The $400 question.

Well a squire strat, or a new or used Epi LP is a good solid bargain that's for sale almost anywere new or used. I have a VOX ad30vt that can make about any noise I want, and loud enough to drive you out of a room. Many other brands of 20-30 watt hybrid modeling amps out about the same range. Pick your brand new or used. Toss a distortion, or OD pedal in the mix if you got a deal or two and rock on!!!!

The elderly can mostly self hydrate. If guitar skills had anything to do with it what's actually needed is a nylon string acoustic and Tears in Heaven.

Still, that would take the fun out of the thread. Not quite sure what $400 can get you, it's supposedly about £240, but things coming this direction tend to arrive with the '$' rubbed out and a '£' written in.

I'll vote with s1120, modelling amp (Fender Mustang I, because I've got it): in this budget you probably can't fit a nice tube combo. And that leaves the question of what guitar fits in the budget. Pacifica 112 might not fit in that (except maybe second hand - you don't have to buy stuff new). These guys quite liked the Ltd EC50 which has a nice classic look, but a similar price. Otherwise Squier or Epi, probably avoiding the bullet/junior end of the range (haven't tried them, but wondering just what they sacrifice to be that cheap). That or a bit more on the guitar, a Pathfinder 15R and a drive or chorus pedal to taste if there's change left.

I'd do this guitar
http://www.rondomusic.com/product4659.html

and this amp
http://www.musiciansfriend.com/amplifiers-effects/marshall-gcs-marshall-mg30fx-1x10-1x10-gtr-combo

Keeping in mind that when I was the age to be in this scenereo I would be trying to impress her by playing Stairway to Heaven.

@ TRguitar, thanks for the links, I was hoping more people would share links to their picks. But, I think you would be utterly disappointed with your picks as a new guitar player and that is kind of the point I was getting at. There is a glut of decent guitars you can get for around $200 but very few decent amps and I think we can all agree that a good amp can make a lousy guitar sound good, but the best guitar in the world will only sound as good as the amp it's run through. First time guitar buyers always suffer from this; they save up and buy the most expensive guitar they can afford and and squeeze in an amp for whatever change is left over. The amp is usually a 5w distortion box with a speaker. So, you have an amp that can do little more than add distortion or a handful of effects and make the guitar louder. What happens when you meet up with a drummer? An earlier post mentioned the Vox VT30, it's a good sounding amp but I had the vt50 and I can tell you it can't keep up with a drum kit without clipping badly. And in my case I was playing with a professional drummer, inexperienced drummers on cheap kits tend to be on the louder side. If you find yourself with the opportunity to play with a drummer you'll be standing there holding a sweet guitar making a nearly inaudible humming sound. "maybe, you should try brushes." you'll say to the drummer, and he'll say, well I can't post what he'd say.
My suggestion to any beginner or first time buyer with $400 in there pocket is to buy as much amp as you can get. That's not to say get the amp with the most bells and whistles or the most wattage. I would try to get the best clean sound possible in an amp that's loud enough play with a drummer. So, you buy a super cheapo guitar, one of those first act things at Target even. It might not play great or sound great and you might have to tune between every song but at least you can be heard. Its easy to fix the short comings of a cheap guitar, it's nearly impossible to fix and amp that started life as a dud. Not to mention, it's a hell of a lot easier to make a loud amp quieter than to make a weak amp cut. And you can gain a lot more from a difficult guitar than a flatulent amplifier. Give any good guitar player any guitar and a decent amp and they'll give you something, there is only one thing that can make any guitar sound bad regardless of who made it or how much it cost and that is the schmuck holding it.
I recently got a Jet city 20w single channel amp. I bought it used for about $230, I've modded the hell out of the thing but it was perfectly usable and loud stock. You can get the two channel combo or a 1x12 stack for around $400. I have used my amp in the studio with a drummer and was able to get a nice clean tone to cut. I know a lot of people like the bugera and the VHT amps. I see blues Jr's and other nice used fender tube amps for under $500 bucks all the time. The fender Chorus is another solid state amp that sounds fantastic and I see those for under $200.
Another thing to consider is resale value. The epiphone LP's and those awful SG400's, MIM strats, and every other sub $500 guitar I can think of; you will never see a return on them. The second you get them home they are worth no more than 50% of what you paid for them. For $400 you can realistically buy an amp you could use as long as you play guitar that could at least retain its value or close to it (not the modeling amps most likely, technology improves too quickly).
That said, there are plenty of great guitars to be had for a paycheck. I have nothing against them but knowing what I know now I would have hoped someone would have imparted this on me. With out an amp your electric guitar is a really bad acoustic and with a crappy amp your '59 les Paul is a $50k kazoo.

