Fender and Mattel team up

[boingboing]

Originally published at: Fender and Mattel team up | Boing Boing

…

[mr_raccoon]

Ah the symbol of boomers voting against increasing the arts budget for local schools and then using the money from they saved from that towards a new wall decoration.

[DiveGirl]

Is this a revamp of the “Wheels or Doors” conundrum?

I’d say there’s a bigger market in Fender-oriented Mattel items (Rocker Barbie? Matchbox music-adjacent vehicles?).

[belovedvillain]

I’m a Fender player and appreciate custom wacky axes, but this collection feels weird. Sure because it’s Hot Wheels there are tons of finishes, etc, but the whole concept is whack (to me).

And, there’s no Jazzmaster variant, but there is that flying-V lookin’ thing. SMH.

[SpaceGhost]

This is like making a jewel encrusted pacifier. If I have 10,000 to blow it’s not going to be on something that makes me look like a 5 year old while I’m holding it.

[Papasan]

$10K for a nice paint job, but nothing under the hood experience. No thanks.

[FSogol]

Yeah, I want a guitar that looks like it came out of a Happy Meal box.

So instead of looking like this:

You look like this:

[WedgeAntilles]

I can’t say I’ve ever looked at my guitar collection and said, “what this needs is a Hot Wheels themed guitar.” I’ve also never paid $10K for a guitar. If I do ever pay that for a guitar, it will almost certainly be for something vintage. At the $10K price point for new guitars almost everything is novelty (usually a “signature” model; i.e, a knockoff of some famous player’s guitar). Quality instruments just don’t cost more than $5-6K at most.

[_osivot]

Next BoingBoing will link to a video of Rick Beato explaining why the Hot Wheels Fender is one of the greatest guitars of all time.

[generic_name]

This is like the recent trend of “numbered, limited edition, colored vinyl LP” reissues. So you pay through the nose for a record that doesn’t sound any better than before, and doesn’t have any extra tracks or even a booklet.

Will anyone actually play these things?

Fender makes good guitars, but $10,000-good is more like a rare violin or D’Angelico or Benedetto handmade jazz axe. You can even get a Fender Custom Shop guitar for half that price.

[Fef]

Came to say the same. I love Fender guitars, but this whole thing looks like a bizarre misfire.

Worse, I fear what this will bring in the future: $20,000 Gibson Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Special Editions. Paul Reed Smith Captain Planet axes. Where does it end?

[VeronicaConnor]

I can hazard a guess at who their target market is for this. There’s a certain flavour of middle-aged white man who has money now and “always wanted to get into music”. They spend huge sums of money setting up music rooms full of mixers, Macs running ProLogic, custom guitars, effects pedals and so on. However they never actually play anything. They just buy the toys of the trade and rearrange them at length. I follow a few people like this online (for other reasons- they are writers, academics, or whatever) and it’s a genuine pattern. It’s the same person who buys a $1000 camera and $8000 in lenses because they have a passing interest in photography (but never take a photography course or, really, take more than a handful of photos).

[hecep]

If these ever show up in Norm’s Rare Guitars, I’ll throw up.

[FGD135]

I seriously expected Barbie’s Dream Stratocaster^TM and now I’m… not disappointed as such, but a little bit sad.