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So last week I was in Las Vegas and I visited the showroom of Ed Roman Guitars. What a cool store - they claim to be the biggest guitar store in the world, and I am not about to argue. My best guess is that the showroom is two or three times the size of a Guitar Center, and it is nothing but guitars. Well, they might have some mandolins and Ukes…

but there aren’t any drums or keyboards like at Guitar Center,Guitar Center. And it felt completely different than Guitar Center - which has always felt chaotic and overly crowded (and certainly it’s always been incredibly LOUD!)

In any case, my visit to Ed Roman Guitars was really pleasant. It can be a bit crazy getting around in Vegas, but the store was really close to the Vegas strip. The cab ride from the Venetian was less than $10. And it was close enough to the strip that we were able to get a return cab ride pretty easily as well.

We got a lot of patient help, and every time I wanted to try a guitar, the person helping us (Scott) pulled it down for us and made sure it was tuned before I started playing. That is a pleasant switch from pretty much any other guitar store I have been in.

Well my Stratocaster arrived yesterday via UPS. As I wrote in my “New Stratocaster” post, this was a bit of a spur of the moment purchase. I mean, I have been thinking about getting a guitar, and I have beenb leaning towards getting a Strat, but I wasn’t exactly planning on buying a guitar when I walked into the store…

At first it sounded like I was going to want to get an American Deluxe Stratocaster, since it had a humbucker pickup to go with the two single coil pickups. But I just liked the sound of the single coils better, so I started to lean more towards the American Standard Strat.

Then I tried out the Stevie Ray Vaughn Strat (with the “SRV") on the pick guard. I really liked the sound of that guitar, but the action was really high… and I am not much of a fan of high action on my guitars. I guess that Stevie Ray liked his action set up pretty high, so this guitar was true to the namesake, but that ain’t for me.

I suppose I could have had the action lowered, but I also really didn’t like that fancy pickguard… a little too fancy for someone like me who struggles to do ANYTHING on a guitar.

In any case, I ended up with the American Standard Strat, and it just showed up at my door - I didn’t want to carry it on the plane ride home, so I had them ship it for me. My Strat came all boxed up and bubble wrapped - and it was in its Fender hardshell case… everything was in perfect order when it showe up.

Stratocaster guitar,
electric guitar

Well I have a new Stratocaster! I am not normally one to make impulse purchases, but I sure enjoyed making this purchase… a new American Standard Strat. You see, I have been thinking of buying an electric guitar for a long time. Almost since I bought my first guitar a year ago. But I never really got serious about it until…

I visited the largest guitar shop in the world (they claim to have 400 Fenders in stock… I didn’t count them, but there sure were a lot of Stratocasters up on those walls.) Let me back up a bit - last week I was in Las Vegas, hooking up with a bunch of buddies. It was actually something of a working trip - we did a lot of brainstorming about our businesses, and we also went out and had a crazy time each night. In any case, Las Vegas just happens to be the home of Ed Roman Guitars… and they have a rather wild web site that I first came across months ago.

So the short story is that I took a cab over there, walked in, and bought a Fender American Standard Stratocaster. The longer story is that the store is really cool - it is just huge, about twice the size of Guitar Center… and nothing but guitars (as opposed to Guitar Center, which also has drums and keyboards). The walls were lined with hundreds and hundreds of guitars.

I ended up hooking up with the manager their - Scott - who was very helpful. At first I thought I might want a Strat with humbucker pickups… so I was looking at the American Deluxe Strat with two single coils and one humbucker. But just like when I bought my acoustic, I went with what I thought sounded best, and I liked the sound of the single coils… so I went with the American Standard Strat.

The toughest part was picking out a color. The one I was playing was the Sunbust Strat. But I tend to be a pretty understated guy, so I thought I would like black or white better. So I picked black… of course, the next day I changed my mind and called up Scott and told him to send me the Sunburst.

File Under: electric guitar,
guitar
Stratocaster