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Music Makers: Guitarists, Bassists and other Stringslingers
Let's talk. What do you have and what do want to have? It's holiday season....don't pretend you're not G.A.S.ing over something right now. We all do it.
Let's talk. What do you have and what do want to have? It's holiday season....don't pretend you're not G.A.S.ing over something right now. We all do it.
To be honest, I just got a bunch of effects pedals last month so I'm not really G.A.S.ing over anything at the moment. (what does that even mean?)
As far as guitars, I have a Fernandes strat with single-coil pickups that I got from a friend and fixed up a bit, and a crappy red Austin intro-model strat with single-coil pickups that has less crackle in the tone knobs.
I haven't done any professional recording yet, having just started building my first pedalboard, but I have been kicking around the idea of doing a full re-work on the Fernandes, getting new tone knobs to fix the crackle and a new faceplate to fit some humbuckers. I haven't ever played a double-coil pickup outside a guitar shop, so I'd like to be able to play with one in my home and get more familiar with the differences.
To that end, does anyone have any recommendations for reasonable-cost humbuckers? I haven't looked too hard yet, but the ones I see listed on my local Craigslist are listed at $100+ each, but all of them are "vintage" so I'm not sure how valid that is compared to new gear.
G.A.S. is gear acquisition syndrome. It's a mostly humorous take on the tendency of musicians to always want more gear.
This is my biggest GAS-related addiction. I can't ever have enough ;-D Please tell us more about your pedalboard.
Does your Fernandes strat have the sustainer system? That always seemed like a really cool feature to play with.
DiMarzio has humbuckers in the $70 range, similar for Seymour-Duncan and Fender. You might be able to find better deals on a used model, but you can expect to pay $70-$90 for a good new one. There are of course super-cheap options at places like Amazon and eBay, but I think you really get what you pay for in this area.
Gotcha! In that case, my G.A.S. is more focused on things I'll never be able to afford, like modular synthesizers. :D But I can definitely see where pedals become a G.A.S. rabbit hole very easily. They are quite fun!
I don't think the Fernandes has any sort of built-in sustain. Or at least, I can't tell if it does. Either way, the guy who loaned it to me said it has seen some gigging, and it was missing a 1/4" plug when I got it and the logo had been filed off the head. After I got a 1/4" plug installed, I brought it in to diagnose the crackling, and the guy pointed out that the pickups were wired "wrong" on the 5-way switch, so they don't switch the same way most strats do. And one of the pickups seems half dead. But it still works fine, as long as both tone knobs are at 0 lmao.
Because I don't really know the differences in pedals, I'll just list the effects I have:
Guitar -> Chorus -> Compression -> Distortion -> Boost -> Noise Gate -> Delay -> Looper -> Amp
That way, rather than focusing so much on this brand vs that brand (since I don't really care to buy other pedals now that I'm still getting familiar with these, and most of these came as a bundle from Craigslist) I can ask opinions on what to use in which order and why.
From my limited experimenting, it seems like compression before distortion seems to be the way to go, since otherwise the compressor just hangs onto those high harmonics forever if I turn the distortion way up. The compression/distortion/gate holy trinity seems to be working very well in creating a good crunchy sound though, and I've been really impressed at how even at low levels, having a chorus in-line before the distortion really widens the sound you get from the distortion pedal.
Aside from that, I'm not really sure where to put the Boost pedal. It's got a 2-band EQ (LO and HI, not sure where the cuts are) and from what I've read/watched online most people use boost pedals to get "character" out of their amps. Well, I'm plugging this crapfest into a crappy $300 used PA at like 25% volume, (#apartmentlife) so not really using it for that, so I figure the next best thing is just using it as a roughly flat +4-6db boost for soloing over existing loops/backing.
The looper I got in the CL bundle is a TC Ditto, so nothing fancy, but playing with a looper has made me realize how sloppy my timing got from not practicing with a metronome all this time. :D WAY fun though! I wish I'd started looping years ago.
Thanks for the suggestions on the humbuckers! I figured people were listing their gear at huge markup on CL, so $70-90 sounds better to me, and I'd rather get new than used anyway.
