I was 16. I traded a Kramer Beretta to my brother for his American Standard Strat back in 1989. Miss both of those guitars:(
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I was 16. I traded a Kramer Beretta to my brother for his American Standard Strat back in 1989. Miss both of those guitars:(
I was 9 or 10. It was a used MIJ Standard Strat in white with a rosewood board, which thrilled me because I had a great picture of Jimi Hendrix with a Strat in the same colors. I traded in an Ibanez Les Paul from the 70's that I had saved up for with paper route and birthday money, and my parents paid the difference for Christmas.
M
www.monstermikewelch.com
OK (pause while I put my teeth in), I got my first electric (see user name) when I was 42. Been playing acoustic on and off since I was 21. I guess I was inspired by the great electric blues players (SRV, etc.) and wanted to experiment with that style of music. I shopped for a long time, but knew deep down that I wouldn't be happy with anything but an Corona-made Strat. Eventually I fell in love the the fat strat texas special in sienna sunburst and just had to have it. Bought one along with a Blues, Jr. and have been a younger man since. Having a great time with my first Fender. Some day I hope to be able to play for a larger audience than just my wife and my dog, but that's OK I play for myself and nobody else.
Thirteen. I remember my sister taking my mom and me to Schneider's Music Center in Augusta, Georgia, just before Christmas. It was one of the early Fender Bullets, Made in U.S.A-- sort of a cross between a Strat and a Tele-- red with a black pickguard and rosewood board. I even remember the way it smelled. I get a boner everytime I think about it. One of, if not the, happiest days of my life.
I was 21. It was June 28, 1994, and I said to my brother, right after I got my Stratocaster, "Please don't tell Mom I spent $650 on a guitar."
Little did I know what I was really getting into.
I bought my first Strat at the age of 16 back in 1963. It was artic white and it cost about £147. $237 U.S, new from Jennings musical instruments in Charring Cross road London.. I had the bloody thing stolen at a college gig a few years later and with the insurance money bought a mint second hand Gibson 335. .. I still have a photo taken back then of my freind Roy Thomas Baker, ( Queens producer) about a year or so after we both left school playing my Strat while we were on holiday together in Switzerland.. I'll dig it out one day.....LOL
I was 16 when i bought my first Fender back in 1979, a new black Stratocaster that i still own. One refret and thousands of hours playing later, she´s still ringing like a bell. Haven´t touched anything but the frets and setup, quite amazing Guitar! I love her!:jack
If you're counting Squier, 1991 - P-Bass (24 years Old)
Fender, 2000, MIM Strat. (33 Years Old)
had a few other guits in between there, Ibanez, Yamaha
DD
I got my first Strat in 1981 - I was 16. It was a used one but it was a 1968 rosewood board in 3 color sunburst. My dad paid $ 450.00 for it and I had it until 2003. I sold it and gave my dad back the $ 450.00 and treated him to a nice long weekend in the Adirondack mountains in a nice lodge in Saranac Lake. Needless to say I had a little extra cash which he said was mine.....
My second one came in November that year since I became a Hendrix fan and a buddy of mine wanted a Les Paul. Paid a whopping $ 375 for a very late 1970 Olympic White maple board model. This one I also sold a couple of years back to a collector. Was a bit more beat up but still nice. I
I have recently got the jones for one of these big headstock and big logo 4 bolt neck Strats and playes some 1969 Custom shop models. These are as good as the originals as fas as I am concerned - minus the mojo of course. And we all know the real mojo comes from use and not from a relic job.............
Ignoring my Amp
My First - A MIM 60’s Classic Strat – 48years young (I’ve had too struggle up till then with a 71Les Paul Custom)
My Second – 2 weeks tomorrow for my 50th . A CIJ Bound Tele - its in the box upstairs awaiting the big day
Ha! Everyone should have to asnwer this question/thread as a right of membership here.
First Fender guitar was a brand new off-the-shelf '68 Sunburst Strat when I was 13. Painted houses all summer to get the cash.
First Fender amp was a '66 Super from a guy named G.W. Smith who made pedal steel guitars. I had been bugging him forever to make me a steel guitar but they were too costly. Finally to shut me up he gave me the Super in '69. It had been in a fire and had a really cheesy cab on it. It was a few years before I realized what I had. GW was a blind steel player so the Super wasn't clean enough for him I guess, LOL. Only got rid of that one (in head form) a year ro so ago.
