I bought a Korean made Squier Stratocaster in the late 90’s as a bit of a joke. I was super into metal back then and owned a fair few shredder type guitars (black guitars, pointy shapes, humbuckers, floyd rose trems and thin necks etc.), but this thing was all cream and curvy, and to me at least, it was so damn ugly that I had to have it!
Fast forward a fair bit and I really grew to love the Squier. I love how it looks, how it feels, how it sounds. The guitar changed the music I listened to as well as the music I was playing. It became my main guitar.
For the past 15+ years I’ve dreamed of owning the real deal. IE: An American made Fender Stratocaster and earlier this month I finally bought one. A brand new Fender American Professional II Stratocaster.
Just owning the American Strat feels great. The satin finish on the back of the neck feels absolutely amazing. The unique Dark Night finish is beautiful…
BUT…
I still prefer playing my Squier.
The neck on the Squier is way thinner and way faster, I feel a lot more expressive on it. I’ve spent so much time over the past few weeks playing one, then instantly playing the other and damn, the Squier feels and sounds better EVERY. SINGLE. TIME!
The random stuff I come up with on the Squier just flows out so easily, but not so on the Fender.
The Fender doesn’t stay in tune anywhere near as well as my Squier as it has a floating bridge (my Squier’s tremolo is decked), and as much as I really didn’t want to modify the Fender at all I made the move to change out the strings to the same gauge as my Squier (8 gauge), decked the tremolo, tuned a whole step down to D (same as my Squier), drop the neck pickup to the same height as my Squier (almost flush with the pickguard) and since doing this it definitely does feel and sound a lot better but it still doesn’t sound or feel as good as my Squier.
HELP!
I do not at all regret buying the Fender. Maybe if I play it more I’ll love it more? Maybe the Fender is like owning a Ferrari, a car you love to look at, love to own, love to drive on weekends, but then prefer to be invisible in the Honda Civic when stuck in traffic and doing the groceries?!
Reddit Thread: https://www.reddit.com/r/Guitar/comments/nddu3m/discussion_help_i_love_my_squier_more_than_my/