I’ve jumped into a couple of threads without an intro - where ARE my manners?
I’m Ray. I live near Philly but have lived for notable chunks of time in Baltimore, Tucson, Colorado Rockies, Puget Sound area. But we’ve been near Philly for 25 years and are probably here to stay. Particularly now that we have a Super Bowl team and can throw off those shackles...
Been playing guitar since I was 18, 40 years ago. But it was basically 8-10 years of playing a LOT followed by about 30ish playing barely at all. I always had one electric and one acoustic, mostly a mid-70s strat and a 1968 Martin D-28, both of which I bought shortly after I started, but I finally gave up on my playing about 10 years ago and sold those and got a couple of cheap placeholders, just to have something to grab on occasion. I’ve probably only played enough to have callouses a couple of short periods in those 30 years. But about a year ago, I got back into it with a fury and now I’m playing a ton again.
Have another strat (Classic Player 50s with some wiring mods) and another Martin (000-15M). But I seem to have mellowed a lot in my older years and I also picked up an Ibanez semi hollow with humbuckers that I picked up in a Guitar Center one day and instantly fell in love with, much to my surprise, And it’s totally displaced the strat as my #1. I’m not into owning a lot of guitars - I can’t do em justice and it just ends up confusing me. So one or two electrics and an acoustic is what I’m happiest with. I was always a blues rock guy, but now I’m just a blues guy with a mellower, almost jazzier feel to my blues playing. So the strat seems to just be there for the occasional quack sound or another lame attempt to play Hendrix. I’m not a terrible player, but I’m decent only within an incredibly narrow range. Out of 360 degrees of possib,e musical expression, I’m OK within about a degree, maybe a degree and a half. I played out a lot as a kid (bands, a regular duo, sat in with lots of folks, more jam sessions than I can remember) but now I’m mostly a man-cave player with an occasional jam session with a buddy. But loopers and both backing tracks and tutorials online make being a man cave player a lot more fun now that it would have been 30 years ago.
Thinking about a 60th birthday present of a really nice dream guitar, which brings me here. I’ll never do justice to a great guitar but I’ll still enjoy the hell out of. I don’t turn 60 until next year but it could happen sometime in my 60th year I guess. Haven’t started really trying out PRS yet, aside from a Custon 24 I played for about five minutes once that I sort of liked, but didn’t love. I’ve gotten obsessed with the thought of a 594, but will probably play other stuff too and see if anything really grabs me. I usually fall in love with the feel of a guitar within minutes of picking it up if I’m gonna. If I like the feel, I can usually find the sounds I like - if I don’t like the feel pretty quickly, it ends there. So, if I fall in love with a PRS in the next few months, I’ll join the club. And if I don’t, I’ll probably fall in love with something else or just sit tight with what I’ve got. Any of which are fine options. If I find something I live, it’ll replace on or both of my current electrics. If not, I may hang onto both or maybe just the Ibanez.
But I’ll be around here for awhile at least soaking up information. Thanks in advance...
-Ray