Mike McCready Signature Strat

Cols

stickyfiddle said:

I'm not a big PJ fan but I think this looks great. Silly money but it the market wants to pay it then clearly not overpriced.

McCready already had a 10k LP a few years ago as well, but you lot obviously weren't on the ball to complain about it :P 

Meh.  Gibson didn’t even take the time to drag the guitar along a dirt track behind a pickup truck for a few miles before announcing it was now ready for the well-heeled guitar connoisseur.  Mediocre.

inthesky729

I've got no beef with the price of these signatures, given that they never seem to have trouble selling them out - I just don't understand why the artists themselves are so keen on collaborating. Giving your name and endorsement to a decently priced signature model, sure; you're giving fans a realistic chance at owning a guitar that's specced out the same as yours, which is an impulse that they themselves surely understand (Mark Knopfler often tells the story of lusting after a fiesta red strat specifically because Hank Marvin had one). But a model that's priced such that only a select few people can even imagine getting their hands on it, produced with deliberate artificial scarcity? Surely none of these guys need the money from the endorsement deal, so what's the point? I can't imagine that a single one of these guys who've given their name to a £10k+ reliced-strictly-limited-run-signature-edition would ever dream of buying one of these things themselves - they just buy the originals - so what's the appeal?

BlueStrat

inthesky729 said:

I've got no beef with the price of these signatures, given that they never seem to have trouble selling them out - I just don't understand why the artists themselves are so keen on collaborating. Giving your name and endorsement to a decently priced signature model, sure; you're giving fans a realistic chance at owning a guitar that's specced out the same as yours, which is an impulse that they themselves surely understand (Mark Knopfler often tells the story of lusting after a fiesta red strat specifically because Hank Marvin had one). But a model that's priced such that only a select few people can even imagine getting their hands on it, produced with deliberate artificial scarcity? Surely none of these guys need the money from the endorsement deal, so what's the point? I can't imagine that a single one of these guys who've given their name to a £10k+ reliced-strictly-limited-run-signature-edition would ever dream of buying one of these things themselves - they just buy the originals - so what's the appeal?

Really agree with this - if I was a rock star player I'd like my fans to be able to afford a guitar like mine rather than a well heeled banker. Marc Tremonti, Santana and Dave Navarro have PRS SE sigs

jeromegreenday

I love pearl Jam, the last time I saw them at the o2 Mike put the guitar behind his head to play the solo, he can play the guitar better behind his head than 99.9% people can play it infront of them sitting down / or on a strap.

Philly_Q

BlueStrat said:

inthesky729 said:

I've got no beef with the price of these signatures, given that they never seem to have trouble selling them out - I just don't understand why the artists themselves are so keen on collaborating. Giving your name and endorsement to a decently priced signature model, sure; you're giving fans a realistic chance at owning a guitar that's specced out the same as yours, which is an impulse that they themselves surely understand (Mark Knopfler often tells the story of lusting after a fiesta red strat specifically because Hank Marvin had one). But a model that's priced such that only a select few people can even imagine getting their hands on it, produced with deliberate artificial scarcity? Surely none of these guys need the money from the endorsement deal, so what's the point? I can't imagine that a single one of these guys who've given their name to a £10k+ reliced-strictly-limited-run-signature-edition would ever dream of buying one of these things themselves - they just buy the originals - so what's the appeal?

Really agree with this - if I was a rock star player I'd like my fans to be able to afford a guitar like mine rather than a well heeled banker. Marc Tremonti, Santana and Dave Navarro have PRS SE sigs

I guess ego does come into it, and not necessarily in a bad way.  If a company approaches an artist about a signature model they may not be so bothered about the money but they may like the prestige of having their name on a really nice guitar.  Even if it's only recognised by a small number of guitar-knowledgeable fans, and even if they don't sell many of them.

Take Tommy Thayer - he's had several Epiphone signature models, but as far as I know Gibson has never offered him a more upmarket Gibson model.  Does he feel happy that "the kids" can afford his guitar, or does he feel a bit snubbed that he's not considered "worthy" of a Gibson?  Could be a bit of both.  I suspect he just accepts things as they are because he's well aware of his position as an employee of the Kiss corporation...

