[ARCHIVED THREAD] - GD Guitarists get in here. (Page 1 of 2)
Posted: 9/5/2014 9:56:51 PM EDT
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To add to the cacophony of shit that we bicker over on this board while our wives divorce us, I present another controversial question to be solved via the hive mind.
This post from this thread got me thinking about a topic that is heated debated in the guitar world. Quoted:
Yngwie Malmsteen Strat in vintage white, its a shred machine with classic vintage Fender looks. Scalped neck, triple dimarzio humbuckers, no pot tone control, 3 pos switch, brass nut, brass saddles, extra jumbo freights, brass insert in neck with machine screw threads. Love it so glad I found one over the years, this is a 2007 Yngwie. My self at a gig 
http://i280.photobucket.com/albums/kk168/STOCKTA/FunkDaside2-23-07010_zpsf181667c.jpg Tone wood. Does it really matter THAT much? My cousin is a Les Paul fan and he stands by the idea that the Mahogany body produces the signature tone. I think its pickups, scale, hardware, then wood, otherwise every mahogany guitar would sound like an LP. Not to mention LPs have a maple cap (unless its a veneer) that bridge is mounted in. I am of the belief that Pickups, string contacts (bridge, nut, body if string through) and the pickup gap (space between the bridge and neck such as on a 21/22 fret guitar vs 24 fret guitar) have more effect on the tone than the wood itself. I think the wood contributes, but less than some people suppose. So My list Electronics>string contacts>strings>wood What do the guitar players of Arfcom think? |
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The wood makes a huge difference. I firmly believe I can hear a big difference between just between a rosewood, ebony, or maple fingerboard with same exact guitar.
And I've had one Les Paul that just sounded dead- due to the wood. Ended up selling it, and saw it for sale in another store years later as the next owner heard the same issue. PRS will destroy guitars they've completed as a PR gimmick sometimes, with cameras present, if the finished guitar has a dead tone to the builder. After wood, the next thing that matters is set neck, bolted neck, or neck through body. I really feel neck through only works well in the bass frequency spectrum. I've owned several neck through guitars and always found them sterile and too productive in an undesirable higher frequency. |
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With a electric guitar, pickups, pot values, bridge, nut, fret material, constriction method, and setup all have a larger effect than the wood does. If you look at how a electric guitar works, all of those things directly effect the strings movement or the electric current produced by the pickups, the wood only has a indirect effect which is limited/filtered by the bridge/nut/frets, and then again filtered by the electronics ......and then you can open Pandora's box by throwing a graphic EQ into the signal path before the amp or in it's effects loop
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Wood makes no difference in tone for Electric Guitars. Wood does 2 things: add weight, and look pretty.
Your sound comes from the strings, pickup, bridge and saddles. Some say the nuts and material of your frets also, I say ok but it's minor compared to the pickup. For what its worth, research it yourself if this link doesn't help you. Did a quick google to get a link. http://www.guitarsite.com/news/music_news_from_around_the_world/electric-guitar-wood-myth-busted/ Wood on Acoustic, sure, maybe, IDK, I don't play the damn things lol. |
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Quoted:
With a electric guitar, pickups, pot values, bridge, nut, fret material, constriction method, and setup all have a larger effect than the wood does. If you look at how a electric guitar works, all of those things directly effect the strings movement or the electric current produced by the pickups, the wood only has a indirect effect which is limited/filtered by the bridge/nut/frets, and then again filtered by the electronics ......and then you can open Pandora's box by throwing a graphic EQ into the signal path before the amp or in it's effects loop I don't even own pedals. Although there are a few that I want. |
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Tone is in the hands. That is a big portion of it, but wood makes a difference too... Play a maple fingerboard Strat vs a rosewood fingerboard Strat through the same amp... The difference is noticable. IMHO, scale, strings, pickups, body neck and fingerboard wood all play almost equal roles to the tone the player imparts. It's why many players can't have just one guitar. 
