So I met Paul Reed Smith today

[LeftyCatton]

Came in to work today to find Mr Smith was paying us a visit....

What a nice dude! I've got to say that the enthusiasm and belief that man has in both his products and their continuous development, is pretty special! Apparently he's 57, not that you'd ever know, just a ball of energy and excitement!

Had a really interesting chat with him about what makes a special guitar special and a dud a dud, which was very interesting to hear his take on it.

Also got some cool stuff planned

....now if only I could find a nice lefty singlecut....

Luke

 

[AndyK]

Sweet! He seems like a tone nut, in a good way. I love watching his videos describing guitar wood, frets, pickups, etc. He puts a guitar down, and gets side tracked listening to the sustain!

 

[Metlupass2]

Cool. Where do you work?

 

[Bob Savage]

It's great when someone loves and believes in what they do.

 

[LeftyCatton]

I work at GuitarGuitar just south of London.

Yeah I get the impression he's dragged his brand kicking and screaming right to the top! Definitely the driving force behind it all!

Luke

 

[Aristocat]

I heard (and this may be unsubstantiated) that Paul used to give away prototypes to get them seen/heard by the masses. The guy definitely has a drive though given the success of his company. Great business model too keeping his ship tight and constantly revamping his line and allowing it to only get better.

I've played PRS SA guitars all the way up to 'real' Custom 22/24 and DGTs the quality is so top notch.

 

[brianiac5150]

I had the pleasure of meeting him several years ago ('97, I think) in a music store I was working in. He was a great guy. He had a friend with him who was experiencing some hearing problems, so PRS (himself) handed me his credit card (his name was on it) and asked me to go get a good in-ear monitor system for his friend. Rang everything up, handed him the bag and he handed it to his friend, who was really surprised, thankful and excited. Great to see someone like that helping out a friend. Super down to Earth, friendly guy, excited about music and his guitars.

 

[RG955TT]

Would love to hear his thoughts on this...could you tell us please per your quote below? Thanks

"Had a really interesting chat with him about what makes a special guitar special and a dud a dud, which was very interesting to hear his take on it".

 

[the rossness]

I was at a GC and he was doing a clinic. He seemed nice and douchy. He was egotistical about his products being better than everything else out there and frankly, they're not =]

 

[ampjunkie]

You don't get to his level being wishy washy about your product

 

[Jeff Hilligan]

Some of his first guitars were played by Derek St. Holmes and Nug!

 

[LeftyCatton]

To summarise he was basically saying that there is only a finite amount of energy you can put into an instrument, let's call it 10. The instrument can then only subtract from that by absorbing the energy in some way. He told me to think of a good guitar as putting 10 in and getting 9.8 put and a bad one as putting 10 in and 2 back out. So with this theory, he said there are about 25 separate things he has changed on his guitars to reduce their subtractive nature to a minimum.

We did a few back to back tests and messed around with some components, and gave chatted about the results. It was just a nice fresh way of looking at whole "tone" conversation.

Luke

 

[PeteLaramee]

I met him a few years ago at benefit. He played a few songs with the band. He sounded great for "Cause we ended as lovers." You could tell he really worked on that one.

He was very nice and told a few interesting stories about the guitar player for whom the benefit was held. He definitely had command of the audience.

 

[JTyson]

To summarise he was basically saying that there is only a finite amount of energy you can put into an instrument, let's call it 10. The instrument can then only subtract from that by absorbing the energy in some way. He told me to think of a good guitar as putting 10 in and getting 9.8 put and a bad one as putting 10 in and 2 back out. So with this theory, he said there are about 25 separate things he has changed on his guitars to reduce their subtractive nature to a minimum.

We did a few back to back tests and messed around with some components, and gave chatted about the results. It was just a nice fresh way of looking at whole "tone" conversation.

Luke

Thats an interesting analogy. It would explain a lot

 

[JTyson]

I met him a few years ago at benefit. He played a few songs with the band. He sounded great for "Cause we ended as lovers." You could tell he really worked on that one.

He was very nice and told a few interesting stories about the guitar player for whom the benefit was held. He definitely had command of the audience.

Great song

 

[moronmountain]

To summarise he was basically saying that there is only a finite amount of energy you can put into an instrument, let's call it 10. The instrument can then only subtract from that by absorbing the energy in some way. He told me to think of a good guitar as putting 10 in and getting 9.8 put and a bad one as putting 10 in and 2 back out. So with this theory, he said there are about 25 separate things he has changed on his guitars to reduce their subtractive nature to a minimum.

We did a few back to back tests and messed around with some components, and gave chatted about the results. It was just a nice fresh way of looking at whole "tone" conversation.

Luke

Thats an interesting analogy. It would explain a lot

Yeah but it's probably a crock of mythical bs lol! Sounds neat though.

 

[thiswaythatway]

I heard (and this may be unsubstantiated) that Paul used to give away prototypes to get them seen/heard by the masses. The guy definitely has a drive though given the success of his company. Great business model too keeping his ship tight and constantly revamping his line and allowing it to only get better.

I've played PRS SA guitars all the way up to 'real' Custom 22/24 and DGTs the quality is so top notch.

When he was first starting out he brought his prototypes with him. In an interview he stated he was trying to get his company off the ground and drove into NYC with some prototypes and brought them to Sam Ash. Ritchie Ash, grandson of Sam, directed PRS to go see a manager who loved the prototypes Paul had an he ordered a shit ton of guitars on the spot from PRS. This helped launched the company and PRS may have tanked if he didn't get the order from Sam Ash.

 

[thiswaythatway]

I was at a GC and he was doing a clinic. He seemed nice and douchy. He was egotistical about his products being better than everything else out there and frankly, they're not =]

For strictly quality if you go into GC PRS is the best you can find. Take your average LP standard off the wall and a typical PRS and the PRS usually wins for detail, quality, etc. I'm not talking tone or what someone feels they prefer, just craftsmanship.

I think the Anderson's and Suhr's of the world are as good or better than PRS though, but they're not what you typically see in GC.

 

[Ventura]

To summarise he was basically saying that there is only a finite amount of energy you can put into an instrument, let's call it 10. The instrument can then only subtract from that by absorbing the energy in some way. He told me to think of a good guitar as putting 10 in and getting 9.8 put and a bad one as putting 10 in and 2 back out. So with this theory, he said there are about 25 separate things he has changed on his guitars to reduce their subtractive nature to a minimum.

We did a few back to back tests and messed around with some components, and gave chatted about the results. It was just a nice fresh way of looking at whole "tone" conversation.

Luke

Thats an interesting analogy. It would explain a lot

Yeah but it's probably a crock of mythical bs lol! Sounds neat though.

As hokey as it sounds, I can relate and understand exactly what he's getting at. And it's not just instruments, it's everything...

Guy's deep. This is cool. Makes me like him and his product even more.

 

[RedRider]

He is a VERY cool approachable guy. He hung out and talked with my wife and I for a while at one of the PRS Roadshows where I provided some BBQ...LOL...I told him I would trade BBQ for some crabcakes from his neck of the woods any time he was ready... He is EXTREMELY passionate about how guitars are constructed and tonal properties of wood and what not.

I LOVE his guitars...however his dealers, there are a few that I think should be in jail...but the guitars themselves I would put my PS up against any 22 fret, non floyd guitar out there...no hesitance whatsoever...