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Guitar Accessories? Which Ones Do I Need To Buy For My Guitar?

There are a number of guitar accessories that you might want to

buy for your guitar. Guitar accessories are relatively cheap and

if you are buying a guitar, you might be able to pick up a good

deal if you want to buy a number of accessories as well.

Here is a list of guitar accessories to consider (in order of

popularity*):

Guitar cases and bags

Guitar tuner/pitch pipe

Guitar strings

Effects pedals/Foot Switches

Amplifiers

Guitar stands

Plectrums (also known as picks)

Guitar Leads/Cables

Guitar straps

Guitar Capo

Guitar Slide

Headphones

Metronome

Cleaning and maintenance (polish, nut file set, wrench set, fret

file set)

Footstool

Stringwinder (also known as a pegwinder)

Straplok set

Power adaptor for effects pedals

Gui

tar Cases and Bags

If you plan on gigging a lot or travelling on planes/trains etc.

I recommend buying a guitar case, otherwise a padded gig bag

will do just fine. The Kinsman guitar cases and guitar bags are

a very good quality and are also one of the most popular. The

Kinsman guitar bags come in three grades.

1) Standard - hardly any padding and one small pouch for music

books and accessories 2) Deluxe - quite well padded, with two

pouches 3) Premium - extremely well padded, with large and small

pouches and a shoulder strap.

The Kinsman guitar cases are made for Stratocasters,

Telecasters, Les Paul shape, electric, acoustic or bass guitars.

Gui

tar tuner/pitch pipe

There are hundreds of guitar tuners to choose from on the

market. The best brands in order of popularity* are:

Korg

Stagg

Yamaha

Intelli

Seiko

Qwik Tune

Boss

Ibanez

The two guitar tuners that stand out from the rest are the Stagg

Automatic Guitar/Bass Tuner and the Korg GA-30. These two guitar

tuners are sold more than any other guitar tuner on the market.

Guita

r Strings

It's always wise to have a spare set of guitar strings to hand.

You never know when one will brake and leave you in a difficult

situation. You will need to buy steel strings for electric, bass

or acoustic guitars and nylon strings for classical, Spanish or

Flamenco guitars

Here is a list of the top brands of guitar strings, in order of

popularity*:

Ernie Ball

D'addario

Martin

Fender

Elixir

GHS

Augustine

Earthwood

Dan electro

Gibson

Markley

Newtone

Savarez

Rotosound

Darco

Dean

Elites

Thomastick

Tonesearch

Maxima

Warwick

Rickenbacker

PRS

Legacy

John Pearse

DR

Eff

ects pedals

For some groovy sounds you will need to buy an effects pedal.

The two most popular are the Jim Dunlop GCB-95 Original Cry Baby

Wah Wah Effects Pedal and the Ibanez Tone-Lok Series SM7 Smash

Box Effects Pedal.

Here is a list of the top brands in order of popularity*:

Ibanez

Jim Dunlop

Korg

DigiTech

Vox

MXR

Yamaha

Dan electro

Amp

lifiers

Amplifiers are used with electric guitars, bass guitars and

electro-acoustic guitars. You will need to buy a lead to connect

up to your guitar. There are many types of guitar amplifiers

ranging from the smallest which is normally 10 watts up to 500

watts! or more:

Practice amps (these are normally quite small) Standard amps

(used for playing in bands or gigging) Bass amps (used only with

bass guitars) Keyboard amps (used with electronic keyboards and

stage pianos) Mixer amps Speakers and Monitors Combo amps (also

known as combination amplifiers) Amp heads

Which brand of Amplifier do I choose? There are a number of

brands of guitar amplifiers, here is a list in order of the most

popular*:

Marshall

Fender

Vox

Peavey

Laney

Line 6

Mesa Boogie

Kustom

Crate

Carlsbro

Ashdown

BB Blaster

Yamaha

Warwick

Dean

Crafter

Cruiser

Danelectro

All guitar amplifiers sound different. Some (like Marshall and

Line 6) are good for Rock and Roll, others have a softer and

less bright sound like the popular Vox amps and Mesa Boogie.

For beginners, I would recommend either the Peavey Backstage or

the BB10 blaster amp. The Peavey Backstage is by far the most

popular and best value for money beginner's guitar amp on the

market.

Gui

tar stands or Guitar Hangers

There are lots of different types of guitar stands, it really

depends on which stand is more suited to you. There is the

standard guitar stand, the universal guitar stand, the auto grab

guitar stand, the double and triple guitar stand and the wall

mounted guitar stand. The standard guitar stand is the most

popular and comes in three different types: i) electric/bass,

ii) classical and iii) universal.

The most popular* brands are:

Stagg

Hercules

QuikLok

Giraffe

Warwick

Fender

String Swing

Ibanez

Ple

ctrums also known as picks

Plectrums are very cheap and can be bought individually, or in

packs. Most commonly you can buy plectrums on the web in packs

of 6. Guitar plectrums come in different gauges. Usually the

thinner ones are used with Classical, Spanish or Flamenco

guitars, the medium gauges with Electric and Acoustic guitars

and the thickest ones with Basses.

