øøøøøøø wrote: ↑Mon Mar 27, 2023 2:30 pm
The price is set by supply and demand, and the Strat and Tele are more-canonical instruments than the Jazzmaster.
Crucially, many of the guitars that became canonized did so due to the enduring work of people who were
older than boomers. The Beatles were/are not boomers. Buddy Holly was not a boomer. Chet Atkins, Albert King, BB King, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Page, Jimi Hendrix, Keith Richards (we could keep going)... all born
before the end of WWII.
The enduring nature of the work of a cadre of pioneering artists is what keeps the price of these instruments high (and will likely do so even after there are no more boomers).
Paganini and everyone from his generation have been dead for a long time, but the instruments of Stradivari are still worth a fuckton... because the music is canonical, and so is are the instruments' place within it.
Right, but that's been my point the whole time. Boomers grew up seeing their heroes play certain instruments, and when they got older, they wanted those instruments.
But their combination of deep pockets, large size, and greater interest in the guitar over other generations (citing Mr. Gruhn again) led to them having an outsize influence in the world of the guitar.
I'm the generation right after the Boomers, you know? Let's think of the Fender Lead. Boomers didn't want it, the Greatest Generation sure didn't want it, and my generation didn't have any money because we were nine. So that's the end of the Lead.
Fender, Martin and Gibson all failed to realized that the Boomers would spend a lot of money on guitars as long as those guitars had been played by their music heroes. That's why they all almost went out of business but then recovered by "makin' 'em like they used to" and that's been a very dominant force in the world of guitar overall.
Boomers had established the canon of what "vintage" is.
That's changing, though. Well, the canon is changing. How much I don't know. But the Jem selling for what it is selling for is because of my own generation's nostalgia, we did grow up with Steve Vai. We know that guitar.
Shit, I offered a trade for a Carvin DC127 the other day. And I hated the one I bought in the 90s!
Nostalgia ain't what it used to be, but it's always had me making questionable purchases, and it looks like it always will. It's normal.
Back in those days, everyone knew that if you were talking about Destiny's Child, you were talking about Beyonce, LaTavia, LeToya, and Larry.