Do you know what today is? It’s the day you can begin pre-ordering your Squier controller from Best Buy. And ordering through Best Buy is going to be your Best Bet for picking up this controller…because, according to a post from Joystiq yesterday, Best Buy will be the only place you can get the Squier.

At the moment, Fender’s own site shows no indication of this new development, and they still have the pre-order date listed as January 1. So it’s possible that this is a miscommunication or misunderstanding (though the press release from Best Buy is quite clear). But best to be safe, no? Here’s the preorder page at Best Buy.

[UPDATE: That was fast! Fender's site now instructs visitors to hit up Best Buy for the pre-order. Also, check out ricecake's comment below: The theory is that Best Buy may have the Squier exclusively at launch -- but not necessarily forever.]

On the other hand, if you’d rather rock out button-style, Mad Catz is currently running a pretty sweet deal on Mustangs: Pick one up through their site and you’ll get a (five-button) P-bass controller for free! You can also get the same deal if you pick up the five-button wooden Strat. And as an additional incentive, if you order a keyboard, you get a stand thrown in for free. Check out the Holiday Specials page at the Mad Catz store.

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Looks like Best Buy is throwing their weight behind the Fender Squier Strat controller for Rock Band 3. Joystiq reports that the retailer has announced they’ll be offering the guitar/controller hybrid earlier than the original launch date of March 1 — though they haven’t said how much earlier.

And that’s not all: You can pre-order at Best Buy or BestBuy.com starting December 15, two weeks before the initially announced preorder date of January 1. Yep, that’s a week from today. Best get your finances in order.

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Hey, have you picked up a Rock Band 3 Mustang controller yet? You have? And do you have a Mac? You do? Well then, you’ll probably be interested in this How-To I wrote up for my friends over at Mac|Life. In it, I walk you through all the steps necessary to record very real-sounding guitar with this “fake” controller. Stick with it ’til the end and you’ll even hear a sample of my work.

In case you’re wondering, the sample at the end is the same piece recorded once, but processed three different ways. The first is a live recording with the Mustang powering the Clean Electric software instrument. The second is the guitar processed in the ways I laid out in the article. And the third is that second sample accompanied by the first sample, but with the instrument switched to Swirling Droplets. Neat, huh?

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Here’s a curiously offhand remark from UK industry pub MCV:

Next year, the [Rock Band 3 peripheral] line-up will be complemented by a £219.99 full-string real guitar that goes one better than the realistic-looking Mustang controller.

I say “curiously offhand” because as far as I know, neither Harmonix nor Fender has confirmed the price before now, and you’d think that if MCV had the scoop they’d package it with a bit more fanfare.

But if this is true, this probably means a price somewhere in the $260 to $270 range — almost definitely not the $350-ish that £219.99 converts to. The Mustang, for example, retails for $150 in the U.S., and will be going for £125 in the UK. So figure about a 20-percent increase in dollars over pounds and you end up with something around $265.

My personal guess would be $259, which would allow players to pick up the necessary $40 MIDI controller and still be “under” $300. I’m trying to get some confirmation from Harmonix, but until we hear from them, let’s take this as a very tentative possibility.

UPDATE: Tommy at RockBandAide spoke to Harmonix’s John Drake, who says the £219.99 price refers to the new version of the five-button Wooden Strat Controller. This…does not bode well for affordable pricing of the Squier.

[Read, via RockBandAide]