For anyone wanting to buy new music gear, the choices and prices can be overwhelming and there is a lot of substandard gear that you can waste money on, or features you will never use that bump up your costs. Before buying anything, I definitely recommend not only testing it yourself but reading up on the product on Google. User-submitted reviews on sites like Harmony Central can get quite skewed by a couple of poor reviews so try to read trusted music publications and read up on gear that your favourite artists use as well – I figure if you like someones sound then finding out what gear they use is a good start to understanding the tonality of certain products as well as knowing what gear will stand up to touring. No-one in a band tours with gear that is ropey, except, seemingly about half the bands we play shows with.
I tend to look at Music Radar and the manufacturers forums as a good place to start reading genuine reviews. Guitar Buyer and Sound On Sound are great magazines to read and they have a lot of information on their websites too. Gearslutz is a great resourse and despite its seemingly NSFW name, is entirely composed of fully clothed dudes talking about equipment, sadly.
Anyway, here is my guide to buying expensive music gear as cheaply as possible, provided you already know what you want, have read up on it, and (hopefully) tested it. I always recommend buying guitars in person, they can vary tons between the exact same models.
- If you are gigging your gear, then buying used is obviously a good way to save money. Cosmetically, the gear may look a little worn, but if you are touring then your gear will get at least a little damage fairly quickly. Guitars are definitely a good purchase used – you won’t need to worry about it breaking or anything as there is very little to break on a guitar that isn’t cheaply fixed. Guitar amps are a little trickier and older amps will need a basic service from a tech and possibly some components changed if the amp is a few decades old. Pedals are a safe buy as lots of people sell them after barely using them. Avoid Ebay! The fees are mental and posting used gear is dodgy. Keep an eye on your local Gumtree, music shop and websites like Punktastic. I don't know much about buying drums used, sorry. I'll ask Joe to post here about drum stuff.
- Better than buying used is buying B-stock. This is stuff that shops get returned, or shop floor units that have been played a little. They check it all over, replace things like tubes and fuses and sell them at less than retail price. Our band is using a heap of B-stock gear and it all arrives looking pretty much brand new. Between me and Josh we saved over £800 on our amps and Joe picked up a rack-tom drum for £50 that was originally something like £300. I have just given away my number one secret to cheap gear.
- Knowing what you actually want will save you money. How loud does your amp need to be? What features does it need? Is it reliable? If it’s cheap you can assume there is a reason for it. Cheaply made music gear does not last and you will eventually hear the sound quality difference in higher quality gear. Be prepared to wait for used/b-stock items to come up on used gear websites – the wait will pay-off in the end.
- Look after your gear. Padded cases for amps/heads (minimum), hard cases for guitars. Keep your leads and pedals in a tool-box or some other container that will stop them getting bashed and broken. Replacing stuff is wasted money if it never needed to break in the first place. Pack the van/car well – use bungee cords to secure gear because the worst thing to do is arrive at a show with busted gear and have to borrow it – even worse if you are on tour and in a foreign country, 100 miles from a music shop, on a Sunday.
- Buy leads with a life-time warranty. This is essential; because all leads break eventually and they aren’t cheap. Keep the packaging somewhere and send the leads back when they break. I have done this twice already and therefore saved about £30. How-zat!
- Understand how your gear works, if even a little. Your gear will break eventually. Basic stuff like changing tubes in your amp will save you a ton of money, most issues with tube amps are literally a blown tube and fuse. That’s a 10 minute fix that you can do with absolutely no tools most of the time and everyone around you will be super impressed that you know your shit. Google is your friend here, there are guides to basic fixes for every amp on the infonet.
There are some things you can’t really do on the cheap – good quality, new gear is pricey but totally worth it if it’s the right thing for you. “Take it away” allows you to buy equipment across 10 months, interest free and most places will allow you to trade-in old gear for a discount on new gear (although you’ll get a shitty price for what it’s worth). Buy strings in bulk, buy picks in bulk. Consider gear that will hold its resale value well if possible. Fender, Gibson, Marshall and Vox are all brands that you could buy for used gear and sell it a year later for the same money you bought it for. Some smaller companies offer great stuff at lower prices and its up to you to decide if the resale value is important to you: G+L guitars are easily equal quality to Fender guitars and were also designed by Leo Fender, but don't re-sell as highly for example
I think that’s enough for now. If you are still concerned about what to buy, feel free to e-mail me and ask anything, I spend far too long reading about this shit and I’ll be happy to help. I’ll probably advise getting a Telecaster and a Tiny Terror though.
Dan
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