This is how my new guitar sounds

[hubird]

You are not wrong...

[garyb]

you don't think guitar pickups are microphonic? you haven't been around real instruments much...

[hubird]

no reason to be sarcastic
Actually I decided not to react on that one, as I didn't feel sure about the subject.
I know a speaker can mike, and I know air vibrations of a voice activate the strings and therefor the pickup, but with all my pleasure you could be right on this one
I'm just interested in the scientific explanation of the 'effect'.

[Nestor]

My Tele sounds amazing! This is a fact! It is made of mahogany, which sounds really great! This is a fact! I love it, this is yet another fact!

It is a factual fact that if a guitar sounds really fat, it is because there is a factory that knows what they are doing to facilitate the factualism of its factorship reality. The facade is not the most important thing in a guitar, but the materials, which are factfully very important to the faculty of sounding cool facing my ears. A facelifting might be good, but wood is more important than facetious electronics. Wood is not a fraction of the sound, but a facetiously indispensable part of the timbre of a given guitar, and the factorlike facutualness of this thing, is reality. We can say facultatively so, that a guitar sound is the result of its factorums, being wood, or the construction material, the most important of them all.

In a few words we could simply say that all these statements of mine are a factful fact, and well…, this is a fact

[hubird]

Can you explain me the reason behind the bodyless el. instruments?

[wayne]

There is a kind of resonant feedback loop between wood and string, it is a two way street. It adds extra information, as well as a feel when playing.
When I was looking for an instrument, my bass stood out against all others for it's acoustic tone when unplugged, and a comfortable feel when handling it.

Graphite guitars seem to suit the era from which they come - 80's & 90's were about cleaning up that dirty old sound and deodourising the funk. A Steinberg bass feels dead in my hands - I would injure myself trying to get some tone out of that! Whereas this particular old Fender has always got something more to give, teaches you things along the way, and gets better and better with age.

I love this symbiotic aspect - a violin maker will often use a virtuoso to break in a new violin for a time, to teach the wood the right way to sound, and start settling the right way.
Tubas, on the other hand, just get more corroded until they die and someone hangs them on the wall of a pub

[garyb]

there's the comments of someone who has played real instruments.

it's like asking if there's a difference between analog hardware and a vst plugin. yes, they're the same, but yes, there's a difference. what's the difference between one strat and another? they both are made of the same materials. there will be a few out of every batch of 100s that sound especially good. the only thing that is really variable is wood. being a living thing, every tree is different and various parts of the tree are different.

hubird, i was never meaning to speak scornfully. seriously, when you play with things a lot, you notice things. not knowing that guitar pickups can be microphonic really does speak about one's experience with them. depending on how tight the windings are on the bobbins in the pickups, they can get VERY microphonic. in fact, that's part of feedback. to control this, guitar pickups are dipped in hot wax(good ones usually are anyway) so that the windings don't vibrate and become microphonic, at least not too much.

the whole guitar is a vibrating thing. certain woods will fabor certain overtones and make a fatter or sweeter or thinner tone. bodyless guitars and basses can still have good sustain and can still play the same notes, but anyone who is a seasoned player and plays one will tell you that the sound is a bit thinner. on the other hand, they're usually graphite, a material that is quite resonant, but evenly so. as wood tends to favor certain overtones, graphite does not. that means that the tone can be quite even up and down the neck, even though it may not be quite as "sweet" or vocal sounding. depending on the music, eveness in tone might be preferrable to any alternative. also, bodyless instruments will be lighter. in the case of graphite, it really needs to have a small body because graphite is quite heavy.

[Nestor]

There is a kind of resonant feedback loop between wood and string, it is a two way street. It adds extra information, as well as a feel when playing.
When I was looking for an instrument, my bass stood out against all others for it's acoustic tone when unplugged, and a comfortable feel when handling it.

Graphite guitars seem to suit the era from which they come - 80's & 90's were about cleaning up that dirty old sound and deodourising the funk. A Steinberg bass feels dead in my hands - I would injure myself trying to get some tone out of that! Whereas this particular old Fender has always got something more to give, teaches you things along the way, and gets better and better with age.