There are lots of brands of plectrums. The most popular* are:

Stagg

Jim Dunlop

Fender

Gibson

Gui

tar Leads/Cables

Guitar Leads normally come in different lengths: The most common

is the 15 feet/4.5 metre leads. This length is ample if you are

playing in a band.

Popular* brands of guitar leads/cables are:

Ibanez

Peavey

Stagg

Gui

tar straps

If you want to buy a gift for a guitarist, there is nothing

better than a nice leather guitar strap.

Levys and Gibson are the most famous brands of guitar straps,

Levys have the most comprehensive selection. Other guitar straps

to look out for are Dickies and Wrangler.

Gui

tar Capos

A capo is a clamp that you can use on different frets of the

guitar to change the pitch of the open strings. Each fret on the

guitar is a half step. If you place the capo on the 1st fret,

all of the open strings will sound a semi-tone higher than

normal, this makes changing the key of a song easy. Dunlop and

Shubb are the most popular* guitar capos.

Gui

tar Slide

The guitar slide is a tube of some hard material about one to

two inches long. Commonly, it's made from glass and metals. Each

type of guitar slide has distinct characteristics, tonality, and

overall sound. The guitar slide is pressed lightly against the

strings so as not to touch the strings of the fret, producing a

sustained tone which can be varied in pitch by moving the slide

across the neck. A quick side-to-side motion is often used in

this way to generate vibrato. The most popular brand to go for

is Dunlop.

Headph

ones

If you want to play at home but don't want to disturb your

neighbours, then a good set of headphones is recommended. Any

headphones will do, so take your pick from any of the following

leading brands:

Acer

Acoustic Research

Advance

Advent

Aiwa

AKG

Alpine

Altec Lansing

Amphony

Apple

Artwizz

Audio-Technica

Behringer

Belkin

Beyerdynamic

Bluetake

BoomGear

Bose

Bravo

British Telecom Clarion

Compucessory

Cornbow

Creative Labs

Denon

Design Go

Direct Sound

Dolphin Music

Etymotic Research

Fostex

Franklin

Gainward

Gemini Sound Products Genius

GN Netcom

Grado

Griffin Technology Grundig

Hama

Harman Kardon Hewlett Packard

Jensen

JVC

Jwin

Kenwood

Kinyo

Kondor Limited Koss

Labtec

Logic 3

Logitech

Macally

Maxell

Ministry Of Sound MM Gear

Nady Systems

Nesa Vision

Nike

Numark

Olympus

Panasonic

Philips

Pioneer

Plane Quiet

Plantronics

Power Acoustik

Pyle

Pyramid

Roland

Rosen

Samson

Sanyo

Sennheiser

Shure

Skull Candy Sony

Stagg

Stanton

Starvision

Technics

Toshiba

Trust

Ultimate Ears Ultrasone

Unwired

Vestax

Vic Firth

Vivanco

Wharfedale

XO Vision

XtremeMac

Yamaha

Zalman Tech

Met

ronome

If you want to play your guitar in time then you are going to

need to buy a metronome. You can choose from modern electronic

metronomes or traditional mechanical metronomes. Traditional

metronomes look very nice and are made from either plastic or

wood, they are also known as pendulum metronomes because the

ticking sound is produced by a small pendulum that swings back

and forth, much like the old Grandfather clocks. The Traditional

wooden or plastic metronomes tend to be a lot more expensive

than the electronic metronomes.

The leading metronome brands in order of popularity* are:

Wittner

Korg

Yamaha

Seiko

Qwik Time

Cleaning and maintenance (polish, nut file set, wrench set,

fret file set)

To look after your guitar you will need to at least buy some

guitar polish. Gibson produce a good guitar polish and also

Doctor Ducks Axe Wax is very popular. If you are serious about

guitar playing then you might want to have a nut file, fret file

or wrench set. You can keep your guitar in top playing condition.

Footstool

The guitar footstool is used mainly by Classical, Spanish or

Flamenco guitarists. Their style of playing and the way they

hold the guitar makes the use of a footstool quite important.

Stringwinder (also known as a pegwinder)

If you have lots of guitars, own a guitar shop, or tune guitars

on a regular basis, the guitar stringwinder comes in handy as a

real time saver. Instead of turning the guitar pegs by hand, you

can use the stringwinder to speed up the process.

Straplok set

For replacing the bolt that holds on your guitar strap.

Power adaptor for effects pedals

If you use effects pedals then you will need a power adaptor to

connect to the mains.

If you are ready to buy some guitar accessories you can find a

comprehensive selection here: Guitar

accessories, tuners, bags, cases, guitar strings, stands and

more...

*Please note that the above article makes references to guitar

accessories listed in popularity order. The popularity order of

these guitar accessories is taken from www.Soundsmusical.com -

the leading UK musical instrument website.

I hope this article has been useful and you are now more

informed about guitar accessories.

About the author:

About the Author Henry Genry is known as 'The Music Guru' and is

the chief writer at Soundsmusical.com. Henry has spent his whole

life in music. He has played various musical instruments to a

very high standard, learnt to build pianos form scratch, tuned

pianos professionally and run several music and internet

businesses. He loves to share with everyone his experiences and

immense knowledge of music. Henry hopes that the above guitar

article will