I bought the viral Hello Kitty guitar
This guitar has had a cult following for ages, and over the last few years, I’ve found myself browsing Reverb and thinking about buying one of the original Hello Kitty guitars. But they were always so expensive for what they were. Now that Fender has re-released them in 2024, I finally pulled the trigger.
People are already trying to flip these for ridiculous prices on Reverb. I'm not sure what the secondhand market will do now the new ones have been released, but here’s how the new one stacks up against the original:
What has changed?
The original Hello Kitty guitar:
No pickup height adjustment screws
No pink on the volume knob
No pink headstock
Unfinished neck
Has the skunk stripe on the back
The 2024 version:
Adjustable pickup screws
Gloss fretboard and neck
Pink headstock with a cute little heart above the "i"
Vintage-style tuners
No skunk stripe
Pink volume knob
The 2024 version is a better-quality instrument. It's still a cheap guitar, but I think Fender have made some excellent improvements—both in terms of playability and aesthetics.
Who is this guitar for?
You’d think, judging by the Hello Kitty branding and Squier label, that it’s aimed at kids or total beginners. But then you look at the specs:
One humbucker
One volume knob
No tone knob
That’s not a super versatile setup for a beginner guitar player. You might think only having one sound would make it better for a beginner. But it’s not a super versatile sound. Unless you mess around with your amp settings, you’re fairly limited.
So maybe this guitar isn’t really for beginners at all? Maybe it’s for people like me who already have other guitars and just think this one is hilarious and kind of cool.
It’s surprisingly versatile
What I didn't expect was how many different tones you can squeeze out of it with the right signal chain. Straight into the amp, it’s underwhelming—pretty quiet and kind of flat. But with overdrive on, it comes to life. You get a crunchy drive tone that really cuts through, and when you roll back the volume, it cleans up surprisingly well. Lowering the volume even more softens the high-end, making it sound closer to what you’d expect from a neck pickup.
It's obviously a metal monster
The stock pickup is fine. It’s a basic Fender Squier humbucker. Not amazing, not terrible. But I have plans.
Here’s what I’m gonna do:
Swap out the pickup for something heavy from DiMarzio
It has to be white (aesthetic matters)
Throw on some heavy-gauge strings
Downtune it and get filthy
I’ve got enough guitars in standard tuning already. This one’s gonna be my heavy metal machine. I don’t know about you, but I think it’s perfect for it.