Fine. If a 50W amp can't keep up with the drummer then what do you think you need and can that actually fit into this budget? There are handicaps either way, get the cheapest guitar you can find and it will be incredibly hard work, especially without the experience to fix it up a bit. I do like TR's suggested Agile, definitely looks the part, which is I'm sure part of the requirements here.

But, I think you would be utterly disappointed with your picks as a new guitar player and that is kind of the point I was getting at.

I know I wouldn't be disappointed with the guitar choice. I have one of those guitars and they are bang for the buck. Grover tuners, wax potted pickups, low action and solid switch and jack. I've played a good may guitar in the $100 price range and the frets cut your fingers, they hum and don't stay in tune. Lets not even talk warped necks, you can't fix those. As a beginner your guitar needs to be playable or you will be discouraged. I like my Agile AL2500. It cost me $225 and compares favorably to my Gibson Les Pauls.

I agree a good amp is the important part but on this budget I don't see that happening. You would need the whole $400 to get a decent amp. I've got a Peavey Valve King I paid that for and it is a decent amp. Maybe you could find one of those used.

Maybe we should rework the scenereo. Your away from home, you can't get your gear sent to you and you have a chance to gig with a band. You have $400 available to buy a rig, what do you get? I know I can buy a guitar at a pawn shop for $100 that I can get up and running for few bucks more. I would look used for an amp but to get the power I need I may have to settle for solid state and a decent distortion pedal. Is this what you were getting at?

This point has been brought up here before. I will share with you my thoughts for the beginning player. And I stress beginner.

First, a decent guitar that is playable and stays in tune (Why? Because a bad guitar will frustrate me and I will quit)

Second, a practice amp with a decent tone to learn how to play (Why not the bigger amp? Because I stink and nobody wants to hear me much less hear me play loud. A Marshall stack won't even sound good with what I am doing to the guitar)

Third, a bigger better amp, giggable and quality sound (I've learned to play and it is time to think about joining a band)

Fourth, finally the quality guitar (I deserve it!)

Ah yes. Notice I said get a loud amp and not to be too concerned with wattage. Not all 50 watt amps are created equal. It really has more to do with the efficiency of the speakers as every increase of 10db gained, or twice the perceived volume, requires 10x the wattage. (so a 100w amp is only twice as loud as a 10w amp) Also, tube amps handle volume better. A tube amp driven hard will distort in a very appealing way, solid state amps don't like to work at their maximum. I have an 18 watt Marshall clone that will kill you, yet my 50 watt Vox avt50 couldn't hang in anything more than a coffee shop setting, if that. Most inexpensive amps have pretty lousy speakers, a lot more of us should consider replacing our speakers than guitars and pickups and tubes and stuff. Even more of a case for the smaller tube heads over a combo. But I think a lot of companies are just completely full of S**T regarding their RMS wattage or at least they're padding the numbers. Perhaps my AVT50 has a RMS of 50w @ 2ohm but the cabinet is only loaded at 16ohm, in fact that would make a lot of sense. Fender and Kustom seemed to get pretty creative with their numbers back in the day. On the other hand Peavey seem to underrate their amps strangely, I'm not a fan of Peavey's tone but I've played 150 watt-ers that seemed like 1 billion watts.
And yes, Some cheap-o guitars will be hard to play. But I promise you, a $50 guitar with a $40 set up will play as well as a just about any $200 guitar as long as there is nothing mechanically wrong with it.

No, I agree about the Agile, fine guitars. I meant the experience would be ruined by the puny little amp. I should have cleared that up.

