A few years ago I gave guitar lessons. Quite a few years, in fact. In that time period I recall a few basic platitudes I developed. One was that you are either born with a natural strum or you aren’t. If you’ve got it, you can spend a couple weeks learning open chords and barre chords, and before you know it, you’re rocking out Crazy Train. If you don’t have that natural strum, however, you’re looking at months and months and maybe years of practicing rhythm and you’re lucky if you can bang out a rough Wild Thing.

One of the most common topics of conversation with my various students in those days was the differences between electric guitars. And it’s no surprise, really. When you’ve embraced the instrument and become a die-hard guitar player and lover, you tend to forget that to anyone who is a music lover without being a musician, particularly a guitarist, guitars are basically colorful shapes that produce sound. But the nuances of body shape and style, pickups configuration, amp selection… these are pretty meaningless details to the non-player.

So when the topic turned to different styles of electrics I usually simplified the discussion to start with. Putting aside a lot of the finer points and details about specialty builders, I would say there are two primary types of guitars to consider. There are the slab style stratocaster-types, and there are the hollow and semi-hollow styles like Les Paul and ES models, most often associated with legendary manufacturer, Gibson.

Now I know everyone brings up the SG and Firebird and other solid body models from Gibson. And yes, I know Fender has made some hollow and semi-hollow models. But remember, this is a simplification, and I was talking to people with little knowledge of these things. at least at the time.

There are a lot of different schools of thought on which style is better, and really, such a designation is kind of silly. The reality is that different styles of guitars are appropriate for different styles of playing, and the sonic results speak to the choice. Of course, aesthetics are important too. I recognize that we’re talking about rock and roll here. Brian Setzer playing a strat just doesn’t offer the right visual, you know?

As my playing and tastes have evolved over the years, I’ve slowly moved away from the solid, slab-body styles. I’ve never been a strat man. The models I’ve picked up always seemed to have a mushy neck with oversized frets. But I’ve been playing my original Kramer Pacer for more than 20 years. But over time I’ve moved away from the controlled, metal oriented blast from the Pacer to something more open with the teeniest bit of feedback-y sloppiness that I can only seem to pull from a semi-hollow.

So, while I never would have said I was a Fender man, I definitely gravitated toward the solid bodies in the old days. But now, when I crank to 11, I find that I’m usually reaching for my semi-hollow Dearmond Starfire before anything else.

And it looks SWEET too.