Tremonti, Santana and Navarro have had SE signatures, but they've also had PRS core models (not sure if Navarro actually had a core signature, but he certainly had his own personal ones).  I'm pretty sure that most of the artists who say "I want the fans to be able to afford my guitar" would be happy to also have an upmarket model.

Offset

Great guitarist, and I like PJ.  But £15k for a guitar made 'famous' by someone else that looks like it's been attacked by a nutter with a belt-sander doesn't do it for me.  And £15k is ludicrous.  Make a stock guitar (vintage or not) your own - far more satisfying.

Cols

At the end of the day, the number one driver is a business case from the marketing department of the guitar company on the value of having a particular artist’s name on the headstock.

Can we sell more guitars by putting this artist’s name on the headstock?

How many more?

How much more are people willing to pay for them?  What’s the demographic of the fanbase?

That really sets the constraints of what the manufacturer will do.  After that, it’s really negotiation with the guitarist about what they’d like in return (apart from money).  If it’s someone like Clapton, Slash or Page whose endorsement can make guitars fly off the shelf, they’ll be able to dictate much more in terms of special features, price point and exclusivity (or not).

For Mike McCready, he’s an awesome guitarist and Pearl Jam’s a major band of the past 30 years.  However, he’s a bit of a niche name and realistically not too many people will be after a perfect reproduction of his Strat.

However, Pearl Jam fans are likely to be mid-40s grungers, some now with a lot of disposable income.  That’s probably driven Fender’s decision to do a small production run at a high price.

jeromegreenday

I must point out I have 15K in saving - I'm not trying to rub anyones nose in it, would I buy a strat or Les paul of his for that money... No
I'd rather get tax relief on putting it towards my pension. I might buy a John cruz Gary moore stratocaster if I could find one for £7500 and it was so fine I would NEVER EVER need another stratocaster as long as I live

UnclePsychosis

I find it interesting that in 2021, when people have the ability to access almost the entirety of human knowledge from a device that fits in their pocket, that guitarists haven't yet worked out that things like this are created by the marketing guys at Fender to appeal to rich collectors not as day job instruments for working musicians.

inthesky729

UnclePsychosis said:

I find it interesting that in 2021, when people have the ability to access almost the entirety of human knowledge from a device that fits in their pocket, that guitarists haven't yet worked out that things like this are created by the marketing guys at Fender to appeal to rich collectors not as day job instruments for working musicians.

Fair point, but it's also easy to lose sight of just how plain weird it is. I work in publishing, which is an industry that has a similar demarcation between regular consumers/rich collectors (e.g. you can buy a new paperback of The Great Gatsby for £8.99, or you can buy yourself an original first edition, if you can find one, for £300k+) and I often find myself musing about what the reaction would be if a publisher came out with a 'Limited Collector's Relic Edition' version of a book, like for example a brand new copy of The Great Gatsby hand-bound and hand-reliced to look like one that's from the original print run in 1925. Or pushing it a step further, an edition made to look like F. Scott Fitzgerald's own copy which he had in his house, with, I don't know, identical rips in the dust jacket and ketchup stains on the endpapers. It's too ludicrous to think about, and any publisher that tried it would be ridiculed, but it's somehow just standard practice in the guitar world. 

rsvmark

Cols said:

At the end of the day, the number one driver is a business case from the marketing department of the guitar company on the value of having a particular artist’s name on the headstock.

Can we sell more guitars by putting this artist’s name on the headstock?

How many more?

How much more are people willing to pay for them?  What’s the demographic of the fanbase?

That really sets the constraints of what the manufacturer will do.  After that, it’s really negotiation with the guitarist about what they’d like in return (apart from money).  If it’s someone like Clapton, Slash or Page whose endorsement can make guitars fly off the shelf, they’ll be able to dictate much more in terms of special features, price point and exclusivity (or not).

For Mike McCready, he’s an awesome guitarist and Pearl Jam’s a major band of the past 30 years.  However, he’s a bit of a niche name and realistically not too many people will be after a perfect reproduction of his Strat.

However, Pearl Jam fans are likely to be mid-40s grungers, some now with a lot of disposable income.  That’s probably driven Fender’s decision to do a small production run at a high price.

I saw an interesting interview with Chris Shifflet. Iirc he wanted to do an affordable model when he first worked with Fender. I would think that Fender went into a huddle, did the maths and then agreed. Now a full fat custom shop version is coming with P90s I think which now ticks the well heeled fan box.