A Pessimistic Revelation

Dear Brothers,

Sometimes in life, things swell and fade.

Most of you have heard that I have been modding cheap Squiers quite regularly. $30 here $50 there etc. It is practically pocket change.

I didn't put a whole lot of money into them as everything was just sitting around the shop of a dollar here or there, and didn't pay a whole lot for them in the first place. I had a lot of fun with them. I learned a lot on the way. All could turn into an easy profit- and may well do so.

"Damn Trashed it sounds like you are depressed, 'ya alright?"

"Yeah Yeah. Nothing to worry about guys, already took my happy pills..."

The last few months I was just playing the Squiers, I put up a bunch of the other guitars because i was satisfied with the Squiers for the time being, and didn't need them out..They sounded good, felt great- or so I thought, so I thought. I have had a lot of fun with them, but there was ONE fatal downfall...

Today, I pulled out some of the Gibsons and high dollar USA Fenders. Slick like butter, ssweet like sugar, and singing like the birds. The Squiers don't make the cut amongst this lineup. They really shouldn't either, factoring in price, and components, etc. but I am disappointed. I have the HH strat down and the blue one. the others are heading to storage for a while.

I don't know if I am a pessimistic realist or realiestic pessimist, or if i am pessimistic about my pessimism but life is life/.

The "what-the-hell-o-caster" and everything about it.

So what the hell is a what-the-hell-o-caster?

I am calling it this because it can be a lot of things. Complex, simple, bluesy, quacky, punk rockey, rock, OR country, are just a few things.

I am attempting to open your eyes.

One thing to me that is essential to ME, yes to ME about a stratocaster is the tremolo. BUT I always keep it blocked.

WHAT THE HELL TRASHED!?!?! You don't use it so you block it and YOU think it is essential? You have bloody hell gone mad.

What do I mean? The noise of the spring cavity and where the routed areas make me almost feel a reverberation in  a guitar. Can it be heard through an amp? Probably not. But I don't jazz (or rock) with hard-tail strats. I have played a bunch of them. Mostly mid '70's and a few '80's of what I don't remember, BUT the hard-tail strat killed the vibe for me.

Some people think that Strats are boring. I can reassure you that they are not. I must agree that the bland, boring, black strat,with the rosewood fretboard, white pickguard and chrome hardware is not the most inspiring, eye catching, or jaw dropping guitar ever made.

The good thing however is that YOU make the rules..

Pickguards are easily interchangeable, and the options are endless! Don't think you are stuck with Fender either, http://www. greasygroove. com can make totally custom designs of whatever you can imagine and with any pickup configuration you could dream of!

Strats allow for a huge variety of pickup selection. Most are SSS, the most flexible is the HSS. HH wired for a 5-way isn't bad either. There is some room in MOST of them. I stick boost circuits in some of my Strats and have room for a battery without any complications. HEADS UP though. There are a lot of different routing patterns, don't assume though that it is a swimming pool. Before you go all hog wild on its ass take a peek, that is all. (If you have a router, Dremel, or whatnot, it is an easy go, just don't go too far on the edge).

Can they get any better !?!?! YES.

EVERYTHING is totally interchangeable of the same model. A neck breaks, (which is a highly unlikely scenario), buy one. If I break the headstock off of one of my Gibsons hellfire would come down to earth. BIG money to get a good repair AND kills the value. Hardware is interchangeable too! (to the similar model).

OK Trashed, you have blabbered and bantered for minutes now, what is this what-the-hell-o-caster? It is a partscaster. I just do whatever the hell I want. You build whatever the hell you want.

COOL SHIT, RIGHT? I think so.

Cheers Brothers!

***TRASHED DID IT AGAIN!*** $50 Squier Blues Shredder

OK guys we all need that a shredder needs 24 frets, but the way that this fine bitch plays so sweet it makes up for it in spades. 

I got this Squier Affinity Strat brand new from a guy on CL. The plastic wrap still on the stock pick guard. $50. It literally hadn't been played. Freaking cool, isn't it?

I got the GFS pick guard for $20-ish.

I used pickups out of an Ibanez Prestige. $0.00

Total investment $70.

I rolled the edges of the fretboard, which really makes it more comfortable to play. I dyed the fretboard with leather dye, and cleaned the inlays. I prefer that look more ebony-esque and classy.
This is standard procedure on cheap guitars with rosewood fretboards. I did do a little filing on the ends of the frets with a needle file, nice and smooth, which we all want. Neck feels great.

