New Guitar

[roamer]

Originally Posted by Zman86

I have three Fender Strats, A 1993 Mexican, a 1998 Mexican that looks exactly like the one you bought, and a 1998 SRV signature strat. The two mexicans blow the american made strat out of the water. Sure, I've played some crummy Mexican strats, but I've played alot of crummy american strats too. For the money you can pick one up for, they cant be beat.


I recently got my '75 Gibson Flying V back from the shop though, and I must say, the strats have been taking a little break lately....

I tend to go in cycles. Sometimes I will play my Les Paul for weeks without even picking up my ESP and then a switch will flip in my brain and all I'll play is the ESP for a few weeks without even thinking about the LP. I think a lot of it has to do with the style I feel like playing at the time. If I am in the mood to play metal and only metal the ESP with the EMG 81s can't be beat, but the cleans on it are horrid. The LP on the other hand is good for pretty much everything (including metal but it can't touch the ESP there). I still have the stock BB Pros on it. Every time I think about changing them out for either an EMG 81/85 set or Seymour Duncan's I just can't bring myself to do it because the BB Pros are so rich on cleans and still have enough crunch to deliver the distortion.

[ippon20]

Yeah Roamer, I got BB Pros in my LP too. Supposedly, they are the closest to the PAF pups from the 50's. I flipped the magnet in my neck to get it out of phase and rewired it 50's style. It's a dream to play!

Zman, you don't like your SRV? Is it because you have the D-neck or the super jumbo frets? I've always loved the older SRV's with the Brazilian Rosewood fingerboards and they fetch a pretty high dollar since less than 100 were released. I'm stunned you prefer the Mexican's to a custom shop.

[Lol-x]

Nice guitars I have heard some good things about the MIMs (Made in Mexico) and offer good value for money. Some guys change the pickups and they tend to get mixed but mostly good results. The standard ones also have some good reports.

I would like to get a fender, probably a telecaster with 3 pickups, with a rosewood neck and maple fretboard, not easy to find but one day....

[Zman86]

Originally Posted by ippon20

Yeah Roamer, I got BB Pros in my LP too. Supposedly, they are the closest to the PAF pups from the 50's. I flipped the magnet in my neck to get it out of phase and rewired it 50's style. It's a dream to play!

Zman, you don't like your SRV? Is it because you have the D-neck or the super jumbo frets? I've always loved the older SRV's with the Brazilian Rosewood fingerboards and they fetch a pretty high dollar since less than 100 were released. I'm stunned you prefer the Mexican's to a custom shop.

Dont get me wrong, I love my SRV, but I dont find myself playing it very often. I love larger necks, big frets and heavy strings, but I find it rather shrill through an amplifier for some reason. I've never seen much less played a first gen SRV. For some reason, I just find the Mexicans a much "smoother" guitar to play. My blue mexican has a rosewood fingerboard with a rather large neck, while my other mexican has a rather small maple fretboard neck with a skunk stripe. I'm not usually a fan of maple fretboards and small necks, but I picked this one up and ended up playing it for close to an hour at the store. And at $300 canadian, it was a steal. My blue strat was a similar story, before I even picked it up, I knew it was something special. I only played it for 5 minutes before I bought it.

Want to hear how good a Mexican Strat can sound? Type Henry Garza into youtube, I read somewhere that all he uses is Mexican made Strats.