Fender Statocaster, USA -vs- Mex. "Remember the Alamo&q

1bassleft · Posted: Sun Jan 22, 2006 3:43 am Post subject:

ps, can't speak for guitar, but I put my bass through a 'scope during a physics demo at 6th form. Much to my surprise, (and unlike a violin earlier) it was a very boring sine wave whatever I did. Could've been my playing, though Smile

mrblanche · Jammin' Hot Joined: 28 Dec 2005 Posts: 117

Indeed, I suspected as much. My gut feeling is that a guitar string on a solid-body electric is a frequency generator and not much else. Very good guitarists have been known to disagree with that opinion, however, so we won't be betting the farm on it, will we?

But after all...if you can make a good guitar out of clear plastic, what can't you make it out of?

I would love to sit in front of an oscilloscope for a while, though.

lee_UK · Posted: Sun Jan 22, 2006 10:48 am Post subject:

is 90% of tone in the fingertips? excuse me while i trawl my nets across old worn and shagged out long past posts..

mrblanche · Jammin' Hot Joined: 28 Dec 2005 Posts: 117

I suspect most of the "tone" is how a guitarist sets up his amplifier, after he's chosen a guitar with electronics to suit his taste.

I read Santana's interview saying that PRS guitars had no "bottom" to their tone. Maybe his ears are better than mine. Well, that would be a safe bet, wouldn't it?

1bassleft · Posted: Mon Jan 23, 2006 1:11 am Post subject:

, Lee. I was mindful of the "90% fingers" three-way flame war:
http://www.guitarsite.com/hotlicks/viewtopic.php?t=440&highlight=

continuing onto the thread "Bassleft is a big bollock". Mr Blanche, you might enjoy a read of them, but I suggest you print them down and save them for that Delta flight from NY to LA. Or, if you're in Britain, the time equivalent would be a Virgin Train from London to Watford.

Back onto the thang, though, I've got a couple of points. That 6th form demo was really just a cheap, ply bass plugged into a very simple 'scope as found in a college lab ca 1981. I don't know if anyone's done something a bit more substantial in this field. A perfect experiment would be to ask Warmoth to supply me with a Tele body in each of their humble and exotic woods and transfer the same electrics to each in turn. D'ya think I'll get some freebies in the interests of investigative journalism? Very Happy

I don't doubt that the electrical side is the vast majority of a guitar's sound, even without the benefit of a zoomable frequency, amplitude display. Giving it some serious thunk, though. We all know that "sounds good even when it's not plugged in" thing we have about a nice electric guitar, yes? Of course, the pups have no part to play in this at all.

Yet, once the sound is coming out of the amp, a magnetic pickup is all about the strings vibrating over a magnet with wire wrapped around it. The darn things are even potted in wax or epoxy to minimize any microphonic interference so, really, there shouldn't be anything in it as regards body wood. At gig volumes, the only thing I can say hand on heart is that a lacquered maple fretboard has more initial attack and rosewood seems smudgier. On a bass, I prefer maple. That figures, because rosewood would have a different damping characteristic when fretted.

But, a lot of my playing is at home, low vol, with or without guitarist, and ears (even mine) are very sensitive things. Perhaps I hear a little bit of that mahogany thru-neck acoustically and it sounds different to the alder bolt-on. Perhaps I choose an instrument to suit the sound I want, then play differently because I know what I'm aiming for. Like I said, psychology and the ability to convince ourselves of something are often factors. Even more sensitively tuned pros (and Carlos, because he's actually an alien Laughing

) would be even more convinced. Plus, if a guitar looks and feels like perphooey, then you'll be certain it'll sound like it.

If I had the time, I'd muck about with the piezo saddles and plonk them on various basses. That'd probably show up a bit more.

GitBoxKurt · Joined: 11 Jan 2006 Posts: 4

Thanks 1bassleft, for your welcoming my sharing, and to not get bent out of shape by various comments of others, regarding writing, etc.

