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Hey, everyone. Welcome to the Know youw Gear Podcast. Today's episode of the Know youw Gear Podcast is brought to you by Patreon members. Thank you for making this possible. Let's get into so many things. We got so many things to talk about, so many subjects, so many cool questions. If you heard already from. The intro is sponsored by patrons. You can become a patron at any level. Now there's a free level, which just basically means you're supporting us in spirit. But also you get access to the. The extracurricular social, social media stuff that I post. But Also there's a $5 tier 10, so on and so on. So just thank you so much for that. Just to give you the options. Lewis said, excellent work. Phil, on the PRSSE Satin review. Was surprised it ended up being on your plate after all. Did you feel like it was much different than the SECE model? No. So backstory real quick. Prs reached out to me a couple times year and said, hey, are you interested in checking out a guitar? And they sent me the Paul Reed Smith Se C Custom 24 and. And a couple other guitars. And then they said, hey, how about the new Satin Sec? And I was like, no, that's the same one I just reviewed. It's the same guitar. And they go, no, it's Satin. And I go, it's the same guitar. It just doesn't have a maple cap and it's satin. And I. I turned it down. And all year, you know, since it's been out, I've heard nothing but. Are you guys talking about it on videos on the podcast? You know, like, oh, no, you need to do a video of that one. A deep dive of that one. And so finally I was like, all right, we need to do it. So I got a blue one, which is behind me right now. I'm pointing at it. And I did a deep dive on it. And thank you guys for supporting that video. It seems to be doing really well. Seemed to be well received. I was impressed, but I kind of figured I would be. I don't. I mean, it's the same manufacturer, which is Cortex, the same employees, the same process, the same guitar as the one that's like 700 bucks. Just. It's satin finished. And so, you know, they just don't do as much, you know, finish work on it. Very impressive. What I was a little. I don't know, a little shocked about. I was a little shocked of how well I liked it, comparatively speaking. Like, if given a choice to pick the satin finished SECEF standard 24 versus this, the regular bolt on finished one. I think I like the unfinished one a little bit more, which was a little strange for me. I think now if they were the same price, I'd probably still pick the nicer one, but for a little less money. I thought it was pretty cool. I think my only negatives were. Like I said, I thought the pickups were sound a little bitey in the, in the video. What's funny about that is I really thought it was interesting because they use pretty much those same 8515s's in a lot of their imports. And it's weird to me how each time, even if they meter the same, they're just have different personalities based on the guitar they're with, just, you know, the time of the month, the guitar that was made, the pickup. I don't know. It's just always kind of fun. Wick sounds says, hey, you mentioned that a 300 to $1,000 for an average guitar is a good range. But how reliable is a $300 guitar for beginner or intermediate player? All my guitars are in the 5 to 1500 range. You know, that is a very reasonable question. And in today's age, it's getting really tough to answer. You know, what price is a good guitar? You know, how much do you have to spend for a good guitar? And that's a very, very reasonable question. And, and this is how I explain it because everybody goes right to a price. And I've. I've said this before, and it's just my opinion, for what it's worth. Prices tend to be comfort zones more so than reality. So what I mean by that is somebody's gonna go, a good guitar is not good until it's 500 bucks. A good guitar is not good till it's a thousand dollars. A good guitar is good at $100. You know, think of this. All the ways I've heard the angles on. Over the years on the channel, somebody will say, no, there's no reason a guitar should ever be over 200. There's no reason a guitar should read over $2,000. No reason a guitar can't be great for a hundred bucks. All of the people having their opinions, and this is where I've settled over all my years and I've. I said this years ago. There's probably a video. In fact, I know there is somewhere early on in my first year or two making videos saying, basically what I'm about to say to you now, I don't think the price of a Guitar is where you should focus your attention and energy. Really, when we say a good guitar is what guitar is right for you. I mean, there are standards. Of course, a guitar. Guitar needs to stand in tune stuff, but that's kind of what's right for you kind of thing. So let me explain. Instead of saying I'm going to spend $500 on a guitar or I'm going to buy a good guitar and I'm going to spend $1,000, because that's how I did it at first. Years and years and years ago, you know, I was like, oh, I'm going to finally buy a good quality guitar. And I set a price in my head. I think mine was like a thousand dollars. If I spend a thousand dollars, I'll finally own a good guitar. And this is where I think people get confused with owning something that makes you feel good versus owning something that's quality. Okay? To own a quality guitar, it's not a price. You just basically make a list. Okay. And you can do it mentally or write it down. Depends on how neurotic you want to be. I'm pretty neurotic, so I'll write it down. I write down a few things. This is what I would suggest to you. Write down all the things that matter to you about a guitar and all of your expectations. So for instance, let's say it's like for me, absolute paramount. First for me is guitar has to stay in tune. So I write down guitar must stay in tune. The second thing is guitar must be comfortable. Guitar must be, you know, must have. Maybe you want a humbucker sound or a single coil sound. Must have those sounds. Maybe you want both. You want coil split. You write down what matters to you. You don't even have to prioritize it at first. You know, you might say, I want a guitar where the neck is very comfortable to me. I want a guitar that is blue. It could be whatever it is. You just write down all the things that you want. Almost like a dream guitar. This is. This is the important parts of the guitar that matter to you. And then here's my argument. If you walked into a store or if you played a guitar and it hit every single thing on that list, but only cost $200, is it a good guitar? I'm going to argue it is a good guitar. In fact, I'm going to argue it's a perfect guitar. And here's where I've kind of come with that over my life is why I sometimes am kind of bitchy. I get bitchy Sometimes I can't help it about certain things. And one of the things I get a little crotchety over is expensive guitars because I have an addiction to these guitars and I love guitars and music and so I love expensive guitars because like expensive cars, they're cool to look at, they're sexy to talk about. But sometimes when I buy expensive guitars, it's not that they're not good and that's where I lose kind of a little bit. I always have to refocus myself. It's not that I'm saying they're not good, they're great. But when I set that list of expectations and when I set that list of desires of what I want in a guitar, I can settle that pretty quickly. Right? Now keep in mind, I've. Over the years I've added things to my list. Like for me personally we're talking about dream guitars, right? A dream guitar for me has to stay in tune, has to have a great neck, you know, feel wise. I have to love the way the neck feels. It's very important to me. It has to have humbuckers, but they can coil split, that's fine. That's just something I designed desire. I like American made instruments, you know, made in usa. It's, it's to me that's an achieved kind of like you've arrived kind of thing to achieve. I by the way, this, you know, I'm good with all the other countries too. I have all those as well. But I'm just saying like when I'm putting down like the master list of my expectations and wants and then I get that guitar one day and it's, let's say in my case was like 700 bucks. And then what I learned this lesson that I'm telling you right now is then one day you buy a guitar because you have the means to do so for $2,000 and you go it's going to twice as good, three times as good as the 701. What you realize is they're, they're checking the same boxes, they're the same guitar. It didn't get better because once one hit all the list, it's hitting the list. It doesn't matter what it costs. So I have picked up guitars and I and I and I'm always try to be super honest to myself more than anything else