Played out guitar aesthetics/features

[gunch]

get a strat, tele, sg, or lp

return to monke

 

[mastapimp]

headless necks and headless hardware
pick guard on a back-routed guitar
non-recessed control cavities where the cover isn't flush
colored fingerboards (Kiesel, PRS)
obnoxiously bright solid paints (solar's neon pink and neon green comes to mind)
Aristides and Schecter wet saran-wrap paintjob
Caparison sponge paint
Suhr's gloss finish over heavily relic

 

[LiveOVErdrive]

They should just stop making BAD trems.

My USA Strat trem doesn't hold tune. Sure I can set it up so I can dive bomb, but if I do that then I can't pitchbend. IDK what EBMM does with theirs, but I wouldn't mind some of that.

But I like my floyds.

 

[Thesius]

Pickup rings on super strats. The amount of ESPs. Edwards. and E-IIs I have passed on because of those ugly ass rings is too high

 

[Alberto7]

Relic'd nitro finishes on modern guitars and/or comet vomit discoball sparkle finishes. Like, I fucking know that Larada isn't 40 years old, who are we kidding. That shit only works on Strats and Les Pauls.

Stained fretboards. Never liked them and the color wears out. Very few guitars out there with stained fretboards that I've ever liked.

Kiesel bevels in general are the main thing keeping me away from truly liking their designs.

People get hung up on the whole "SS frets don't wear out so you never need to refret them" argument and kind of stop there if they don't feel like they've ever been burdened by refreting non-SS guitars.

Here's why *I* still really like SS frets (though it's not quite a deal breaker for me): Have you ever mirror polished your frets? Not just polished, but really, really polished them to the point where bends are so effortless that you almost have to relearn some basic technique because there's zero friction between the string and fret and you find that you can push certain chords slightly out of tune if you're not careful? If you haven't, it's worth getting some 10,000 grit and doing it sometime. Just be prepared to spend some real time and elbow grease on it. If you get used to that feeling, it's really addictive. With non-SS frets though, it will only last for maybe an hour of playing before it's back to merely "really smooth". Even overnight in a humid client and there's enough oxidation of the frets that the feeling goes away. With good SS frets, you put the work into mirror polishing the frets once and it just stays that way. I have Parkers from the 90's with SS frets that have that glassy zero friction feel all the time every time I take them out of the case and it never requires any more maintenance than wiping the frets down with a damp cloth when I change the strings.

I bought a Harley Benton with SS frets recently and it came with them basically unpolished and gritty feeling. If that's what other people experience with SS frets, I don't blame them for not understanding. But at least I was able to polish them myself *once* and now I know that it will continue to play like that from now on.

My Strandberg Boden Original 8 with shitty fretwork felt like bending on sandpaper until I finally decided to have it fret-leveled and polished. It's basically a different guitar now, and a very good one, too.

 

[Grindspine]

Just, "wow", at this list...

I miss the days when the cringiest shit to look at was an abalone covered hot topic schecter.

What was it, the Charvel Desolation series that came out of the same factory a season before Schecter did it? Those were gaudy af.

Not an aesthetic or feature, but signature guitars for online influencers/YouTube guitarists. I’m sure it’s the dream of every guitarist who makes a living as a musician to have a signature guitar, but if your claim to fame is having e.g. a “20 cool fusion licks” video on YouTube from March 2018 with 154,176 views, and not an album like Passion & Warfare or Surfing With The Alien, I question whether you deserve it.

Do record labels still exist in the size they were in 1990 though?

-block inlays (they look awful on basically every guitar)

-poorly done fades (ibanez, schecter) - it's not that hard to do a fade ffs, especially a fire fade. If you can't consistently do it then don't make em.

-chrome hardware - makes everything look cheap

-gold hardware with guitars that aren't white or black - it looks tacky as fuck

-people that get shitty custom inlays on a guitar and then try to sell it - No I don't want a fucking harry potter themed guitar, or one with a fractal butthole inlay, just fuck off

Chrome pisses me off whether it is on a guitar or a car.

I like when people take production guitars and customize the fuck out of them way more than I like blindly spec'd monstrosities.

Customized af!

 

[Grindspine]

I thought of one that I hate on any and all guitars... scalloped fretboards... I have never been a fan of the tightrope feel.

The kicker was when this one-of-a-kind koa Mockingbird was up on ebay, sold, then popped back up a few months later with the fretboard massacred. Scalloping is just.. yich.

 

[thraxil]

I just thought of another one that seems to be a trend lately that's already starting to feel played out to me: mint green pickguards. I don't know what happened recently, but all over the place I see what looks like a white pickguard that's maybe lit a little oddly and it turns out to be "mint green". As a rare, unique thing I guess that's cool. It just seems to be everywhere now.

 

[Alsvartr]

I just thought of another one that seems to be a trend lately that's already starting to feel played out to me: mint green pickguards. I don't know what happened recently, but all over the place I see what looks like a white pickguard that's maybe lit a little oddly and it turns out to be "mint green". As a rare, unique thing I guess that's cool. It just seems to be everywhere now.

The cringiest part is that mint green pickguards weren't even real. The original plastic was supposed to be white but was slightly transparent and had a milky look with the black middle layer being a bit more visible. The actual mint green opaque plastic wasn't a thing until the reissues in the 80s and 90s trying to mimic a similar look with different materials.

