A Squier Affinity ??? Sounded Mega At Rehearsal Tonight....

Neill

I'm not a great fan of those Andertons videos but there was one discussion I happened to catch where they were discussing the merits of cheap guitar + expensive amp vs expensive guitar + cheap amp, given that most of us have a limited budget.

I think Rob Chapman hit the nail right on the head.  There are a lot of folk out there who don't aspire, for whatever reason, to playing in a band and doing gigs, and for these people there's probably more pleasure to be gained form owning and playing a "quality" guitar, and very little point in buying a boutique amp.  OTOH a gigging musician needs to spend as much as possible on the amplifier and, within reason, any guitar will do.  





    

Maynehead

Any guitar can play well if it's set up well. The difference will be in the pickups, and the reliability of the hardware, and sometimes the looks. That's what you're paying for.

The problem with some cheap guitars is that they can't all be set up well (uneven neck curve, wrong neck angle, loose frets etc), so you'd have to rely on luck to find a good sample.

impmann

Maynehead said:

The problem with some cheap guitars is that they can't all be set up well (uneven neck curve, wrong neck angle, loose frets etc), so you'd have to rely on luck to find a good sample.

I think that was true a few years ago, but I genuinely haven't picked up a cheap end guitar recently where I've found inherent faults in the construction. I'm sure you can find exceptions to prove the rule (possibly in Argos, Poundland or similar), but I've not see any in a music shop for a long time that fall into that category.

Maynehead

impmann said:

I think that was true a few years ago, but I genuinely haven't picked up a cheap end guitar recently where I've found inherent faults in the construction. I'm sure you can find exceptions to prove the rule (possibly in Argos, Poundland or similar), but I've not see any in a music shop for a long time that fall into that category.

I have to admit, I haven't tried any budget guitars from a shop for a good few years, so you may well be correct, as hard to believe as it may be. I just can't imagine workers on a mass production line putting as much attention to detail into each guitar, especially since different people will work on each guitar. The level of training must have to be exceptionally high...

LuttiS

I wonder if you just got lucky?

I have a Cort X6, was £270ish new 15 years ago, not a beginner/budget guitar but fit for the argument. I love it. It has great neck, feel and sound on it. It has been gigged a lot. 
I wanted a back up guitar, and something with a floating bride for shits and giggles and for when i forget what i'm doing in a solo.. (DIVEEE!!!) 
I found another X6 on ebay at a pretty low price (sub £100 if i remember) so i got that.. 
It was a complete dog. The sound, the feel, everything. Even a good set up couldn't help it. 

So for two guitars that should be the same (give or take a fixed bridge) they are completely different.   

So i wonder if that particular affinity was one of the good ones.. a little extra care when building or something like that.

crunchman

Maynehead said:

impmann said:

I think that was true a few years ago, but I genuinely haven't picked up a cheap end guitar recently where I've found inherent faults in the construction. I'm sure you can find exceptions to prove the rule (possibly in Argos, Poundland or similar), but I've not see any in a music shop for a long time that fall into that category.

I have to admit, I haven't tried any budget guitars from a shop for a good few years, so you may well be correct, as hard to believe as it may be. I just can't imagine workers on a mass production line putting as much attention to detail into each guitar, especially since different people will work on each guitar. The level of training must have to be exceptionally high...

A lot of it is CNC and robots now.  All the bodies and necks will be cut and routed this way so the necks will fit snugly in the pockets, and bridge will be in the right place.

The wood does make a difference, and more care will be taken with the sourcing of the wood for higher end guitars, but there is no reason why you can't find a good piece of wood on a cheap guitar.

My brother-in-law had a Squier Affinity Tele that sounded superb.  Tuning wasn't great, but that would be fixable with a new set of tuners and/or some work on the nut.

darthed1981

I own two Squiers, a Classic Vibe Tele Custom, which I preferred over a Mexican Standard, and a Bullet Strat.

The CV Tele is great, just full stop.  The Bullet Strat is very playable, sounds very good and it is conveniently very light.

Sometimes we forget that we really discuss several intersecting topics here, and that playing guitar as an amateur or professional, and collecting gear are different (if complementary and intersecting) hobbies.

I've not got to the point of desiring aged Les Pauls with lovely fading Nitro finishes etc. yet, but if I had a £3000 guitar, I'd leave it at home and gig a Squier or Epiphone.

The few % points difference in sound/playability between a Squier and Epi and their bigger brothers are probably less important than other factors (brand,value,cachet,snobbery etc.) when you go buy a multi-thousand pound guitar, as nice as they are.

richardhomer

I think the point is - provided a guitar is playable - a decent player can make most things work.

We probably spend too much money and effort chasing ‘perfection’....

p90fool

Build quality aside, I've often posted on here about how good the Affinity Tele bridge pickup is, definitely a far more authentic early 60s vintage Telecaster tone than either the Mexican or US Standards. 

I occasionally jam with a friend who plays Johnny Cash songs, if his Affinity Tele and Marshall MG 30 are there I don't bother bringing my own gear. 