because you could lie to yourself the easiest, right? In fact you're always probably trying to lie to yourself a little bit. That's how you kind of try to convince yourself of things. I pick up guitars daily now. And I can tell you a guitar that's 2, $300 and I cannot come up with a single reason on my list other than not made in usa. It's the only thing that's missing off the list. I'll go, man. It stays in tune. I love this neck. I love the way it looks. It feels great. It's got cool, it's got features I like, it's got a cool look. It's not made in the usa and that's the only thing against it. And if I remove that one objection, then obviously the guitar is now it's the perfect guitar for me. I want to be very clear. I didn't, I wasn't like this for, for a long time. For me, owning a Korean made guitar was like a, a big deal for me when I first started playing guitar. You couldn't dream when I started playing guitar in 89 of buying a USA guitar, much less a made in Japan guitar. They were very expensive. So if you go, if you're a little older than me, you probably remember where you went to Sears and Roebuck and they got it, you got a main Japan guitar there. But for me, major hand guitars were very expensive. USA guitars were expensive. And so like my first guitar was made in China and then my second guitar I think was also made in China. And then my third guitar was made in Korea was an Aria Pro 2. And it was like, whoa. That was like I stepped up in the, you know, manufacturing country, you know, hierarchy that people, that people tend to focus on. I find that as I've done this job over the years, I find that the main, the source of the manufacturer, the country of origin matters very little in the overall thing other than there is a value system of social value. There is a pride value. You know, not only pride. Like I, like I said, I'm American, I've served in the United States Army. I have pride for my country, for my state. Like I said, it's, you know, so I have these. So there's things that stick in my head that I want for those reasons. But when it comes to what guitar, you know, at what price does a guitar become good or how much do you have to spend? There's no evidence that I found dissecting over a thousand guitars on a deep dive process that says any one value, you're safe above that. And that's why those, those things are great. A perfect, perfect example is, you know, I have that, that Keisel PM delos that I play all the time and I Love it. And I said this before. They didn't design it for me. I didn't design the guitar. I just was playing it all the time. And they're like, hey, we'll put your name on it. So there's a skew point when I get asked, you know, and I get stopped at, like, a music store and we're talking, you know, I mean, some cool guitar people that I meet, we're talking. Anytime anyone asks me, like, what's special about the guitar is that, you know, it's like, I know you said you love the guitar. What's special? I go, it stays in tune. Like, it doesn't stay in tune. It's just always in tune. I don't mean all keisels. I have other keys that don't. They can. I can pick them up. They can be out of tune. My favorite guitar, one of my favorite guitars, my Paul Ritz, Mira, my mirrors. I've said this for years. It's. I can pick it up right now. It's probably out of tune. Guitars fluctuate. I live in a climate that, you know, it's sometimes it's 115 and sometimes it's 70, and, you know, and things change. But for some reason, through the. Just the, you know, the universe coming together correctly, some guitars you can just pick up, they're always in tune. And there's something about when I pick up a guitar, just knowing that it makes me want to grab that guitar first. Like, if I look in this wall behind me and I look at this wall, what you guys probably think is I'm looking at, like, oh, I want to play a hollow body, or I want to play a solid body, or I want to play classical. Really, the first guitar I'm going to grab is the one I believe is in tune on this wall behind me. If I was going to guess, I'm going to say the green Strat is in tune. So I'm going to grab it, and I'm going to probably be wrong. There it is. That's an American professional Strat. Nothing special. I mean, other than, you know, it's. It's relatively expensive guitar, but it's not like a custom shop or anything. I just gravitate towards guitars that I know are in tune because it's just. You can pick them up and I just start playing. I feel like the process is fast and it's easy, and I love that there are guitars that. I love the way they sound, but I play them on a special circumstances. I just don't grab them and go for it. David says he grabs the guitar with the most, the freshest setup I have not experienced that helps it with it either. It's not how old the strings are, it's not, it's not how good the guitar has been set up. It's not a type of wood, it's not a type of construction. Just some guitars just, you know, like I said, the universe has decided that this guitar just doesn't, doesn't move or doesn't go out of tune. The only exceptions that is a lot of like the man made carbon fiber type guitars I can pick up and pretty much guarantee they're going to be in tune for the most part and ready, but that even that is not as guaranteed as just the luck. So anyways, so the core of the question is what, at what price does a guitar become good? And I, like I said, I think that's the way you should look at it. Because I, I don't find any other way is going to ever work. And what's nice about that is also I think it adds sanity to your, your journey as a guitar player is when you pick up a guitar that you're supposed to like. That's a question that I have never actually got asked on the show. I don't think I've had that happen to me a couple dozen times. I'd love to know if any of you had this happen. You finally play this guitar that you're, you know, you think you're gonna like, you know, some exotic guitar that everybody's talked about. For years our famous guitar players have played and it's expensive and it's amazing and unique or whatever. And it's this thing, it's a holy grail guitar. And you pick it up and nothing, it's, you feel nothing. You don't understand why anyone likes this thing. You don't, right? You, you start doubting how much you know everyone who must be lying to you, you're like, is all these rock stars, who is everyone lying? How, how could they like such a, a guitar that is not great? And that's why I said, I've learned you have to come up with your own checklist of things that matter to you. And, and you'll find sometimes why, why it doesn't matter because for the argument of, you know, if somebody says you can't make a great guitar for 200 bucks, I can argue they can't make a great guitar for three thirty thousand dollars. I've picked up a thirty thousand dollar guitar that I thought Was not great. So. And I've picked up a 200 guitar that I would rather play now own. Of course you'd probably. If somebody's going to give you a thirty thousand dollar guitar or two hundred guitar and you're going to own it, would you pick it? Yeah, you pick the more expensive guitar. But if you had to like, remember these are tools at the core of it. If you had to bank everything on it, what would you take? And that's why I learned this the hard way. For me, I would go to local gigs and I would just bring guitars or basses that I thought were looked cool on stage or people would think was cool. And slowly you just start finding yourself bringing the ones that play the best and handle the best and you can trust. And doing the YouTube gig, I've definitely honed in on that thought process. I only care about things I trust. As soon as a piece of gear does anything that makes me nervous, it's gotta go to the side. It can't be something I think about. I don't have time. You know, same thing with the equipment I use for the live show. Same with the equipment I use to make content and videos. I just can't worry about, you know, other things. I really wanna stay focused on the things that, that, you know, that help me make content. Alex says, that is my greatest fear. I want an R7 Black Beauty. It's expensive and I'd hate to hate it. I feel the same way about things I have now, unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on how you, you look at it. I have played pretty much all the dream guitars that I want. Like all the guitars that I've ever even thought about wanting. I've played them at this point, I've put my hands on them and had a moment with them. Like I said, it's a horrible feeling when you pick up the ones that you know, you've been lusting for for a decade or longer, two decades, three decades, and go, ah, it's also kind of a. So you know, Alex, it's also kind of a relief. You know, I said this before, there's a couple things that I've played through that I go, man, I'm glad I don't love this. This is too expensive to love. So. And then there's things the opposite. Because of where my YouTube video started. If I would have started YouTube 10 years earlier, you'd hear me saying how I don't like tellies. And then by the time I, even before I even made my first YouTube video, I was already In I like Tellies and it was just weird. Telly's were one of those guitars I just didn't get, didn't like, thought they were cheap, didn't understand why anybody had them other than maybe country players. And now one of my favorite guitars is Tellies. The way they look, the way they feel, just everything about them. Very cool. Okay, so thank you Wick sounds for that, for that great question and subject Shatman 2 because there was already a Shatman 1 sign on it says did you ever record a video on roughing a neck with white Scotch Brite pads? I did and I did it for the patrons only. I will make one for the main channel as well. I did a, I did a live clinic. We were doing live clinics and testing out the live clinics on the patron thing. And from that we were, we were able to do the research how to do the pre recorded ones that are what start this month on the Patreon channel and then those type videos will then go find themselves on the main channel. What happens when you do a lot of repair videos, like I said, is I do them and I actually go through them many times and edit them and go through many times again because like I said, I'm trying, I try to minimize the mistakes that somebody could have if they watch a video. Making instructional content on YouTube is a fight between people's attention spans and not letting people screw up their stuff. You know, it's like I want to make a video that, you know, helps you figure something out, but I don't want a video that you don't watch. And then if you try a portion of it, you have a problem. So. And I kind of forgot about it too. So after I did it with them, I think I even told them that I was going to make the video official and put it out. But now it's on the real radar. It's on this radar, which means we'll get it done. Alex says, he says, I had a YouTuber say GC is a private equity owned and is being prepared for prep for slaughter. Well, you could have heard that 30 years ago. Barring to pay interest, no intent to pay principal off, no more gc. There is a private equity firm and they are partially owned by themselves a little bit now. This is such a long thing. So first of all, at any point that information could be accurate. Most musicians that are into the industry at all just recognize that in the early 2000s, Bain Capital was the one that kind of purchased Gibbs, our guitar center. That's, you know, that was the main thing. And then that's what people generally know. But since then they've been purchased. Remember, they've been, since then they've had a bankruptcy, another venture capital company involved in them. Their future is like a lot of businesses now. First of all, before we go ever go down that road, which is the road we used to talk about, the Guitar center and the private equity and what's going to happen? Is it going to get strip mined and all that stuff. Just the landscape of retail in general in the US much less the world, but in the US right now is already strange to explain. So to give you a reference, my daughter manages a retail business. Okay. She's, I'm very proud of her. She's very, very young. She just turned 20 and she's, she, she runs an entire business and a, a large group of employees or a good group of employees, they work it, man. I, I, every time I see them in action, I'm impressed of how well they do. Her and her team, you know, obviously her employees. She's very, very much like her mother. She's a workaholic who is very focused on doing, doing things the way they're supposed to be done. The reason I say that is not to do proud papa moments, but to say she's mentioned to me that her company, this, you know, their billion dollar business, not her company, but the company she works for, they're in dire straits right now and that she doesn't even know, you know, she speculates. She's not even, she doesn't even know if there'll be a job in a year, if she'll have a job, if there'll be a company. Just looking at them, they're out, they're blowing the doors off a company like Guitar Center. Playing the retail game right now, before I would go on the whole, hey, they'll get stripped and I mean, by the, by the way, Sweetwater's also been kind of, I don't want to say gobbled up, but purchased by a private equity company as well. So is Fender, for the most part. I mean, it's just, it's, it's an interesting landscape. There's always rumors and stuff. Who the hell knows? I will tell you this. Most of the rumors I've ever heard about Guitar center and Sweetwater and Fender that are all in that kind of vein have been. Nothing happened. They're still all around. I used to make a joke. I have not made that joke since the new CEO, so I don't want to, I've already dogged the new Guitar center platform, which is why I'm going to do a podcast with them and talk about Guitar Center's future now. Because I'm curious, like a lot of you, but I used to say this all the time. I used to say Guitar Center. I used to believe this. I used to say it all the time. I used to say Guitar Center. Every they, like, wake up every morning, they go, how do we run this into the ground? And they just can't figure out how to do it. That's why it just keeps on living. It's like the Jason Voorhees of guitar retail just keeps going. Maybe that'll be enough. Who the heck knows? We'll see. T side says, hey, Phil. He says, what's basically going on with the new gear market? Got a reverb offer for a new Ibanez PF for $2800. MSRP is $3500 used. Okay, let's rephrase all this. All right? I know what you're saying. He's basically saying that he got an offer for an Ibanez PF for $2,200. Knew their 35, used their 27, took the chance on it. Looks like it sounds amazing so far. So what's going on with the gear market is people have too much, too many guitars. There's too much product out there. We said this last year that there was an avalanche of gear. In my. My experience right now, what I'm seeing is a huge amount of Gibsons and Fenders on the out there in the wild, more than any other brands then probably followed up by Paul Reed Smith, which makes sense. Those are the biggest players. They're going to have the biggest amounts of guitars out there. But I also think that especially Fender. But Gibson and Fender and then a little bit of PRs really push the dealers to load up at the tail end of a boom. And you. That's where you get the gunk up. A friend of mine just texted me the other day and said, man, I just got a Fender for like, below cost. And I. I actually chuckled and said, so did I. I literally just bought a Fender too, as well. Not below cost. I bought it for dealer cost, Let me tell you. I. I know for a fact it was dealer cost. So I know the dealer really wanted rid of it. So, you know, it happens. The market is soft and it's over. It's overstocked. There's a saying in retail which is called inventory rich. You know, cash light, inventory rich. There's a couple ways to say it, but that's really, really what it comes down. They're sitting on more inventory than they want to be and they're going to, they're going to want to move it. I, I've seen a lot of deals. That's why you want to pay attention if you're out there in the market for something because there are, there are deals to be had. They were heavy on gear. We've seen most of the year. They haven't been selling a lot of. Sorry. They have been selling a lot of high end gear has not slowed down for the most year. But this is the season when high end gear doesn't sell because everybody's kind of buying gifts and stuff. So yeah, I, I see why you're T size. I can see why you got the deal. I like I said, I got a couple of deals offered to me myself and I took a couple of them because they were really, really good. Funny story. I bought, if you guys recall, a couple weeks ago, I showed you that I bought the hello Kitty gig bag. It's all right. I mean it was a little. It's a little much for what it is, but it's cool. I'm happy about it. I don't know why, but I bought another Freeman small box pedal. I got rid of it. I like that pedal. I have a real Friedman small box and I have the profile, my Kemper that I use all the time. And so I got rid of the pedal ghost because I don't need the pedal. I got the real amp and I got a profile. I bought the pedal again and got it home and you know, it got delivered and I played it and I thought, oh yeah, I remember why I got rid of it. It's good. But I already have the sample. So I bought that@guitarcenter.com and so I just took it into the store and exchanged it. And I got a volume pedal because I could use that. And I got a little. A practice amp. I actually needed another practice amp and they gave me an extra 15% off for cyber Monday, whatever. And they just offered it at the Ring up. So they're definitely out. Everybody's out there giving deals. Wisconsin Jet says Pro audiostar sure seems to have a ton of B stock deals. Yes. So very clear. I got a confusing question to me. Somebody asked me because I said that I bought from Pro AudioStar a ton x1 pedal that was listed as used for $134, but I believe it's new. And they said, well, so the question was if it's used. Are you going to have software registration issues? I got the pedal and it was brand new. So Pro Audiostar had that pedal listed as used for 134 instead of 179 and it was absolutely new in box and not opened. So yeah, Pro Artistar is one of the bigger culprits known for listing things as B stock and used. But keep in mind you got to do your own research and be prepared that you could get used or you know, you're taking the chance. I don't want you to be like Phil said, it's always new. It's. It's not always new. I just. You can sense. How I usually can tell is if it's listed used B stocks always as is a gray area. Because if it's listed B stock it could be a return. It could have blim. If it's listed used and they. And they have like 50 of them in stock, I would. I just assume that's new and they just want rid of them. Clan of house cat says new Gibson studio higher tier looks nice for 2k. Yeah, we talked about the new Gibson studios. They're really nice. I like. I said I like studios. It's really like as my journey of Gibson's gone, if I would have kept my original studio and stayed there, I'd been just as happy. I don't think I ever owned or have still not owned a Les Paul that I liked as much as that studio or more. I like it as much. I just never liked one even more. But I had to have binding. That was it. It wasn't even a sound issue or looks. It was just like gotta have binding. You don't own a real Gibson unless you have binding. That's what I told myself. This was years and years ago. Silly John says, hey Phil, what kind of guitar strings would you put on a cheap laminated guitar to make it sound better? I like phosphor bronze. They're very bright compared to 80 twenties. So phosphor bronze. That's how I kind of like want to liven up the guitar. Two things you can do to liven up a laminate guitar, especially a heavy laminated laminated guitar. Acoustic guitar is not only go with brighter strings but even make sure you go with 12s or I wouldn't do 13s but make sure you use 12s. Okay, you can do 13s. It depends on your fingers. But I like to make a laminated guitar come to life. Use a thicker string and then a brighter string. And I like the the phosphor bronze over the 8020s for that lunamatic. This also all these came from Amanda Luna. Matic says. Hey Phil, I've noticed lately that E Art is selling guitars for 1,000 to $3,000. Do you have any thoughts on companies that try to go upscale? Are those models still good value? I have not touched those guitars, so I'm not testifying to their quality. They could be great quality. I think the ones that I played for $300 were great quality. But you use the word value. A value would be no, they're not a brand that I would associate with higher end or expensive instruments. By the way, that doesn't mean much. I mean Schecter. Depending on when you decided you like Schecter. Throughout the history of Schecter when they were a parts company and then they were kind of like, you know, then they were the import company and then they now they do a high end US custom shop. There's a lot of companies like that. But I always think of like, you know, what always comes to my mind was first act. Now I don't think first act yard are the same but I get the same vibe. You know, I don't think it's a good idea. Now keep in mind, how do they get to high end if they don't make them? I don't know the answer. Here's what I would say. Lunamatic. I talk to you guys like I would talk to my friends, telling my friend, I would say, you don't want to be the guinea pig on that idea. It's kind of like, you know, a lot of stuff to me. Even though it's not a technology business in the guitar industry, there's like, hey, you know, vhs, Beta comes out. Let's wait and see where the dust settles. Hey, there's, you know, there's a, you know, bending flat screen, bending TVs like right? Where, where does this go? You know, where does it settle? And that's where I feel like this. I would say with E Art, I would say let somebody else spend a lot of money on an er guitar and see how that goes for them and see if they're happy with it. But I, I wouldn't. Pizza is good, says Phil. Do you still recommend the music Nomad fret work tools? Well, the only tool I've ever recommended from Music Nomad is the safe file. It's just like Stu Mac. I don't recommend all steaks, I don't recommend all music Nomad tools. I just share the tools that I Like the safe zone file, $79. This is the one I like. I did a video on this that was an independent video. I really try to focus and share with you guys the tools I like. That was a tool that I really, really liked, and I really think it's a beneficial tool to a lot of people. It's. You should I. If you're thinking about getting a crowning file, I would definitely consider that video. A lot of people liked the video, but a lot of pushback I got was people said, yeah, but Steck has better warranties on their files. They absolutely do. But I really like that file. So, you know, I like that file so much that I bought one and made that video. And that may not sound like a big deal, but it is. I'm sure Stu Mack would have loved to sponsor a video if I would have talked about their file. But instead, I talked about the musicnomad file because I really liked it because of that music. Nomad sent a bunch of tools since then, and I've checked a bunch out, but nothing has really caught my attention or got me to. To make a video because I find that although I can be objective with guitars, I think what I mean by that is, presentably, to you guys, I think I could take a guitar and take it apart and give you some feedback on it, and people go, oh, Phil like that. Or Phil hated it. Or Phil, whatever, you guys. Sometimes people focus on what I feel about it so much as. Not so much as, like, I'm just sharing with you what I see. And, you know, I'm making content that I think is informative with tools. I've noticed now if I mention a tool, it's because I like it is what the perception is. So I'm very sensitive to not mentioning tools that I don't actually like, because I've now been in conversations personally and then publicly where somebody's like, oh, you really like this tool? And I used it, and it didn't have a good result. And too many times it's been like, no, I've never said I like that tool. So, yes, in the Safe Zone file, I like that I have been sent the musicnomad Nut files, and I have not ever done a video of them. And I've talked about this, too. It's because I think they're cool. I think a lot of you will like them. You know, you're gonna have to do your own research. My problem is, is that I've been using the set of file tools that I've been using for over 20 years. And I'm used to it. I move quickly. I like it. I've been trying. So, you know, I pull out the musicnomad nut files all the time. I pull out the musicnomad tools all the time at least once or twice a week. And I go through them and I. I'm trying to find what I like and don't like about them. I kind of feel like it's good timing to. To do something. We're gonna do something fun this week. I got a great question, and I wanted to tie it into this. And now it's time for gear of the week. This is something cool. Somebody asked me, sent me a really nice email because I like my Amplified Nation amp so much that. Because what they really paid attention to was last week I said, I have a pedal board, and I kind of build that sound so that it's in a pedal board. Is there other pedals you own that you think would be a good pedal to get if you're trying to get this really expensive Amplified nation sound? So I'm going to share a pedal with you that I really like, and I'm going to play it through my Fender Princeton. So the pedal I have is the Marshall vintage reissue Blues Breaker pedal. Now, this pedal, for me, this is the reissue. This is still made in England. You can still get these. I put a link if you want to check them out. There's links. Okay, there's links. First of all, if you get the real ones, they're crazy. I see people asking a thousand dollars. I see people asking $600. This one, new, is $189. Here's why I like it. It's. Obviously, it's used by John Mayer. That's where it got a little notoriety. What's funny about these pedals is I remember in the 90s when the Marshall pedals came out and I wanted the ShredMaster that my. My mind at that time was ShredMaster, ShredMaster. And I finally end up getting a Shred Master. And I was like, oh, I love it. It's metal. And this was just. I'd never seen one of these. And this is one of the few pedals I bought in my life where I never heard one. Personally, I had no reason to want one. I just. It was expensive and hard to get. And so when they did the reissue, I'm like, oh, well, I should get one. You know, especially since when I found out they were still making them England, and, you know, it's not like a. A cheaper Reproduction, at least as far as I know. So here's what I like about it. It definitely does the thing that. That you want it to do. Right now I'm running my Kiesel PM Delos. Just a Strat with two humbuckers. I'm running the humbucker neck. Right now I'm going to be running. I'm running this into the Blues Breaker Marshall pedal. Then into the Princeton. Let me give you the clean. So if you look at my settings, you see that I have the gain at about 70%. I have the tone control straight up, and I have the volume at about 70%. First thing you notice when I turn it on, you're not hearing a whole lot of. A lot of gain. So let's go ahead and play something for you. But what I want to show you, I love pedals like this. I actually will run the gain at 10. So there's the high gain. What I'm going to do different is I'm going to switch over to single coil neck. So I'm on a single coil neck. I'm going to use the same drum track now at the gain on 10. It was really cool. I do a little like a dance now. You guys see that? For those listening later, I was dancing just. But what was great about this question was this pedal. Although not inexpensive at 180 bucks, I. I feel like when I'm playing this through a Fender amp, whether it be a Hot Rod Deluxe or a Juice Blues Jr. Or a Princeton Man. It's just something about the mids in this pedal. The. The Marshally mid throatiness mixed with the scooped mids of a Fender amp. I get that sound that I really like, which you just heard, which is that kind of the bigger notes with the less gain or the thinner notes, but with the more heavy attack. And I thought it'd be fun because somebody asked about it. But also to mention that, you know, who knows how long they're going to keep making this or if they're still even keep making this. And so, you know, when I was looking for links to give you guys. Guitar center was out of stock. A ton of people out of stock. So Sweetwater had some. So I put the link there. Randy says, hey, Phil, I bought a PR CE based on your review. Wow, that was fast. He says, I might have it as early as tomorrow or Monday. You are a bad influence. Yeah, I'm bad influence. But hopefully, you know, the review that I did informed you enough to what to expect. Grubby. My guitar says, just curious which of the Asian manufacturers, do you consider to have the best and most consistent quality? So I find that that can change throughout the years. It can change throughout, you know, the, the market and time. So I'm going to go off current as of today's. Like, if I was going to say who's my favorite for consistency, it's Indonesia. I would say two years ago, I would say I like Indonesian manufacturing, but I also would say it was not as consistent as made. Made in Korea as well. Main Korea is getting tough because there's not as much stuff made there. Main Japan also is getting a little. I've had guitars come in a little bit, you know, extreme. To me, having a great guitar every once in a while is not. Does not make it. It's all great guitars. Like I said, anybody can make one great guitar, but making a bunch of them is the trick. And I think when I look at Indonesian guitars right now, I'm not as blown away. So let me, Let me, let me be clear. I can pick up a guitar made in Japan and Korea right now and go and know that I'm going to have an experience and know that it's really, really good instrument and maybe better than anything I've played. Made in Indonesia, maybe. But I've had. We're seeing the variances in that. And where Indonesia seems to be really consistent. And I think, believe it or not, I really believe that's because of where they focus their infrastructure. You know, Japan has always been known for using really, really nice and beautiful craftsman and craftsmanship, you know, in their instruments. Where Indonesia is really focused on machines and. And that's where you're gonna get a lot of consistency. So a lot of consistency. Especially for the price. There is no guarantee. There's no guarantee if I say made in usa, there's no guarantee if I say made in Japan. You're gonna have a great product. I have a Fender review coming very soon. And again, it's another like, oopsies, they let this out kind of guitar. I was like, oh, it's not horrible. But I was like, you know, Chris900 says this came from Amanda says, hey, Phil, just ordered a Tom Anderson. Can you explain the Buzzfeet and tuning system? Sure. The buzzfeeten or Fetton tuning system is essentially, it's improved the intonation by using a compensated nut. The best way I have to explain it we've talked about in the past, but it's been a while so we can do it again is to talk about the Irvana nut and the Reason is. Is because although they are different same but different. But same. No, I'm just kidding. Let me pull up a. So what we're looking at now is a Urvana compensated nut for Gibson. And you can see here, if you look at it, there is different. The way the strings land. You can see that they have different positions. So in other words, just like how this. The saddles are compensated. Now the nut is compensated for better intonation is essentially what they're going for. And the Buzzfeed system works the same way. The nut is cut a certain way to improve the intonation. So you know, when I. When. When it was a bigger deal than it is, I think now more well known the buzzfeeding system. I used to have the subine buzz when I have to do setups I used to do. I was not certified because you could go to Buzzfeed and get certified to do his setups, you know, to do his system. I did not do that, but my friend did and he didn't. You know, I don't want to make it look like he. He went and taught me, but obviously, you know, I'm. I'm curious. So I learned as much from him as I can. I had the Sabine, Buzzfeet and tuner. And there's a. I think if I recall there's a slightly different way of tuning the guitar. And you did it that way and I haven't done it. So you know, I'm talking 2006 was probably the last time I ever did it. A guitar like that. But. So all the guitars I have, which are usually washburns that have the buzzfeeding system on it, personally, I just tune them regular and I use. I don't even have that Buzzfeed and tuner, nor do I think they even make it anymore. But that's the main thing. It's just another way to give you perfect intonation. It's our journey for perfection. All we want is a perfect guitar. That's it. Guitar players are pretty easy if you think about it. All we really want is a perfect guitar for the absolute lowest price with no zero defects. That's it. If you can do those three things, then you. You'll probably only piss off 30% of guitar players. I'm sorry, I couldn't help it. It made me laugh. All right. Sc. David says. Hey Phil, I see you got your proper jazz master now. Ah man, way to pay attention. I kind of. Maybe it was an Easter egg. I left it there. It's great. Is it new? Deep dive? It Is a new deep dive. How am I liking it? Well, here's what's funny. It's a. It was a gear math fiasco. So here's what happened. I got a jazz master with a Strat tremolo on it. I did a video, and I was being sarcastic, saying, is this a real jazz master? Because it doesn't have the real jazz master bridge. And you know, people are like, you know, some people say, yes, and some people know. But for some reason, playing that jazz master made me like, huh, maybe I need a jazz master in my life. I need an offset guitar, you know, kind of thing. And then obviously, what happened was when I was at the guitar center in Mesa, Arizona, because I returned that pedal and got a volume pedal and stuff, I was running around the store because I was trying to. To find something to buy, you know, Right. I might had one 69 credit, and I'm like, I gotta find something to buy. And I found myself this made in Mexico jazz master. And I was playing it. I was just loving it, loving it. I was like, man, this is it. It was 800 bucks. They weren't on sale like the Strats. And I was like, yeah, this is it. I'm all about this. And then the last minute before I pulled the trigger on buying it, I thought, well, it doesn't have the top controls, you know, so it's a jazz master. Got jazz master style pickups. Of course, they're probably designed a little bit differently. Jazz master. Jazz master style bridge, but didn't have the top control layout. But guess what did. There was a Squire jazz master right there. I picked up the Squire, had fret, sprout, and wasn't in tune. I picked up and played it, and then I loved the way it sounded more with the electronics and stuff. And I was like, okay, I think I need to get a jazz master that's more traditional. So I went on the Internets and looked for one, and I found one. And yes, it will be a deep dive video. Dale Gribble. This came from Amanda says, hey, Phil, Lately it's been high 70% humidity for weeks in my area. Well, you don't live near me. I noticed frets receding as opposed to sprouting. Any harm in that? No, no, no. It's very hard. Look, it's very hard to hydrate. I mean, think about this. It's dying, and it's not coming back to life. Okay? But in some cases, yes, if you put enough humidity in it, it can. There is sometimes concern that if they get too much humidity in a fretboard, the frets can actually lift out. I don't know if that's what you're going to be dealing with. But I, I have dealt. I have seen that as a problem very rarely, but I have seen it. But yes. Yeah. In fact. So, you know, sometimes they can hydrate and reverse a fret sprout. In fact, before I usually do a correct fret sprout, I fret sprout. In other words, a shrinking fretboard. Sometimes I'll put the guitar in a case with a humidifier to see what happens in 24 hours. So it usually never fixes it, but it can minimize how much you're going to have to file away from those frets. The good news though is I've said this before, is that, and again, everyone lives in different parts of the world. I can't speak for everywhere. Okay. I mean I live in a very dry climate. And so mostly speaking of my experience in the dry climate. But, but what I can tell you is that if you correct fret sprout on a guitar, sometimes you might have to do it one or two more times in its life. I've never, not never, but it's rarely to never seen it need a fret sprout correction three times in a guitar's life. What I've. So just be prepared. So sometimes you do it, you may have to do it again. What I've never seen is it being done and then you know, like all of a sudden like people are like, oh, what if it expands out now? There's like the frets don't come to the end. It's never happens. You're, you're, your fretboards don't expand and contract that much. It only in fact. So you know, even. Well, in some extreme cases, the frets bra gets really aggressive. But in most cases it's not as, as, as extreme as we think because like I've said is, you know, your, your nose, your mouth, your hand, your ears are very sensitive and so your hands are very sensitive. So they, they feel things that are not as extreme as you think they are. They just kind of come across that extreme. The, the frets aren't sprouted out as far as most of us think they are. Kirby Craft says. Hey Phil, any thoughts on buffer pedals? Are there any difference between dedicated buffer pedals and built in buffers like on a polytune? Three tuners. You know, my friends that are pedal builders and pedal geeks swear that a buffer pedal is A great idea. So I have no reason to think that not to trust them. Me personally, I run like two 10 foot cables in this office, so I'm usually not running enough signal to worry about it. And I don't run a whole lot of pedals, as you've seen. My. My biggest pedal board is maybe seven, eight pedals, and that's not really accurate. Most of my pedal boards are five or six pedals. I'm. I'm a pedal switcher, not a pedal. Like, I don't like a lot of pedals. I like, like I said, a couple pedals and then when I'm sick of one or it's time to rotate, I like to rotate out. That's kind of my thing with pedals. So I. I don't really use a buffer pedal is what I'm trying to say. And now I have pedals that are. They have buffers in them like you said, like the polytone, polytune and boss pedals and stuff. But I don't specifically own or I don't recall ever owning an actual buffer pedal. But I know it can solve a lot of problems for a lot of guitar players, especially if you're running a lot of cable or running a lot of pedals. So that's my two cents. But I would definitely check out like that pedal show and Josh Scott and stuff like that for that kind of information as well. There's so much information there. That's where I would go and learn about pedal stuff. Mark says I can pick my guitar, I can pick my friends. I cannot pick my nose, apparently. Good for him. Let's see. Dale says. Hey, Phil, local guitar shop has new nags and that is amazing. The nags are definitely amazing. They've had it over a year, marked at cost for six months, but not selling. I want to offer less than cost, but they won't. Well, they're not going to do it. They're not going to do it. You can offer whatever. So let me just tell you what I would do in this strategy, okay. Because I've been in your exact situation. Okay. Nags is a guitar brand that I could tell you like, again, like a lot of brands, if somebody said, phil, one of the best guitars out there. Name a brand. Nags is in my top 10 best, best quality. Just great guitar, sounds great, plays great, looks great. Great resale value. No, think about this. A good friend of mine texted me a couple weeks ago, kind of a couple months ago, I think about now, and he was like, I'm looking at A a nags used and this is the price. What do you think? And I'm like, if you, the closer you can get to three or under three, the safer you are. I have bought and sold a couple nags, you know, because again, not because I was trying to do anything other than I bought one to see if I liked it and then I changed it and each time I took a little bath on the nags. Now the last one I took the least bath on and this is why I'm going to give you the information. I'm going to give you a guitar like that. So here's as someone who owned a store, as someone who's a guitar freak like you, this is how I know this will work for you. If you can't get someone to budge on a price. So let's say there's a guitar and you know they can't sell it so you know they want to get rid of it because they've been had it for a while, they have a lower price on it. So I would suggest to you maybe figuring out a trade deal. Trade deals can work really, really good with stores. I, when I did the Guitar center one, look, I can't, I can't. I was. That's one video I'd like to do more. I'd like to do a lot more trade videos. Not because I'm a master trader, right? I'm not going to be like, I'm not here to like have a new course on how to trade guitars. I'm just, I just, I believe that the more you see how trades go, the more ideas you get. Because you have to be creative to me to get rid of three mid price import instruments and walk out with one USA one. That's a win for me, me personally. Okay, what's funny is somebody made a great comment in the video. They go, somebody ride a. He's like somebody would bring in a USA guitar and walk out with three of those import guitars. And I'm like, yeah. And that might work for them. In your case though, what's great about stores? Some people don't really seem to understand. You got to think like a store, especially a mom and pop, more so than the Guitar Center. One great thing that I've had super success with, which is why I've said this before. So you guys know I've said many times on this show that I own more Gibsons than any other brand of guitar. That's absolutely true. If you think of all the guitars you see me that I have and I mean not only in history of me, all just currently I own more Gibsons. Like, of any one brand, I own the most in Gibsons. I will always own the most in Gibsons. And the reason is Gibson's is how I get rid of inexpensive stuff. So what I mean by that is pedals, microphones, little amps, things that I accumulate over time. Impulse buys that maybe weren't the smartest decision I've ever made, right? Trades I get from some other people, things because I'm a YouTuber that companies have sent me. I just acquire up all this stuff. And what I found is, is that I can sit there in a parking lot in front of a guitar center and try to sell this $30 item to somebody and hope they show up on a Craigslist or a Facebook sales thing. Or I can take them to Mom Pops. And then they go, okay, we'll give you $1,400 for all this stuff. And I go, cool, I'm going to take that Gibson sg. I'm going to take that Les Paul. I'm going to take that, you know, that ES339 or the ES335 or something. And because it's a great way to get, get guitars like Gibson's for me. Because. Because here's why. Instead of thinking like, oh, that stuff, if I would have sold it all piecemeal on my own, I would have got 3,000 for it. Now I've given away half the money. I'm like, yeah, but if I get a Gibson, I walk away in a Gibson. One, I have a Gibson. And two, and if you, as time goes on, that Gibson will outpace that stuff in value. In fact, most of stuff will become worth, be worth less. Proof, proof in point is walk into stores now and look at all the crate amps and Randall amps and PV amps. They're not worth anything. I mean, There's. I see 212 PV combos that I could have totally gigged with in the 90s, and I would have loved to have for three, $400. And they're there for 50 bucks. And the store is like, please take this thing. So, so my point is, is this is maybe an opportunity for you to do something like that, you know, and it can be cash and trade, right? So in other words, like, let's say they don't want to, you know, because like you said, they're at cost, they don't want to lose. But what's great about trade is, yeah, you're losing some value on the trade. But they can sell that stuff for more. And sometimes it's a nice way to do that. And so I've used that in the past, too, especially in this exact situation you're in. I've done a thing where they have a guitar. I think it should go lower. They can't go any lower. And then I'm like, okay, okay. And, you know, what can we do? You know? You know, I'm like, how about trading these two things? And they're like. And they do the math. And they're like, okay. Because now their math goes. If you give them $1,400, I'm just using a number. 14 hours cash. They have $14 cash. But if you give them $1,000 cash and they give you $400 for some gear that they can sell for eight, now they're $1,800. See what I'm saying? They can make it move, and maybe you can get it lower that way. So you got to be creative and inventive is what you're. What I'm saying. You know, the reason why I like talking like this is because I was just. Literally today, I was on a long walk with my wife when we were walking to the post office and running errands. We're just walking around, you know, trying to get our steps in and stuff, or whatever. And I was telling her this story about this is true. I bought this handpaid cabinet once on a deal, and it was a store had it for use. I won't go too long on this. Long story short, I got $150 in this cabinet. And then a few years later, I didn't have a head for it. This is like a. Like two years later, I see an ad in the newspaper. This. I'll tell you how long ago this was for an SVT3 head from ampeg. And I got the head for 300 bucks. We went to Scottsdale, which is a fancy part of town, and got this head, and I had this amp. And then I eventually got a 115 for it. And then I played a. A. What do you call it, A talent show. At my work with it, I had a big rig. Played. Played a talent show. And somebody who worked there is like, oh, man, that rig sounded great. They're like, I gig. I'd love to have an amp like that. And I was like, okay. And they go, I'd like to buy it, you know, and they basically offered me a thousand dollars. I was into it. For what would you figure it was? 153 is 450 plus 2. 750. So I could. What was great was that's how I got my very first washburn in four. Musician's friend had them on sale for 9.99. I didn't have a thousand bucks, but when he said thousand bucks, I was like, sold. And I bought my first N4. So you see what I'm saying? It's like if you don't, I, you know, if you're not just flush with cash, which is not a situation that I've been with most of my life. I've had to be creative on how to get to where I want to get with stuff. And you can be creative. So be creative is what I'm trying to say. Long story to say. I should have just said be creative with a trade. This came from Amanda says. Michael says, hey, just bought a Sire T7. How do you polish the frets? On a lacquered fretboard or do you have a video? I don't on that. And it's not lacquered. So that's the important part. Thanks for everything, Phil. I. I'll use the knowledge you give me often. I use the knowledge you give often. Okay. So, Michael, a couple things on the side. I. I don't know for a fact. Okay. But I'm pretty sure. Okay. So I'm going to go with my gut on this, that the sire T7's not a lacquer. It's a polyurethane finish. Very rare to see import guitars with lacquer. I could be wrong. So if I'm wrong, please just make your adjustments accordingly. Do your own research. But I would want. I would really like you to double check that research. Manufacturers are very stingy on giving that information out what finishes they use on their guitars. So it's polyurethane. The reason is, is because the polyurethane is going to be harder than the nitro. The nitro never really cures. So a lot of times when you're dealing like with a Fender, like a maple neck Fender guitar, and they spray the nitro lacquer over the frets. What I've done in the past is I've used a razor blade and I've scored the each side and I've taken all the finish off the frets and then polished the frets and done it that way. I've seen all the variations. The. The variations being that sometimes they spray them off to the side, sometimes spray them over them. You know, with the Fenders, I've not seen how sire's done it so that I'm not looking at it. But my concern is that the poly is when you score is a little bit less easy to work with, so you could cause some damage on that. So what I would suggest to you on that is do your research. I don't have a video on that, unfortunately. But also maybe that's something to take to a legitimate tech to have done because of the fact that if you chip anything on the neck, it's a real pain in the ass to fix. And cosmetically, because you're going to be looking at it and feeling it, you know, it's a lot easier to hide mistakes that you don't necessarily come in contact with your hands and aren't looking at constantly like a neck. So you definitely don't want to mess with your neck. But I. That's my guess. It's not lacquer. It's. It's poly. And that, you know, that's how you fix it or how you. You remove it, is square it and remove it. But I don't know. I haven't seen how they did it. Kyle's got a great question. He says recommendations. My first acoustic guitar. After playing electric only, I find most body styles very uncomfortable in. On full acoustic models, you know, this is where a lot of times, a lot of electric guitar players, it happens both directions. So, you know, acoustic players who play mostly acoustic or all acoustic, they get electric and they just never bond with it. And same thing happens electric players. You'll find that it's very hard if you're used to one style of guitar. When you get like electric guitar and you go to acoustic, like you said, it just doesn't feel very comfortable. The harder part with acoustic is, is that a lot of the ones that feel the most comfortable tend to sound not so great acoustically. In your. In your. In. In my experience, what I ended up doing for myself was I found that when I finally got a nice acoustic. Okay, so there's two things. One, if you get. Don't worry about. So acoustics. There's two ways of thinking of acoustics. If you're electric player, and trust me, one of these, you definitely either want one of each or. Or you definitely want to lean, you know, learn and lean towards one. Either go comfort or go tone. With acoustic, that's the. That's the way you. There's no other. There's no in between. Okay, Like I've said this before, I don't like talking in absolutes, but unfortunately, this one's a little. I got to break my own rule a little bit. What I mean by that is don't worry about if the acoustic is comfortable, if it sounds great. I mean, it sounds beautiful. Okay? Like you pick up a Gibson or a Martin or something. You strum a chord and it's just like angels singing. You're like, it won't matter if it's uncomfortable. It won't matter. You'll. You'll push through it. You'll get through it. Okay? Your desire, okay, To. To hear and feel that sound. You will work, you know, you'll figure it out. You'll figure out how to press a little harder that you used to. Not pressing so hard on the strings. The next little chunkier, whatever. You just find that acoustic that sounds great. You'll be drawn to it through the sound of it. Okay? And it has to be exactly what I said. It's angel singing. It's literally, it's. It's okay to say, man, I don't love the way it feels. But, man, this guitar, and you just hit one chord and you go, that, that I gotta. I got. That motivates me, that moves me spiritually, emotionally. I'm connected. I'm making music with this thing. You buy that acoustic, nothing else matters. Just the way it sounds. If you can't do that, then you go the exact opposite way. You buy yourself an acoustasonic. You buy yourself a goney six. You buy yourselves the Taylor T5. You buy yourself just that Keisel, a Zeus that I had, you know, that I. That I. That I liked. You get yourself a guitar that essentially is a. As close to, you know, just comfortable as hell. And it doesn't sound great or it doesn't sound as beautiful. Right? It's like. It's Right. Try to. You gotta. You gotta make your. Your. And so a lot of times people go, well, I'll go with a smaller body, acoustic, hollow body. It's more comfortable, but it won't sound great and it won't be motivated to play if it's not 100% comfortable. So again, 100% comfortable feels exactly like electric guitar. You go with it or it sounds amazing and it doesn't matter if it's comfortable. I find, I found for me personally, all of the in betweens from those two state things I said always led to me never playing them. That's the two reasons I'll pick up an acoustic. It's easy as hell or it sounds amazing. That's it. That's it. That's the way you look at when you're acoustic, and that's how you kind of focus your thinking. Now, of course, you know, we're not all the same, so you might be different than me, but these are where you should start. Start with that logic and then, you know, morph it, adjust it, figure it out for what makes most use for you. But what I can tell you is I. I literally, when I play acoustic, I'm either playing the ones that sound amazing and I'm just, you know, loving it, or I play the one that doesn't sound so great, but it just feels great, and I'm just getting in my acoustic playing time. There you go. What's nice about the thinner body acoustics that I like? Like the, you know, the Go6, the Kiesel, the. The Fenders, you know, acoustic Sonic series, all that stuff. Taylor T5, I stick electric guitar strings on them. I'll just play them just like electric. At this point, I, you know, some people was like, oh, it just sounds worse. Yeah, it didn't sound great to begin with. So it's. It's gonna get fixed in the. In the recording or in the amp or whatever. So I'll. I'll just go that way. And there's a ton of suggestions out there. I'm sure a lot of them are putting in the comments right now of other little guitars in those veins that I just talked about. But that's the way you just. You pick what you want. But I would follow those two avenues of thought. Favin wants to know if I'll review a surguitar. They reached out to me. I feel horrible. They reached out. Surgitar has reached out super nice after a podcast and asked if I was interested in doing a videos. And then for some reason, it fell through the cracks. I will make a note to go in the emails and find them and email them again. This came from Amanda. Grab 3J music, says Phil. Speaking of Friedman, why haven't you tried any of the IR pedals? Especially the irj. Seems like it would be right up your alley. You know, it's funny. I don't know. It wouldn't be. I have. No, no, I can tell you why I haven't tried one. I have no idea what they're for. I mean, I mean, I get it. Let me put it this way. I know what they're for. I don't know why I would use one. So to everybody understanding these IR pedals. So essentially, Friedman makes a bunch. Now they make a dirty shirl. I think they make a be Be. I think they make the small box and they make the Jakey Lee one. And they're essentially. They have IR loaders. They might be in two preamps or something. Essentially, it's a way to plug direct and get a direct sound is what I get from it. I've only seen the advertisements. I've seen no videos or anything. And we talked about this. Somebody even asked me about it then. And I was saying why I picked Delaney over it, why I like Delaney. So Laney makes a pedal that is. It's an Ironheart loud pedal, and there's a couple versions. But more Importantly, it's a 200 watt power amp section. It's a powered pedal. So you use it. You plug into a cabinet and you have an amp on the go, two channels with reverb and a boost. The idea with the Friedman stuff is the opposite of that. It's like I can plug in the PA and have a direct line and do that stuff. I'll use my Kemper for that. I mean, I have a. I have a. I have my Friedman small box profiled in my camper, and I just take that. If I go and my Kemper has whatever power section it has in it. Maybe it's like 500 watts or whatever it is, it's got a power section in it. So I just run that into a cabinet and then run a line out, and then that's how I'll do it. So that's why I do that. I have no use for it as a pedal concept. I like the idea of it. In other words, I mean, there's musicians and they definitely have a use for that. If you want a Friedman amp, I believe Larry Mitchell, my buddy Larry bought the Dirty Shirley one. And I'm sorry. And I think he liked it. He never said, but I just don't have a use for it. It wouldn't. It wouldn't. I don't know what to do with it. I don't run a line direct 99% of the time. I'm recorded with mics and not line in. If I'm line in, it's usually with something like the Kemper or something like that. Okay, Don wants to know how does the blue. Which is. It's purple, but I understand what you meant. Don. The blue a. A set behind me. The telly. He's talking about the GNL telly. How does it compare to my GNL margarita asat? I like the neck on this one better. This is the classic modern. And the other one I have is the fat classic or whatever. On the margarita. Other than that, I like the margarita one way better, but I'm just connected to the margarita one. But if I. In a perfect world, I would have the smaller neck on this purple ASAT versus the margarita. But I like the. I like the ASATs pickups in this purple one. I like. I like the way it sounds in place, but I just. I just like the margarita one better. For sure. But they're both really good. I just really want, like, a perfect. I've been tempted to switch the necks on them. I. I mentioned it to Shauna, and she was like, yeah, why don't you do that? And I go, well, because one's gonna have a purple headstock. Won't have a green one. That'd be just weird. Sal says, hey, Phil, I haven't made an Indonesia Fender Telecaster. Does Fender have a factory there, or are they made by another company? You know, I don't know. You know, it's one of those things, like, I'm. I could. I'm gonna give you a guess. This is 100 guess. I'm gonna guess that it's not their factory, but I don't know. I know. You know, Epiphone says they own their factory in China. That makes Epiphone. I have not heard Fender ever state that. That they own their factories in Indonesia or China. So I just don't know because they don't say. I don't understand this question. So this came from Tom. He says, question. So there is a database of guitar and amp builders, like a NAM list. Oh, okay. Is. Is there a database of guitar and amp builders, Question mark, Like a NAM list? I have trouble shopping for small brands, and it would be nice to have a list without just hunting on the Internet. Well, you can go on to namm's. I apologize. I need to get some water. You can go on NAMM's website, and there's usually a list of the vendors that are going to be there. That's probably the best way. Namm. NAMM tried to send me a thing. I guess they sent it to all the YouTubers for, like, I don't know, 1800 bucks or 27. I forgot what it was. It was a lot of money. They would sell me a list of all the vendors and the contact person at that company. So I wasn't interested in that. But. But you can just go to the NAMM's website, go look at the NAMM show, and it'll give you a list of everyone who's putting a booth there, and that's a pretty big directory of people and you'll be able to see all the companies. Scott says, hey, have you checked out the Squire 60s classic vibe custom Chicago Music Exchange has a cool one in Oxblood. I have not. So that would be one to put on the radar for sure for a deep dive video. If you guys have suggestions, especially on this show when the when it plays later. If you want to put the comments suggestions for Deep dives I'm doing the year in review summary that I do every year where I go through all the stuff and when I was going through this year, I don't know why particularly, but this was the highest amount of non sponsored videos I've done in the last three, four years. So a lot of more independent views videos than I've done in the past, which is good. And that also has led to a lot higher view counts obviously. Like I, you know, I say it's like usually I pick the stuff that you guys are interested in. So if you have suggestions this is the best time to do it because I tend to start planning out the first quarter of next year right around now. Like what, what videos do people want to see and what, what would be a guitar to take apart and look at. So suggestions, like I said, would be fantastic. Just anything you can think of. You know those videos perform really, really good and they're fun and it's cool. And like I said, you guys been right a lot this year because a lot of suggestions. So on that note we'll button it up and we'll end on that note. As always, thank you so much for your time. Till the next time. Know your Gear the Know youw Gear podcast.