Selsaral

What's wrong with Gibson Studio, Fender HWY1 and other low priced MIA's? Nothing. Unless you're at TheGearPage where unless it's custom shop it's garbage (that was a joke). They are all American-made, right? Why do some people dont like them? We're picky bastards. Also some of us are snobs. Does it mean: high price = high quality, low price = low quality? This used to be a fairly solid guideline, but it's becoming less true over time.

For precise picking like lead stuff, I have to anchor. I rest my hands on the strings out in front of the bridge so that on a strat I pick in between the neck and middle pickups. I also rest my hand this way to palm mute and keep noise down. I use it to mute the strings that would normally make a lot of noise as I release bends.

Start buying amps instead then.

I fingerpick on acoustic songs, but I pretty much only use a flatpick on the electric. For acoustic fingerpicking songs, like Babe I'm Gonna Leave You, or Landslide, IMHO you gotta fingerpick it.

Snappy New Guitar Day! That pickguard is the stuff! Yeah I gotta say it grabbed me too. Also there's a sweet tint on the neck.

Nice! I know the purists hate it, but for me the single coil bridge of a Strat is unusable. So, it's a wasted position for me unless there's a HB in there. I'm kinda with you. But I also played a great Reverend with a tele style single coil in the bridge. That was actually a sweet guitar and with the 2 neck/middle strat pickups had a great combination of sounds. It didn't nail the Fender sounds but it did sound very good. Now I have GAS for that damn thing. Here's a pic of that one:

Fender Deluxe Lonestar Strat. This guitar has the spanky, quacky neck sound that I had been searching for, and I love the humbucker in the bridge. My band plays covers so that versatility is incredibly useful. It rocked the house at band practice the other night. Sits in the mix, cuts through, everything. I used every pickup position (except 4) to great effect depending on the song. Blows away my previous Squier in every way, from fretwork, to finish, to sound. I churn through guitars, buying and selling, learning as I go, but I have a feeling about this guitar. I just have a crappy cellphone pic.

DRRI is what I am gassing for.