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Put me in the camp of body / neck wood.
most of my guitars are mahogany.....I can take the same pickups...put them in a guitar of different wood...and there is a huge difference I always start by selecting a guitar that "rings" ...i.e...I feel the vibration and sustain when I hold it and play it. This has never steered me wrong in the 40 years I have been playing. Pickups are part of the equation ...but I always have beleived the wood is a bigger factor. I have used custom wound Seymour Duncans since the early 80's wound by either Seymour himself or Maricela Juarez at Duncan.....yeah they are good....but not as noticeable as I once thought. I have several pickups that are factory stock Epiphones that are amazing. What I have found is that if the wood is not good...better pickups rarely help. If the wood is good...they can be the icing on the cake of an amazing guitar. A third component is the amp ..... lots of great guitars sound shitty in a piece of crap amp. I much prefer vacum tube amps. My amps currently are as follows: 2 - Marshall 1987 model plexis built in 1969. Set up with EL34s - they scream Hughes & Kettner Tubemeister 2 Blackstar HT-5's combine everything and you have a great sound to work with. |
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lots of great guitars sound shitty in a piece of crap amp. I much prefer vacum tube amps. My amps currently are as follows: Maybe because the AMP and Pickups (and string setup) are what give the guitar the sound? If wood gave the sound, it would sound GREAT on that amp! |
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Only the most expensive, exotic, endangered wood from the most inaccessable faraway region in the world makes the best sounding instruments. Thought everyone knew that. Only if coupled with a strap made from baby harp seal. Cables must be sealed and filled only with unpolluted air from sealed ancient catacombs. Amplifiers must be hand-wired point to point non-master-volume made from NOS components originally procured for rebuilding B-17 avionics. Fingers, wood, pickups, scale length, bridge, fretting hand technique, picking hand, amp, EQ, are all contributors to the whole sound. I still sound like me on different guitars but can discern different colorations to the sound. It wasn't until this year that I rediscovered just how much fun it can be to use a tube amp that feels "alive." |
| The sum of all the parts make a difference. Even the (filtered/unfiltered) AC that is powering your gear affects your tone. If you decide to go on a tone quest and perfect your signal chain, you will notice more and more that the smallest of things make a big difference. Often times you will hear artists say things like they prefer one battery over another and stuff like that. That isn't BS, it is real. That being said, the number one tone factor (outside of the player) is the amp. If you insist on tubes, you never loose! |
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Quoted: So a Telecaster through a Fender Twin will sound the same as a high output humbucker equipped guitar through a dual rectifier amp, because tone is in the hands? Quoted: Quoted: Tone is in the hands. So a Telecaster through a Fender Twin will sound the same as a high output humbucker equipped guitar through a dual rectifier amp, because tone is in the hands? |
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Quoted: The sum of all the parts make a difference. Even the (filtered/unfiltered) AC that is powering your gear affects your tone. If you decide to go on a tone quest and perfect your signal chain, you will notice more and more that the smallest of things make a big difference. Often times you will hear artists say things like they prefer one battery over another and stuff like that. That isn't BS, it is real. That being said, the number one tone factor (outside of the player) is the amp. If you insist on tubes, you never loose!  Salesmen must love you. |
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Quoted:
Put me in the camp of body / neck wood. most of my guitars are mahogany.....I can take the same pickups...put them in a guitar of different wood...and there is a huge difference I always start by selecting a guitar that "rings" ...i.e...I feel the vibration and sustain when I hold it and play it. This has never steered me wrong in the 40 years I have been playing. Pickups are part of the equation ...but I always have beleived the wood is a bigger factor. I have used custom wound Seymour Duncans since the early 80's wound by either Seymour himself or Maricela Juarez at Duncan.....yeah they are good....but not as noticeable as I once thought. I have several pickups that are factory stock Epiphones that are amazing. What I have found is that if the wood is not good...better pickups rarely help. If the wood is good...they can be the icing on the cake of an amazing guitar. A third component is the amp ..... lots of great guitars sound shitty in a piece of crap amp. I much prefer vacum tube amps. My amps currently are as follows: 2 - Marshall 1987 model plexis built in 1969. Set up with EL34s - they scream Hughes & Kettner Tubemeister 2 Blackstar HT-5's combine everything and you have a great sound to work with. I think that the "ring" of a guitar has a lot to do with build quality. A Squier Tele won't have the same resonance and overall "tone" of a USA Fender Tele as the quality of the materials, fit and finish is significantly different, even if the components are of similar type. All of that has more to do with string vibration and signal path. The problem is putting the same pickups in a guitar with different wood is typically not the only difference. Are the bridges the same? and of similar quality? Are nuts set up to the same degree of accuracy? also of similar material and quality? What is the age, and quality of the pots, the jack and the switch? Was the construction of similar quality, and fit and finish similar? You could solder a set of Bare Knuckles/Seymour duncans/Lollars/younameits into a squire strat and they would sound like shit compared to being hooked up inside a Gibson Les Paul standard, because the difference between the quality of the signal paths is going to have a significant difference in the quality of the sound. I agree on the amp part. I think most guitarists prefer tube amps to solid state when they can be afforded. I am not saying you are wrong, just enjoying the good ol' arfcom debate room known as GD.
