If I upgrade my chinese counterfeit will it play just as good as my Gibson?
Goddamn YouTubers…
I keep seeing amature YouTubers post kit-guitar videos and then lure their viewers to some shady website with some 15 percent off coupon. If you’re thinking about it please READ THIS FIRST!
Ok first and foremost, if you’re buying one of these trendy chinese guitar Kits for any reason other than ‘fun’ and I use the term ‘fun’ rather LOOSELY please consider the following…
You haven’t discovered the ‘Ultimate Money Saving’ hack, NO MONEY WILL BE SAVED!
You’ll spend hours fixing issues with the kit (bad routes, wrong measurements etc.) before you even start to build.
Assuming you finish it, you’ll realize it plays like shit and decide to take it to your tech and don’t be surprised to pay up, I tell people around $500 but mind you I don’t cut corners.
No, they aren’t reliable backup guitars
Im making an assumption here but from what I’ve seen in online photos, some of these companies seem to be building out of chicken coops. The working conditions look fucking terrible!
Lastly, They’ll always look cheap and fake.
So last week I decided to take on these two Les Paul Jr’s. They weren’t terrible but still required lots of modification along the way and lots of part replacement.
Ok i don’t want to discourage anyone from building or getting into this type of stuff but please just be careful when going down this path. If you still decide to give one of these a shot I’d recommend buying a kit from stewmac (I have no affiliation to them) or some other reputable company that offer some kind of warranty. I’d also recommend maybe getting some guidance along the way from a professional luthier or tech. Pay them for their time and expect to pay for some work as well.
Surprisingly enough these actually turned out alright and it only cost him a pissed-off wife and $1000 over his original budget. So Remember kids, you can put lipstick on a pig but it’ll still be a pig.
-Luis M.