My first Strat was a '66 in 1979. It was stamped "DEMO" on the heel.
My first Fender amp was a 67 Blackface Vibrolux Reverb when I was 14 My first Fender guitar was a 1999 crimson red transparent, Am Dlx Strat with maple fretboard when I was 40 years old. I grew up in Kalamazoo, Michigan and it was much cheaper to buy a Gibson than a Fender.
Got my first guitar at 13. It was a Fender 62 Sunburst Telecaster reissue. Not long after that, I got a black 1978 Fender Strat (large Headstock) with a maple neck of which I still own almost thirty years later.
49.... My son kept asking me how to play somthing on the guitar. I would take his electric out of his hands to show him. He was never happy about this. I "needed" an electric to play with him because none of my 5 acoustic guitars would do ;) One trip to GC latter, I had my MIM Tele to enjoy. I'm getting a Strat this next week.
It was a year ago, so I was 41. :D
I may have told this story before, but I was a Gibson/metal guy when I played in the 1980s. Had an LP copy, then a Les Paul Custom. For gigging, I backed up the LP with a pretty cheap Ibanez X-Series with a radical body shape, locking whammy, and metallic red finish.
Late in college, I sold off all my gear, bit by bit, to pay for school. The LP Custom was the last to go. I'd just about kill to be able to go back and stop myself from selling that one.
I barely touched guitars for more than a decade after that. Then, in 2006, I decided I'd try getting back into playing. Didn't want to spend a lot of money on a guitar (in case it ended up collecting dust), and I didn't want anything I'd be tempted to compare to my old LP Custom. So I got a Squier "Deluxe" Stratocaster. (I put "Deluxe" in quotes because it actually says "Standard" on the peghead. As far as I know it's only called "Deluxe" in the marketing materials because it has a matte amber finish and a matching headstock.)
Turned out I loved playing, and I was starting to get into the blues, which I'd always been a fan of but never played or studied. Then I got the DVD set of the 2004 Crossroads Festival, and I decided I *had* to have a nicer, Fender Strat. :D
So, for my birthday last year, I got myself a Deluxe Player's Stratocaster. Almost 30 years after I first picked up a guitar, I had my first Fender.
on my 13th birthday, dad took me to the store and bought me a new 2001 mexican strat and a peavey amp. my first fender amp was a twin. :wah:
In early '68 I bought a '66 sunburst Strat from the original owner for the then-princely sum of one hunnert yankee dollahs. I was sixteen years old an' the Fender replaced my severely-used/abused-and-totally-boogered Gibson Melody Maker. My first Fender amp was a '65 Deluxe (not DR) that I bought in late '66 for ninety bucks from the kid down the street who got a new Vox Viscount for Christmas.
Geez I wish I still had 'em both!
Got my first guitar about 1.5 years ago when I was 17 which was a Fender Stratocaster 60th Anniversary (MIM). I just changed the pups out of them to GFS Jimi Staggered. This guitar is painted silver (Blizzard Pearl) with a maple fretboard. I love this guitar so much.
My first Fender was a '76 Stratocaster which I purchased in '85 (I was 22 at the time) for three hundred dollars. I had two LP's by that time and decided I wanted to see what this Strat thing was all about. I sold it in '97 to a kid in the neighborhood, for the same three hundred dollars.
I guess I was 42.Now I have 2 Strats.92 and 96 American Standard.
15
Traded a big bagggie of Mexican for a Tele Custom. It was the 70's Man. I was a young hippy and it was groovy, Peace !
when I was 16, I got a 1970 or 71 big heaqstock 4 bolt custom color Stratocaster.Pissed it away a 5 years later.
The piano wasn't cutting it anymore, if ever, so at age 12, I somehow obtained a Kay SG bass copy and tiny Gorilla amp. Then a cheap no-name acoustic at 14. Then, a couple years into college, I picked up a Squire Tele. After school, I ignored guitars and making music for too many years. At 30, I was offered a spot playing bass in a party band with some fellows from the office, so I picked up my first Fender, a new 2000 MIM Jazz Bass. Next up: a new 2001 MIA sunburst Tele. Then a 1999 MIA Hot Rod Precision in 2002. And then nothing for years, until last week when I picked up my first-ever Strat, a new American Standard.