No, your mention that my tuners wouldn't be vintage wasn't taken badly by me. I appreciated your knowledgeable input, and the input by various others on the topic of tone, what matters and what doesn't.

I'm glad for that mention someone had about the various visually challenged people who read these... I hadn't thought about that, but will keep that in mind.

I personally think that there's lots of things that can affect 'tone' to some degree or not, depending on your ears, what type amp, settings, what date your grandparents came to America, and so on. (Some may or may not)

When something changes in your tone, it's easy to backtrack and see if you changed something recently (strings, springs, neck relief, and maybe tuning machines possibly).

In some recent reading I've done regarding tone, trying to learn more about it, so as to get more from my instrument(s), there seems to be so much controvery by the 'experts', famous guitar technicians, like Buzz Fieten and his Fieten Tuning system for the guitar, that I understand Washburn is equipping some of their guitars with.

He (Buzz Fieten, per Dan Erlewine's book on setting up your guitar), Fieten seems to think that a negative neck angle and/or putting a shim or two between the neck and body (in the neck cavity, but on the tuning peg edge of the cavity) will give a guitar better 'tone', Buzz Fieten suggesting or implying something regarding that 'separation of the neck and body', that the body and neck each have their own vibrational frequencies, their own tones, etc., so he believes in shimming and negative neck angle...

...But then of course, on the flip-side of the coin are the others who want to have a tight bonding of the neck to the body, the tighter the fit the better, hopefully without shims, and what Dan Erlewine in his book(s), and so many others tend to agree on, that "good coupling" contributes to good vibrational frequency transfer, better sustain, better tone, etc.

I'm not going to bother with shims unless I have to with my strat, and think I agree with Dan Erlewine on that. After all, isn't that why certain set neck guitars are preferable than their bolt on versions of the same, for tone, sustain, etc.?

I'm liking my mexi strat more each day Laughing

Happy plinkin'

1bassleft · Posted: Tue Jan 24, 2006 2:09 am Post subject:

Welcome back, Kurt. There's a point I hadn't put in my head; it's not what effect the guitar body etc has on the pups (virtually none) but what it has on the strings, I suppose. Like my example of the maple vs rosewood fretboard; I could see that as a direct effect on the string at the point of fretting. You can carry that on to the "angled headstock better than string trees" reasoning, although to a lesser extent because the nut is now in the way. FWIW, I do prefer the angled headstock, but for practical reasons rather than my ears saying something.

I'm not sure how much the terms "attack" and "sustain" are genuinely a feature of tone (people's definitions will vary) but, apart from headstock preference, I have a personal loathing for the bent piece of tin that Fender refer to as a "bass bridge". Again, a lot of it is just practicalities but I doubt if it's the last word in sustain either.

Funnelly nuff, I bought a Washburn 5-string neck (for that project #4352) which has a (1) brass plate sandwiched between the headstock layers and (2) a Buzz Feiten nut. Because I made a hash of the body routing, I haven't put it together to make an opinion. I cannot for the life of me see what's so different about this nut that it wipes away the non-ideal behaviour of strings and eliminates the compromises of a fretted neck in one stroke, but then it's not such a big issue with a (mostly) monophonic instrument like bass. Ed Roman reckoned that Washburn merely licensed the name as a sales gimmick, but then he would say that.

Could be that the resonant frequencies of the various woods (and they will differ, for sure) make their play on how the strings vibrate. Strokes chin... ought to set aside some time for a bit of research into who's done what on the subject... Still, no doubt Mr Blanche is correct in saying this is pretty minor compared with the acoustic world. Tres interesting thread, though.

mrblanche · Jammin' Hot Joined: 28 Dec 2005 Posts: 117

Call me Mike. "mrblanche" is just my initials and last name. Mister is too formal, mister!

What we would really need is some way to "capture" the signal without it being affected by an amplifier, and then analyze it in something like the machine the CIA uses to analyze voices. It can show the huge differences between the best of mimics and the subject of their mimicry, analyzing overtones, hidden frequencies, etc. Wouldn't that be fun?

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