The pickups came from a RG-2570EVSL that I pulled out (in favor of a Dimarzio Crunch Lab and Liquifire configuration for Petrucci tones). These pickups are the Dimarzio/IBZ pick ups, NOT to be confused with the "V" or"INF" as found in other Ibanez guitars.

The Dimarzio/IBZ  are still made in the USA as all of Dimarzio's pickups, and are pretty damn nice overall. The bridge slightly reminds me of the Super Distortion in the bridge and similar bite in the neck. The neck pickup is not low output wimpy shit here, it is full of sweet screaming leads.

I used the switch, jack, and pot from the Squier and rigged it up. Two things to note is that the five-position switch works fine. The only thing is that it is silent in positions 3 and 4. I don't mind that.. not to mention that it saved me $10. The pot was a CTS which was kind of odd to find in a bottom of the barrel guitar.

I set it up and put it with some D'addario .11's and HOT DAMN was it something sweet. I tweaked it a little bit, and it plays insanely well. Freakishly low action, great sound, I found a sweet guitar here.

2017/03/25 Nitrocellulose -vs- Polyester Finishes

Welcome to the world of the Trashed lifestyle, come in on the subject, I usually don't bite.

THIS IS GOING TO BE A HOT TOPIC.

The problem is that there are a lot of strong opinions. There is some cork-sniffers that will start bitching right away. BUT... maybe I am a cork-sniffer myself. Oh-well.

I am not going to get into the chemical makeup and application of either, you can Google that yourself.

There are a few pre-requisites on this though. First off, some are hand sprayed and some are done by machine. Some coats are thicker than others, some poly seem thicker, and some are really thick and i hate that. The 'stickiness' is irrelevant between the two, as you can go over the back of the neck with some #0000 steel wool to get it slipperier. *IF you do this make sure you have your pickups taped over so you don't get metal dust in there*

I own twenty-ish guitars at the moment and five are nitro (all Gibsons). What i love about nitro, is that feels much smoother and silkier on the back of the neck. Its a beautiful feeling to slide down the neck on a properly finished nitrocellulose neck. 

My poly guitars, (at this point mostly Ibanez Prestiges and USA Fenders), feel great too. In my opinion the best feeling poly necks are done on the Ibanez Prestiges. They play well, and applied thin. USA and fenders are pretty good too, but some i will take the finish off of the back of the neck and apply a rubbed on finish, which I love too.

So over a decade ago, I had this Washburn X-50 PRO. It seemed as if the finish was so thick that the body was suffocated by poly. It was dead sounding. A few months later, I chipped it. I will be damned if the finish wasn't as thick as truck bed-liner. I ended up selling the guitar shortly after, thoroughly disgusted. That is one reason I don't buy cheap poly guitars.

Nitro DOES WEAR though, and it can be fast. I do not have my former #1 Gibson (not on me at the moment), but a lot of the finish is through, but it got beat for EIGHT years. The only reason I am not using that guitar is that it needs a re-fret (if I get lucky I may get by with a level and crown). Nitro also checks/cracks if exposed to the harsh elements, I have that on there too. BUT the neck is just yummy. sooo damn yummy. One thing about nitro is that it is more breathable and to me it feels more natural, and only feels better with time.

Some say nitro is thinner SO it sounds better, I call bullocks on that. Poly is more durable on the surface and doesn't scratch on the surface as easily. Nitro is easier to repair, which IS a good thing. I have never seen a nitro finish as thick as a thick poly finish.

In conclusion, send your hate-spam.

Cheers, Trashed.

2017-02-21 How to Hot-Rod the Hell of your Stratocaster for $50!

Addicts of the Fender Stratocaster - this MAY change your life!

"So Trashed, what is going to get me a killer tone out of my strat for $50? That is less than the price of a shitty pickup!"

"Fasten your seat-belt bros, here we go!"

What is it? Here ya go! the"Fender Pre-Amp Mid Boost Kit." There are two main components in the kit. the TBX control, and the variable knob controlled 25db mid boost. You may be familiar with this setup if you have tried a Eric Clapton Strat, as it comes that way directly from Fender.

This installation was on a Mexican Std. Strat (MIM) from around 1995. As you likely may know, the pickups are far from ideal. I picked up the strat for $175 a few years ago. Its actually one of my favorite Strats as far as feel and the neck go (I have owned a shit-ton of them). However the tone was lacking.

The TBX allows you to cut both treble and bass, and there is a stop in the middle of the control at the neutral location. Alone it works wonders. If you only have ~$15 this will make a nice difference as well (it is stock on some USA Strats if I recall correctly). It is great at taming the bridge pickup and making it usable.

