I play guitar in a band as well as keyboard so I keep on top of both markets. A couple of workmates have been buying cheap Korean guitars from a New Jersey distributor at
http://rondomusic.com and I keep being blown away by the quality of some of these guitars for the price. So even though I have never before bought a guitar without playing it first ( I'm not a very trusting guy ) I decided to take a bit of a gamble and bought a Les Paul copy unseen from the Internet. I spent a little more than my friends had, and chose an Agile DLX-2800 Les Paul for $289 with a solid Canadian maple quilt top on a mahogany body with Alnico magnet humbuckers.
What can I say .... now I have received the guitar .... I'm totally blown out by the quality !!!!! It looks like a $3000 Gibson Les Paul and sounds like it too. What more can I say. Even though the first one I received was damaged Rondomusic.com simply UPS-ed it back to New Jersey and sent a perfect replacement. And I do know electric guitars as I have been playing for 36 years now and my gigging guitars include a US Fender Strat with active EMG electronics, a Schecter Strat with Seymour Duncan pickups and a Gibson Les Paul Special which I am planning on refitting with Seymour Duncan pickups. But this cheap Agile LP copy is just great as it is and I have no intention of changing anything about it. I just thought I'd mention this in case any of you are in the market for an affordable guitar. I have played numerous more expensive Epiphone copies at my local Guitar Center and have found them to be very mediocre. I suspect the US companies such as Gibson/Epiphone and Fender/Squier make sure their copies of their more expensive guitars never come too close less it kills the market for expensive guitars. But with these Korean companies there is no incentive to lower the quality of their products.
I highly recommend you check out
http://www.rondomusic.com if you are looking for a good but cheap guitar. The products they are selling are great value and Kurt who runs the company has a very good reputation.
[This message has been edited by Nigel (edited 07-18-2003).]