A diverse clutch of guitars or one REALLY nice one?

[stevejamsecono]

Sort of a thought experiment more than any real opinion on this.

I've generally gone between owning 2-5 guitars back and forth at varying quality levels for my entire playing life. My current clutch is made up of some nice lower-end US-made guitars that I'm fairly pleased with. At least two are sentimental "lifers".

At the same time, I do find myself occasionally lusting after something more high-end, and I wonder if I'd be willing to trade some/most of these in to that effect assuming I found the right guitar. I think I'd feel obligated to do that just since I wouldn't be able to justify having that many and ALSO one that expensive.

So I put the question to those of you who've faced this choice: Do you prefer having the clutch of "ok but diverse" guitars, or did you choose having one REALLY nice one and called it a day after that? Obviously some of us have managed to pull off both, but realistically I don't think that's in my grasp and I'm ok with that.

[Telliot]

I love the less is more approach to most things, and I’m a minimalist at heart. A few years ago, I realized I’d accumulated a room full of seldom used guitars (and other instruments), and I couldn’t help but feel guilty about it. I ended selling everything I deemed unnecessary and used that money to buy more expensive gear that covered my needs. What I’m left with is a stable of nicer gear that gets used all the time. To me, that’s a much more comfortable place to be.


tl;dr — Why own 5 crappy guitars that see little play if I could own one amazing one that gets all my attention for the same money?

[W.L.Weller]

I have 8 guitars hanging around at the moment, but with best case assumptions and a bit of luck, I might be able to get $1k total if I were to liquidate.

So maybe I could get an AVRI? But then I wouldn't have a baritone, or anything with humbuckers, or anything tuned CEGACE, or GABDEG, or ACCGG#C, or an acoustic...

On the other hand, I play the Squier JM like 75% of the time these days.

What if the crappy guitars are so crappy you'd have to pay people to take them off your hands?

[Gavanti]

For years, I had a steadily rotating group of electrics, and I really enjoyed getting to know all of them. Now I have had four for awhile. All of them except one are lower-value vintage— they’re either very much players’ grade or not high demand (the fourth is nicer, but I lucked into it at a decent price). I’ve occasionally thought about selling a pair or trio of them to grab something versatile but higher value, whether vintage or custom (hello Zaftig!). However, I like playing all of the ones I have, and they all do something a little different. Whenever I think about selling one, I pick it up and quickly rediscover why I’ve kept it. I also have a hard time wrapping my head around anything above a certain price generally, and I’m still hauling guitars to practices and occasional gigs. I’m not certain I’d be willing to do that with a pricier guitar—though I love playing it, #4 stays home.

So I guess that for now anyway, I've settled on stable but diverse.

[PorkyPrimeCut]

I feel like I have more than enough guitars - 4 of them, 1 acoustic, 1 hollowbody electric & 2 solid body electrics. All of them have different characteristics & one can even be converted back to a 12 string, if I wanted to. I occasionally lust after other vintage models but I'd happily let one of my stash go to make way for something new.

What's more likely, the older I get, is my selling all but one of my guitars, keeping a single electric & buying a very, very good old acoustic.

So I guess I'm somewhere in the middle of the OP's options.

[mijmog]

It pretty much has gone like this for my entire life:

When I have just the one, I want more, when I get more, I want just to go back my "one" again. Constantly go back and forth between these two feelings.

When I'm not making music I end up thinking about and buying gear, when I'm in the middle of making stuff and playing live all I can think about is one guitar and a minimal setup.

It drives me crazy, its like the grass is greener thing but constantly! I have one guitar that I've had all my life and I can't seem to get away from it.

[windmill]

Have a long think about which guitar you really want.

Then get it.

There are plenty of cheap and cheerful secondhand squiers and epis around if you need another guitar or two for specific purposes

But get the guitar you really want.

HTH

[jthomas]

I would vote for owning as many different guitars as you can have or want to have. I have 12... and may soon pick up a 13th. Most are in the $400 to $500 range. Two are in the $600 range and a couple I picked up for $250-$300. They all play and sound different. They are like different tools that serve different purposes. You wouldn't keep a single hammer or a single screwdriver. Maybe a better analogy would be to compare guitars to desserts. You wouldn't eat only chocolate cake, every day. Even if it was really good cake. Better if you can choose between cake, pie, scones, ice cream, tiramisu, pudding... (all of a sudden feel like the character in "Forrest Gump" who talks about all the ways you can eat shrimp).

[sookwinder]

I have a sickness ... I collect guitars/basses/pianos.
I have too many, but it allows me to have the same type of guitar with different sounding PUPS...
e.g: 5 strats (some expensive, some average costs) that all sound different.
Two J basses, one with flats one with rounds.

but I am at the stage in my life that allows me to be able to afford these.

Some get played rarely, but when played really make themselves heard in the records.

I have 5 electro-mechanical pianos (Rhodes/Pianet N, Piano T, Vintage Vibe 64, Wurliters) All have a differnet sound, different action, different feel. So for me it allows me to choose the exact sound/feel I want for a piece of music.

