How to know what electric guitar to buy
5 Things to Check BEFORE Buying a Guitar!
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hey guys welcome back to the channel
hope you're having a great day today
it's Darrell here and today we're
talking about five things you need to
check out before you buy an electric
guitar and they might not be what you
think now the odds are pretty good if
you're a first time guitar buyer and you
walk into a music store the salesperson
is gonna hand you something like this
strat style guitar and say this is what
you need and you end up going home with
a strat now there's certainly nothing
wrong with that but we want to dig a
little bit deeper today so that you guys
are equipped with some knowledge to help
you pick the right guitar for you now
over the years I've been lucky enough to
try and own many different instruments
so here is kind of like a boiled down or
condensed list of some of the most
important things and some of the things
that you know people might think are
important but aren't let's jump in here
we go alright in no specific order let's
start with tip number one now season
players may notice I am holding a Gibson
SG famous for one little flaw and that
is yes you got it neck dive one of the
most annoying things about a guitar and
it can plagued acoustic guitars electric
guitars various different body shapes
but the SG is well known for that and if
you're new player neck dive simply means
it's really heavy on the headstock side
really light on the body so when you let
go of it the guitar always dives so
that's called neck dive super annoying
now I think checking for neck dive is
really important and why it made my list
is because especially if you're a new
player and you're not aware of it again
whether you're playing electric
classical acoustic whatever it can
really impede your learning if you're
subconsciously supporting the weight of
the headstock with your left hand it's
gonna be a lot harder to play so if
you're new player your hand should be
free you know you shouldn't be
supporting the weight of a headstock you
should be you know playing chords notes
riffs or whatever you're doing your hand
should be just loose and able to cruise
around the neck if you're supporting the
weight of the neck it's gonna be a lot
harder to play so that's why I think
checking your guitar for you know
headstock dive is really important don't
lean it up against your body if you're
wearing like a sticky shirt like I am
here you know it might look like it's
going to stay and then as soon as you
put it on a strap and stand up with a
different shirt or whatever it's going
to be like this and you
fighting it so check for that just do
quick little test and then you'll know
now the second thing you should consider
when buying an electric guitar is the
instruments tone no it's not tone is way
way way down on the list I'm gonna show
you guys why at the end of the video the
second thing to consider much more
important than an instruments tone is
ergonomic s' so ergonomics is all about
contouring the shape of the guitars body
so that it's easy for the player to play
now when I was designing this guitar I
had the privilege of doing that with 10s
lots of you guys have seen this guitar
but it's all about contours right
contours all along the top and the
bottom almost almost all over the body a
huge scoop here so I'm just gonna look
at my monitor right in here
you know most manufacturers will not
give a scoop like that because it might
not be as aesthetically pleasing but as
soon as you start to play it you're like
why doesn't everybody do that it's so
comfortable and so that's an area where
maybe economics wins over just straight
aesthetics although I like the way it
looks up here again get it in the light
huge contour here for your hand
contoured heel joint big belly cut that
goes all the way along right from the
the top horn all the way to the back so
again it sits against your body and it
just feels right it becomes a part of
your body you don't want to be fighting
that now new players may not consider
economics at all I certainly didn't when
I was young but the older I get new more
instruments that I play I really
appreciate what manufacturers do to make
it easier for us to play now people
might just be like well I've always
liked the Les Paul I'm just going to
order one online or I'm just gonna pick
one up used and not really take the time
to really consider it and after playing
on some other models maybe that your
friends have or something like that or
just playing on it and you realize how
big and heavy and clunky and you know
almost everything about that well it's
from the 50s right and it hasn't been
changed and that's great if you want a
historic instrument you know if you just
like Les Paul's that's awesome that's
great but if you go into it not
considering some of these things you
might regret what you buy now I'm not
one to talk in this regard because I do
love my Telecasters and they are almost
worse than Les Paul's although they're
quite a bit lighter
yes just a plank of wood no contours
here no contours on the belly no
contours here so it's just like I said
it's a plank so you can still play
proficiently and enjoy an instrument but
if you're new player try some different
designs out you might be surprised as to
what feels the best and that's really
important all right number three and the
third thing to consider when buying an
electric guitar is yes we're still
talking about playability it's that
important we will get to the tones don't
worry
but playability super important here
we're talking about neck profile let's
be honest you spend a hundred percent of
the time playing your guitar on your
guitars neck it's gotta be a good fit
for you now if you're a new player
there's at least three things to
consider when choosing a guitar neck
number one is the profile and this
simply refers to the carve on the back
of the neck some guitar necks are very
thin some are very thick and there's
different shapes or profiles there's the
C shape which is like famously on the
strats D shape you shape V shape or soft
v ya so some really interesting carves
on the back of the neck so something to
consider the radius is the second thing
and that refers to the front face of the
guitar how flat it is or how curved I'll
give you an example in a second and of
course the fret size now I know that's a
lot to consider if you're new player but
they are very important to how a guitar
feels and how it plays so you know maybe
more advanced players would be you know
easier to go into a store and understand
all these things and pick an instrument
but I think it just speaks to the fact
that you should try a bunch of different
guitars out because they're all going to
be slightly different and so even if you
don't maybe understand all those terms
you will understand what feels good to
