fiddelerselbow wrote:I've literally been told "You can't afford that" while asking to play an american standard strat in one of my locals. Which is mainly why I buy nearly all my shit off the internet.
pretty woman'd
there are good local music stores and then there are guitar centers and the like. sucks if you don't have a good mom and pop local...
See that's the weird thing, it's a family run place but still their sales staff are fucking wankers. There is a nicer place in the city but they don't stock all that much stuff. Probably because they can't afford to.
We have one marginally OK small retailer (that just doesn't have what I want, and I don't blame them simply because I'm not SRV-worshipping, cover-slinging rock/country dude). The other two, well, I'll never roll my chair in.
GC and the like rock for rural people - shiping is decent, return policy good, etc. Without them I'd be paying $10 a pack for strings and MSRP+.
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My pedalboard costs approximately 191 Metal Zones.
just got a (seemingly) great deal on a used ibanez promethean bass combo. get it home, plug it in, crank it to 6 and one of the speakers starts farting like all hell. fortunately, i bought the pro coverage warranty....
so i call the pro coverage number this afternoon and apparently the coverage doesn't begin until the 60 day store warranty expires and the customer service rep just told me to go return the amp. thing is, if i do that i miss out on a seriously good deal. i am pissed off at guitar center for selling me an amp with problems and also for neglecting to fix the problem in a timely fashion.
I hate it when I get treated like some punk kid at a music store.
"Distortion? On bass?"
"That's not a guitar amp."
"I don't see why you'd need more than one fuzz."
etc.
The local shops here are okay. One has the nicest staff ever, but rarely anything good. That's where I buy my strings. Then there's one that stocks most new fenders and squiers, which is where I got my VM Jazzy. They're kinda dicks though. Or kinda just dumb. Not idiots, just like, not very informed. And then, the one with anything good and actually cool have employees that are HUUUUUUUUUUUUUGE dicks. I was in there once, thinking about buying an Orange, and then the guy behind the counter talked shit about one of my friends. Well, guess you don't want my $1k.
But, they're big into pedals, but rarely look up prices. I've made a fair amount of profitable deals there, and I never feel bad.
Twangasaurus wrote:My local store actually isn't bad. They are friendly, knowledgeable, every person that works there plays in actual bands that gig regularly and what they have in stock is pretty cool. I don't buy from them much because Australian prices blow and I mostly buy online but every now and again I try and throw them some coin. It's kind of a classy joint as well so the greasy pubescent bumblefaces are afraid of entering.
In other news the Australian version of GC called Billy Hydes went broke recently, got bought out and shut down 70% of their stores. I don't think I even have one in my state anymore.
Didn't Gallins buy them out last second for mega low price?
I'm not sure who bought them out? I do know that a lot of distributors got left out in the cold though when it happened. I don't particularly care about Billy Hydes but I thought that was pretty sad.
I work in a music store... so it's pretty sad to me that if I had the money, i'd probably not consider buying ANY of the hundreds of guitars we have there
theavondon wrote:I hate it when I get treated like some punk kid at a music store.
"Distortion? On bass?"
"That's not a guitar amp."
"I don't see why you'd need more than one fuzz."
etc.
The local shops here are okay. One has the nicest staff ever, but rarely anything good. That's where I buy my strings. Then there's one that stocks most new fenders and squiers, which is where I got my VM Jazzy. They're kinda dicks though. Or kinda just dumb. Not idiots, just like, not very informed. And then, the one with anything good and actually cool have employees that are HUUUUUUUUUUUUUGE dicks. I was in there once, thinking about buying an Orange, and then the guy behind the counter talked shit about one of my friends. Well, guess you don't want my $1k.
But, they're big into pedals, but rarely look up prices. I've made a fair amount of profitable deals there, and I never feel bad.
I don't get it though. I worked in retail for years and in most places I'd be fuckin' shot for treating customers like that.
theavondon wrote:I hate it when I get treated like some punk kid at a music store.
"Distortion? On bass?"
"That's not a guitar amp."
"I don't see why you'd need more than one fuzz."
etc.
Oh man, this shit right here. Whenever I've gone to GC, they absolutely shit themselves when I want to run a bass through some "guitar" pedals, or into a "guitar" amp. They really do think that a bass signal will cause a guitar amp (or pedal) fucking explode or something. Every time I've ever gone to a smaller shop, they never had a problem with it. An empty Daddy's Junky Music let me run a bass into a guitar amp cranked up all the way into a bass cab for like 25 minutes, and they were totally cool with it. And it sounded the balls too.
Kind of related: I was at our local Shop once and asked if they had a Mesa rectifier in Stock that i may test. The Guy responded that they had One, but it is One that is already reserved for a Customer. If i Pay additional 100 EUR i can get that one. I just laughed and walked out, went home, ordered a triple rectifier from thomann. They missed Out 2400 EUR! Since that time i won't go there again.
I don't like really going into music stores. There is a local one back near my mom's house that's okay from time to time. They had a vintage Jazzmaster but wanted something like $5500 for it or whatever. They also had an old 70's orange but I always got the feeling they didn't want ANYONE to play it, just look at it.
I always got the 'why do you want .12's?' when I would go to buy strings from them. But they didn't stock .12's. So I never bought strings from them. I bougth a used guitar cab off of them once. Didn't know the wattage of the speaker and ran a 50w head into it and it just sounded like a bad idea so I exchanged it for a guitar stand. I feel like ever since I did that I got on their shit list or whatever.
When I was in Richmond I'd go to Guitar Center from time to time just to waste time. Sold some gear there but the amount that they lowball you is ungodly and the staff are dicks.
I've resorted to online only. I can make my own decisions without someone hasstling me about what I'm playing or playing through or going to use whatever I buy for.
i've actually been pleasantly surprised by the Guitar Centers in the north Chicago suburbs. compared to the one in San Jose they're clean, quiet, well-organized and friendly, and the guitars appear to be in better shape. i even got a Rane 5-band parametric from one store for $75.
the thing that seems lacking here is mid-level independent stores...all the ones i've seen are either too small to have a good selection or specialized to the Expensive Shit market.
In girum imus nocte et consumimur igni
FIFTY YEARS OF SCARING THE CHILDREN 1970-2020--and i'm not done yet
fungalattack wrote:It's fun to go into guitar center and see if you can say what's up dude to one of the employees before they say it to you... It's really freakin hard!
this. also, the other day i saw a blue box for sale for $40. that's pretty great. i've know a few people who somehow or another eded up working there and even when they offer to cut you a deal, often times it's like "that's a deal? YGBSM." did get my old rickenback 3001 there for $800 back in '04
Ugly Nora wrote:Maybe he should go back to mail order like Jandek.
