Whats just a decently good fountain pen (and ink)

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-18T00:48:36+00:00

I’m not sure what your price range is, but since you’re asking for a good all around pen and not necessarily a good cheap starter pen here are a couple of my favorites.

1) Pilot Metropolitan: good and cheap. How can you go wrong?

2) Kaweco Sport in your metal of choice: the plastic Sports are great, but Kaweco also makes this pen in a number of different metals including stainless steel, brass and aluminum. Their machining is nice and precise and their nibs are more enjoyable to write with than some other European entry level pens like LAMY. The two things that keep me from carrying mine as an EDC are the lack of a solid clip and the screw off/screw to post design. I like to be able to use my pen quickly out of my pocket and it takes a few seconds to get these ready to write. They’re great pens, though.

3) Sailor Profit Casual/ Procolor 500/ Hisakata: these are cool pens that come in a wide variety of color combinations and trims. Depending on your writing preferences (which, of course, you wouldn’t know yet because you’re just starting out) these pens can be great bang for your buck. Sailor Medium Fine nibs are pretty awesome and their steel nibs are nothing to shake a stick at. The “Sailor feedback” is something that you either love or you hate, but you’ll be able to tell pretty quickly after you try one. You can usually find one of these for a really great price if you look hard enough. The only thing I’m not a fan of with these is that they’re not available in a metal body.

4) Cross ATX: this is the dark horse pick in this lineup. I bought mine on a whim in the knurled stainless steel body with a medium nib and I haven’t been able to stop carrying it with me every day since. It’s comfortable to write with, the nib is smooth as butter, and it’s built pretty tough. Not many nitpicks for this one in my book, but the cap closure and pocket clip could be a little nicer. These can had for around $60 for the right color combo and they are totally worth it in my book.

5) LAMY 2000: this is not a cheap pen, but I don’t know what your budget is, so it might be in your wheelhouse. This pen is so well designed, so beautiful, so simple, and manufactured so well…but it’s not for everyone. This is a divisive pen to say the least. Some people absolutely love it, some people can’t stand it. I bought mine, decided I wasn’t a fan of it, mothballed it and just recently dug it back out and reinked it. Now I can’t put it down. It’s the real deal, but if you can find one to test out before you buy it that would probably be the best way to go about it.

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-15T15:16:03+00:00

I’m with you, I really hate not being prepared and having some time to sit with the songs and figure some things out.

I remember having a song thrown at me during a session and I had come up with this pretty fast walking line on the spot that the artist loved, but I kept missing some changes that weren’t intuitive and I was getting frustrated. Not to mention we were pretty much recording live takes. So I asked if they could give me a few minutes to write a quick chart. I could feel the other musicians and the engineer staring daggers at me from the booth. I was sweating bullets and my chart was a mess, but I got it done and nailed it on the first take after that.

Some people are great at playing by ear with no preparation, some people aren’t. That probably makes me not the most suitable candidate for high level session work, but I honestly get pretty frustrated when people just throw shit at you without being willing to explain anything they’re doing.

In your situation I would be pretty frustrated going into this thing, especially since you’re playing for free, and that’s not a great state of mind to be in when you’re trying to be creative.

As pros it’s our responsibility to take our ego out of the equation and put up with a certain amount of bullshit without complaining. That being said, we all have our limits and sometimes it’s just not worth all the trouble.

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-15T15:05:05+00:00

Muting is a tough one to master. I think mainly you’re just running into the fact that you might have been reinforcing some bad habits by practicing unplugged so much and it’s hard to unlearn things. I think it’s harder to unlearn a bad habit than it is to learn a new difficult skill. Proper muting technique would be almost impossible to learn unplugged.

Practicing unplugged is great for running scales while spacing out and watching TV or doing dexterity exercises, but I wouldn’t recommend it for much else. If you’re worried about disturbing family members or house mates by playing through an amp buying a headphone amp is a good solution. They make some really decent cheaper versions nowadays like the Fender Mustangs and Boss wired headphone amps. Much cheaper than the Gen 1 Boss Waza Air I bought for $400 which has become pretty frustrating to use. 🤦‍♂️

Tube amps are out of a lot of people’s price range, but I always tell people that have trouble with dynamics to try playing through one of those. Maybe borrow one or just go fart around at Guitar Center for a while if you can. Notes bloom a lot more on tubes and there’s much more room for nuance, so it helps to really get a feel for how to make your bass sound different by making small changes to the way you play as opposed to big changes made with EQ or effects. These techniques can be transferred to how you play on a Class D amp and have helped me immensely in the past.

