Do any of you still buy Guitarist?

Loobs

I stopped long ago. I just picked it up in WH Smith and flicked through. Didn't get excited by it. 

ThePrettyDamned

Same.

Total guitar, despite being known for rock and stuff, has much greater versatility of music and gear, but is mostly adverts sadly.

I have tons of back issues covering pretty much every genre but fusion and jazz, I got them from a bootsale for a tenner. There was a year where they changed format and it became adverts with the odd interview and review in, and a couple of tabs. I still have them because there is such a massive variety of song material, one day I might bother learning some covers.

Loobs

Yeah. Total Guitar tends to feature some 'cooler' artists. Guitarist just concentrates on the blues-rock/PRS thing, mostly. Guess Baby Boomers are their main demographic. 

impmann

Buy? No.

Vibetronic

yeah I still get it, normally to read on the train when I have to work in London. The last issue was one of the most boring I've ever got, although I should really have guessed by the cover. They still sometimes have some really good features, but the adverts with lots of pics are slowly becoming my favourite part. And there's virtually no music to play in there any more, just blues headlines or whatever it is, which is a pity. 

breakstuff

Have occasionally bought Guitarist but find it rather expensive verses it's content.I have a subscription with Total Guitar but am considering cancelling it for the same reason.Over the past year it's content has become smaller and smaller to the point where instead of reading it over a couple of hours I find myself skimming through it in half an hour mainly due to the amount of adverts.They don't feature JoBo much though so i I suppose that could be considered a plus point by some.

thomasross20

Guitar techniques is the one I always bought.. But only sporadically these days.. I'm more a player than a gear hound. The articles can be repetitive and although I could improve by doing the exercises I find that can get sterile.. I'd prefer if they transcribed kick ass songs rather than doing their millionth srv or Clapton article.

Alnico

I still buy it but shake my head at what they've done to it.

I have bought it religiously since 1985 - the issue which featured Nancy Wilson from Heart on the front cover.

Does anyone else remember the black and white 'Shop' adverts and full page ads from Marshall..............

1nten5e

All magazines are the same, they just regurgitate the same stuff over and over again, when I started getting keen on photography I subscribed to a couple of magazines, but cancelled them when I realised they were just in a loop...

You can get all you want on the web these days

xSkarloey

@Alnico

Yes I remember the ads, having been a teenager with sod all money but still enjoying seeing what was available. 

I am now a grown man who looks at ads on the web...and who buys stuff. The teenager inside me approves. 

I still look each month in Smith's to see what each guitar mag has on the cover, but it's getting more like a game to find reasons why I shouldn't buy a copy. 

Guitar and Guitarist seem virtually interchangeable at times, and we've had threads about it before. 

I admit to quite liking the Guitar and Bass 'Special' issues they do, where they collect articles under a theme and charge less than a tenner for what amounts to a decent book. And I'd love to buy the current "Les Paul" bible, but there's far too much Phil Harris content for my tastes. 

thermionic

I'll buy it maybe once a year now - if there somebody interesting interviewed, I'm bored and and I feel that I haven't spent too much money that month.

I still subscribe to Guitar and Bass though, and think it's worth it.

Loobs

I used to love it, bought it religiously from the age of about 12 until 21 or so. 

Guitar Player (US) is a fantastic magazine. They feature a really diverse range of musicians from classic to avant-garde, to metal. Always cool gear too. I subscribed to it for a long time. They also had cool jazz lessons and what not. 

Phil_aka_Pip

I still get it on subscription

Moltisanti

I had it on subscription until last year, then swapped my subscription for empire which is vastly more interesting when i'm on the bog

Loobs

I think I'm gonna get a subscription to Wire. 

chrisj1602

I used to love it and buy it all the time. Now I've got a digital subscription through zinio, it was only £19 for 13 issues, but even at that price I've gradually lost interest and won't be renewing.

Bucket

Still read it, it's alright but could be better.

Total Guitar has improved massively in the last couple of years, it's a pretty decent mag.

Guitar and Bass doesn't really enthuse me.

I wish Guitar Buyer was still around, that was a good one.

TimmyO

Bucket said:

I wish Guitar Buyer was still around, that was a good one.

I the irony here is that one of the reasons Guitar Buyer was so good was Mick Taylor (no, not *that* one) the Editor - Guitarist poached him, he impoved the mag, and now they have gutted the mag and let him go. 

Although being fair, I suspect in that period the arse dropped out of the print mag market.

The shame of it is that the genuinely good journalistic content of print mags has not (for the most part) survived the journey to website-based content. Just crank out another "Top 13 things I stumbled across yesterday" article... 

guitarcookie1

Just downloaded the digital copy of the latest edition & really struggled to find anything of interest this time round...

Jalapeno

Occasionally for train travel.  Prefer Guitar Techniqiues - but one issue usually has 3 month's content in it, kind of self defeating !

Loobs

Guitar Player!