Debate: Electric guitars and tone woods?

[Mudfuzz]

Pickups on rails, that you can slide, changing their position. Patented. By me.

[Chankgeez]

.. blah blah blah.. and that is most likely why Rick Tuner and Gibson have made pickups with movable pickups...

Yo, dawg, we heard your pickups like to "move it, move it" so we made your pickups able to move while they're moving so you can move 'em while you move.

[Mudfuzz]

.. blah blah blah.. and that is most likely why Rick Tuner and Gibson have made pickups with movable pickups...

Yo, dawg, we heard your pickups like to "move it, move it" so we made your pickups able to move while they're moving so you can move 'em while you move.

[Mudfuzz]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=985d_7kQpEg[/youtube]
and no I really can't hear that much a difference..

[Chankgeez]

Just get an old dearmond thin archtop pickup with the mounting rod so that the pickup can be slid around any distance and analyze the differences.

[Achtane]

I really want to give one of my basses a sliding pickup with way more range than the Grabber...all the way from the bridge to the neck. But I can't figure out how to DIY it.

[FuzzHugger]

Pickups on rails, that you can slide, changing their position. Patented. By me.

Oh fuck you.


(I was sure it'd be done a lot, just too lazy to google. But it should be done more! Guitarists are so traditional. All pickups should plug into sockets by now. *head shaking emoticon*)

[Mudfuzz]

Pickups on rails, that you can slide, changing their position. Patented. By me.

Oh fuck you.


(I was sure it'd be done a lot, just too lazy to google. But it should be done more! Guitarists are so traditional. All pickups should plug into sockets by now. *head shaking emoticon*)

Oh you knew I would.. it's me...
But yeah I agree! things need to move forward music stores are depressing anymore... it's like nothing has changed since I was 13 other then a few gadgets... IT IS SO BORING

[Nelson Instruments]

I read this statement a while back: "change for the sake of change lacks substance"
while there were some unique instruments produced at various points in time so much of "industry" is based on the need to keep people buying things.
Fender shouldn't be in business anymore because they created such a huge backlog of used instruments that one wonders why people keep buying new fenders?!
Yet every year or so they change a pickup, add a different saddle arrangement etc and people buy the newest and greatest thing.
Gretsch was famous for that in the 60s. They felt the way to sell guitars was to have as many gimmicky things you could think of.
In the 70s guitars needed to be au naturale with brass hardware on everything and a neck made of no less than 8 laminates of different woods a.k.a the hippie sandwich.
On guild s100 guitars from the 70s if it was natural finish there was a suffix on the model number of "NB" which stood for "nature boy"
Then in the 80s it was painfully bright colors and pointy everything and 10 floyd roses on every guitar.
When you boil it down what is this all about?! Making music. Do the gimmicks actually make the music better (on a guitar)? generally not and then the fad passes quickly and people don't care anymore.
I saw a Barney Kessel interview where he was asked about his guitar (an old gibson es150 with a single charlie christian pickup) he said the sound is what he hears in his head and he loves the fact that with that guitar (as simple as it is) he can forget about his guitar and focus on the music.
I think we lose sight of that these days. With things like the fender g-dec we have turned music and guitars into amusement devices and we grow bored of them.
That's why, personally, I take a "simple is good" approach to my instruments. No gimmicks, just a guitar that plays and sounds really nice, so you can forget about the guitar and focus on the music.
We will hem and haw for years about if brass hardware is better or active electronics etc etc etc.... but how many people take the time to learn how to use diminished chords or major 9s?
Has anyone else noticed that if Eric Clapton plays a strat or a 335 that it still sounds like eric clapton?
This actually works on another level...I geek out about vintage american wood working machinery. I restore them and love using these awesome old american machines!
There have been many instances where companies would try to appeal to home woodworkers by making a table saw that also had a jointer and a sander and and and all attached to it.
Problem is when you cram all those internals into one machine it is cramped and it just doesn't do the job as nicely as a dedicated table saw.
Thinks like robot tuners sound cool but when those little servo motors burn out then what?
I say let's keep things simple on the guitar side. Let's all play the (Nelson) guitars that look and sound and feel good and let the pedals and amps do all the crazy stuff!

[Bassus Sanguinis]

Yes, the woods matter. Apparently, since my four stringer doesn't sound quite like a Music Man. And the strings and the pickups, apparently since the same four stringer doesn't sound like a Rickenbacker either, and my cheap Gretsch bass weak mini-humbuggers runs fuzzes just... differently. More single coily.

So both tone woods and electronics make the instrument. And there's the build construction design that plays a role too. Choices on one factor reflect on the other. Obviously. I feel it's about a well balanced mixture of features for a target sound.

And then there's the fx and the amps. And the Cab, of course. And the space You are playing in, and the microphone You're using to record that, and the cabs You're listening the recordings through...

[theavondon]

Also, sidebar, the "mechanism" for the grabber's pickup is like, laughably simple.

[masked elwood]

I read this statement a while back: "change for the sake of change lacks substance"
..................
That's why, personally, I take a "simple is good" approach to my instruments. No gimmicks, just a guitar that plays and sounds really nice, so you can forget about the guitar and focus on the music.
.................
I say let's keep things simple on the guitar side. Let's all play the (Nelson) guitars that look and sound and feel good and let the pedals and amps do all the crazy stuff!

amen.

[mathias]

Pickups on rails, that you can slide, changing their position. Patented. By me.

tangent: what is this bass?

[Mudfuzz]

tangent: what is this bass?

I found it in a random google image search...

[mathias]

the website for that builder is some flash crap that never loads so sucks to be them.