Custom Made Guitar : Is it a right move in this economy ?
Hi guys , i have recently retired my custom guitar from a local builder here in italy after almost 8 months of waiting. This instrument is everything that I was missing from my other instrument ( which is an actual fender stratocaster AVRI 70 from 2011 , you can see it on the last pic).
I would like to start from the beggining: why didn’t i just buy a Fender ?
Well , the answer is not that easy. I’m a huge fan of the company, but not in the last few years. Back in the days the AVRI was basically a step lower than the custom shop, basically one of the best instrument I could buy on their catalog. Just 1700€ at the time (crazy).
That guitar is more that 2k now ( and they do not make a 70 white strat with rosewood fingerboard anyway).
So in this economy everything is more expensive, but i wouldn’t care about spending more if I actually HAVE MORE BACK from the company , but it’s not happening .
This guitar basically is the better version I would say of Fender’s Suhr-killer , the american ultra luxe vintage , which is sold at 3500 k euro/dollar.
I went crazy for that guitar but i was not feeling good about spending that much, so i had the crazy idea to contact this guy in Venice and started a project with him.
This guitar has some good specs :
\- american 2-pieces alder body
\- roasted maple neck (1 piece) with compound radius from 9.5 to 12
\-indian rosewood fingerboard
\- tusc nut
\- 22 stainless steel frets with pearl inlays
\- hand wounded pickups from an other guy who worked with vintage stratocasters for his own life, with a very modern blend features ( so i have tele’s tone too)
\- gold hardware, gold locking tuner, gold tremolo, everything made in japan from gotoh
\- 3 nitro colors (white, shoreline gold and black) with a over-relic finishing on the body, and a little bit too on the back of the neck)
\- hard case included
I didn’t make that list as a flex, which considering the price and the FUCKING SOUND OF IT actually it is a little bit, but the real deal is that: should i feel bad about this ?
Should I feel bad about not supporting the original design and company who made the stratocaster what it is today ? Because i can’t give an damn thing about reading “Fender” on that headstock. I feel a little bad for having the headstock too with the original design, which makes this guitar a very boderline replica . But look at it, Fender would never build something like this . And it’s not something crazy.
Fender are even starting to sue every boutique builder or any brand that copy the design of the strat but i see that as a very coward move to not have any competitors on the market, which actually is parallely very rich in good alternatives, in particular if you’re looking for some specific specs that Fender don’t do.
So the topic isn’t about the guitar, is about the context and what makes me doing this project.
What do you guys think ? Is this on of the worst era for guitars? Higher prices, no innovations. Should really players keep spending their money just to have a Fender ?