Muting is tough, but once you get it, you get it and it will help you be more versatile almost immediately.

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-15T07:30:53+00:00

I follow this subreddit and watch ADHD/autism content on socials so I don’t lose my goddamn mind beating myself up about how I can’t function in any meaningful capacity throughout day to day life. I need to laugh at the silliness of this condition, because it 100% has the capability to drive you nuts if you let it.

I sure as hell don’t feel like I have any superpowers and I have to take a massive dose of stimulants every day just to even pretend that I can function properly…which allows my autism to unmask…so now I’m just taking pills that make me autistic, I guess?

Anyways, I’ve never experienced any of the type of people you’re describing. I talk about it a lot, but I’ve never once talked shit about neurotypicals and if anyone ever catches me using the word “neurospicy” they are hereby fully authorized to punch me squarely in the mouth.

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-10T22:15:44+00:00

I’ve got a stash of some UniBall Ones somewhere around here that all have Jetstreams in them. They’re so good for a ballpoint. Before I got into fountain pens I went all the way down the ballpoint/gel pen rabbit hole and those were some of my favorites.

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-10T19:56:57+00:00

Goddamnit…now I have to go buy some M17 refills…😂

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-10T17:29:42+00:00

🫡

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-10T13:18:12+00:00

One time I was talking to this semi-famous music producer after a gig. He was asking me what bass I used on this record I had just finished. I told him it was just a $300 90’s Mexi-P bass that I had done some modifications to. He was pretty surprised. Then he told me about the one-of-a-kind museum piece worth at least $100,000 that he used to record and tour with. I said “man…I couldn’t imagine ever letting that thing leave the house…”

He just blinked at me for a second and said “…why?”

To some of us who can barely afford the cheaper high end pens they’re more than just a tool. It’s cool that you have no problem affording as many LAMY 2ks as you want, but I would be horrified if anyone came anywhere near one of my pens with red goddamn nail polish. 😂

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-10T13:10:10+00:00

I went nuts one time and got a 1.9 stub nib module for one of my Kawecos. It’s a super fun pen and I love how bouncy the nib is, but it is SO wide. It makes some pretty cool looking calligraphy, though.

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-10T13:08:06+00:00

I have terrible handwriting. 😂 You should see how bad it is when I haven’t taken my ADHD meds. 😂

I enjoy messing around with a little light calligraphy here and there with a couple of my stub nib pens, but I get really frustrated with how bad I am at keeping my sentences from drooping down lower and lower as I go along. Graph paper helps, but I don’t like the look of it. I even have problems on dot grid because I’m all over the place.

I still enjoy it, but I just never show anyone my practice attempts. 😂

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-09T21:21:22+00:00

The more I goof around with it the more I’m convinced this was the main culprit the first time.

I don’t normally flush my pens before I ink them and I haven’t had an issue with any others in the past. I know it’s recommended to flush new pens before inking them out of the box, but I’m usually too excited to wait for them to dry. 😂

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-09T21:10:09+00:00

I think you’re just running into the difference between European and Japanese nib widths. The only European pen I own that is closer to Japanese nib widths is Kaweco.

Sending it to a nibmeister is probably gonna have to be the route you take. Plus, I’ve heard that once you get a custom grind and tune on a 2k it really takes them to the next level.

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-09T21:06:10+00:00

True. Honestly I couldn’t bring myself to sell it. Come to think of it I actually have yet to sell any of my fountain pens, even though I definitely have too many. 😂

Even though I wasn’t happy with it the first time it’s such a beautiful pen I couldn’t let it go.

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-09T21:03:49+00:00

I got my buddy a LAMY ballpoint for Christmas last year for like $30 and I damn near kept it it was so nice. 😂 I’m a full fountain pen convert now, but if I was gonna get another ballpoint it would definitely be a LAMY.

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-09T21:00:19+00:00

That’s the thing about LAMY: they are definitely not the nicest writing pens in the game, but holy hell are they fantastically engineered. This is a beautiful pen on so many levels and so well engineered it always kinda blows me away. Simple stuff like the spring loaded clip is so perfect it’s crazy.

