No parent in his or her right mind will gift a teenage son or daughter a set of drums. Most would rather want their children play something less lethal to one’s aural senses, something that seems innocuous and can be beautifully crafted, to boot – the guitar.

However, once plugged into an amplifier and played with the volume cranked, it makes windows rattle, neighbours complain and birds and animals in the vicinity go wild. The sound of an electric guitar can be best described as sheer energy, like pure molten lava racing down a mountain, devouring everything in its path. And at the end of the day, many youngsters want to be guitarists because, let’s just face it, it’s really cool to be able to harness all that energy with your fingers and to truly express how you feel through six strings.

Like humans, no two guitars are created equal. Your personality can only truly come forth and be expressed in music if you pick the right guitar for yourself. If you are

a shredder, perhaps picking up a cheap

‘Givson’ electric isn’t the best idea; if you like punk rock and jumping around with your instrument, then maybe you shouldn’t even think about investing in a Gibson Les Paul (unless you don’t mind breaking it and can afford another) — but alas, to each his own!

The electric guitar is truly a versatile music equipment because it can be modified to suit your tonal needs and playing style. Toni Iommi from Black Sabbath played extra light strings specially made for him after the left-handed guitarist nearly lost the tips of the middle and ring fingers of his right hand in a freak industrial accident. But perhaps that’s too extreme an example. Everyone has their favourite brand of strings, guitar cables, plectrums, bridge — and they all make a difference to your overall sound. Many a time guitarists replace the stock pickups in their guitar with better ones available in the market (such as Seymour Duncan, DiMarzio and EMG) for varying amount of prices. Changing a pickup can add more to your guitar sound, making each note picked really stand out. It can either add a heavy bottom-end to your sound, resulting in a rumbling bassy sound or cancel the low frequencies, giving your notes clarity and more space to breathe when you want to let it rip.

One may also go about the process of forming one’s sound by walking the oft-trodden path of emulating their favourite guitar hero’s sound. But since many cannot afford the fancy equipment these guitar gods have cut their teeth to claim ownership to, it is usually not advisable to walk this path in order to be someone else. For, one of the best things to have in life is your own voice and to not speak through someone else’s words. And the only way to do that is to have your own style. Since most of what anyone sounds like on their guitar comes through their fingers, it is usually a good idea to start off with a good guitar. But finding one isn’t easy. It’s a journey marred by perilous prices and deceitful maidens (guitars) that seem angelic from afar but are quite devilish up close. In other words, you need to get your hands dirty and cannot get away with merely scratching the surface.

Arsh Sharma, cra­zy-ha­ired guitarist of the Delhi-based rock band, The Circus, is known for belting out some insane riffs from perhaps one of the best-looking guitars made by a company called Paul Reed Smith (PRS) Guitars. If we go down to specifics, it’s a PRS SE Paul Allender series guitar that came for around Rs 55,000 when he purchased it. Enamoured with its beauty, Arsh tells us he had been scouring for guitars for a long time and this was what he exactly needed. “Before this I had my eyes set upon another PRS model but someone else bought it before I could. So I took to visiting The Gurgaon Furtados shop every week and try out all their new guitar models as I wanted the right one. I don't ever buy guitar from the internet as I don't think you can ever gauge the neck of the guitar from a product description; so I waited for almost four months till I bought the model I wanted. I picked it up the day I played it. At that time I had some money lined up from some of my past shows and from some work I had been doing, so it wasn't a biggie.”

He had playing a Washburn X series for almost four years before picking this one up. “It was a great guitar in its own right but had a single coil and a humbucker as a pickup; so it gave a slightly thinner tone. The Paul Allender has two humbuckers which have an awesome fat tone whi­ch I really like. Also, it is one of the few guitars I have played which gives me a great clean as well as a distorted tone with a lot of body in it. It's a great guitar to possess, specially for someone with a bipolar style of playing.”

Not one for modifications, Arsh says he was “basically after the fatness of tone when plugged directly into an amp, and once I had modelled a few guitars I knew what I was looking for — something which felt really good while playing, the neck specifically.”