Incidentally, I traded the Squire on the Jazz Bass, which I totally regret. But hell, that band was half a gag anyway, and I didn't want to be out too much cash if it fizzled in a month...
:da
Oops!
double post..old thread alert!!
Hmm When I was 14 I was playing alot of epiphone Lp's and when I was 14 I saved up and got a mexican standard tele, had that for about a year then sold it, then when I was 17 I got my first USA Fender, a got a USA white blond tele w/ SCN pups and a Maple fretboard. It was a great guitar and Felt so comfy, my first real strat. I did one of the most bonehead moves selling that one...don't even want to get into it lol.
In 1968 I bought my first used Fender guitar, a Musicmaster. Don't know how old it was when I got it. I kept it for a few years and then in 1972 bought a '64 Strat from a friend of mine for $125. Happy to say I still have that one!
My first Fender amp was a '65 Deluxe Reverb purchased in 1976. I think I paid $275. Happy to say I still have that one, as well.
46 when I got my first Strat, I still have it and a few Teles, a Zone bass, 68 Drip Edge Bandmaster, SF Vibro Champ, DRRI, and a little BXR 60 bass combo.
I was 20 years old in 1986 when I bought my first Strat. Matter of fact, it is my only Strat and I still play it today. Looking to get a Lonestar Deluxe if I can swing it.
Another de-rail...I have played plenty of Stratocasters and a few tele's.
Have never bought one for myself, though!
My first Fender is the amp, the 67 DR, in '83 when I was 20.
I didn't know what I had, and I never let it go.
Now I love the 'lil son of a gun!
I was 13 , 72 Telecaster Thinline black with Mother of Pearl pickguard. A year later I had it painted white. In 74 traded in for a Les Paul Custom , it didn't matter then but they tell me its a 72 year and probably was old stock at the store. I still miss that guitar ,my first good guitar and things never felt quit right till i got my strat last year. I guess I just wasn't a Gibson guy but it took me over 30 years to find out " slow learner " :-)
My first exposure to Fender was wanting to buy a used $120 1966 sea foam green Mustang; I was 18 years old. Instead, my dad helped me out by springing for a brand new '72 ES335 purchased from West LA Music. His theory was the bolt on necks can't be very good. In hind sight I would have enjoyed the Mustang a lot more. Officially my first Fender was a 1966 Princeton amp purchased in '72 from Ace Music in Santa Monica, Ca. My first and best ever Fender guitar was a homemade Strat built in '75 which used a '73 Fender maple neck as the foundation. It wasn't until 1990 that I would buy a real Fender Strat and I have now owned 12 to date. The original homemade Strat is still in the family and is outstanding.
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g8...hns73STRAT.jpg
My first Fender was my second guitar - a '73 Fender Bronco, when I was 16. I promptly modded it with a Dremel so I could install a DiMarzio PAF in the neck position, and some sort of hot bridge pickup to compete. It was my main guitar for years.
The first Fender amp I owned (as opposed to borowed) was a '57 5E3 Deluxe. :smile: My second was a '67 Dual Showman.
I don't have any of them anymore. :doh
right after high school I bought a brand new Fender Bullet. It was a small-ish strat shape with a tele headstock. then I got a used Lead II.
Shortly afer that I got my first "real" strat from another guitarist in the church group. 1977 ash natural hardtail with rosewood lam board.
I still have it. (many strats have come and gone)
I was 13 when my dad gave me his 72 strat (well let me play it anyway).
I was 49. It was an American HH Strat. I could not convince my parents to spend the money on a Fender when I was young. I quit playing for a long time (going to engineering school, finding a wife, holding down jobs, and raising a family kept me busy). I got started back when I tried to show my teen aged son how to play.
First Fenders were bought at 40 (current age). 1 MIM Roadhouse Strat, 4 Jazz and 2 P basses. You could say I went a little overboard, but I'm real happy :applaudit .
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r.../IMG_strat.jpg
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r...r/IMG_0173.jpg
http://i142.photobucket.com/albums/r.../IMG_colaP.jpg
29
16 in 1974, bought a brand new sunburst strat with maple board. Back then, there was just a strat. You chose the color, the fingerboard and trem or hard tail, from whatever was available in the shop.
that was it.
no signature models.
no made in xyz, they were all made in california, USA
no budget models. That 444 dollars was a major fortune for me back then. I ended up selling that guitar for 125 dollars 5 years later, to pay medical bills from an uninsured motorcycle accident. The buyer had to buy a new neck and 2 new pickups to make the guitar playable. And I thought it was just me.