Corvus

Haven't tried a Tele but had an older Affinity Strat in for setup; it was pretty poor. The pickups were thin & uninspiring, the trem/springs wouldn't quite sit inside the cavity without the backplate being spaced out a bit, the neck felt crude - mainly thefretboard edges so could be improved. Perhaps newer ones are better.

I also had a CV Strat though and that really didn't give much of anything away vs my US one. Trem took some welly after a bone nut & basic set up, a better block improved it, neck felt OK just too thin for me. In playing & usability terms there was nothing inferior about it.

midlifecrisis

i bought a used affinity tele a year or so ago, loved it, giged it for a few gigs, leaving my les paul studio as backup. I inspired me to seek out and buy fender baja tele. which im pleased with but the butterscotch colour on the affinity was much nicer than the baja.  im happy with the baja but wish i kept the affinity as well and will happily buy another one if i see one.

TTBZ

Where can you get them new for £130?? Interest piqued... I really liked the neck on the one I tried a while back. 

Panama_Jack666

@koss59 knows the score!

JezWynd

Corvus said:

Haven't tried a Tele but had an older Affinity Strat in for setup; it was pretty poor. The pickups were thin & uninspiring, the trem/springs wouldn't quite sit inside the cavity without the backplate being spaced out a bit, the neck felt crude - mainly thefretboard edges so could be improved. Perhaps newer ones are better.

I can understand how a Strat Affinity may be lacking as the Strat setup is more complicated; the Tele though is a very simple design, a big part of what has made it such an enduring success.

That said, I wouldn't go selling off your other guitars just yet Waz, the Affinity is a great guitar and I enjoyed owning and playing it but I wouldn't trade my current 72 Thinline for one - the Thinline is a superior instrument in every department.

Part of what makes the Affinity such an instant love affair is the raw finish on the neck but over time you come to appreciate the finesse of the more expensive models. The Affinity Tele is a great guitar, I wish they'd been around when I started playing guitar - those Woolies Audition's that go for for stupid money nowadays were real dogs.

Sporky

Jez6345789 said:

It has to be said that Strats and Tele's were designed for mass production or what mass production was at the time. CNC now means production is less dependent on a skilled handcraft workforce. 

Not sure that Fender ever relied on a skilled workforce for the woodwork bits of production; the early ones would have been done on pin routers or ganged pattern routers. They're faster than CNC for repetitive work and pretty simple to operate.

If you look at the Gibson factory footage it's all divided into tiny little tasks, very few of which require finesse.

thermionic

Wazmeister said:

A Squier Bloody Infinity. It cost the owner £129 NEW !!!

Shouldn't it cost more than that? Like, infinitely more?

mikem8634

I know it's not an Affinity but Chuck Prophet's go to guitar was always a Squire Tele

Lifted from TDPRI:
Prophet's electric is a 1984 Japanese-made Fender Squier Telecaster strung with Ernie Ball Light Top/Heavy Bottom Slinkys and plucked with green (.88 mm.) Dunlop Tortex picks. Prophet plugs into a pair of customized Fender Blackface Deluxe Reverb amps. His pedal board includes a Ratt fuzz unit, a DOD envelope filter, a Boss delay, and a Sex Driver midrange booster (originally designed by Austin techie Alan Durham for Dylan sideman Charlie Sexton). When a down-home-and-dirty mood strikes, Prophet also plays a 1970s Dobro.



A little non-album version of what that Squire is capable of (in very capable hands). The album version (Here Come the Snakes - picked it up in a Woolies bargain bin for 99p) Is more fuzzy, this one showcases the guitar a bit better.

 

thegummy

Was thinking about this thread earlier while philosophising during a late night nappy run and I think that on some level when I read that a low end Squier was good, it's not even that I doubted it but somehow had a subconscious dislike for it.

As if something inside me wouldn't want it to be true that a guitar so much cheaper than the one I bought could be good.

It's hard to put into words what I mean but I wonder if some of the brand snobbery is to do with us being subconsciously defensive about how much we've spent previously.

p90fool

thegummy said:

Was thinking about this thread earlier while philosophising during a late night nappy run and I think that on some level when I read that a low end Squier was good, it's not even that I doubted it but somehow had a subconscious dislike for it.

As if something inside me wouldn't want it to be true that a guitar so much cheaper than the one I bought could be good.

It's hard to put into words what I mean but I wonder if some of the brand snobbery is to do with us being subconsciously defensive about how much we've spent previously.

Partly, but there are genuine quality differences between the cheapest Squiers and more expensive Telecasters, like crappy switches and pots, a flimsy bridge, a dull neck pickup and soft, quick-wear frets. 

As a grab and go cheapy for rough gigs or whatever they're great sounding guitars, but I still wouldn't want one as my only guitar without doing the kind of work on it which would bring it into a midrange price bracket anyway. 

GoldenEraGuitars

I think this is a good thread for that “lightbulb moment”. When you look at your £4K guitar and wonder how it’s possible that a £130 guitar put a smile on your face. It makes me wonder why I lust after a CS 335 when I know I’d be happy spending a lot less on a different guitar