock.

If you're after a nice Les Paul for not too much money...try a Japanese built Tokai or two

I was looking for an ES335 a few years ago and ended up with a Tokai ES120.
It was the best guitar of quite a few I tried, including Gibsons ...and about half the price.

What about dual OD/DIST pedals??
I'm thinking about xotic bb+, Fulltone fulldrive, fulltone GT500, Visual sound Jekyll&Hyde, Blackstar DUAL DIST, new Mesa BOOgie flex five............

Quote
KeithNacho
What about dual OD/DIST pedals??
I'm thinking about xotic bb+, Fulltone fulldrive, fulltone GT500, Visual sound Jekyll&Hyde, Blackstar DUAL DIST, new Mesa BOOgie flex five............

What are you after? A Tele, Strat, LP, Pedals?
It's getting a bit confusing.
It's not about what others think is good, it's about what you think is best for you. It's very hard to describe sound and feel. Go to a music shop and try different things and buy what you feel comfotable with which hasn't necessarely to be the same what is good for others.

Quote
More Hot Rocks
Don't get a Squire. They are one step up from a toy. Absolute junk with pots, wiring, pickups, frets, i could go on and on. These guitars are for kids starting out. Nothing more.

That is an absolute nonsence. Squiers can be great, as others already mentioned, especially the Classic Vibe series is a great value for the money. In shops I have seen expensive US Fenders that were horrible instruments with major flaws that I haven't understood how could pass the final control. On the other and I have seen great Squiers. Of course if you take 10 random Fenders and 10 random Squiers, you will end up with 8 or 9 good Fenders and 1 or 2 good Squiers and the good Fenders will be better than the good Squiers, but to say that Squiers are "absolute junk" means you you were either very unlucky with Squires so far or you have actually never played one. If you pick up a guitar and it sounds and feels right in your hands, than that is the right guitar for you. Simple as that.


Anybody that likes a squire is tone deaf.

Quote
RockinJive
Anybody that likes a squire is tone deaf.

...again...like John Mayal for instance. Right? I love those snobbish comments

Instruments made in China are made with unfair labor practices while ignoring environmental standards. As an American, I purchase and play only domestic products whenever possible. While most of you may not be so sentimental regarding US manufactures I urge everyone to think about the consequence of our actions. Most Squires I've played or owned are substandard to their US or Japan counterparts. Better to own one great guitar than a dozen crappy ones. Look at The Beatles, their records were made with just a handful of instruments. Paul still uses them till this day.... by right, buy once, make it yours. In the end the music pays the biggest price when everyone is playing garbage.

Quote
KeithNacho
What about dual OD/DIST pedals??
I'm thinking about xotic bb+, Fulltone fulldrive, fulltone GT500, Visual sound Jekyll&Hyde, Blackstar DUAL DIST, new Mesa BOOgie flex five............

for me , nothing beats an ibanez TS9

Quote
Happy24

Quote
RockinJive
Anybody that likes a squire is tone deaf.

...again...like John Mayal for instance. Right? I love those snobbish comments

That's out of hundred of thousands that play live. No one uses these toys to play live. It's like Tiger Woods using a putter that he got from the local Put Put range. Junk garbage pieces of crap toys.

Quote
DoomandGloom
Instruments made in China are made with unfair labor practices while ignoring environmental standards. As an American, I purchase and play only domestic products whenever possible. While most of you may not be so sentimental regarding US manufactures I urge everyone to think about the consequence of our actions. Most Squires I've played or owned are substandard to their US or Japan counterparts. Better to own one great guitar than a dozen crappy ones. Look at The Beatles, their records were made with just a handful of instruments. Paul still uses them till this day.... by right, buy once, make it yours. In the end the music pays the biggest price when everyone is playing garbage.

Think about it a bit longer Doom.

If it weren't for Asian production of guitars, Fender for example wouldn't be the healthy company it is today and wouldn't be making such good guitars in its own US factories.

I have a great respect for Fender. When makers such as Tokai started producing copies that were better than a lot of Fender's then currently indifferent product, they embraced the challenge and tackled it with the "...if you can't beat them, join them" approach.

