Most Overrated/Overpriced Acoustic Guitars?

Most Overrated/Overprice Acoustic Guitar?

  • Epiphone

    Votes: 2 1.2%

  • Fender

    Votes: 15 9.1%

  • Gibson

    Votes: 47 28.7%

  • Ibanez

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Martin

    Votes: 35 21.3%

  • Taylor

    Votes: 50 30.5%

  • Washburn

    Votes: 9 5.5%

  • Godin (seagull, art & lutherie, etc)

    Votes: 3 1.8%

  • Rogue

    Votes: 3 1.8%
  • Total voters
    164
Ovation made a deal with the Byrds to provide guitars free of charge for the promo. After a very short time Clarence White and Roger McGuinn told them they could keep their guitars. They couldn't even give them away except to Glenn Cambell
 
Ovation wins hands down. They became popular in the 70's because they built the first "acoustic" with a pickup that didn't feed back like a mother. I've got a Taylor 710CE that I absolutely love. I'm not impressed by the cheap Taylors, Martins, or Gibsons. Expensive and overpticed/overated? Rain Song.-Richie
 
Timothy Lawler said:
Have you ever noticed how little guitars cost compared to violins, violas or cellos? Even a low end student alto sax or clarinet is several hundred $. I guess, just within the guitar world some makes are better values than others, but compared to the larger musical world, we're really lucky.

Tim
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The woodwinds cost a lot more to make. As for the other strings, that's supply and demand. Most cheap strings are bought by parents who want the cheapest rental available, versus the teenager who buys the acoustic with their own money, they want something that sounds half decent. And there are many more guitars sold than violins.

I've bought violins made in Eastern Europe for $200-300 and been very satisfied with the result.
 
I've been playing Ovations since the early seventies and have owned maybe a dozen....I still have five, and though I don't care for them much for anything other than stage use, in that capacity they're hard to beat. But times change and electronics from Fishman and the like have improved and in conjunction with my Bose PAS I can dial in my higher end acoustics well enough for concert and specialty gigs while still using Ovation Country Artists for corporate casuals and background/restaurant type situations. Nylon hybrids are great for those things and a Godin would be just as good except for it's lack of acoustics.

I'd have to agree that Ovation is overpriced, but for a different reason; poor resale.

For most overrated and overpriced, I don't know, you can often find great guitars and crap from the same manufacturer..Gibson for instance. From personal experiences I guess I'll vote for Taylor.
 
Hey Richard Monroe - I played a Rain Song in a shop once, and man it was loud! But not a sound I'd seriously consider recording, but then again I don't think they market them as recording guitars, more performing ones.

Shame it cost about $1000 more than the most expensive Aus made Maton money can buy - insanely expensive...
 
Of what ya got listed... Overrated and Overpriced.. Taylor.. Not often ya find a TRUE Martin fan that does like a Taylor though...

For just flatout overpriced... Prolly have to be the 1960's Archtop Kay with a cracked top and rusty hardware I saw sell on Ebay one night for $3500... Or maybe the 1940's Stromberg that's on there for the next two days at $65,000

Tim.. Ya mentioned how much cheaper guitars are than Violins, cellos, etc... Guitars for the most part aren't carved... For the cheapest guitars you get a endless sheet of plywood to die cut the peices out of.. Even if you were to die cut thicker peices of wood for a violin, there's still some carving that has to be done to the front and back... If not by hand, by a CNC... Time or money either way you look at it..

Even then you can get some pretty inexpensive stuff if you shop around... You can get a 4/4 upright bass off Ebay for under $500 shipped... Or a decent fiddle (I said fiddle, not violin) for about $80...

--
Rob
 
I voted for Taylor although Gibson is a close second.

I have heard a lot of negative comments about Washburn. I have played a lot of guitars in my 55+ years. While I don't think Washburn makes the best Acoustic guitars, they seem to have the best trade off between sound, cost and quality for me anyway. A top of the line Martin they are not but they aren't all that bad.
Ovation on the other hand is an over priced peice of crap. I have played a few of these and I can't stand the pain in the ass rounded back... or the fact that it is half plastic. I figure that there are about $75 worth of labor and material in one of these things. The only good thing I can say about it is that they project well .. the tone still ain't that good. I have heard Ibinez guitars that sound better.
 
I heard that Taylor 'used' to make high quality guitars, but with the growth of the company the quality has dropped
 
I hate threads like this.

When we go looking for an instrument, we don't look to see what kind of damage we can cause by laughing at the salesman who's getting underpaid selling stuff he doesn't know much about because he has to make the rent.