The last guitar I bought was the Reverend Sensei HB https://www.reverendguitars.com/guitars/sensei-hb
I like the sound from both pickups separately and coupled with Tone and Bass contour controls they have a wide range of good sounds to pick from. The treble bleed on the volume also provides a lot nicer sounds at lower volumes than I have found on most other guitars. I spent a couple hours and tested maybe 30 guitars from Reverend, Gretsch, Gibson, Epiphone, and PRS and this guitar had the most range, the best sound and was still affordable at $1000. It was out-performing $2000-3000 guitars in most aspects.
My second guitar is an Epiphone Les Paul Custon w/ quilt top. I want to replace the pickups and rewire it similar to my reverend but with 2 volume knobs for each pickup and a Tone and bass contour. I think I'm going to stick with the HA5 neck pick-up from Reverend but I'm not certain yet what pickup I want to use for the bridge, still more to test out. My hope is to set up the guitar for DGCFAD or CGCFAD tunings and get slightly bigger strings put on it as well.
I play through an Orange Thunderverb 50 and a 2x12 Orange Cab with Celestion V30s open back. My plan is to get a 2x12 closed back cab and play through both. I'm happy with this amp so I'm not looking to upgrade any time soon, but every chance I can get I'll test out new amps until I find one that sounds perfect.
For pedals I've bought a bunch of new ones over the last year and usually try to pick up something new once or twice a year just to keep thing interesting and keep evolving. My next 2 I'm looking at are basic Tuner and EQ pedals since I removed a modulator pedal I was using as a tuner and just having something to quickly reshape the sound of the whole pedal board sounds like an easy way to double down on most everything else I have. I also need to upgrade the board itself from some slab of wood I drilled holes into to a nicer lightweight metal one. I might possibly just get 2 boards to separate the power suppliers and fit into better carrying cases.
Nice! Always cool to hear about how a more "economic" model can out-do premiums. My first "good" guitar was a Reverend. I had a Commando GT in the bug-eyed black finish. Sold it almost 20 years ago and been kicking myself ever since.
Good luck pickup-hunting! That is one deeep rabbit hole. For what it's worth, my favorite humbucker I've found is the DiMarzio Bluesbucker. It's like the best of humbucker and P90 sounds together.
Love me some Orange amps. I have a Dual Terror head. It's my favorite amp I own. Speaking of cabs, is it possible to change the rear panel or install a new piece over the open portion and convert the cab to closed?
I could cut a piece of wood for the back of the cab and then I would have to permanently fasten it there with some screws. I'd rather just buy the closed back cab and use the outputs from my amp to have a stereo affect in the room I'm playing in. And later on possibly upgrade to playing through 2 amps and utilizing stereo effects at the end of my pedal board. I do have multiple amps and already do this sometimes, but my secondary amps don't sound as nice or blend their tone with the orange that well.
I'm a Fender guy myself. My number one is a Billy Corgan Signature Stratocaster. It has my favorite feature of any strat I've played: a through-body hardtail bridge (I never liked tremolos much.) The pickups are pretty hot too. I've recorded everything with it from heavy rock and metal screamers to clean, Nile Rodgers-esque disco licks. Just all around, it's the best guitar I've ever owned.
I recently played one of Fender's new Acoustasonic Telecasters and wow! They sound great, they feel great and it has one of the best amplified sounds I've heard from an acoustic. I want one!
I had never seen those Acoustasonic fenders before. That tele looks really cool. Reminds me of a thinline on steroids haha. Do you know how it handles a bit of overdrive? I would imagine it's prone to a bit of feedback?
I played one through a small Boss Katana amp. With the clean and crunch settings, it was fine, but the lead and brown settings did feedback some. I was probably playing too close to the amp though.
Ah nice. I rarely play with super high gain, usually just a nice transparent OD from an EHX soul food. I’ll definitely have to try one of these out!
I'm planning a build, sort of. I'm going to convert a Squier Strat into a fretless guitar, possibly with some sort extended New Standard sort of tuning. All I want for christmas is a seven-string guitar set and a cheap Chinese fretless Strat neck.
As far as complete gear, I've really been wanting Seagull's mandolin.. I played one once, it feels nice in the hand. Their dulcimer, too, more for a gaff than anything. I just love my cheap Oscar Schmidt mandolin too much to give it up to get the Seagull.
That's a nice looking mandolin. I have one of their M4 Spruce Dulicmers and it is all kinds of fun to play.