Asian Squiers and Mexican Fenders enable players without deep pockets to own a very decent Strat or Tele that they otherwise wouldn't be able to afford.
They're buying a Fender product and Fender USA are benefiting from it.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2014-04-09 18:59 by Spud.

Quote
DoomandGloom
Instruments made in China are made with unfair labor practices while ignoring environmental standards.

How many China guitar manufactures have you visited and what environmental standards do they ignore and how? Or do you say it because it is a general knowledge and everybody says so? Especially on TV? I don't mean to advocate for China, I am by no means any expert on that topic, but this general view that WE are sooo right and THEY and sooo wrong just makes me really angry, espacially the "WE" part. We are told that THEY ar so evil, but WE actually have no problem to do all kinds of business with THEM. So where is the principle? The whole enviromental thing and many other things might be right in general but in reality it exists mainly because it is a HUGE bussines for a handful of international companies. Basically I just don't believe that WE (western culture in general) are as good as the media tell us and as so many people so willingly accept...

Quote
DoomandGloom
Better to own one great guitar than a dozen crappy ones. Look at The Beatles, their records were made with just a handful of instruments. Paul still uses them till this day.... by right, buy once, make it yours. In the end the music pays the biggest price when everyone is playing garbage.

Exactly...like...let's see...the Epiphone Casino. Oh, wait...let's discuss Epiphone vs. Gibson and let's get some "anybody that likes an Epiphone is tone deaf" comments.
I know, the Epiphone in the sixties was different than today, but still...

Or the most iconic one - the Höfner bass. Surely not a top quallity instrument. Paul himself admits it has always been impossible to keep in tune. Yet he plays it all the time. So? And where was it made? Germany? Was Germany in the late fifties / early sixties, a couple of years after the WW II an okay country to buy products from or did sir Paul make an unforgivable ethical mistake?

Sorry, but to judge an instrument without feeling it and playing it is plainly stupid. If you play a Squier or any other brand and you tell me then that you don't like it, then fair enough. All other arguments are pretentious.



Edited 4 time(s). Last edit at 2014-04-09 20:44 by Happy24.

Quote
Spud

Quote
DoomandGloom
Instruments made in China are made with unfair labor practices while ignoring environmental standards. As an American, I purchase and play only domestic products whenever possible. While most of you may not be so sentimental regarding US manufactures I urge everyone to think about the consequence of our actions. Most Squires I've played or owned are substandard to their US or Japan counterparts. Better to own one great guitar than a dozen crappy ones. Look at The Beatles, their records were made with just a handful of instruments. Paul still uses them till this day.... by right, buy once, make it yours. In the end the music pays the biggest price when everyone is playing garbage.

Think about it a bit longer Doom.

If it weren't for Asian production of guitars, Fender for example wouldn't be the healthy company it is today and wouldn't be making such good guitars in its own US factories.

I have a great respect for Fender. When makers such as Tokai started producing copies that were better than a lot of Fender's then currently indifferent product, they embraced the challenge and tackled it with the "...if you can't beat them, join them" approach.

Asian Squiers and Mexican Fenders enable players without deep pockets to own a very decent Strat or Tele that they otherwise wouldn't be able to afford.
They're buying a Fender product and Fender USA are benefiting from it.

Doesn't make it right, doesn't make using China child labor the only solution.. That's like saying slavery was ok in The South because plantations could not survive. Sometimes doing the right thing is costly, painful and in the short term detrimental to what we love. The inability to change, to grow, to evolve for artists and their tools is evident by the staleness of rock and roll and other art as well. The guitar you buy was once alive, it's mojo knows if the person making it is being taken advantage of, unhappy et et. This pain transfers in a negative way to the music and musician, The guitar problem began with the mindset created by manufacturers that guitarists need dozens of guitars, which is only true for bands who use many tunings and capos like The Stones, Sonic Youth, The Who... The fact that Japan made better Fenders 30 years ago does not hold true now, USA Fenders today are better than those 80's copies, better than Mex, and better than Squires. Those guys in the video are full of it but they had me for a minute, I checked out a "Vibes" or 2 and the frets were jagged and the pick ups were blah. So buy a Squire, fill it with aftermarket parts and it's resale value will not increase one penny. Guitar guys know you can never reclaim the money spent on mods, in fact no matter what the mod it generally decreases the value.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2014-04-09 19:31 by DoomandGloom.