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Quoted:
Salesmen must love you. Quoted:
Quoted:
The sum of all the parts make a difference. Even the (filtered/unfiltered) AC that is powering your gear affects your tone. If you decide to go on a tone quest and perfect your signal chain, you will notice more and more that the smallest of things make a big difference. Often times you will hear artists say things like they prefer one battery over another and stuff like that. That isn't BS, it is real. That being said, the number one tone factor (outside of the player) is the amp. If you insist on tubes, you never loose!
Salesmen must love you. LOL, I am speaking from years of experience and experimentation. |
| Put me in the camp that believes that wood makes all the difference. Put the same pickups in a mahogany les Paul and an imitation made in south east Asia and you can defiantly tell the diference. With that being said, the quality of the pickups does play a significant role, but it is second to quality of wood. |
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You'd be amazed at how many of the well-known Led Zeppelin songs featured Jimmy Page waling away on a shitty Danelectro. He claimed at one point that he did the acoustic part of Stairway to Heaven on a Harmony. Quoted:
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Tone is in the hands. So a Telecaster through a Fender Twin will sound the same as a high output humbucker equipped guitar through a dual rectifier amp, because tone is in the hands? He recorded a lot with a Telecaster too, yet he'd use Gibsons on stage. If tone is in the hands, why not just own/play one guitar? I mean, they all sound the same...tone is in the hands. |
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I think that the "ring" of a guitar has a lot to do with build quality. A Squier Tele won't have the same resonance and overall "tone" of a USA Fender Tele as the quality of the materials, fit and finish is significantly different, even if the components are of similar type. All of that has more to do with string vibration and signal path. The problem is putting the same pickups in a guitar with different wood is typically not the only difference. Are the bridges the same? and of similar quality? Are nuts set up to the same degree of accuracy? also of similar material and quality? What is the age, and quality of the pots, the jack and the switch? Was the construction of similar quality, and fit and finish similar? You could solder a set of Bare Knuckles/Seymour duncans/Lollars/younameits into a squire strat and they would sound like shit compared to being hooked up inside a Gibson Les Paul standard, because the difference between the quality of the signal paths is going to have a significant difference in the quality of the sound. I agree on the amp part. I think most guitarists prefer tube amps to solid state when they can be afforded. I am not saying you are wrong, just enjoying the good ol' arfcom debate room known as GD.
