Tonewood doesn’t matter

Chromatizm said:
I know if you give me 10 different guitars, 9 of which will have old strings, rusty and out of tune, and one will have brand new just-ot-of-packing set, I will pick this one every time
I will simply decimate 10x times better guitar simply because of strings
The point is - one should be careful when trusting his ears

Someone in this forum told a nice story of buying a Black Cat amp which sounded INCREDIBLE in store, and mediocre at home. Happens with guitars too :) My teacher once told me - if you went to buy a guitar OR amp, and you've found a perfectly good guitar, BUY BOTH!
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I have the opposite experience: even with months old strings a good guitar will still feel better than a bad or mediocre one with brand new strings
 
lol - "everything matters" is a pretty safe statement in any context - I'm not quite ready to give PRS a "brilliant award" for stating it in relation to guitars.
 
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sprint said:
"everything matters" is a pretty safe statement in any context
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It is, that's why I'm more interested in if this is something ACTUALLY manageable and fully predictable, or up to a chance.

The video with Greg Koch is awesome in this regard - were those four sounds are actual original intention, i.e. were builders "hearing" exactly those sounds and made a guitar to a sonic template, or they simply did the best they could with the materials they had, and got something "about right" because some sorts normally would give you that "kind of sound", but the end result is still up to too many variables they cannot actually control.

From all I've seen so far it seems to me that the chance in the king when it comes to guitar building - but I might be very wrong.
Pretty much like the stories that from X number of Marshalls only one will sound amazing, and the rest are just... Marshally tones.
 
Chromatizm said:
It is, that's why I'm more interested in if this is something ACTUALLY manageable and fully predictable, or up to a chance.

The video with Greg Koch is awesome in this regard - were those four sounds are actual original intention, i.e. were builders "hearing" exactly those sounds and made a guitar to a sonic template, or they simply did the best they could with the materials they had, and got something "about right" because some sorts normally would give you that "kind of sound", but the end result is still up to too many variables they cannot actually control.

From all I've seen so far it seems to me that the chance in the king when it comes to guitar building - but I might be very wrong.
Pretty much like the stories that from X number of Marshalls only one will sound amazing, and the rest are just... Marshally tones.
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If it has wood in it it is not fully predictable. If you want to get as close to predictable as possible the cost goes up because the wood selection criteria gets very picky. And by picky I don't mean "tone wood" I mean wood that is as close to the same grain ,density ,weight.
 
Well Well here we go a gain let me put my input in to this one for the ones that think different wood makes a difference aah sorry to break your bubble but marketing is a beautiful thing thats how company's make their money I want the ones who believe this nonsense and go to you tube
and punch in jim lill he took this subject to a hole new level of science not only on guitars but also guitar cabinets and amps and so on
watch the guitar video one to the end and you will be crying why did i spend so much money booo hoooo!
 
snidrof said:
Well Well here we go a gain let me put my input in to this one for the ones that think different wood makes a difference aah sorry to break your bubble but marketing is a beautiful thing thats how company's make their money I want the ones who believe this nonsense and go to you tube
and punch in jim lill he took this subject to a hole new level of science not only on guitars but also guitar cabinets and amps and so on
watch the guitar video one to the end and you will be crying why did i spend so much money booo hoooo!
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Punctuation matters. Good luck with your troll post.
 
snidrof said:
Well Well here we go a gain let me put my input in to this one for the ones that think different wood makes a difference aah sorry to break your bubble but marketing is a beautiful thing thats how company's make their money I want the ones who believe this nonsense and go to you tube
and punch in jim lill he took this subject to a hole new level of science not only on guitars but also guitar cabinets and amps and so on
watch the guitar video one to the end and you will be crying why did i spend so much money booo hoooo!
Click to expand...
Utter BS.
 
Here's the thing i have built guitars in the past still have one that is 36 years old now made of Honduras mahogany also have a Ibanez rg 1750
which is made of base wood over 10 years old took bridge pickup out of it and put it in the 36 year. old one and "WOW" to my sup-prize they
sounded like TWINS what I'm getting at is, pickups will make a slight difference in sound but not super drastic remember that your pickups are facing outwards not inwards capturing string resonance not like a acoustic guitar which takes the resonance of hollowness in within the body
try this for a experiment strum a acoustic guitar away from your body in other words don't let it touch you body and you will see it resonate
even more so imagine a solid body that is resting against you how much more deadening muffled or however you want to put it .
I have a Gibson Les Paul 1978 mahogany which i changed pickups in it a few times and yes it did change some what but remember the BIG OPERATING 'WORD" HERE IS CHANGED PICKUPS . you really want to see a difference try changing your guitar SPEAKERS and you will see
a significant change. So to put this into perspective your choice of wood is not going to change heavenly much especially in recording .
Reason for me to have more than 1 guitar is more for comfort and inspiration. as you can see always experimenting with everything these cabs
in the photos i built have different speakers in them. one is designed for AXIII and other is standard celestion so yes i have to say speakers make
a huge difference in shaping your tone.
 

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snidrof said:
Here's the thing i have built guitars in the past still have one that is 36 years old now made of Honduras mahogany also have a Ibanez rg 1750
which is made of base wood over 10 years old took bridge pickup out of it and put it in the 36 year. old one and "WOW" to my sup-prize they
sounded like TWINS what I'm getting at is, pickups will make a slight difference in sound but not super drastic remember that your pickups are facing outwards not inwards capturing string resonance not like a acoustic guitar which takes the resonance of hollowness in within the body
try this for a experiment strum a acoustic guitar away from your body in other words don't let it touch you body and you will see it resonate
even more so imagine a solid body that is resting against you how much more deadening muffled or however you want to put it .
I have a Gibson Les Paul 1978 mahogany which i changed pickups in it a few times and yes it did change some what but remember the BIG OPERATING 'WORD" HERE IS CHANGED PICKUPS . you really want to see a difference try changing your guitar SPEAKERS and you will see
a significant change. So to put this into perspective your choice of wood is not going to change heavenly much especially in recording .
Reason for me to have more than 1 guitar is more for comfort and inspiration. as you can see always experimenting with everything these cabs
in the photos i built have different speakers in them. one is designed for AXIII and other is standard celestion so yes i have to say speakers make
a huge difference in shaping your tone.
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The Troll has escaped.
 
fcs101 said:
Honestly I was shocked this thread made it to page 7 before one emerged. I've sort of been watching to see how convo would go. It's been pretty fair up to now.
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The stupid thing is wood matters but" tone wood" is as much marketing BS as saying only the pickups matter. Most people here have been around long enough to totally get it but every so often someone escapes from TGP and post here.:tearsofjoy:
 
Andy Eagle said:
The stupid thing is wood matters but" tone wood" is as much marketing BS as saying only the pickups matter.
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That needed saying. The phrase “tone wood” gets raised as a straw man by people who like to stoke the fire and watch it burn. There is no kind of wood that's officially designated as “tone wood” except by some guitar maker’s advertising literature.
 
One of the things I've really enjoyed lately is seeing how some manufacturers and builders are starting to use more "non-traditional" woods and other materials. I'm not sure I'm ready to embrace synthetics (just me personally), not that there's anything wrong with using them, but I love seeing bodies, necks, and fretboards made from things other than maple, mahogany, and rosewood. I think there is a great potential for some unique, great sounding, and beautiful instruments and that sounds like an exciting prospect to me. I think it also emphasizes the importance of the builder being able to work with the given material to bring out its best qualities. Doesn't always make for easy mass-manufacturing, but I applaud the bigger companies that are taking the initiative.
 
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