Quote
RockinJive
That's out of hundred of thousands that play live. No one uses these toys to play live. It's like Tiger Woods using a putter that he got from the local Put Put range. Junk garbage pieces of crap toys.

Mick Taylor has been seen playing a Squier Strat now and again when playing in pubs and the like (also a Vintage Strat copy, I think, which is a comparable guitar in price and quality terms). Jack Pearson, the country-jazz-blues dude that played with the Allman Brothers for a while and has frequently been cited as the world's best unknown guitarist, also used one quite a lot and possibly still does. You can find good quality guitars at all price points these days. Ultimately, they're pieces of wood with strings on them. It's how you play them that counts.

To all those DoomandGlooms, RockinJives, More Hot Rocks and others out there:

Quote
Happy24
To all those DoomandGlooms, RockinJives, More Hot Rocks and others out there:

Starting with the homemade guitar, everything used here, made in America, including The $$$5G Gibson used in the end for the actual playing and the Silvertone amp. BTW is Jack White still alive?



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2014-04-09 21:20 by DoomandGloom.

Yes, everything good comes from America, including you, and you are the King of everything.

Get yourself a Fender Telecaster made in Mexico then have some Seymour Duncan pickups installed. If you dare replace the volume, tone, pickup selector switch and the caps. You will turn an already good piece of wood into a Monster! If you're really lucky, MJ will build the Pickups for you.

The bodies and necks of a Fender guitar regardless where they are made used the same machinery, same wood, same ageing process and same assembly methods.

It's just a difference in electronics (maybe the tuners) and how much the people people are getting paid to build them. Ive had a couple custom shop fenders and they were excellent. The Mexican I have play just as good if not better with minor upgrades.

Quote
CBII
Get yourself a Fender Telecaster made in Mexico then have some Seymour Duncan pickups installed. If you dare replace the volume, tone, pickup selector switch and the caps. You will turn an already good piece of wood into a Monster! If you're really lucky, MJ will build the Pickups for you.

The bodies and necks of a Fender guitar regardless where they are made used the same machinery, same wood, same ageing process and same assembly methods.

It's just a difference in electronics (maybe the tuners) and how much the people people are getting paid to build them. Ive had a couple custom shop fenders and they were excellent. The Mexican I have play just as good if not better with minor upgrades.

don't like them one bit, they feel choked by the thick finish and plastic truss rod..

Here's one for Keef himself.... [www.ebay.com]

Quote
Happy24

Quote
More Hot Rocks
Don't get a Squire. They are one step up from a toy. Absolute junk with pots, wiring, pickups, frets, i could go on and on. These guitars are for kids starting out. Nothing more.

That is an absolute nonsence. Squiers can be great, as others already mentioned, especially the Classic Vibe series is a great value for the money. In shops I have seen expensive US Fenders that were horrible instruments with major flaws that I haven't understood how could pass the final control. On the other and I have seen great Squiers. Of course if you take 10 random Fenders and 10 random Squiers, you will end up with 8 or 9 good Fenders and 1 or 2 good Squiers and the good Fenders will be better than the good Squiers, but to say that Squiers are "absolute junk" means you you were either very unlucky with Squires so far or you have actually never played one. If you pick up a guitar and it sounds and feels right in your hands, than that is the right guitar for you. Simple as that.

Happy24

I'll add to that it also depends on who's playing the guitar! Some people thought the Kay's and Silvertone brand guitar's were absolute junk too! Funny how some of the best blues and Rock n Roll were recorded playing that brand. Nope, I would not write off any guitar just "BECAUSE" what someone has said. Seen way to many players make a "JUNK" guitar shine like white diamonds.

CBII



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2014-04-10 05:05 by CBII.

Yes, 99% is in your hands. If Clapton picks up a Squier, he will still sound like himself and if he played a conert with it, those experts here would not be able to tell the difference if they didn't see the headstock. On the other hand if I pick up a Clapton signature model, it won't make me (or anybody else) sound like himself.

As I wrote above, I myself own 1 US Fender Strat and 2 Squiers. I like the Fender most by far, I love everything about it, but would not say a word against the Squiers. The Fender was 4 times more expensive. It is better, but is it 4 times better? I don't think so.