Quoted:
Quoted:
Put me in the camp of body / neck wood. most of my guitars are mahogany.....I can take the same pickups...put them in a guitar of different wood...and there is a huge difference I always start by selecting a guitar that "rings" ...i.e...I feel the vibration and sustain when I hold it and play it. This has never steered me wrong in the 40 years I have been playing. Pickups are part of the equation ...but I always have beleived the wood is a bigger factor. I have used custom wound Seymour Duncans since the early 80's wound by either Seymour himself or Maricela Juarez at Duncan.....yeah they are good....but not as noticeable as I once thought. I have several pickups that are factory stock Epiphones that are amazing. What I have found is that if the wood is not good...better pickups rarely help. If the wood is good...they can be the icing on the cake of an amazing guitar. A third component is the amp ..... lots of great guitars sound shitty in a piece of crap amp. I much prefer vacum tube amps. My amps currently are as follows: 2 - Marshall 1987 model plexis built in 1969. Set up with EL34s - they scream Hughes & Kettner Tubemeister 2 Blackstar HT-5's combine everything and you have a great sound to work with. I think that the "ring" of a guitar has a lot to do with build quality. A Squier Tele won't have the same resonance and overall "tone" of a USA Fender Tele as the quality of the materials, fit and finish is significantly different, even if the components are of similar type. All of that has more to do with string vibration and signal path. The problem is putting the same pickups in a guitar with different wood is typically not the only difference. Are the bridges the same? and of similar quality? Are nuts set up to the same degree of accuracy? also of similar material and quality? What is the age, and quality of the pots, the jack and the switch? Was the construction of similar quality, and fit and finish similar? You could solder a set of Bare Knuckles/Seymour duncans/Lollars/younameits into a squire strat and they would sound like shit compared to being hooked up inside a Gibson Les Paul standard, because the difference between the quality of the signal paths is going to have a significant difference in the quality of the sound. I agree on the amp part. I think most guitarists prefer tube amps to solid state when they can be afforded. I am not saying you are wrong, just enjoying the good ol' arfcom debate room known as GD.
I 100% agree on the guitar resonation. If you pickup a guitar and strum it and it doesn't resonate, don't waste your time plugging it in! |
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Quoted:
The sum of all the parts make a difference. Even the (filtered/unfiltered) AC that is powering your gear affects your tone. If you decide to go on a tone quest and perfect your signal chain, you will notice more and more that the smallest of things make a big difference. Often times you will hear artists say things like they prefer one battery over another and stuff like that. That isn't BS, it is real. That being said, the number one tone factor (outside of the player) is the amp. If you insist on tubes, you never loose! Duracell's provide so much more sustain and richer harmonics then those damned Energizers.
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Quoted: Salesmen must love you. Quoted: Quoted: The sum of all the parts make a difference. Even the (filtered/unfiltered) AC that is powering your gear affects your tone. If you decide to go on a tone quest and perfect your signal chain, you will notice more and more that the smallest of things make a big difference. Often times you will hear artists say things like they prefer one battery over another and stuff like that. That isn't BS, it is real. That being said, the number one tone factor (outside of the player) is the amp. If you insist on tubes, you never loose! Salesmen must love you. Yes is right, but he's talking about things that will only be noticed by a player who has spent a lot of time standing infront of that rig. 98% of the shit guitar players obsess over will never be noticed by people who don't play guitar or have never played with that rig.
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Quoted:
Duracell's provide so much more sustain and richer harmonics then those damned Energizers. Quoted:
Quoted:
The sum of all the parts make a difference. Even the (filtered/unfiltered) AC that is powering your gear affects your tone. If you decide to go on a tone quest and perfect your signal chain, you will notice more and more that the smallest of things make a big difference. Often times you will hear artists say things like they prefer one battery over another and stuff like that. That isn't BS, it is real. That being said, the number one tone factor (outside of the player) is the amp. If you insist on tubes, you never loose! Duracell's provide so much more sustain and richer harmonics then those damned Energizers. And the cheap dollar store alkaline batteries give you a nicer sag tone! 
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I have seen "tests" where it seemed people could tell the difference, and tests where they couldn't. However, the problem is that it is very difficult to set things up so that, between two guitars, the only difference is the wood, and they are usually not double-blind. Furthermore, lots of the same species of wood can vary greatly in density, and grain, so to say that every type of wood has its own specific sound de facto may be a bit spurious. Still, I suspect that there is, at least, some influence on the balance of fundamental and overtones from the woods used.
