Don't collect guitars

It's not exactly hoarding, but pretty darned close.

If there's one thing you see a lot of on YouTube, it's guys showing off their worthless guitar collections. They're worthless because the majority of what they own is hardly ever played.

These guitars either spend most of the time in cases, sitting on stands on the floor or hanging on the wall. They don't get used.

Just about every guy who makes a video on his collection says the exact same things, such as:

"A lot of you guys have been asking to see my collection!" That's a lie. Nobody ever asks this. Ever. It's especially a lie whenever the guy also says 'people ask me all the time' and/or 'people ask me daily' to see the collection. Never happened. Again, nobody ever asked.

"Owning a bunch of guitars makes me a better player!" No, it doesn't. Never has, never will.

"Here is my [insert random worthless guitar here], it's rare!" Guitar collectors think they own valuable stuff, because of course they do. Sorry pal, that Dimebag guitar you have is, at most, worth about $200 in trade at Guitar Center. You think it's worth 3 grand. You're wrong. It doesn't matter how much you paid for it, it's still junk. Rare does not mean valuable.

And here's the kicker:

They all sound the same

Some videos of guitar collections have sound samples, which is the collector taking each instrument and playing a few riffs on them.

Notice that what doesn't change from guitar to guitar is the player. Ultimately, one guy will still sound like that one guy regardless of which guitar is in his hands; this is especially true if the sound samples are all drowned in distortion.

All guys who have guitar collections fall into this trap. Yeah, you have 20 guitars, but no matter which one is in your hands at any given time, there is barely a difference in sound from one guitar to the next. A 6-string is a 6-string is a 6-string.

There is one benefit to watching guitar collection videos

That one benefit is seeing what not to buy.

I'm pleased to see collection videos by idiots who spent thousands on guitars only to have them end up as wall decoration. They spent the money and I didn't have to.

On a final note, it's especially funny when watching guitar collection videos where you can totally see Guitar Buyer's Remorse in the guy's face. That happens a lot. Sometimes he'll even flat out lie and say "I bought this [insert crap guitar here] from a friend". No... wrong... that didn't happen. He saw that hunk of junk in the guitar store, paid way too much is trying to point the blame at someone else (who doesn't exist) for why that guitar is such crap. Your fault, dude. Always was.

Published 2020 Apr 23