I love this symbiotic aspect - a violin maker will often use a virtuoso to break in a new violin for a time, to teach the wood the right way to sound, and start settling the right way.
Tubas, on the other hand, just get more corroded until they die and someone hangs them on the wall of a pub

Apart from being a clear answer, it sounds like a poem to me, beautiful, thank you

[Nestor]

A Steinberg bass feels dead in my hands

I was interested in on one of those instruments a time ago, and it happened the same to me, when I tried it I felt disappointed, it sounded like a can with strings. They are good for some slappy songs, when you need a bright sound, but then forguet about it.










By the way, my old and death Wasburn Status S70 1000 Series is like your Fender is, it would get better and better with the years, like a good red wine, and the reason for its fantastic sound was Its body, which is a maple neck through with walnut added to the "wings" and It's fingerboard extracted from the central ebony, which is the strongest and blackest, with jumbo frets, a very powerful combination to spread sharp sounds.

[fra77x]

Well i discussed the subject with my friend and yes garyB is absolutely right. The microphonic effect of the coils is a common knowledge between guitar players. My friend also told me that the vintage coils weren't covered with wax and they had very much microphonic effect. So if that is the case, the body colorizes and affects the sound way more than with the situation of electromagnetic induction only. Mechanical disturbances are also taken place. So thanks for enlighting me on that subject.

[garyb]

it's true! it's all about wood!


but it's kinda disheartening that you believe him and not me....

[fra77x]

Knowledge needs some time to take its place. Of course i believed you, but until the end i hoped you were wrong. Guitarist ego, it's normal

If you check the posts in that thread you will see that i have found the wax thing in an article in wikipedia after you told me about the microphone effect, but before you explain the wax thing yourself. So i knew you were right when you said that.

But because i play guitar from my 6, and of course i remember my coils to react on pick hitting or whatever other noises but i haven't distinguised the microphone function, i wished you were wrong. My friend just insured the new knowledge... I haven't made the test myself, but there is a latin motto which says 1 tester, zero tester (unus testis nullus testis). 2 testers and up you have a truth....

Regards

[Nestor]

Well i discussed the subject with my friend and yes garyB is absolutely right. The microphonic effect of the coils is a common knowledge between guitar players. My friend also told me that the vintage coils weren't covered with wax and they had very much microphonic effect. So if that is the case, the body colorizes and affects the sound way more than with the situation of electromagnetic induction only. Mechanical disturbances are also taken place. So thanks for enlighting me on that subject.

Honestly, for anyone who has been playing guitars and basses for a long time, the topic it is as obvious as being aware of the existence of tables in a restaurant... only people that have never been to a restaurant can question the existence of tables in there... I'm glad you finally got there...

But hey, you have a virtue that I recognize and appreciate enormously: you know how to learn and you are ready to change your mind on the fly, all my respects to your genuinely intelligent way of going on in life It's a pleasure talking with people like this.

[garyb]

there are not many reasons to blindly accept what i say!

it's (almost)always good to test information.

[Nestor]

but it's kinda disheartening that you believe him and not me....

He he... Good point... hilarious...

[Nestor]

there are not many reasons to blindly accept what i say!

it's (almost)always good to test information.

Most interesting is when the exact same information comes from oneself, without being aware that there are other people saying the same thing, which is what happened for me in the first place. I first knew these facts for myself, as a player and as a luthier, and then found out that many others had discovered the same facts I discovered too.

[fra77x]

@ Gary

wikipedia + my friend = 2 testers

I will do the test someday, i don't really care about the usage of the guitar as a mic



@Nestor

My friend i play faster than your brain can comprehend musical notes. I eat fast too. Be happy with your new present. I can make any piece of wood sing, and any piece of electronic shit sing. So beat it...

[Nestor]

@Nestor

My friend i play faster than your brain can comprehend musical notes. I eat fast too. Be happy with your new present. I can make any piece of wood sing, and any piece of electronic shit sing. So beat it...

for the first two phrases: don't burn your fingers and try not becoming too fat

Well, I'm crazy with my present already! I'm a child, and this............................., well.................... this................ is a fact!

[fra77x]

It's evident. But not a child. Childish...

[Nestor]

It's evident. But not a child. Childish...

No, before having it in my hands, I was like this:



Now that I have it in my hands, I'm a child with a Tele like this: