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[SilentJ]

So like a week before Christmas I was in the car with my dad, seeing if I could get him to drop a hint or two about what I was getting for Christmas.  Right after I discovered I wasn't getting Guitar Hero from my parents:

Me: "Well, I hope that means what I think it does."
Dad: "What do you think it means?"
Me: "I'm also asking for a guitar for Christmas."
Dad: "Don't you already have a guitar?"
Me: "Yeah, why?"
Dad: "Well what do you want another one for?"
Me: "...."

So it got me thinking, and I suppose these here forums would be a good place to ask it.

My question: What is YOUR motivation for buying more than one guitar?

[CutMan]

Different guitars are...uhm, different.

Different tones, feel... I mean, for instance, some guitars have a more metallic sound. Like my Schecter SG-1. Or to a greater extent, a Dean guitar generally seems to be very, very metallic.
Then there's getting stuff like twelve-strings, or seven-strings. <---I want a seven-string! Schecter Hellraiser!

[Gridgm]

because i only have an accoustic at the moment and i really need to get round to getting an electric

[Hewittv18]

The acoustic I own has to be like...40 years old or something, it was my dad's when he was in college and I'm almost done, so...

And that just means his acoustic has an uneven bridge, so some strings are MUCH higher over the frets than others. It makes playing somewhat problematic at times, but not too terribly. And of course, I want to keep my dad's guitar forever, so I'd like another acoustic to play on so I don't risk ruining this one.

[TrueNeutral]

Well, electric and acoustic have very different sounds.

[valley_parade]

Gear aquisition syndrome.


Meaning that I want to have like 10 or 15 guitars someday. I have one electric right now, and I'm getting another in the spring.

[alexalexalex]

slightly less impressive if they're all cheap shitty guitars like sonic youth have 

[Thrillho]

Sonic Youth's guitars have awesome tunings and awesome sounds. Who cares if they're cheap?

[E. Spaceman]

they have nice expesive guitars now, since the cheap ones were stolen a while back.

[Aram]

Well, I only have an electric right now, but that's fine, since I'm not really all that good at guitar, and I don't know how to appreciate the sound of a guitar at the moment. I'm hoping, later on in life, to get a Gretsch White Falcon. That's one beautiful guitar. I'll probably get another guitar before that, though. Maybe a Stratocaster or an SG.
Also, I'm either going to buy or I'm going to get my brother's acoustic guitar. He's got a nice one, but I doubt he'll give it to me, despite what he's saying. Okay, I'm rambling now, so I'm going to stop talking

[David_Dovey]

I have a Squier Precision Bass that I bought a few weeks ago, and I may someday buy an electric 6-string. Also, I want this bass bad:

[SilentJ]

I know mine.

I gots me two guit-fiddles at the moment: very pleased with the Takamine acoustic, but my other one is a fuckin' Squier Strat, and somehow my parents don't believe that getting a new guitar will be infinitely better than getting the Squier's guide fixed.

[godinpants]

Gear aquisition syndrome.


Meaning that I want to have like 10 or 15 guitars someday. I have one electric right now, and I'm getting another in the spring.

i have 8 or nine guitars all up... i think. maybe more if you include other string instruments.

i have gas bad.

also, all my guitars have a different personality.

like theres no way, id show up to a metal jam with an acoustic, thats obvious, but at the same time, im not going to show up to a fusion jam with an rg.

[Hunter]

Sonic Youth used different guitars for every song on 'Confusion is Sex'. When they toured the album, they had to take every single guitar they used with them. In 1983 the number was fourteen. By late 1985 there was twenty-three.

"(Sonic Youth) could only afford cheap guitars, and cheap guitars sounded like cheap guitars. But with weird tunings or something jammed under a particular fret, those humble instruments could sound rather amazing?bang a drumstick on a cheap Japanese Stratocaster copy in the right tuning, crank the amplifier to within an inch of its life, and it will sound like church bells"

Since each guitar sounded unique because of it's peculiar setup (an alternate tuning or specific guage strings for example) and also because the band didn't have the technical ability or finances to emulate the effects on a standard rig, they had to travel with literally every guitar they owned. Before recording 'Bad Moon Rising' they became tired of the songs they had written and deliberately altered the setup of every instrument, thus destroying the songs forever. The songs were so reliant on specific instruments the band could never play them again even if they wanted to.

Thanks to your little blurb there, i tuned my guitar into wierd keys and did some cool stuff

[Patrick]

The acoustic I own has to be like...40 years old or something, it was my dad's when he was in college and I'm almost done, so...

Meh, my acoustic's well over 50 years old plays like a dream. You just need to find a good restoration luthier who can restore your guitar and make the necessary adjustments.

