Anxiously Awaiting

Playing guitar is an interesting hobby. It’s intriguing to watch how people approach different facets of playing. For example every person has their own opinion on what the “perfect” amp and the “perfect” guitar setup is; even down to the seemingly irrelevant things such as which guage of strings to use. The naive guitarist–often young in his or her playing ability–often doesn’t think of things such as body wood, pickup height, action, string guage, and neck wood. At one time, I was the naive guitarist. My focus was on sounding like someone else: Metallica, Stevie Ray Vaughn, Joe Satriani, Eric Clapton, Led Zeppelin, Foo Fighers, my list of musical phases is quite long. These days I have focused more on building my own sound; much of which requires a decent chunk of investment captital, a rock solid resolve when things go wrong, and the will to experiment.

Physics is a wonderful science because it is applicable to nearly every physical thing in life. Since I’m a nerd (ahem, see blog categories) I like to apply science to random things in life. With that said, many of the rules of physics can be applied to a guitar to help explain the characteristics of the instrument. For example, electro magnetics are the key to how pickups work. The body mass of a guitar can and most times will color the tone of the guitar. The type of woods involved when you build the guitar will color the tone of the instrument–energy, or the vibrations caused by the strings travels differently through different types of wood. Tightness of the neck and bridge relative to the body of the guitar dictates string sustain. The applications are many.

Why all the preface? Recently I have been tweaking the Telecaster that I have “borrowed” from a good friend of mine. I added new pickups–a Lollar P90 at the neck and a Lollar Telecaster Special at the bridge, changed the bridge out to a Wilkinson, and rewired some of the electronics. Needless to say my first attempt was good, but not perfect. The P90 was very dark and muddy, and the bridge pickup was bright and ice picky. After posting on my favorite forum, I received some suggestions on how to fix the problem. So I followed those suggestions and the gutiar gained some new life. Unfortunately, it was a little too bright. Next, I ordered a custom bridge with stainless steel saddles from Callaham Guitars. Not only did that bridge fix the typical intonation problem that Telecasters with vintage saddles are afflicted with, but it darkened the tone just enough to where I am happy with it.

I used to believe that a guitar simply is, a guitar. There is no coloration of tone because of the materials. I was totally incorrect in my thinking because I was thinking only in terms of electronics. The microphonics of a pickup is more nuanced by the tone and vibrations of the body and bridge than I had previously thought. Who would have thought that the tone of the guitar would be quite darker with a bridge that is simply .25mm thicker? Who would have thought that stainless steel saddles would add some snap to my pick attack? Who would have thought that the guitar would have picked up an additional second of body sustain and an improvement to the overall bendability/playability of the strings due to the tightness of the bridge relative to the body? Not I. I am a nonbeliever no more. Components matter.

So, I believe I am finally finished with tinkering with this guitar. It’s tone is now truely righteous in my eyes. Were I to do anything else, it would be efforts to kill the 60 cycle hum that all single coil pickups suffer from. In any event, this endeavour has been very rewarding and quite fun. Every penny spent was well spent in my eyes, even for the pieces that I didn’t use or switched out. I love this hobby, and I must say it’s quite less expensive than some others =D.