What are the most overhyped guitars?

[Lionsden]

Currently, there is no answer besides anything Abasi Concepts….their stuff is GROSSLY overhyped right now as evident bunted fact that they’re extremely expensive, have been plagued with QC issues and they sell like hotcakes both new and used for top top dollar.

 

[Solomon Monagle]

Nice man! always cool to have a discussion about this stuff, I appreciate your reply I've got a 2020 Regius Gothic 6 - it's a bloody sick guitar, and maybe I got lucky out of the box, but my 2009 Horizon is equal to it. the neck thing is entirely subjective, I just find the Regius neck slightly too wide from side to side for my hands, so I get a little more strain from it.

What mayo do you play? Also I do still need to add a Regius Core to my arsenal haha, the extra carve on top makes a world of difference so perhaps it's an unfair comparison between the flattop Regius and carved Horizon.

as for BKP, I had some Blackhawks, Warpigs (C) and Nailbombs. I liked the Blackhawks the least, then the Nailbombs. the warpigs were pretty cool, but I've basically uniformly swapped them out for an SD Nazgul/Sentient set in the respective guitars, which is my go to set.

 

[onefingersweep]

Not a particular brand, but I don't understand people who feel they need certain things otherwise they can't play the guitar - scale length, fanned frets, evertunes etc. Most of the best songs ever written, in all genres, were played on guitars with more 'traditional' specs.

I have several favourite songs which has been recorded with suboptimal gear. Just because a song is great doesn't mean that the production is great. Stuff you mention are different ways of making something sound better.

 

[SamSam]

They also have the worst, most plastic gloss finishes I've ever touched.

100% agree with this. I enjoy my two mayones guitars and may buy more. But I would never buy a gloss finished model. The sticky finish they apply is awful.

 

[Razzle]

PRS earns this distinction.... BY FAR

 

[budda]

PRS earns this distinction.... BY FAR

As a fan of their guitars, Im curious to what lead you to this?

I dont think many guitarists i know irl hype PRS at all, and I get flack reasonably regularly for liking and owning a few .

 

[TheBlackBard]

I have two PRS guitars and they do what I want them to do, but it's not like I'm out there saying "hey these are the greatest guitars on the planet." For me, they sound good, they feel right, and they're perfect for my application. The most hype I'll ever give them is that I'm not letting either of them go, ever, and one is a Korean model while the other is Indonesian.

 

[nightlight]

Mayones - they make really good guitars and the QC is excellent, but they're not the otherwordly, mana from heaven guitars that people worship them as. Spend 4000+ (Australian) for a used Mayo, spend less than half that for a used ESP Horizon and get the same build quality with a more comfortable neck.

Also Bareknuckle pups - overpriced, tinny shite.

I've owned two Mayones - one a Regius 6, one a Regius Core 7.

I got to say, I agree to a certain extent. The Regius was a great sounding guitar and played very well, but the Schaller Hannes bridge on it had been set up incorrectly, imho, to the point where the low E string would make this horrible "bong" sound if you every picked it without palm muting. Drove me crazy.

The Regis Core 7, on the other hand, is God's gift to 7 strings. It is absolutely hands down one of the best crafted and playing 7s I have ever handled. Seriously, I'm not exaggerating.

I think, like all other brands therefore, it pays to try the guitar out instead of buying off the Internet.

 

[_MonSTeR_]

Underhyped around these parts...

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I’m old enough and have been playing guitar long enough that I have a Pavlovian response to a Les Paul with humbuckers, doesn’t matter if it’s a Studio, a Standard, or whatever. I see one and I think Slash and I want to listen to Appetite for Destruction.

 

[Sermo Lupi]

This is a very niche example but I'll say Rick Toone.

I was in contact with Rick as far back as 2006 or 2007 due to the fact that I had an acquaintance who owned one of Rick's first guitars. This was back when Rick was still prototyping his "Orchid" basses. Back then, I believe Rick's custom shop prices were around $3,000 but slowly climbed to $5000 as Ola Standberg became more popular. By 2010, Rick partnered with Townsend Machine (a precision machine shop) to make relatively simple creations like fixed bridges and neck cores (which were just solid metal truss rod replacements with no moving parts).

Anyone who looks at Rick Toone's guitars now can see that his work with Townsend Machine was the thin end of the wedge. Nearly all his guitars produced from 2013 onward revolve around elaborate (and exorbitantly expensive) machined parts such as solid aluminum necks, lever-actuated bridges, and so on. His guitars now regularly run $15,000-$20,000, or $7,000-$10,000 for more modestly-spec'd stock models.

It isn't that Rick's guitars are overhyped because they're bad (albeit I've heard a few bad things). It's more that Rick was always targeting the niche, ultra-modern ergonomic guitar market that sat atop that astronomical price point. Even though he collaborated with Ola Strandberg from an early stage, they were diametrically opposed: Strandberg wanted to be affordable and open-source. Rick patented all his work and seemed to be aiming for a Ken Parker trajectory (i.e. post-Parker Guitars, building innovative $20k archtops).

With Tosin and Misha owning a couple of Rick Toone's guitars, obviously hype was bound to happen. I still wouldn't say he exploded in popularity or anything. But it created a wider audience for his work aside from just the guys buying Teuffels. At that price point, I think it is important to understand you're buying art as much as an instrument (which maybe doesn't need to be explained for a $20k guitar that looks like it came out of a coffee table book).

I suppose what I'm saying is those guitars were never intended to be affordable custom guitars for up-and-coming prog metal musicians. The fact that crowd became interested in them was mostly a product of "overhype".