 

[Einhander]

Man a lot of these are on point...
-Bevels are a bit out of hand
-Odd burl fades
-Cheap hardware
-Coil taps on both volume and tone knobs( just experienced this for first time on some local E-II's in Shibuya, hated it)
-Custom inlays that do not compliment the guitar are odd
- Ridiculous price demands for n axe just because it's made in the US ( back up the QC and then maybe I'll bend)

But other than that just my opinion, to each their own and you like what you like at the end of the day 🤷‍♂️

 

[LiveOVErdrive]

I like mint pickguards because white pickguards automatically associate with a cheap starter strat knockoff for me. The off-white look adds a little subtle interest.

 

[Choop]

I like mint pickguards because white pickguards automatically associate with a cheap starter strat knockoff for me. The off-white look adds a little subtle interest.

Ye -- I'm a fan of the aged pearloid look, where it's just a little cream-colored or yellowed. Looks nice! I have a bass with one, but I can't tell if it was purchased that way or is actually aged to some degree.

They should just stop making BAD trems.

My USA Strat trem doesn't hold tune. Sure I can set it up so I can dive bomb, but if I do that then I can't pitchbend. IDK what EBMM does with theirs, but I wouldn't mind some of that.

But I like my floyds.

I dunno if this would 100% solve it, but a lot of tuning stability issues in general are due to strings having friction at the nut. Having some nice high gear ratio tuners and lubing the nut with graphite or nutsauce, etc, helps a whole lot. I probably wouldn't depend on a non-locking trem to stay in tune like it would with a floyd for a whole set of bending though.

 

[CanserDYI]

I like mint pickguards because white pickguards automatically associate with a cheap starter strat knockoff for me. The off-white look adds a little subtle interest.

I like the mint look on WHITE.

I've seen them put on tobacco bursts and it looks fucking dreadful.

 

[LiveOVErdrive]

I like the mint look on WHITE.

I've seen them put on tobacco bursts and it looks fucking dreadful.

Mint on white is GORGEOUS. I like it on black with white pickup covers for that little bit of contrast. And I LOVE it on a red sienna sunburst.

 

[wheresthefbomb]

What was it, the Charvel Desolation series that came out of the same factory a season before Schecter did it? Those were gaudy af.

Earlier this summer I was GASing hard over an older wine red LTD EC1000 with abalone fucking everything, even abalone trim inside the binding because what could be better than trim for your trim?

I didn't end up buying it for a lot of reasons, but I had to laugh at myself because I used to shit talk Schecter for exactly the same thing, but now somehow I'm all "wOoOoOoOoWwWw"

I've seen them put on tobacco bursts

I said it before I'll say it again, posts like this are why we need a cry react.

Many modern guitar designers seem to have a very poor grasp on color theory and aesthetics in general. Most of the builds I see are too focused on being a br00tal metal guitar or being as insanely eye-catching as possible, or worse, both at the same time.

 

[Grindspine]

I like the mint look on WHITE.

I've seen them put on tobacco bursts and it looks fucking dreadful.

I was looking for a puke emoticon to display my opinion of a mint pick guard on a tobacco burst guitar. It sounds as dreadful as drinking a cocktail with tobacco bitters in it.

Earlier this summer I was GASing hard over an older wine red LTD EC1000 with abalone fucking everything, even abalone trim inside the binding because what could be better than trim for your trim?

I didn't end up buying it for a lot of reasons, but I had to laugh at myself because I used to shit talk Schecter for exactly the same thing, but now somehow I'm all "wOoOoOoOoWwWw"



I said it before I'll say it again, posts like this are why we need a cry react.

I remember some guitars in the nineties, PRS Dragon, B.C. Rich Goddess, etc. with all of the hand-inlayed paua shell abalone inlays. Then, after NAMM 2002 or so, every import from Korea had abalone trim. I can see where it was appealing once, then got totally oversaturated.

Can we add a puke react with the cry react?

 

[Hollowway]

Many modern guitar designers seem to have a very poor grasp on color theory and aesthetics in general. Most of the builds I see are too focused on being a br00tal metal guitar or being as insanely eye-catching as possible, or worse, both at the same time.

I soooo totally agree. The good lord does not magically bestow a strong sense of style or design on someone just because they start building guitars. Nearly all luthiers would do better to hire an actual designer. There are exceptions, but they’re not the norm.

 

[Nlelith]

The off-white look adds a little subtle interest.

 

[thraxil]

I like mint pickguards because white pickguards automatically associate with a cheap starter strat knockoff for me. The off-white look adds a little subtle interest.

That's why I brought it up in the "Played out guitar aesthetics" thread. I don't necessarily think it's a bad look. The first time I saw one, I probably thought it was a nice, unique subtle touch that could look pretty nice. It's just that now it's on like every other guitar I see and has just become a lame trend.

It's kind of like how I still think silverburst les pauls are gorgeous but I will never, ever own one because it's now just become synonymous with "Adam Jones fanboi".

 

[ixlramp]

Headless guitars with a Strandberg-Boden-like body shape.
Even though that extra cutout is a good idea (if well designed), and even though i generally love headless guitars.