I just played my Les Paul Custom after a couple of years of it sitting in the case, fell in love all over again. From Blues to crunch to clean to thick metalish sounds, this axe does alot. Now if I want a more twangyish sound i'll go for my strat.

-Chris

I have a PRS singlecut, a American Standard Strat (2005), a Levinson Blade California Standard and an Ibanez Artcore (335 look-alike). I prefer the Fender to all of them.

CA

I was never an Ibanez man until I accidentally was handed the S series I now own one fateful day 3 years ago. I love that guitar, the way it plays, the way it sounds, the way it looks (prettiest piece of quilted maple you've ever seen), the subtle details (like the thumbscrew tension adjuster for the floating bridge - why doesn't EVERYONE do that for FR bridges?!), just all of it. Great axe.

I've owned LP's - hate them. I've owned Strats - don't hate them, but wouldn't go out of my way to buy another one. I've played many a PRS, and they are fine instruments. Jacksons used to be pretty good, but they've really hit the skids here of late. My wife used to own a Jackson, and it was just clunky, and played like a cheap piece of crap - and this was one of their custom models. Schecter? Why are they even on this list? It's a poor man's Ibanez, IMO. Gretsch? Nice niche piece if you're after a highly specific sound. Can't quantify them as "best thing I've ever owned", because they're so single-purpose. ESP? I have no opinion.

I don't think there's really such a thing as "best guitar out there" - because all the above opinions are based on a sampling of maybe half a dozen or fewer selections from each manufacturer. You could play 30 of the same model, same manufacturer guitar and have a different opinion about each one, because of the variance in mass manufacturing and the subtleties of each given piece of wood and how it responds to the electronics.