"Buy the most expensive instrument you can afford" - good advice?

[ChrisDowning]

[ QUOTE=$originalposter]{$pagetext}[/QUOTE]

Hpw many times have I said that before - its actually even less than that because if you buy what you need - a Heritage 575 or a Gibson 175 or a Scofield Ibanez etc, the $2500 is divided by about 3500 days of playing. In fact most people keep good guitars longer - my Guild 30 years so far. All my guitars are over ten years. But they are not all iconic - Takamine, Tokia, Tom Waghorn, Hofner - but they all do the job as well as you'd find anywhere.

But don't kid yourself that all guitars are made the same way. Obviously a hand made instrument by someone experienced over twenty years is different to one made in an Asian Factory by workers who last year were ploughing fields (making instruments they neither play or recognise in some cases.) Somewhere between those extremes will be a point the purchaser will find acceptable - and its reflected in the price. Nothing of quality is ever going to be cheap - a free market doesn't work like that - Chinese antiques are not half the price of Eurpean ones, just because they are Chinese - the market fixes the price.

Maybe the answer is don't buy a mid range archtop, but a better quality solid, like a Fender USA Telecaster, or the halfway point - a USA 335 or a Scofield Ibanez?

[ChrisDowning]

BTW if you are considering playing out for real money, you might want to think about this. Who would you employ to service your car - the guy with the right spanners and ramps, or the guy with an adjustable wrench and a set of bricks to hold the car up while he's underneath. Pros know - you just won't get the work if you turn up with oddball gear.