Anup Kutty, virtuoso guitarist of the Delhi-based rock band, Menwhopause, which has taken Indian rock to dizzying heights, has been making (tidal) waves drowning critics and naysayers for many years. His guitar collection will make you green with envy, specially if you are a Gibson fanatic, for he owns not one but three of their guitars — an Epiphone Les Paul (Rs 30,000) and a Gibson Les Paul Studio (Rs 81,000) in ebony as well as a Gibson Custom Classic 1969 Reissue Les Paul honeyburst (Rs 4,95,000).

Anup adds, “The first guitar I bought was an Epiphone around 12 years ago when I got my first job. I got a credit card only to buy the guitar, which cost me around $600 (Rs 27,000). Many years later I got an endorsement deal from Gibson which gave me the other two Les Pauls. All three guitars have different characters and so behave differently. The Gibson Studio is a much smaller guitar but heavy wood gives it a mean tone. It's a no- frills guitar meant to deliver in a studio but does a great job on-stage as well. The custom classic is like a stunning and smart lady who you are proud to wear around your arm at a party/gig. It has a beautiful rosewood neck which delivers a warm tone and lots of sustain. I've had lots of fun playing around with the feedback noise that I can get out of this guitar.”

Anup explains his affinity towards Les Paul with a simple reply: “Because that's the sound that got me into serious guitar playing. Even the guy I used to go to learn guitar from, back when I was in school, had a homemade Les Paul that looked and sounded exactly like the original.”

Keshav Dhar, Delhi’s own guitar god who has now started emerging out of the underground one song at a time, told us how he came to finally get the axe of his dreams, the Ibanez SZ2020 Prestige. “I got it used, there was an ad for it in the classifieds section of a forum I post on, and I happened to be in the US where the seller was located. I got a lucky deal on it. It’s a rare item now since it went out of production a few years ago. New, it costs $1500 (Rs 68,000) but I paid $ 450 for the second- hand instrument which was an absurdly low price.”

About the guitar’s construction he said, “It is built better, has better quality construction and choice of tone woods that match my style of playing; it has a mahogany body with a thick maple cap and a set neck. It also has a Gibraltar III custom bridge. All these factors make it a highly resonant and harmonically rich instrument and far superior to any guitar I have owned previously. What I was really after was a guitar with a comfortable neck and a solid chunky body with resonant tone that would lend itself well to low tunings, and this guitar happened to be perfect in all respects. It adjusts very well to low tunings and the intonation has remained spot on regardless of string gauge changes.”

Delhi-based metal group Undying Inc, which has carved a niche for itself in the underground music scene of the city, is known for destroying venues around the nation with their furiously chunky guitar work. The man that wields the axe proudly for them is Biswarup Gupta, or Biz, as he is known among the legions of his fans. Unlike most over-excited teenagers who cannot handle it, Biz is a master of the seven-string guitar. His weapon of choice is the Ibanez Prestige 1527M (Rs 68,000) and he has been playing it since 2009.

He gives the reason for his choice: “I have another string (Low B) to experiment with and I can go much lower in terms of pitch. I find it much more convenient to make music on a seven- stringer right now.” He says he is crazy about this guitar. “The colour, the basswood body, the edge-zero7 bridge, the maple fingerboard, everything. I stopped looking for any other guitar the day I saw this online.”

After hearing all these guys about the guitars they own, one may ask if the price tag makes a difference to the quality of a guitar. A man of few words, Biz says, “Honestly, if you want something great then you have to pay a great price too. A Rs 60,000 guitar is going to be way better than a guitar which costs Rs 60. Please do the math.”

Anup differs, “I don’t think price has anything to do with the quality of a guitar. I’ve heard great guitarists make bad gear sound like heaven. Sure, sometimes things get expensive because of the quality of wood and hardware but a lot of guitars are also heavily priced because of their legacy or are collectibles.”

Keshav agrees, “A guitar is definitely not better simply because it is expensive, however, it is an important point to note that the highest quality wood and hardware components usually come with a correspondingly high price tag on them, as do the services of the best luthiers in the business, especially when it comes to handmade and custom built instruments. It is important to put brand names aside when judging the value of an instrument.”

aazaranis@mydigitalfc.com