I have used small weights to "tune" a guitar such that "dead spots" in the neck went away, or shifted. By dead spots, I mean specific pitches that didn't sustain quite the same as others (no matter where they were played on the neck), or that sounded a bit "thinner", due to a fundamental that decayed more quickly than the overtones. Sure, the sound coming from the amp is coming from the pickup. The pickup should only be sensing the vibration of the string, which is terminated at both ends by either metal saddles and frets, or the nut. Obviously, though, the mass is altering the way the instrument responds. It seems that the way the body and neck absorb energy from, and return it to the string affect the vibrations of said string such that it alters the decay of the fundamental relative to the overtones, creating or eliminating dead spots. The balance of the fundamental and overtones must be considered to be at least part of the tone. If adding small weights to the guitar is sufficient to achieve this, I would say that it isn't inconceivable that woods of different densities / weights, and grain structures might impart a small difference. Now, I am not saying the difference is terribly significant in light of all of the other variables, particularly in overdriven or processed signals. If there is, it is certainly less of a difference than the sound of, say, a PAF vs. active EMG, single vs. humbucker, neck vs. bridge PUP, Vox vs. Engl, etc. TL/DR - the mass of the instrument changes how it responds, so woods of differing densities must have some impact. I don't know that it is significant enough, particularly in high-gain settings, to make a discernible difference, or to say that wood "x" always has a particular sound, due to variation from batch to batch. Quoted:
I 100% agree on the guitar resonation. If you pickup a guitar and strum it and it doesn't resonate, don't waste your time plugging it in! I can't say that I agree 100%. I have had some guitar that just sang when unplugged, and some that sounded like strings on a 2X4. Plugged in, however, there wasn't really that much difference. As above, resonance certainly does play a role in how the string vibrates (e.g. dead spots), but I don't think you can predict that a guitar won't sound good plugged in if it isn't inspiring unplugged. Even if your pickups are really microphonic, and picking up the vibrations directly from the body, it isn't necessarily going to be a good thing. |
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Yes is right, but he's talking about things that will only be noticed by a player who has spent a lot of time standing infront of that rig. 98% of the shit guitar players obsess over will never be noticed by people who don't play guitar or have never played with that rig. Quoted:
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Quoted:
The sum of all the parts make a difference. Even the (filtered/unfiltered) AC that is powering your gear affects your tone. If you decide to go on a tone quest and perfect your signal chain, you will notice more and more that the smallest of things make a big difference. Often times you will hear artists say things like they prefer one battery over another and stuff like that. That isn't BS, it is real. That being said, the number one tone factor (outside of the player) is the amp. If you insist on tubes, you never loose!
Salesmen must love you. Yes is right, but he's talking about things that will only be noticed by a player who has spent a lot of time standing infront of that rig. 98% of the shit guitar players obsess over will never be noticed by people who don't play guitar or have never played with that rig. That is a good point too. My cousin likes the sounds I can get out of my set up, but I sit there and tweak and nitpick all day. I like the sounds he gets from his, and he does the same. |
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Quoted: He recorded a lot with a Telecaster too, yet he'd use Gibsons on stage. If tone is in the hands, why not just own/play one guitar? I mean, they all sound the same...tone is in the hands. Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Tone is in the hands. So a Telecaster through a Fender Twin will sound the same as a high output humbucker equipped guitar through a dual rectifier amp, because tone is in the hands? He recorded a lot with a Telecaster too, yet he'd use Gibsons on stage. If tone is in the hands, why not just own/play one guitar? I mean, they all sound the same...tone is in the hands. Tone and sound are two completely different things. Different guitar/pickup/pedals/amp combos will sound different. To maximize the tone of the rig, you must have the hands.
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Quoted: Duracell's provide so much more sustain and richer harmonics then those damned Energizers. Quoted: Quoted: The sum of all the parts make a difference. Even the (filtered/unfiltered) AC that is powering your gear affects your tone. If you decide to go on a tone quest and perfect your signal chain, you will notice more and more that the smallest of things make a big difference. Often times you will hear artists say things like they prefer one battery over another and stuff like that. That isn't BS, it is real. That being said, the number one tone factor (outside of the player) is the amp. If you insist on tubes, you never loose! Duracell's provide so much more sustain and richer harmonics then those damned Energizers. Energizer Bunny plays drums = more musical !!!!  |