Guitar Nerds Anonymous

Thanks for the offer, and to everyone else for the advice!
A little overwhelmed by options just now, back in the day I just had an amp and a distortion pedal, hadn’t considered modelling or anything more fancy so I might take a day or two to digest all the options and go from there.
This is my new toy btw, I’ll prob never be cool enough to pull off an sg but for £100 posted I think I did ok… should arrive by the end of the week hopefully.

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It's crazy what guitars you can buy for £100 now. That Epiphone looks great.

Yeah, that looks like all you really need in a guitar for £100.

Stuck at home with long Covid and always wanted to try learning guitar. A neighbour is selling a Jose ferrer 3/4 student acoustic, would this be appropriate? And any recommendations on online tutorials? Thanks :)

If you're a 4/4 person then you might find 3/4 cramped; get one of those SGs above for £100 and you'll be laughing. Then go find Marty Schwartz on YouTube.

Thanks for the YouTube suggestion, looks great. I’m 6 foot but will need to be sat on a sofa due to fatigue, so wondered if something smaller would be more comfortable :s

Unless you've got really small hands, it's likely to be less comfortable tbh.

Thanks, good to know :)

I find that an electric is comfier to sit on the sofa and noodle on than an acoustic anyway. And it's likely to be a bit easier on the hands to learn on as well.

There was a few more sg’s for similar money on eBay at the moment and an infinite number of strat copies for well under £100

@edmundro

edit- Gone :(

Saw a Blackstar HT1R combo on cash converters the other day for £75 which would have been perfect for you. Just checked and it's sold.
@Sparky you still got yours?

Sold mine, and have fallen deep into the 70s valve amp rabbit hole.

Blackstar Fly 3

I got one for Xmas and I absolutely love it. It sounds much bigger than the equivalent mini amps.

@edmundro have a look at this mini amp shootout and see if any of 'em tweak yer bum. Most have headphones. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_lUA2dXgPk

My guitar dork mates are pushing me towards either the blackstar fly3 if I want an all in one solution or the Orange Micro Terror head unit if I expect them to talk to me in the pub again.
The argument being it’s expandable if I keep it up, works well as a headphone amp and will be easy to sell on if I don’t stick with it. Plus it’s an Orange which satisfies my need for crunchy doom.

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Gonna watch this as soon as this podcast is over. Thanks.

Heads-up on the Micro Terror: for headphone use the output doesn’t have a cabinet simulation. Fine for clean sounds, but if you’re after the crunch it will sound a bit fizzy. No problem if you’re going into the matching speaker cab.
The Micro Dark version does have a cab sim, so better for headphone use, but I only ever had the Terror so can’t comment on other differences.

Now that’s some valuable information!
I’m being lent a micro dark by a mate next week to try out but cheers for the heads up.

+1 for the Yamaha THR. I've got a THR10 and I reckon that they've pulled off the ultimate aim for a small amp, which is to make it sound like a big amp a long way away.

Had a play on this over the weekend, which is the first Tele that I've actually liked. Don't have the chops for chicken-pickin' though, which is frustrating.

Also had a noodle on Gretsch Electromatic Double Jet, which is just a ridiculous amount of guitar for the money and instantly makes you sound like Malcolm Young.

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Yeah, it was obviously an oversight they corrected in the Dark, but shame they haven't altered subsequent Micro Terrors for a version 2 or something.

In the Dark they removed the aux in, so could be that adding cab sim would have muffled the backing tracks for playalongs and they couldn't be bothered wiring it so that it only applied to the amp tone.

I sold mine and accidentally upgraded to something even less good at headphone practice.

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Oooof the Rocker 15 sounds great in any demo I've heard, nice one!

Yeah, not the classic Orange sound, but probably for the better and it's a good all-rounder. With the power scaling down to 0.5W very useful for home, and much better recorded sound than the Micro.

As a counter to the advice from more knowledgeable folks than I @edmundro …

I have a fender GT40 (similar to Yamaha THR) that I used getting back into guitar during lockdown… only lasted about 9 months and have done nothing since my kids came, and space is a huge concern now - so my requirements are maybe different to yours. But. I’m planing to get a fender mustang micro for when I start again. Less cables, more ease, much easier to just get practising and playing along to tracks. I really don’t rate a full amp as a learning/ beginner practicing device. Realistically when are you going to be playing out loud, or noticing the accuracy of the cab sim? Not for ages, right? Micro is cheap, has amazing reviews, and you can get the mini amp down the line once you feel confident going somewhere and trying them out with your new chops, maybe spending more and you know you’re in it for the long haul, and getting something that suits you and the next guitar you inevitably buy once you’re back into it.

I also found the fender learnalong awful as I had some prior experience but from the sounds of it not much more than you. The first like 3 chapters of the blues one were tedious. There’s only 5 chapters iirc. And the songs are often very basic interpretations that left me really disappointed.

But also also that SG is super nice.

My SG has arrived 🥳
It’s definitely at the lower end of Epiphones offerings as it weighs considerably less than I was expecting and it’s almost certainly a thin veneer over whatever timber was laying around.
No matter, neck feels a nice shape, might lower the action a smidge but for the money I certainly have no complaints.

As long as it feels good that you want to play it I'd say that's the main thing!

I recently re-bought the first guitar I ever owned (an absolute piece of shit Stagg that I knew was going to be shit when I bought it), and honestly it's pretty much fine to play. Not as refined as the Steinberger (also not a particular fancy model) but once the strings were changed and the action sorted it was perfectly fine. Weight distribution was very head-heavy though.

Main thing I'd say is to keep it somewhere that you're likely to pick it up and noodle around everyday. Helps that it's probably not something you're incredibly precious about and keeping it in some hermetically sealed case.