The bread and butter of this though is the boost. It goes from normal on the minimum setting to a searing boost all the way which WILL cause some good breakup on a tube amp. This control RARELY need to be up all the way for MY purposes. In other words, its got some cojones to it.

The setup I use most often is a cut off of the treble and the boost up half way with the volume knob on the neck pickup. Its dark and has bite and is really smooth and liquid. The bridge pickup is usuable for once too!!!

"Whoa! Trashed that sounds really cool!"

To that I reply "You bet you're ass it is!"

Now lets move on. The only thing was that the installation was a bitch. I have done a lot of tech work and that is rare for me to say to be honest. The two wiring diagrams that Fender included are shit. Absolutely useless. I had to do a lot of searching to find something that was better laid out and I found one after a few minutes**. If you are not experienced with electronics, and haven't done anything like this before, I would send it to a tech. It would still be well worth it IMO if you are unable to. However, if you can solder and have time, I see no reason that I would not attempt it. 

Fitting the 9V battery in the Strat and the PC board was relatively easy just with a little bit of messing around. You must keep in mind though that Fender routes a lot of their Strats differently. Incidentally mine was one of the smallest routes and I still got it it in, so nothing to worry about. The only PITA factor is that you have to take the pickguard off to replace the battery. Some people have mounted the battery in the trem cavity with results, but I need all five springs on my tremolo. That could be an option too though. The battery should last a while, just remember to unplug the guitar when not in use (check out my previous blog- http://trashedengineering.blogspot.com/2016/11/2016-11-27-9-volt-batteries-are-from.html)

I am telling you that it will change your life. Go out and get one! I will likely be posting a video demo here. So look for it!

Cheers! Trashed.

**If you do this and want the link, shoot me an email and i will link you to it, no problem. The reason that i did not include it here is because it was not made by me and I do notwant to take credit for somebody else's work**.

2017-01-11 - Sometimes Ya Gotta' Pay to Play

Dear Tone Brothers.

I have something to tell you of utmost importance. Some things in life aren't cheap. Good tone ISN'T.

I am not slandering those with a small budget, but if you stick with it, you will pay.

Those solid-state (also know as transistor amps) are not going to make you sound like your rock 'god'. I don't care how good you are if you are playing on a Marshall M10 watt combo, you won't exactly sound like a professional. WATCH THIS STATEMENT: You may PLAY like a professional, but it isn't going to SOUND professional (as in studio, or gig, etc.). Don't get me wrong, paying like a professional is definitely an achievement and something to be proud of, but so is good tone.

(Trashed kicks the dust off of his boots and continues)

Are tube amps the end-all for tone? No. 

Personally they are for me (I have 19 quality tube amps), and I love the suckers.

Do you need tubes to sound like a 'professional'? No. 

If you are on the way up, an amp is the core of your tone. $400 used gets you a great combo in the right market. I am referencing a Peavey 6505+ combo, Marshall DSL40c combo, Fender Hot Rod Deluxe combo, etc., but there are tons. That $400 will be WELL spent.

Lets talk about guitars. Your $100 Squier Strat, is a viable instrument with a little work. Your $100 Epiphone LP Special (IMO) is trash-can bound in time. It depends on what guitar to a degree, but at that price the quality is generally pretty low across the board.

So Trashed - WHY do you want to spend a little more on a guitar? 

There are a bunch of reasons. Typically mid-level instruments stay in tune better, are of higher quality regarding fit and finish, the fretwork is notably better, the hardware is a little better. They will just feel better in your hands, if you are transitioning form a cheap guitar, and you play a mid level guitar, you will feel the difference right away. It isn't something I can really describe, its just a vibe.

I am going to stick to the sub $400 used budget. Ibanez RG's (without tremolos), Epiphone Les Paul Standard, Fender Mexican Strat. They will all play well with a little set-up, and sound much better. If you are obsessive, you may want to get a new nut fit for it, maybe a fret-level and crown. However for me? I haven't done that on any cheap guitars.

Is $800 a lot to invest in a past time/hobby? To me, not a whole lot. I can probably think of a dozen more hobbies where you invest more in mid level equipment. Also for most of my readers, they are beyond the entry phase to be researching.

Pay to Play.

CHEERS BROTHERS, 

TRASHED.

*I have a bunch of disclaimers here. The guitars and amps I referenced are just really common guitars and amps that you can find anywhere. In most of those cases they can be found cheaper. I posted those for a broad audience, a basic 'metal' rig, a 'rock' rig, and more of a 'clean' amp for other things. However, they are ALL gig-worthy.