 

[Akkush]

Mayones

 

[Ataraxia2320]

I'll add to the Mayones dogpile.

They used to be great value guitars back before they were well known and I remember playing a few in Musicstore Köln out of the recommendation from the staff member and thinking it was well worth it's price (cant remember exactly how much it cost, but I think it was just over half the price of the USA built guitars at the time).

Then Mayo took off with support from big artists and the prices raised with it's profile. Now I couldn't in good faith recommend one unless it was a killer deal.

 

[michael_bolton]

I’m old enough and have been playing guitar long enough that I have a Pavlovian response to a Les Paul with humbuckers, doesn’t matter if it’s a Studio, a Standard, or whatever. I see one and I think Slash and I want to listen to Appetite for Destruction.

I'm not a fan of LPs or GNR, matter of fact I dislike both lol but I literally can't think of a single criteria by which LPs are overhyped instruments.

 

[bostjan]

I'm not a fan of LPs or GNR, matter of fact I dislike both lol but I literally can't think of a single criteria by which LPs are overhyped instruments.

Depends on the model. A lot of the "signature" Les Pauls are extremely pricey and don't really offer upgrades that come anywhere near justifying the price hike. But something like a Les Paul Studio is pretty difficult to argue is overpriced. Maybe some people would say it's overhyped because so many guitarists buy them/use them, yet X/Y/Z guitar is better because of opinions A/B/C. Whoever is buying Les Pauls, though, probably doesn't care about A/B/C, and just wants a guitar to play that doesn't totally suck. As long as your back is strong enough to deal with a 7-8 lb guitar and you aren't too bothered by tune-o-matic and a very slightly shorter scale length, then they are decent guitars.

 

[Dawn of the Shred]

I think a lot of the higher end guitars I’ve bought have been overhyped. Higher end or custom. The ones that disappointed me most might EBMM was just meh after the honeymoon phase, Keith Merrow sig was just awful in every way that I have never considered buying a another Schecter. The Mayo’s I’ve had where underwhelming, Every Gibson I’ve played or owned played worse then any Epiphone I’ve had. Every high end ESP has been great for me. I recently got two Aristides 060 and I’m loving them but I’m in the honeymoon phase right now.

 

[works0fheart]

His guitars now regularly run $15,000-$20,000, or $7,000-$10,000 for more modestly-spec'd stock models.

I feel when guitars start getting into this price range and upwards, it's all overhyped. There's only so good of a playability and sound an instrument is going to reach, and I don't think a guitar needs to be this expensive to do that. Conversely, I feel like most of these super expensive instruments don't always sound that good or play as well as guitars I've spent maybe $700 on.

Not to say I haven't played some great high end guitars, but I don't think anyone needs to buy The Deluxe Reissue Reissue, Limited, One off color, #13 of 150 produced, 1972 Dadblues guitar for the same price as a new car. I also don't get the super gaudy custom guitars made of real Moroccan teak wood, with flamed cocobolo stained tuning machines, with extended scale, fan fret, true temperament, headless, whatever.

The guitar is a tool. It's okay to want nice tools, but I'm not a fan of the obnoxious culture that surrounds them sometimes.

 

[John]

As a fan of their guitars, Im curious to what lead you to this?

I dont think many guitarists i know irl hype PRS at all, and I get flack reasonably regularly for liking and owning a few .

Most of the excess negative hype I'm accustomed to hearing against them come from people who are whining over buying the wrong thing. ie- older folks who were expecting something different for whatever reasons, something they're clearly not such as Gibson Les Pauls.
In an example like that, PRS makes good guitars in their own right- they are their own thing. But if you were really wanting something else like an LP, it would've made a lot more sense to burn that 2-4k, or however much else, on that instead.

 

[StevenC]

I feel when guitars start getting into this price range and upwards, it's all overhyped. There's only so good of a playability and sound an instrument is going to reach, and I don't think a guitar needs to be this expensive to do that. Conversely, I feel like most of these super expensive instruments don't always sound that good or play as well as guitars I've spent maybe $700 on.

Not to say I haven't played some great high end guitars, but I don't think anyone needs to buy The Deluxe Reissue Reissue, Limited, One off color, #13 of 150 produced, 1972 Dadblues guitar for the same price as a new car. I also don't get the super gaudy custom guitars made of real Moroccan teak wood, with flamed cocobolo stained tuning machines, with extended scale, fan fret, true temperament, headless, whatever.

The guitar is a tool. It's okay to want nice tools, but I'm not a fan of the obnoxious culture that surrounds them sometimes.

This is exactly what the poster is getting at though.

The difference between, say, a standard black ESP Horizon and this year's fanciest gaudiest ESP Horizon showpiece isn't going to be playability. It's the effort it takes to execute the concept.

This is what "art guitar" means.

 

[BenjaminW]

But there is not an over-reaction to the brand because they've been pumping out the same basic stuff for 60+ years and the only time anyone talks about them is when they fuck up and make a stupid authentic video or reinvent the tuner.

Or take that same basic stuff and try to be innovative with it such as dip switches, weight relief, finishes that aren't gold tops or bursts, and they fail with it.

 

[budda]

Most of the excess negative hype I'm accustomed to hearing against them come from people who are whining over buying the wrong thing. ie- older folks who were expecting something different for whatever reasons, something they're clearly not such as Gibson Les Pauls.
In an example like that, PRS makes good guitars in their own right- they are their own thing. But if you were really wanting something else like an LP, it would've made a lot more sense to burn that 2-4k, or however much else, on that instead.

Buy an SC594 and never want for a les paul again