My main criteria are:
1) Brightly voiced humbuckers/splittable, or a H/S configuration - this is an "all purpose" guitar but mostly it's for playing heavy alternative and some shoegaze/dreampop. I've tried out some Gretsches and find Filtertrons work really well for both heavy tones and jangle. A lot of mini HBs and WRHBs do this too. Basically I need the guitar to handle heavy(without noise) and Jangles
2) Wiggle stick - pref. a Strat or Wilkinson Trem as I already have an Offset trem on my Jaguar, which I've decided I actually really like
3) Cool colours/finishes - I'm very partial to green, turqouise and purple guitars, as well as trans red and sometimes trans black(I also like CAR but my Jag has that covered). Aesthetics are important to bonding with an instrument - it's what draw me to the Marauder at first but I've since gone off the finish. Honestly colour depends on the guitar - I love a nice Sunburst if it's not too orange and other earthy colours.
4) Pref. Offset(obviously) though not necessary
. Ideally I want to stay away from Strat style single coils as again, my VM Jag handles that very well for me.
Since I last made a thread I have found some other good options - the Vintage Surfmaster Thinline for example ticks so many of these boxes, but has the Jazzmaster Style Trem. If it had a Strat Trem, it'd be perfect. The other major issue is I can find absolutely nothing about this guitar online.
They also do this, if it has the proto-Floyd Rose style Mustang Trem it could be worth a look -
(the official Mustang selection is honestly shockingly bad in terms of trems, at least in the affordable range, I would rather at least Gibson scale too)
The Dano 64 is one of the coolest sounding guitars I've ever heard, but the neck is wide and flat so I've largely ruled it out unless I can try one in person. It's also at the pricier range so it's not like it'd be worth doing a neck swap. But those pickups are great.
I absolutely adore this guitar, but the price has shot up recently in part because it was featured on Bocchi the Rock. But I love the look, it's got a P90 in the neck(Yamaha tend to have nicer P90s) and a humbucking bridge, a wilkinson trem, a cool dark turquoise colour, the guitar is just vibes. Only thing I'd change is a black P90 cover. It's *possible* to find one second hand for similar to what I'd get for the Marauder. Some of the other models are much cheaper but lack Trems which is annoying.
I'm a big fan of Sire guitars, the feel and sound of them is just really good, but they are nearly all the epitome of what I consider to be played out guitars. They recently however started making JM type guitars - also a bit played out now but a bit more my vibe. The cheaper models have Strat Trems. It might be worth getting one and just getting a mounting frame to put a HB in the rear. The colour selection of the J3 isn't great though. The J5s have an interesting take on the offset trem - anyone have any idea what they're like? If the range is better than a regular JM trem it might be worth going for - honestly I do love the feeling of JM Trems I just need more range.
The S7s could also be worth checking out but I'd need to figure out something more interesting to put in the neck. Lipstick pickup maybe?
My Dream guitar that meets all my criteria would be the G&L Doheny V12 - it looks like it was made for me almost, I love the "Jazzbucker" design, but they don't have a cheaper version of that model. If anyone knows anyone who makes Jazzbuckers like those for around a hundred bucks though, that'd be amazing. One of the witchiest guitars I've ever seen.
anyway hopefully that gives you an idea of the sort of guitars I like. I'm asking again because I keep finding more and more badass guitars I had no idea existed, but they still tend to run into obstacles most notably in terms of the Trem & Neck profile. I'm honestly considering seeing if I can get a Sterling Mariposa and putting a HB sized Filtertron in the Neck, that would be a beast.
