The controversial gear thread

[$harkToootth]

WALTDOGG AMA?

[tremolo3]

He got page #34 all for himself, I think he'll be okay now.

[waltdogg]

[friendship]

Nonperson in a world of antipersons.

that's a safe position to be in

[$harkToootth]

Corey, for band names I get 'Tommy Soy and the Boys'

[MechaGodzilla]

if a person and their antiperson collide they either fight or fuck

[Kacey Y]

Corey, for band names I get 'Tommy Soy and the Boys'

How about Coy Roy Malloy and The Soy Boys? Debut album: Soothing Noise Toys

[$harkToootth]

Coy Roy Pity Live In Soy Boy City: Agency Ethics, Sources of Normativity, And Soyness In The Contemporary Forum Landscape: An Introduction

[$harkToootth]

From the author of 'The Word Salad Cook Book'

[gringostar]

if a person and their antiperson collide they either fight or fuck

Yes

[MechaGodzilla]

Corey, for band names I get 'Tommy Soy and the Boys'

How about Coy Roy Malloy and The Soy Boys? Debut album: Soothing Noise Toys

released on the Boys Noize label

[lost in music]

We could serve La Croix and broiled bok choy to the hoi polloi at the album party.

[Kacey Y]

We could serve La Croix and broiled bok choy to the hoi polloi at the album party.

[Hobbes96]

Chirping in 35 pages late. Whenever I pick up a guitar, I go into with the understanding (or perhaps presumption) that music is objectively un-objective. Ignoring the gear debate, music is defined solely socially. We might agree that the basic idea of music is communication through sound, but what we perceive to sound good is simply to the result of social conditioning.

I think the best example of this in western music is how we perceive Maj7 and 7 chords. Initially people thought these sounded dissonant and wrong, but we grew accustomed to them over time so we know recognize them as legitimate. People also used to think vibrato (even in classic settings like opera) was wrong. Another good example is overdrive and distortion. Prior to the advent of electrical amplification, these sounds simply did not exist. Even after amps were invented, people tried to avoid overdrive as much as possible because it was the sound of electrical failure. The same goes for tape or vinyl, or any analog sound- the sound is technically incorrect, but we value it because we are emotionally attached to it. If you go read early reviews of blues or rock n roll, people called it dissonant, raucous, and unpleasant. However, innovators pushed forward, and 60-70 years later, people are still trying to recreate those sounds.

This doesn't mean those sounds are good though. People find them pleasing because they were used, and think fondly of that music. I personally don't really care for that era of music. When i pick up my guitar, I aim to make sounds that haven't been heard before. I don't want to be conservative in my music. I want to do what early pioneers did, but not recursively. I want to create a sound that hasn't been played before. I want to write songs that don't sound like what music is supposed to sound like; I want it to sound like what it could sound like.

I don't think there should be a rule book, and because i disagree with this idea, i don't think there could possibly be such thing as enhancing your tone. "good tone" is just a societal construct, one that doesn't make any sense to me. (Tone is technically just the presence of treble, and most opponents of digital criticize it for being sterile.To me, that doesn't matter.) What matters is doing something unique and expressive. Sometimes this means playing songs rooted in rock, sometimes it means going off on 20 minute of just spaceship and video game noises.

getting onto your original questions.

1) I don't care for jazzmasters because I like short scale guitars. My jaguar is fine, but i'm usually playing my sg. I think I could play any guitar tho, and it would still sound like I was playing it because I try to play a unique way. I approach the guitar as a stick that i use to make sound, i just tend to be more comfortable on the one I play the most.

2) Analog vs digital is a weird question. Sometimes, I'm looking for features an analog effect has, sometimes I want digital. Sure, maybe you can tell the difference between an analog delay and a digital delay, but does just the presence of digital pedals in your chain change "The toanz"? Definitely. So does the temperature of the room, how long your amp has been on, the barometric pressure, size of the room, etc. When I'm playing live, the size and shape of the room is definitely 98% of what changes my noise. I don't care about the 2% that comes from something like the length of my cable. When I'm recording, the microphone, mic placement, and pre-amps used has far more influence over my sound than my pedals, so if I like the general gist of something, it works for me.

3) I don't change pickups often, but when I do, it's solely for the EQ curve. I want my guitar to cut through a mix well, which means choosing something with upper mid presence. The difference between hand wound or machine wound doesn't matter to me, because even if the differences are perceptible, I'd rather spend the $200 difference on another mic, or you know, like food or rent. Even if I had unlimited money, I'd rather do something meaningful with the money like buy new shoes or help someone else out.

All in all, there is no such thing as good tone. There can be a sound that you want to have, but I think music is about creativity, and your gear should enable that. To me, creativity is about making something new and unique, and I'm sure while dumbles could get me there, so could a fender frontman. While a DMM big box probably sounds better than a Memory Toy, the difference in price simply isn't worth it to me. I'd rather pick up gear that does something completely different that what I already do, or spend the time I might spend gear shopping just working on music.

[Mudfuzz]