Good luck with build. Post some pics when you finish it.
I bought a basic Yamaha one 3 years ago and play it everyday, but I don't feel like buying a new one yet. That said it's quite fucked up (the neck cracked and I glued it back, the bridge is also a bit wonky) to the point I might have some intonation issues. Maybe it's time to get a new one...
I am pretty new at guitar (playing for two years) and I've been thinking of getting a looper pedal, maybe someone can recommend a good one to me?
I play the cheapest Ibanez Gio that was around with a Fender Mustang 2 and some old no brand acoustic, guess I am pretty happy with both of them, they probably are both really bad, but I didn't play better guitars so I guess I don't even know if they actually are bad :D.
The TC Electronic Ditto series is one of the most popular options for looper pedals and there are many models to suite your needs.
The Ditto is pretty well-regarded, but another option I'd recommend is buying a delay pedal. A lot of them come with a looper mode. I can personally vouch for the EHX Canyon, which isn't too much more than the Ditto if you buy it used on somewhere like Reverb.
To echo audioj, I would also recommend the TC Ditto pedal. You can get them for about $90 new or about $60 used -- be warned, I've read some bad reviews about the Ditto X4, haven't used one myself, but it seems like the standard Ditto is the one to get. It's not super-fancy, but you can overdub as much as you want; the limitation is 5 minutes in loop length, not amount of tracks to loop.
In my opinion, the only way to know for sure what's a good guitar and a bad guitar is to go to a guitar shop and actually demo some guitars. Then you will know what feels and sounds right to you. Depending on how friendly your local guitar shop employees are, you can potentially even ask to demo a setup close to what you have at home, if they have a similar amp and guitar combo. That way you aren't comparing e.g. single-coil to double-coil sound or a meaty 2x12 cab sound to a dinky 1x10 combo amp. Even if they can't match your setup, I bet you can still get good results by asking one of the employees plainly to show you the difference between a good guitar and a bad guitar -- most guitar nerds love to geek out on this kind of stuff, and if you look like you're eager to learn (and it's not very busy in the store) they will probably show you. :)
Mostly want to uprgrade/repair what I have. I need to replace the electronics in my Jazzmaster, and maybe upgrade the pickups from to stock Japanese ones (which aren’t bad actually). I don’t have a proper amp though, and I’ve been trying to decide between a Vox AC-30/15 or a Fender Twin Reverb/Deluxe Reverb.
I got a used Squire Telecaster for my wife, but it doesn’t stay tuned. It came with a nice Fender neck, but the nut needs to be replaced if I’m going to be able to use it. The stock bridge might be a source of poor intonation too.
I have a small stand-alone recording booth I’ve been recording in, but I’m just using GarageBand. Starting to feel the limitations, especially when it comes to sampling/sequencing. It would be nice to upgrade to a more professional DAW but...that’s amp money!
I feel pretty content with my setup for the moment. Using a Squier J Mascis as my guitar now and I'm getting pretty attached to it. Definitely intend on sticking with Jaguars/Jazzmasters, but this thing is good enough that I don't feel the need to upgrade to a nice Fender.
I do plan on adding a Repeat Percussion style tremolo to my board eventually, but my board is already has more than enough to keep my busy in the meantime :)
One of my saving graces when it comes to instruments is that I tend to stick exclusively to acoustic stuff (I would get way too into teh audiophile end of electric strings, and that would not be good for my wallet). With the sole exception of the electric piano (casio), every instrument I've ever owned has been acoustic. Strings wise, currently I just have an Alvarez (acoustic guitar), and I'm pretty happy with it. Most of what I play on the guitar tends to be finger-picked, so I will probably be looking into a nice Spanish/Classical guitar in the not too distant future.
But I just moved to this place, so maybe I should get a couch or TV or maybe a damn chair before I get into another instrument. Like, priorities.
As my playing has progressed I've got more and more into pedals and weird stuff than bass playing itself. I've even been experimenting with swapping out the bass for a tuba and exploring those sounds, which is always fun, but I still have a cheapo Fender bass laying around that I pick up sometimes. I don't really ask for any gear for Christmas because nobody in my family is musical enough to know what I'm talking about :P I've been eyeing either the Cathedral or the Rainbow Machine for my next purchase, I'm a sucker for ambient noisy pedals like that.