play so I just wanted to quickly show
you guys the difference in radius now
here we have a couple radius gauges this
is seven and a quarter so this would
represent a vintage kind of Fender
radius you can see it's very arched and
this would represent you know the front
edge of your fingerboard so your frets
would be arched your fingerboard would
be are very nice for courting and you
know just general playing and on a
modern radius it is much much flatter so
there's almost no arch in it at all very
flat playing easy to bend you
to play fast easy to play all sorts of
multiple genres where is the seventh
quarter can be a little bit more you
know specific for courting and stuff it
could be harder to band and play fast so
that's just a quick way to kind of
illustrate the difference between a
vintage and a modern radius and again
you just need to you know try the mode
some people love the vintage radius some
people love more modern try a bunch out
see which one fits best for you alright
the fourth thing to consider when buying
an electric guitar is the type of
pickups so we're getting closer to tone
here but we haven't quite arrived so I'm
going to go over three of the most
popular configurations for pickups and
we're gonna talk about which one might
be right for you because when you're new
player it can be daunting all these
guitars on a wall and they all have
different types of pickups and stuff but
we're going to go through the most
popular let's start with the single
coils bright punchy glassy chime II
cutting these are all words that
describe single coils in sort of vague
ways but single coils very popular now
if you're new player
I know it's daunting when you walk into
a guitar store and there's walls of
guitars and there's different pickups
and they all look cool and different and
you don't know what they do but as
general rules you want a single coil
equipped guitar if you want to play
styles that don't require a lot of gain
although there's ways to get around that
with gates and stuff but as a general
rule if you want you know clean tones
bluesy tones light breakup up to a boat
kind of classic rock the lower end of
classic rock kind of gain a single coils
are a great choice
you know famously used by almost every
blues player on the planet they just
give you a very nice present every
single kind of nuance is not lost on a
lower output single coil as you you know
up the the output of pickups you kind of
lose some of the nuances but for the
most part single coils are low output so
you know everything you put in comes out
and players you know like clapped in
like Gilmour like Stevie Ray Vaughan on
and on and on the list is huge so a very
popular pickup but if you want to play
high gain
there's better choices number two is the
humbucker much more high output than
this
single-coil these guitars can be used
with a lot of distortion and they remain
quiet if you do that with a single coil
it generates a lot of noise and most
people hate that that's why the
humbucker was invented to buck the hum
at a 60 cycle hum so anyway great for
metal you know classic rock hard rock
all those Styles handles gain
wonderfully and they clean up nicely too
so jazz players will use them and get a
very very warm sound so very versatile
in terms of the tones that you can get
for it but as a general rule if you want
to play with more gain humbuckers a
great way to go and finally the king of
versatility the humbucker single single
or HSS as its referred to so if you see
that written out HSS that just simply
refers to humbucker single single so you
get all the best of rock and metal tones
with that humbucker and all the best of
kind of like bluesy tones that famous
position for on strats so this is a
great way if you're not sure what you
want and you're just figuring out what
what kind of tones you want or you know
you know I only have a certain number of
dollars and I want to be able to play
multiple styles humbucker single single
absolutely great way to go alright
finally number five and the thing we've
all been waiting for is of course the
guitars aesthetics yes we're talking
about aesthetics no we're not we're
going to talk about the guitar tone but
I will say one thing about aesthetics
it's really tied up with image
unfortunately or fortunately I guess
good and bad a guitar playing is caught
up in that image right you see a Les
Paul you think rock and roll you see and
I've been as you think Steve Vai or Joe
Satriani you see you know whatever
whatever a big body guitar you think
jazz it's really tied up in image so I
will say aesthetics do matter I'm not
you know gonna say they don't because we
all want to play guitars that we think
look good and are inspired to play so it
is important but yes we're talking about
tone and why it's on the bottom of my
list let's talk about that now so here's
the cold hard truth and the reason why
tone is at the bottom of my list when
she was in a guitar and you know well
below things like like I mentioned like
urgh UNAM explain all those things that
are really going to inspire you to play
and it's this a guitars tone
comes from the amp so to illustrate this
let's take this cheap $100 strat copy
plug it in and see what kind of tones we
can get out of it
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so there you guys go that's why I put
tone at the end of the list things like
the guitars wait the guitars balance the
neck profile frets eyes contours on it
all those issues of playability like I
said before are really gonna make you
reach for that guitar because it just
fits you so well whether it's a you know
a thick baseball bat neck or a thin
Ibanez neck
everybody has their preferences so if
you're a new player that's my advice to
you hit up the music store don't just
you know whatever try a certain guitar
because your favorite artist uses it or
whatever try a bunch of different
guitars even ones that you're like I
don't know I don't really think I would
gel with that guitar try them out
because like I said you spend a hundred
percent of your time on that neck and a
hundred percent of that time with like
guitar body up against your body and as
I've gotten older you know guitar wait
really important
ergonomics really important and anything
you know that inspires me to pick up
that guitar is important so hopefully
that helped you guys if you're new
player and yeah if there's other things
that are important to you guys drop them
in the comments below if you've
discovered over the years that you know
maybe a guitar that you thought you'd
never liked you ended up playing or you
know a specific feature that you
absolutely love on your guitar I'd love
to hear them so drop them in the video
comments below thanks so much for
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a great week take care
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