What the hell are we doing here?


How about learning what makes a decent instrument for a decent price, playing one before we buy it and staying away from the stuff that doesn't work for us?

I'm not a real fan of Ovations either but the Adamas SMT makes one hell of a good stage guitar. There's a blue graphite topped sucker in the local guitar shop that runs circles around my Taylor 815C for that purpose - and the Taylor is in all other respects by far the best sounding guitar I have ever played.

Every instrument has a purpose. Some are intended to get people started. Some seem intended to make the others look good. Some are destined to change how you think about music and will change your lives. And you will never, never know which one is which until you play it.
 
I've been guitar-shopping lately, doing a lot of test driving, and I'm confused now as to why so many people in this thread voted Taylor as the most overpriced acoustic guitar.

A Taylor 810 costs almost exactly the same as Martin's flagship guitar, the HD-28. Both guitars are moderately ornate dreadnoughts made from the finest materials -- spruce soundboards, indian rosewood back and ribs, ebony bridges and fingerboards, etc. Both guitars play like a dream. Both sound rich and full and project much volume.

So what is it about the Taylor that makes it overpriced?
 
So what is it about the Taylor that makes it overpriced?

Nothing. My 710CE was worth every penny I paid for it, and the selection was made after playing everything from Ovation to Breedlove and Froggy Bottom.-Richie
 
I still have five, and though I don't care for them much for anything other than stage use, in that capacity they're hard to beat.
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Exactly. Ovations offer *huge* bang for the buck for performing musicians. They are not made for recording or true acoustic use.

I voted for Taylor, but could have easily voted for Martin or Gibson. Both of these guys pale in comparison to my Breedlove. The other poster nailed it when he mentioned Collings, Goodall, and Santa Cruz. These guitars are around the same price and all of the them just destroy their mass produced counterparts.

Lets face it guys, we guitar players are stubborn. We find a company we like, and we stick to it until the bitter end, regardless of whether it is still a quality product or not. I won't even look at any of the big guitar makers anymore because I know that the attention to detail just isn't there, and that includes Gibson, Fender, PRS, and especially Gretsch. PRS doesn't make anthing even close to my 1988 Custom 24 anymore. It doesn't even resemble the same guitar.
 
Richard Monroe said:
So what is it about the Taylor that makes it overpriced?

Nothing. My 710CE was worth every penny I paid for it, and the selection was made after playing everything from Ovation to Breedlove and Froggy Bottom.-Richie
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I don't think it's a case of all Taylor's (or whatever manufacturer for that matter) being overpriced. As I said earlier I've played some incredible sounding Martins that would be worth every penny on the price tag however i've also played some very ordinary sounding/playing Martins in the £500-£1000 price range (a lot of money in my world). I'd say the same for gibson on pretty much the same basis. I haven't played many taylor's, perhaps it's the same with them?

Anyway guitars are very personal things as we all know. My regular guitar is a mid level seagull but I'm in love with how it sounds and plays and there aren't many instruments in the local vintage and rare shop I'd swap it for. And of course those I would consider swapping it for cost many, many, many times more.
 
So much hating on Taylor, with no real, actual reasons explaining why.

"So Jim, which guitar do you think is the most overpriced?"

"Well Frank, I'd have to say Taylor."

"Really...why is that Jim?"

"Because they just are, Frank!"

Can someone actually post a reason why they think Taylors are overpriced, instead of this pointlessness?
 
No, they can't. The guitars are competitively priced for the mid to high end of the market. They aren't quite at the the custom luthiery end of the market or there would be more $9,000 Taylors floating around. Instead you can go to the local guitar shop and buy a killer 12-string for $1,400 street price. Overpriced? Take a cold shower and have some coffee.

It's a bit like the Ford v. Chevy debates in 1968. Who had the ballsier engine - was it the big block Chevy 428, the Ford 428, or the Ford 429? Was the Chevy, rated at 428 BHP really a weaker engine than the Ford, rated at 429 BHP? Of course not. Both were ridiculously powerful motors. But the brand loyalty raged on without regard to facts. It was more fun that way. :D
 
Ovation, followed by Fender. Never heard an example from either company that actually sounded good.

Come to think of it, I have never heard a Gibson acoustic that sounded decent, either.
 
Zaphod B said:
Ovation, followed by Fender. Never heard an example from either company that actually sounded good.

Come to think of it, I have never heard a Gibson acoustic that sounded decent, either.
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Interesting. What DOES sound good to you?
 
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