Guitars Are All The Same

Guitars are all the same these days. It’s true. Sure, there are differences among the different body styles, but when it comes down the actual components that are critical to sound and playability, they all seem to be the same. What am I talking about? I’m talking about things like the electronics, the frets, the fretboard radius, scale length, etc. These are the parts of the guitar that effect how the guitar sounds and how it plays.

There are two main schools of design when it comes to modern electric guitars; Fender and Gibson. Nearly all modern electric guitars resemble either the Stratocaster or the Les Paul. Now, initially these guitars were incredibly different from each other. The Stratocaster had a more round fretboard radius, smaller frets, and a longer scale. They also had three single coil pickups. The Gibson Les Paul had two Humbucking pickups, a flatter fretboard, larger frets and a shorter neck. These two guitars have formed the mainstay of guitar design for decades. But over time the Fender guitars have become more similar to the Gibson line by incorporating humbucking pickups, flatter radius fretboards and larger frets. The two guitars are still not identical, but they have moved towards each other.

Other manufacturers have designed guitars that sought to be unique, but beyond a strange body shape or a mixing of different design elements from the two major guitar designs there hasn’t been much innovation. In fact it seems to me that guitars are becoming more and more homogenized. The phenomenon has reached such a point that certain guitar manufacturers exist solely by replicating the designs of the originals. Take for instance Suhr Guitars or Tradition Guitars . These are both fine guitar makers, but what do they contribute to the craft? What do they offer in terms of variation? Little, if anything.

This is in contrast to the luthiers designing modern bass guitars. Bass players seem much more willing to experiment with not only body shape, but also very fundamental factors such as number of strings, scale length, multi-scale necks, etc. These are things that standard electric six string designers rarely if ever do.

It’s getting to the point where going to a shop to play a guitar isn’t that much fun anymore. I know what I’m getting most of the time before I pick the instrument up.

Where is the spirit of creativity? Why to bass players seem to have it, but guitar players don’t? Is there anything that can be done? Or are guitar players such a stuck in the past traditional group that Les Paul knockoffs are the only things in our future? I think its sad to find something that is different from the standard guitar on the market today I’m better of looking at a guitar that’s 35 years old than one that’s new on the market today.

I’m not the only one to notice this. Robert Irizarry, the author of Building the Ergonomic Guitar blog agrees with me. Check out this post which talks about the myth of “modern guitar design.”