If you have the $ and the space and you like to collect good instruments, then go for it

[Singlebladepickup]

Quality over quantity every time for me. I got 1 electric, 1 acoustic, and a bass. Still list for a xii and bass vi, but I never want a bunch of guitars that are all just six string electric

[Larry Mal]

I like having a lot of guitars. Every now and then I remember one that I haven't played in a while, and I get all excited to get it out, and since they are all quality instruments I'm never disappointed.

It's like a mini-NGD.

[marqueemoon]

I like having a lot of guitars. Every now and then I remember one that I haven't played in a while, and I get all excited to get it out, and since they are all quality instruments I'm never disappointed.

It's like a mini-NGD.

Pretty much this, but I feel like I want to pare things down a little to make some space and get better examples of guitars I like most.

[Despot]

I've been down this road.

I started off having about 7/8 really decent modern guitars - like the Bilt Relevator, AV Jazzmaster etc. This was when I started thinking about buying vintage. I recall selling a few of those to buy my first two vintage guitars - a '65 Mustang and a '76 ES355. Slowly, over time the modern guitars were replaced by vintage guitars - so maybe two decent modern guitars worth around 1,500 euro would get traded up with a bit of cash to something like a SG Junior or refinished vintage Jazzmaster. In time the horde of new guitars became a similar number of vintage guitars - albeit stuff that was more 'affordable' in relative terms - so no old Telecasters, ES guitars etc.

I'd always bought the guitars as a sort of investment. The trading up to vintage stuff wasted money I guess, but I also know that if I hadn't done that I'd have blown any spare cash I had on stupid stuff ... so at least in having saving goals to trade for something I wasn't blowing it on random weekends away or whatever. All the while I was ring fencing my house deposit fund - this was all done with anything else I had spare at the end of each month that went into the guitar fund.

When we actually started the process of buying the house I realised that there was a quite a bit of money held in these guitars. I couldn't justify having that much stuff - especially given the money it represented that could be used to accelerate putting a roof over our heads. So I started selling things slowly. But the counterpoint to the plan was that I would work the horde down to a small number of 'final' guitars - 2/3 at most. These would then be the keepers.

It's worked. I'm still undecided about what should be the third guitar (I've 4 right now) between the reissue ES345 and '69 SG Standard - but the Jazzmaster and ES335 are staying. I can honestly say that I'm much happier having a small number of really good guitars. If I had to I would be happy just having my Jazzmaster - and it may come to that down the line as kids take priority over stuff. I see the last few years as being a bit like having a guitar library that I could access - I've had some great guitars over the last five years. I know what a really good old ES330 feels like now, and how it can feel different to a good new one. I can compare different years of Jazzmaster production and tell some of the differences that set them apart. Stuff like that. I'm a guitar geek - I like that I've had that experience. But I'm done now - I will only ever have a smaller number of guitars than I have right now.

The final thing is that it has stopped me relying on gear as a crutch. If you've only got one guitar, whether it's new or vintage, you've really got to know that guitar and how to use it. These days the ES335 is my no.1 - it goes back and forth between it and the Jazzmaster. But I had to really work out how to make that ES335 work for everything I wanted ... and it took a bit of effort and learning, but it worked. There's a big feeling of achievement in getting to that stage.

[Zork]

I prefer the clutch a 1000 times. I really enjoy to have a big toolbox, or call it a broad palette, and I try and make it as diverse as possible. I'm tinkering a lot with my guitars to find what it really sets them apart from others and then try to bring this out as far as possible. I experiment a lot with what kind of strings, how many strings I need and their tuning and this gives me not only different sounds, but totally different approaches on playing and melodies.

I do actually have a really nice one, though. It's not a very expensive guitar but it's beautiful, sounds exactly like my ideal guitar tone, feels absolutely great and practically never gets out of tune. This is my go to guitar for everything (it's an old japanese Firebird copy). Then there are the others that just do their respective and sometimes very specific thing: 8 electrics, 3 basses, 4 acoustics. I also feel that that's enough for me and haven't bought a guitar in years. I don't want to have more than these but I wouldn't part with one of them either. Most of them don't have any resale value anyways...

[ludobag1]

i have lot of guitars
some have story's,for the buyed ones others are diy
other are just something i want and i don't keep example jaguar are not keeper for me,i love the shape,, sound ect but i don't use them really to justify the keeping
for some years i try to downgrade the number and in fact when one come one dissappears ,then i don't increase the number of guitar
also it is money things too i can't justify to spend all my money in gears ,i have already more than i need !
maybe one day i will have to sell lot of them but at this time i can't ,the goal to have one guitar i just not for me ,at first i need a spare for live event and i prefer to bring my own build rather than a vintage expensive gear when i play out ,the risk of stolen instrument is not negligible also in tour the gears is not babyed sometime they falls ,they are shock ect ......
it is just a personnal approch no thruth for every one