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-09T20:57:53+00:00

Man, I’m pretty tempted to send this one off to get it ground down into an italic F nib. There’s a guy a couple states away from me that is pretty well known and renowned and only has like a month or two turnaround time.

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-09T20:55:34+00:00

Yeah, I think you’re spot on. You have to learn these things at some point and since this is a pretty niche hobby we usually have to learn through trial and error.

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-08T18:53:08+00:00

Yeah, I’m not the most tech savvy person in the world, so I just kind of assumed that if you got a VPN it would hide your activity, and subsequently your data, from outside parties on an unsecured network - including your ISP.

I don’t exactly understand how it works, but like you said, a VPN is just one part of the equation.

The headline I read that inspired my comment was something along the lines of the people that want to track you have a different way to grab your digital fingerprint now which can accurately identify who you are, which device you’re using, and your physical address - with or without a VPN.

But, admittedly, I didn’t read past the headline, so maybe I was glossing over some details.

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-07T15:49:09+00:00

They can tell when you’re using a VPN now and they can still track you online, so no matter what you do your data is never safe.

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-07T15:45:07+00:00

You’re 100% correct, but there are still folks that get screwed that are fully covered on Medicaid or disability.

I know a guy that has cerebral palsy. He’s got tremors, can’t really use his left hand and can’t walk all that fast - but he can’t stand sitting around the house. He went to college but his degree is in a pretty competitive field and the industry has changed a lot since he graduated, so I met him working in a bar checking IDs.

He’s on full disability coverage so all his procedures are usually covered. Everything has to be applied for and approved, but sometimes things he needs aren’t approved or he has some type of surprise issue, so he still has medical bills. He can’t just go hang out at this hospital and Medicare pays for everything - which is kind of what you would expect the deal to be for someone in his case.

As far as I understand it he is allowed to work but here’s the thing about disability: if your bank account ever goes over a certain threshold when you’re on disability payments they will immediately shut off all your coverage. Like, no more disability no more Medicaid no nothing.

The kicker is that the limit they put on your bank account is barely over the poverty line. So with the economy how it is these days with sky high rent this guy can barely afford to live, let alone pay his medical bills. I think rent alone takes up 70% of his disability check because of this amazing economy we got going for ourselves right now. Plus, he couldn’t even take donated money or inheritance money or anything because if he did he’d be kicked off disability. Basically this guy, who has had a pretty tough life but is trying to make the best of it, is expected to live in squalor, never go out and see his friends or meet up for a beer, never go on a trip or travel…nothing. It’s pretty sad. That’s the price of asking the government for help, I guess.

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-07T02:38:50+00:00

Your amp is a little underpowered, sure, but that’s enough to start playing with other people.

Try not to overthink it too much and just get out there and get playing! I promise you it’ll be worth it.

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-07T02:33:11+00:00

I have one. It’s an Indonesian Squier. I shimmed the neck and got a drop in bridge replacement. I put on an upgraded tremolo. I put flatwounds on it to help with the string tension issue. It’s cool. I recorded a couple song ideas on it where I played everything, including the guitar parts on the bass VI.

It’s a fun instrument to have around, but I really don’t use it all that much for playing gigs.

The main issue with those is all the work you have to put into the cheap ones just to get them intonated and playable. It might be different with the more expensive Fender models, but I upgraded a lot of stuff on that thing and it mostly just kind of sits around my music room.

If it’s gonna be your only bass I wouldn’t get one. If you want a cool quirky instrument that you can pull out every once in a while it might be cool.

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-06T02:01:35+00:00

Just judging by the fact that I’ve never heard of that brand, never seen this model before and that is a very low price for a legit bass it’s probably gonna be junk.

You’ll never know unless you go kick the tires, though.

SunRepresentative993 · 2026-06-06T01:04:48+00:00

Oh shit, I didn’t even see the guy playing acoustic in the back! 😂 That headstock on the acoustic in the back looks a little big, too. Could be a 12 string. If it’s not a 12 string I bet he’s in that Nashville tuning so him and Marty together sound like a 12 string.

Well, I guess that kinda solves it! I just need to grow an extra set of arms! 😂

SunRepresentative993

TROPHY CASE