Anyone following the "Taylor McGrath" debacle on TGP?

[culturejam]

Man, what a trainwreck:
http://www.thegearpage.net/board/showthread.php?t=1387224

The first 12-13 pages were a couple months ago, and then day before yesterday it exploded with new drama.

TL;DR -- Some guy from England started up a "pie and mash" shop and allegedly ripped a bunch of people off, then went to Australia and started a "custom" guitar company (TMG Guitars). Got popular with the P&W scene and sold a lot of $5000+ tele/strat clones. Started selling $300 pedals. Took 3x the amount of time quoted to deliver most stuff (allegedly). Moved to California. Continued with not delivering on time (if at all), allegedly. Turns out a string of people on three continents claim to have been ripped off by this guy (paid, but did not get anything; or got sub-quality product). Then it comes out the that the fully custom guitars are actually partscasters, and they don't really do anything but assemble from cheap C&C bodies/necks and Chinese no-name pickups. And all under the guise of being a friend of Jesus.

Makes the Freekish Blues incident seem pretty small-scale. Allegedly. 

[jtn191]

Crazy. With the market as it is, it's so saturated that it's hard for many people to get noticed...many people are doing different variations of this "pedal building", some doing mods, some using the same pcbs as other companies, some cloning circuits, some using unique parts and circuits--so it's a shame the scammer did get noticed.

I agree that some of the P&W crowd is pretty quick to jump on a bandwagon...I've worked with groups as a sound guy and they all seem to have aligned with JHS pretty quickly. I've said it before: Church is the biggest music business in the south and many places. But it is a shame that anyone got scammed. Research the company before sending them your money

[juansolo]

DAMN YOU CJ! *shakes fist*

Do you know how long I've managed to avoid that place and it's shenanigans?!

Bah! It's the car crash threads that always draw me back...

[GermanCdn]

Wow.  Days Of Our Lives, relic guitar edition.

But I really, really don't understand the concept of ordering a $3k partcaster (this from a guy who's flipped his entire collection 5 times in the last decade).  I mean seriously.  You could get a gorgeous Tom Anderson/Suhr for that price, with top quality tonewoods, killer finishes, and great electronics, they will definitely hold their resale (let's face it, if the stories about TMG are true and dude disappears/gets deported/arrested, resale on his guitars are going to be shit) due to both quality and supply.  Hell, buy a MJT with a set of BKP's for under a grand if that's the way you want to go, couple hours of assembly and you've got a nice relic caster.

[culturejam]

DAMN YOU CJ! *shakes fist*

[atreidesheir]

$5000 strat and tele clones.
'nuff said.

[neiloler]

This is why I have such a hard time plunking my bucks down for a new production just-about-anything these days: I can build it and have it be better quality, more customized, or just more along the exact, anal-retentive lines of what I want (be it a partscaster, pedal, amp, etc).

I still do want a Carvin California Carved top (single cut). Those look awesome and seem to be a great deal. Anyone charging more than that had better have a darn good reason for it (and there are good reasons, but not all people building guitars for big bucks have those good reasons )

[GermanCdn]

I still do want a Carvin California Carved top (single cut). Those look awesome and seem to be a great deal. Anyone charging more than that had better have a darn good reason for it (and there are good reasons, but not all people building guitars for big bucks have those good reasons )

It's funny, cause I originally put "/(2) Carvins" after Suhr in my original post, but since they've only got one real Fender-ish offering, didn't think it was the right reference.

Building with Carvin is a lot of fun, and the CS series are great.  A few pieces of advice:

1) If you're a strap lock guy, order it with the Dunlop strap locks installed.  Their stock strap pins use a bigger screw than either the Dunlop or the Schaller units, and you'll either have to plug and fill it or drill new holes.
2) I think their C22 pickups are better suited to their active electronics (like in the DC400); they sounded a little dead in my CS6, but sound killer in my DC400 (my 400 is an all mahogany build as well).  If you've got a preferred set of pickups in mind, don't upgrade the pups, just buy a new set with rings, as their pickup rings don't fit anyone elses with the four screw arrangement.  You will have to plug and fill those holes, but their hidden under the rings and they're not load bearing, so it's not a big deal.
3) My experience - their flame tops are better than their quilt tops.  Not to say that the quilt tops aren't great, it's just that they are less predictable than the flames.  I have an orangeburst quilt and an aqua burst quilt.  Both look great, but not exactly the way I wanted them to look (the aqua burst is much darker, and there wasn't as much fluidity to the orangeburst).  That's the biggest risk/potential for disappointment with them.
4) If you like smooth playing necks, the tung oil neck finish is the way to go.  I like it almost as much as the older EBMM gun oil and wax finish.
5) If you buy used, be prepared to give the pots and electronics a thorough cleaning.  I've picked up four of them used, and three of them need serious DeOxIt time (i.e. the pots they used to use were pretty lousy).

To summarize

They look great.
They play great.
Stock pickups are OK, but put in your favourite set.

If you decide to go ahead and order one, feel free to PM me if you want some input.
For $1800 (i.e. lots of options) you're going to get pretty close to the equivalent of a 10 top PRS. 

[atreidesheir]

90 minutes later... P&W tele.  keep us informed.

[playpunk]

Haha. That thread is awesome


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[lars]

I recently sold a partscaster on craigslist, I guess I should have asked A LOT more for it. It had a mint green pickguard after all $$$

[Leevibe]

How surreal can this get??? I just got sucked I to reading this and I'm up to page 23. It a real train wreck were happening I'd have to ignore it to keep reading this saga.

[LaceSensor]

Sweet read. People are dumb sometimes.

Reminds me of this quote:


"Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that."


― George Carlin

[alanp]

The whole TGP  P&W mega-gear thing always feels odd to me, chiefly because for decades, the music group at church consisted of Dad, his Yamaha acoustic, and one or two other singers. Now it's him, his old Yamaha, a Boss AD-5 (I think), singers, and a PA setup. And me, when I'm not on the sound desk.

[juansolo]

This is why I have such a hard time plunking my bucks down for a new production just-about-anything these days: I can build it and have it be better quality, more customized, or just more along the exact, anal-retentive lines of what I want (be it a partscaster, pedal, amp, etc).

Same goes for amps and guitars. I know a few awesome guitar and amp builders. For the price of a custom shop LP I could have Jon at Feline make me a completely one off custom guitar to my specs that's even better. Likewise further down the price spectrum, WezV entertains all my damned silly ideas for guitars and turns out some awesome creations. I could have bought a Princeton RI off the shelf, but for a little more I preferred to have MJW build me a head. Better quality parts, better construction, essentially builds it how you want it.

The smaller outfits (essentially us) are where it's at! Support your local custom builders!