54 in February 2008 :salud: .
Similar excuses - :slove: marry, raise family, pay mortgage etc.. etc..
First guitar (acoustic) in 1962 when I was 9. First electric (Hagstrom Futurama II Deluxe - blue fibreglass body cover, white pickguard :electric: ) in 1963. Couple of others over the years (Yamaha, Cort).
About 19 years old. Paid $65 US + tax, in 1977, for a 1960 Fender Duo-Sonic that some idiot had covered in house paint.
Still have her. My dad refinished her natural years ago, only finish is lemon oil.
http://static.flickr.com/19/92630662_ff2d6110d2_o.jpg
SCHWEET!Quote:
Originally Posted by Brian Krashpad
:sign11:
59.
Last August..my birthday present to me.
1988 MIJ Stratocaster with Gold Lace Fenders.
For my 60th I have just purchased a circa 1988 MIJ Fernandes Telecaster.
Cheers & Beers.
I will buy a SRV type mutt someday.
It just hasn't happened yet.
I have six slots on my wall, and there is a bass occupying one of them.
Um, other than that, It's a homemade bich (never going away). a Hamer Phantom A5 (also not), a Charvel Model 88 ( yeah, right, TRY to get it away from me), A Jackson DKMGT (main player), and a Kramer ST300...that one is likely to find another home, probably going to give it to a nephew. There's my hole, and it's going to be filled with either the right strat, or the right tele.
I'm in a similar position, just slightly younger !!!!!!!!Quote:
Originally Posted by blair
Bought my 1st Fender (a brand-new USA 'Blonde' CBS Telecaster, 1977 model) way back in November '78, when I was 17 years old.
Cost more money than my 1st car !!!!!!!!!!!!!
P/x'd it in 2001 (for Double what I paid for it) in exchange for a 1999 USA Am-Standard Olympic-White Stratocaster.
No regrets on the axe, but wish I'd kept the gorgeous Tolex case
I was very lucky and got my first Fender just days before my thirteenth birthday. It was a virtually new '67 Telecaster. I bought it for $75 with my saved up bank money. I think they cost a little more now.
My first Fender was in 1966, a 1965 Mustang!!! Played through a piggyback Vox Berkley. Crap tone, but then who knew.We played every song with a Fuzztone!!!LOL
Got my first Fender Strat (a used 75 Strat) when I was 19.
http://i244.photobucket.com/albums/g...1975Strat2.jpg
http://i244.photobucket.com/albums/g...g/1stSTRAT.jpg
Got my first tele (a used 78 tele) when I was 20.
http://i244.photobucket.com/albums/g...zzMe78Tele.jpg
Got my first Fender amp a Super Twin when I was 16.
http://i244.photobucket.com/albums/g...laying1981.jpg
I got my first fender when I was 7...a 71 Competition Mustang handed down from my grandpa and my aunt who made me promise never to sell it...so glad they said that 'cause the more I get into guitar, the more I realize it has an awesome and unique tone and is wonderfully easy to play.
I played a plywood acoustic & a rubbish cheap electric in my teens then guitar took a back seat for a while. I got back into it and bought my first "proper" guitar (a MIJ Strat) in 1989 at age 33. I still have it and have since added another (USA artist series) Strat, a Les Paul Studio & 2 other electrics as well as a couple of acoustics & a resonator.
I sold my 60's Bird "Golden Eagle" amp as part of a part exchange in the 90's
http://www.chambonino.com/modify/mod3.html but still have a 70's WEM Dominator III and a Fender Princeton Chorus which is my main "bedroom" amp.
Sept. 1972, 13th B-Day: Twin Reverb. I was in a working band playing weddings and parties and the like. Before the twin I was playing my Moms 65 Deluxe Reverb. She traded it for part of the Twin. <sigh> I wish I still had both those amps! That Christmas there was a Les Paul under the tree. Man I was a spoiled kid! (loved every minute of it!!!)
- HR
I was 8 years old when my Dad bought the L series second hand in '67 then he died in '69 then my brother had it for about 12 years then got married and gave up music and I've had it eversince. This guitar is still in original condition apart from a refret done about 6 years ago because it was becoming unplayable.
