Late news...found a Classic 50s Tele in Nitro for sale near me for a useful saving over new. A package deal with an amp and other bits that I could sell on to recoup the cost. Maybe by the time I've sold my Affinity on and the OV pick ups separately then this 'new' Tele would end up being about £350.
Managed to get hold of the seller of the Tele and picked it up tonight. A young lad who had only bought it six months ago and is going back to just using an acoustic. I got the guitar, Fender strap, tweed lockable hard case, spare lead, some iPhone/Pod interface thing, Orange 12 watt practice amp and a Boss tuner pedal...all like new and for £140 less than I was going to pay for just the bare (poly finished) version of the same guitar brand new. After I took the photos I gave it a little wipe down and then realised the cellophane was still on the pick guard (which explains the surface marks from a plectrum).
I played back to back with my Squier Tele (which has upgraded Original Vintage Fender pick ups which cost more than the guitar) and the 50s Tele sounds quite different: Clearer and more twangy (if that's a word). The neck pick up is a little dull compared to the Squier Tele, but I expect I'll swap the OV pick ups in to the new guitar and put the original Squier ones back in the Squier Tele, then sell it on.
Depending what I get back for the unwanted amp, Squier Tele and Boss tuner pedal this new guitar might end up costing little more than just a new neck would have done. It'll be worth more too compared to the upgraded Squier if I ever needed to sell it (though I have a feeling it will be with me for a long time). I like that it has 'Fender' on the headstock too (I know it was made in Mexico, but it makes me smile).
Funny I wasn't keen at first as I was really after the two tone sunburst one that they sell (in the cheaper poly finish), but the one I tried in the shop was this colour too; kind of semi see through as you can see the (supposedly ash) grain. It's very, very similar in looks and feel to my cousin's son's Custom shop '52 which I believe was over £2k (and has the same pick ups I'll be swapping into mine).
I want to keep playing it, but everyone else has gone to bed...
Yup real bargain, looks lovely. Congrats on the new guitar!
I find Gumtree pretty good, but there are a lot less people still so selling can take a bit longer and I find if it doesn't sell after a week it's best to relist and knock a little off. Friday night is the best time to list as I get the most views over the weekend. Ebay fees are pretty steep now but as it costs nothing to list a BIN/best offer can work well.
The Orange amp should go no problem, I see them go regularly go for pretty decent prices. Lot of love for orange currently and the crushes sound great.
There are some real bargains on Gumtree, but they go can go really quickly. I tend to find watching Gumtree daily works best as people get desperate as GAS builds or has won people over and you see some pretty big reductions from the original cost. Adding a watch on items works pretty well.
Managed to find a seller of BNIB zip discs for my ancient Boss 8 track recorder and I collected them from the post office today. Plan is to go through my old songs written way back when and tidy them up a bit (especially the lyrics) so I'll have to put my mind site as my 20 something self (shouldn't be hard, I'm convinced I'm still 21 in my head, if not the mirror). Then I want to record the better ones (if any!) with my Roland edrum kit, various guitars and amps and maybe my old Roland D5 synth too.
If I feel any of them are up to scratch I'll post them on here somehow...in about 30 years I guess.
I saw a Hendrix tribute band last night and was very impressed. Only playing in the back room of a local pub, but maybe 30-40 people there. He was using a little Fender Champ X2 amp into a 4 x 10 cabinet (we think, as it looked too small to be a 4 x 12) and it sounded great, loud too. I looked up this amp when I got home and it's only 15 watts; a modelling/valve hybrid with valve power amp and modelling pre amp stage.
I quite fancy trying out the head version so I can use it at the rehearsal room into their 4 x 12 cabinets. At home I can plug into the speaker in my Blackstar.
Typical...I go out and still end up looking at new gear.
I began something similar a few months back, found a load of old recordings; gcse compositions, band rehearsals and 4-track demos. Made an attempt to redo a few tracks, but like a lot of music projects they ended up half-done and added to an ever growing todo list.
Be interested to hear any originals/remade versions you get done, might give me inspiration to have a second crack at redoing some old tracks. Used to own a tascam portastudio 20 odd years ago, been looking on ebay at 4-tracks to transfer old demos to pc, not sure mine are worth the effort though!
Yes I've still got my Fostex X15 cassette 4 track with ancient stuff on recorded in the mid 1980s! I'm going to transfer them onto my PC using Cubase to clean them up and then master to stereo*, but most are very rough recordings with the drums on a single track and only mic'd up using a single microphone, so not the best drum sound.
At least these tapes reminded me of songs I'd almost forgotten about, so I have something to work from to redo them on the newer equipment/instruments.
*I specifically chose a 4 input USB interface which should allow me to 'record' 4 tracks at once into Cubase as my X15 has 4 direct outs, but I'm not sure this will work as I suspect I will effectively only record 2 x stereo tracks, which isn't quite the same thing. Maybe some fiddling about within Cubase once I have the songs in there might allow me to achieve 4 independant tracks as there are loads of useful features within Cubase that will help clean up/EQ/enhance the sound: Whether I can make a silk purse out of a sows's ear is another matter of course...
Don't know if recording all 4 tracks independently at the same time will work, but if it doesn't you could always try muting either left/right channel on the hardware, record to cubase then repeat for the other channel as new tracks in the same project.
Author: KelvinS1965
Author
25-11-2019 21:16:58