Meet the newest member of the family: A Fender Squire Bullet Strat. Not fancy or expensive by any means, but feels and sounds like a pretty decent guitar at first play, and it’s basically new out of the box. It still needs to get a real workout, of course, and then see how it holds up over time. But my initial impression is very good.
It will compete most directly with the Indiana Strat copy — the one that’s covered with stickers and upgraded with two lipstick-tube pickups in the neck and middle positions. Aside from the lipstick pickups, they are essentially the same guitar, at least superficially. What remains to be seen is if they have the same tone, feel, and vibe… or if they each have their own unique personality.
This guitar was definitely an impulse purchase. I was not supposed to be buying any more guitars. I haven’t bought any for quite a while. Money has been a little tight; but more to the point, I seem to have everything I need to get the sounds that I want to get. No matter what sound I’m looking for — acoustic or electric, hard or soft — I can pretty much pick up a guitar in my collection and get that sound. So I was pretty happy with the stable the way it is.
Then on Monday, the next-door neighbor came over and asked me if I wanted to buy a guitar. I wondered how he knew I was even interested in guitars, as he is fairly new here and we haven’t talked a whole lot yet. He said another neighbor had told him that if he wanted to sell his guitar, maybe he should ask Ed, as he knew that Ed had a bit of a collection…
So there I am standing in the yard checking out this nice little axe. One side of me is thinking, “I don’t need any more guitars, and this isn’t anything that I don’t already have.” The other side is thinking, “Oh, man… Feels nice… Sounds nice… Brand new… Price is right…”
My wife, Vicky, is also there. Unlike many spouses I’ve heard horror stories about, she is saying things like, “Well, if you really like it you should probably get it.” And (to the neighbor), “What’s the least you can take for it?”
See what a lucky guy I am?
So he named his bottom-dollar price, and I said something to the effect of, “Hang on a second, I’ll get you the money…”
And here we are.