I like having several different guitars for lots of reasons. I keep my newly acquired Squier Strat and my old Arbor AP230CS (cherry sunburst Les Paul copy) in drop-D for all-purpose work so I have tonal variety in that tuning. When I fix up my old Johnson Strat copy (the Shitocaster, as I lovingly refer to her), she'll be put into open-Gmaj to do slide guitar. My acoustic will be in drop-D. And my fake PRS (a kit-built piece of shit that my dad and I are going to fix up) will be put into DADGAD or some other silly alternate tuning just for the lulz.

[Hewittv18]

Hmm, having it fully restored would be pretty cool, I bet my dad would think that's pretty cool.

[valley_parade]

I think my favorite alternate tuning is DADGAD.

[doki]

between me and my brother we have six guitars, only four of which work.  i am planning on buying a new one as soon as:

1) my car is fixed
2) i have my AC30

the best advice i can give you is to buy ONE guitar.  and use it until you start making cash off it, then buy more.  the argument my parents give me is that our freind has had two guitars his whole life.  I point out that those two guitars (an ancient Gibson SG and a Strat we gave him) were worth a lot of money and he took great care of them.  So if you want another guitar, buy one that's gonna last, a hard case to keep it in and clean that fucker every day

[Aram]

Yeah. The one guitar I have is the black Squier Strat. I need to get a new one, since I've gotten a lot better at guitar than when I bought the damn thing. Don't get me wrong, it has an okay sound considering its cost, but I'd rather have a different one

[Patrick]

I think my favorite alternate tuning is DADGAD.

More like GAEGAE amirite?

Sig'd. DADGAD is hellof fun though, I agree. So much interesting stuff you can do with it. I'm going to go tune my hardtail Squier Strat to DADGAD now and just fuck around until I've made something cool.

[Scytale]

I'm also the owner of a squier strat. I've had it for about 2 years and purchased it 2nd hand. The poor things been through so much, it's all beat up to hell. My excuse for not replacing it is simply I'm not good enough at guitar to justify buying another one. Keyboard is my main instrument and I have a reasonable one of those. I picked up the Squier from a mate at work for next to nothing and it's served me pretty well so far...

[IronOxide]

I have an Epiphone SG knock-off that I like. I wouldn't know much about other guitars however, as I pretty much just mess around with chords and scales when I do try to do anything with it.

[NiMRoD420]

I have one electric (Schecter Omen II) and it covers a pretty wide range of tones with the help of my Line 6. I would LOVE to have more guitars, but then, I would love to have a million dollars too.

I also have one acoustic guitar. I want another.

I also have one electric bass. I want an acoustic bass. Fretless. Because that is just sexy.

[Tartar Martyr]

Sonic Youth didn't really steal from Branca... They learned from him.  As in Thurston took lessons with him when he moved to NYC and Lee actually played in Branca's ensembles even during Sonic Youth's early years.  So saying they stole from him isn't really accurate... it is like saying The Breeders stole from the Pixies.

To the original poster though, I own multiple guitars (all electric) so that I can leave them in different tunings, leave them in different rooms and (the most legitimate reason) because they sound differently.  I play my american tele the most because it is my favorite guitar ever and covers just about everything I like to do to some extent.  Then I have my ibanez Talman for those times I want to play around with a whammy bar, it also helps that this guitar is seafoam green with a pearloid pick guard.  Then there is the Squier Super Sonic that is just a total piece of shit that I keep meaning to paint purple and drop new electronics into it and give it a short scale neck... right now it just sits on my sofa in the classic "Pavement tuning" DADABE.  I just bought a 1960's Univox ES-335 clone that is pretty sweet but needs some pots replaced.  I will probably find some peaceful uses for it, but right now it lets me pretend like I am in the Jesus and Mary Chain while pissing off my neighbor.

So there isn't really a great reason to have more than one... a lot of people can't tell the difference between the sound of a fender style single coil/P90/humbucker, and a lot of the draw is definitely based on the guitar's appearance (some of them just look too cool to pass up, if not for the price tag I would 20 Jazzmasters for this reason alone).  But having a guitar for every room, or a guitar for every tuning you like are the most common excuses I use.  I used to try and explain the difference in their sounds, but that just led to more questions like "why do you have so many fuzz pedals?" and "why did you pay $200 for this delay pedal that only has 600ms of delay time while this other one costs $70 and has 2000ms of delay time?"  (the classic analog vs. digital debate). 

[Patrick]

The guitarist is indeed a strange beast. The 'other tunings' is a legitimate excuse, though, because switching from 'blah blah' tuning to 'blah blah blah' tuning will cause string breakage a lot sooner than just leaving it alone. I don't care how much less expensive it is to just buy more strings, I am a lazy son of a bitch and I want to save myself the effort.

Also, there's a lot of fun in buying a really shit guitar and making it better (so long as you know what you're doing). I'm a consummate tinkerer and so I like to play around with things.