This one is going to be very obvious to older readers, but maybe not so obvious to younger readers. Here’s the deal: whenever you see the word “Review” attached to a web page or YouTube video regarding a product, substitute the word “Advertisement.” And 90% of the time, it’ll be accurate. I’m not going to talk trash about any specific guitar websites or YouTube videos, because I don’t think the Budget Guitarist budget will pay for a good lawyer, or even a bad one. But I just read a review of the Marshall Origin 50 on such a website, and I had to laugh. Such an advertisement. It called the Origin a great “pedal” platform. That’s marketing speak for “bring your own dirt or drive pedal, you’ll need it.” Ha ha ha! It’s a Marshall that doesn’t have a good enough dirt sound on its own. C’mon, now.
A guitar website who features Gibson advertisements isn’t likely to be unbiased in their reviews of Gibson products. They can’t. Gibson won’t advertise with them. To the oldsters, yes, I know you already know this. But we can’t assume everyone does.
Some YouTubers are desperate to be a big name, and they’ll do a positive review for any pedal company that sends them a product. Man, it’s not even worth it. YouTube doesn’t pay that much. Maybe it’s ego. Most of us have egos. I do. But I’m not going to lie to people just to get a few more clicks.
What about this website? I have ads, yes. Once in a while, I see a StewMac ad. And I do recommend some StewMac products because I use them and they’re great. But often you can find a cheaper alternative and I recommend those. StewMac isn’t giving me anything. They make great tools that cost too much money. Sometimes I pay it, sometimes I find something cheaper.
I do respect some guys out there who do “product demonstrations.” Thank you. That is very open an honest. A company is usually paying them to demo their product, and it’s all out in the open. It’s not in a form of a fake ad. I also respect guys who do reviews that are honest. They do exist. I’m one of them. But it can be difficult to figure it out, can’t it? Over time, you’ll get a feel for a site and their reviews. If all the reviews are positive, all the time, someone is dishing out BS. Every company has their stinkers. Apple has iTunes, Gibson has, well, tons of bad models. Fender has the dirt sound on the Hot Rod Deluxe, that is still terrible despite being revised FOUR TIMES.
One more comment. I’m a fan of Pete Thorn’s channel, and he demos a lot of products. But I kind of wonder what the use is. Pete makes everything sound great. I once heard Brian May play a hundred dollar guitar and sound fantastic. If he played that guitar in concert, people would run out and buy it. And they wouldn’t sound like Brian May. Listening to a fantastic player play a piece of gear is not an indication of what it’ll sound like when YOU play it. You need to go to the music store and play it yourself. Duh.
Enough grumpy old man talk. Get off my lawn! You kids with your Line 6 amps and your Djent. You would have loved my old Toyota. Towards the end, it sounded just like Djent when I started it up. Ha ha ha! Put your pointy guitar down and go listen to some classic UFO.
Ahem. Sorry. To wrap things up, I really like opinions. Not ads, opinions. I like sites that will sometimes rag on a product and wonder what someone was smoking. Sometimes I agree, sometimes I don’t, but it’s real. It’s not BS. So I try to model this site after that philosophy.