The 1st Fender that I bought was a new '80 Antigua Strat my Mum got me from England and it sounded like shit, it still to this day is the worst sounding guitar I've ever heard, really weak and thin sounding and it was pig heavy. Got rid of that and bought the Ibanez Blazer.
My latest one is the Rory Gallagher is a keeper, hate the relic look thing, but sounds like awesome Pre L or L series Strat. As soon as I played it I knew I had to own it. I tried a lot of other CS Strats including 2 Masterbuilt's and this one is head and shoulders above the rest.
I saved up money from my job as a photographer's gopher and bought a used 1972 Stratocaster when I was 19. It cost $300.
I had and played a Harmony Rocket with one pickup from the time I was 12, until I got the Strat. I didn't play the Rocket much after I got the Strat, even though it was a reasonably good guitar. It had a good neck, and a really low action. A couple years later I traded the Rocket for some weed.
That Strat really wasn't that good a guitar. It had a three-bolt neck, and that would wobble around when the strings were bent. I find it funny the prices that early 1970s Fenders will fetch now, considering that many of them had real manufacturing problems.
About 15 years ago I got one of the newer Strats, with the Wilkenson nut, and the tuners that clamp onto the strings, and the two-post trem, and the "trem-setter." It's a much better guitar. It'll stay in tune thru an earthquake!
For me it was 1968 a 68 Mustang BassQuote:
Originally Posted by cherokee747
and i was 14 and in 67 i got a 67 Bassman with the
tall cab.
I have had countless fenders in the last 40 years
Presently i have 6 Fenders, three basses and three strats
First Fender Amp, 67 blackface (taken in oct 67)
http://img504.imageshack.us/img504/8...sampoctxj4.jpg
My first Fender Bass, a Mustang (taken in 68)
http://img504.imageshack.us/img504/2...sartsiedd6.jpg
My first top of the line Fender, a 61 Jazz Bass (photo in new years 71)
http://img504.imageshack.us/img504/1...alcliffer4.jpg
My First Fender Stratocaster a 61 sunburst (taken in sumer 71)
http://img504.imageshack.us/img504/3...ppyhairgj0.jpg
I was 17 (1967) when I got my first FENDER amp, a 1966 Deluxe Reverb, and a 1967 Telecaster.
I was 57 when I bought my first Strat. I actually ended up buying 2 MIM Standard Strats last year (2004 & 2006) about a month apart. I got rid of the newer one and kept the "04". I've done some mods to the Strat. I've replaced the maple fingerboard neck with a rosewood board, put Graphtech string trees on it, FENDER locking tuners, knurled chrome knobs, turned the tone control into a "master tone control" (works on all 3 Pups), and I'm going to replace the trem block with a Callahan unit.
Was that the one that plugs into your guitar?Quote:
Originally Posted by cherokee747
This kid band I was in played top 40 of the time ('72) I don't know when "Satisfaction" came out, but our manager/music director gave me a fuzztone to use to play it. I was 12 so I was stunned, so cool.
My next hip device was a "fender blender" vintage 73 or 74. Then on to the Big Muff. I think the wooden box it came in lasted longer than the pedal. Seemed like small wooden boxes came in handy back then. ;-)
I'll have to scan some pics, my Mom gave me a big scrap book a few years back. Big fun.
- HR
I got my first Fender when I was 18 years old and a freshman in college. I had a really nice triple-nickel plated 1979 Mongoose BMX bike with a set of Skyway Tuff-II graphite wheels on it. This was a slick setup, but I didn't want to ride it around campus. One of my brother's buddies had a 2-year old MIA Fender Bullet with a nice Fender hardshell case and a small 15W Peavey amp. This fellow was left-handed and was tired of trying to learn to play right-handed on the Bullet, so he suggested a trade. He rode away on the Mongoose and I have been playing the Bullet ever since.
One of those things that will always chap me, though.... Those graphite Skyways are now worth over $1000 a pair. Whodathunkit?
Here is a pic of my first Fender:
http://i248.photobucket.com/albums/g...guitars011.jpg
Ron
HotRod, mine was a floor pedal. Can't remember the model.It sounded great for Satisfaction,Yardbirds stuff,ect.I just didn't know when to turn the shit off!!!:jaw Mike
Mine was like a '70's Dan Armstrong effect, it plugged straight in to the guitar. I can't find any pics on the web. Sounded really cool though (best I can remember!)Quote:
Originally Posted by cherokee747
- HR