Most dads who play guitar fit it in late in the evening, at low volume, often on a guitar bought long before the kids. Good gifts work with that: playing quietly, playing in the living room without a tangle of gear, or finally owning the guitar he always looked at. Every pick comes from our rankings, with tonight's Thomann price.
Gifts for a guitar-playing dad under $400
Boss RC-1, $119
A simple looper pedal with 12 minutes of stereo recording: play a chord progression, then solo over it. #3 of 52 looper pedals.
Boss Katana Go, $130
A battery headphone amp that plugs straight into the guitar, with five guitar amps, three bass amps and Boss effects: full sound at midnight, nobody wakes up. #70 of 79 headphone amps.
Epiphone J-45 Studio, $385
A slope-shoulder acoustic with a solid spruce top, mahogany body and a pickup, styled after the classic Gibson J-45. #11 of 284 dreadnought acoustic guitars.
Gifts under $1,000
Yamaha THR30II Wireless, $525
A 30-watt amp with a built-in battery, Bluetooth and 15 amp models that looks good on a shelf and doubles as a speaker for music. #7 of 19 battery operated amplifiers.
Epiphone Les Paul Standard 60s, $646
The classic Les Paul shape and sound at a fraction of a Gibson's price. #9 of 249 single cut guitars.
Fender Player II Strat, $861
A Stratocaster with an alder body and a modern C neck. One of the highest-ranked guitars we track: #1 of 631 ST style guitars.
The dream gift
Gibson Les Paul Standard 60s, $2,611
A mahogany Les Paul with a maple top and a slim taper neck, the guitar on a lot of dads' bedroom posters. #2 of 249 single cut guitars.
Questions
What do you get a dad who plays guitar?
For quiet evenings, a headphone amp like the Boss Katana Go ($130). For a big birthday, the Strat or Les Paul he never bought himself.
What is a good gift for a dad who plays acoustic guitar?
A solid-top acoustic like the Epiphone J-45 Studio, or a looper to play along with himself.
How we picked. Every product comes from an AudioFu ranking, scored on demand, price, specs and brand; specs from Thomann's product data. Prices are converted from euros at the European Central Bank rate and updated every night, as are the ranks.
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Denis Kataev runs AudioFu. Every night the site records the prices of more than 38,000 instruments and studio tools at Thomann, and he writes about what those numbers show: what got cheaper, what just arrived, and which discounts are real.
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