I still don't agree with the crappy little amp as a first amp, if no one wants to hear you, turn down. If you get the dinky little amp to learn on than you get better and you want to play ensemble (that's french!) you have to buy a new amp and you've wasted money. Buy a usable amp in the first place, practice at low volume, get better, turn up, get rich, get girl... That's my thinking. Those dinky things are great when you finally start jamming with people and playing out and you get a rehearsal space and you don't want to lug your combo on the express every night. (Newbie tip #1 Only leave your equipment at a locked rehearsal space, never ever ever ever at a mates house and under no circumstances should you ever leave anything with a drummer unless you want to get it back pregnant or not at all)

But i didn't mean to dis your pick (it did sound harsh) i should proof read or have some one else through first. I like the Agiles and more so I like and respect TRguitar, I feel like he's my posting cohort.

Hey, I just thought of something ........ $99 clearance Fernandes with a $35 set or Grover Rotomatic clones I put on it through an Epiphone Valve Junior half stack with a Korg G3 multi FX unit from the early 90's that I would value at less than $50. I think it qualifies for under $400. (The VJ was $99 for the head and $99 for the cab back when I bought them. The prices did go up)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-sgLSNj8co&feature=channel&list=UL

Keeping up with my son's 300 watt GK bass stack. (He is playing a $400 Jackson through a $800 bass rig)

You gotta respect the Jr. it really kicked off the small tube revolution. I have seen the combos go for under 100. If you picked the amp up used you might have enough left over for a tube and a speaker upgrade.

OK...so Im not in a band, so I may be a bit clueless... But being a guy starting out will spend 90+% of his time woodsheding in his bedroom, dropping almost the full piggybank on a big honker for that maybe 10% of the time seems a little backwards. There are a lot of good sounding smaller amps out there that are good sounding,that if you do get that high school gig, can be miked with the PA. If your playing somewere without a PA..... well your going to need to get yourown anyway for the band....so just plan to mike that small good sounding amp. I DO agre that a lot of the amps people start with are junk, and sound like crap. But there ARE a lot of smaller good sounding cheaper amps out there. Also a new player is not realy going to know his sound yet. He may know what he WANTS to sound like.... but I think we most know that that changes as we progress in learning. Spending big money on a amp, that may not have the sound you grow into is money not well spent. A few of those extra bucks into a guitar that makes them look foward to picking it up might be the better way to go.

I think there are a lot of variables that go into the equation when you have to make a choice like this and everyon;e variables will be different.

I started with a cheap guitar and an even cheaper amp. At the time I had no aspirations other than maybe playing in my basement playing along with some CD's.

The amp I had (a Fender 10 W) wasn't even that good for that.

Now I am in a band have both a Fender Hot Rod and a JCM 900 I still mostly pracice unplugged.

My point..I'm not sure.

I think there are a lot of variables that go into the equation when you have to make a choice like this and everyon;e variables will be different.

I started with a cheap guitar and an even cheaper amp. At the time I had no aspirations other than maybe playing in my basement playing along with some CD's.

The amp I had (a Fender 10 W) wasn't even that good for that.

Now I am in a band have both a Fender Hot Rod and a JCM 900 I still mostly pracice unplugged.

My point..I'm not sure.

I started with a pretty good guitar. It was a long term loan of a nice MIM strat. Realy a nice player, and good feel to it. A nice "real" guitar as aposed to others I was pricing out in the low end range. With that I had one of those cheap Marshal, battery powerd amps. SOunded like crap, but as cnev said... frankly most of my pratice was unplugged anyways. I moved up to that VOX AD30VT and have been mostly happy. Granted Ive never played with a drummer, but its pretty loud cranked up!!! I normaly play the watt knob cranked down, with master and vol up full to get the sound I want.... and quite enough to not wake the house. In my settings anyways maxed out, is pretty darn loud, and unless im outside, I dont do it. As a player still learning the ropes, and seeing my sound/tastes change as I progress, I will be shopping in the future... Not that im outgrowing the VOX... Im sure it would do whatever I want, but just have to mic it... but im getting a feel for what I want to sound like, and Im sick of all knob twisting to get it.

Many relatively dinky amps have the option of running a line into a PA & using stage volume as a monitor. If the school has a PA -- floor wedges would help too -- you might be able to get away with something smaller & (relatively) less expensive. (I've done this to make a po-boy bass rig: My Line 6 Pod 2.0 into house PA AND my puny bass head, at the time was a crappy Hohner PA head I got for free, then into a two-way wedge of my own for stage volume. Worked for the small clubs I played.)

You won't be getting anybody's hormones in a twist for a while in any case if all you did with the flattop was "lovingly plunk it for a few weeks."