# Pickups don't matter?



## Guitarjon (Dec 31, 2022)

Saw a new video by Spectre Sound Studios pop up on my feed yesterday. This time Glenn is claiming that aside from output levels, pickups don't change the frequency response. I think this test was way too narrow with the pickups that he used. If he had compared say an EMG to a Duncan the difference would have been quite noticeable.

Sure, sometimes the differences are more subtle than you might expect. If you put a bunch of Duncans side by side they often sound quite similar (but not exactly the same). I also think we can all agree that active pickups can sound vastly different than passives etc. My Fluence alone with the two voicings proves that there can be quite a difference imho.

Another good example would be the stock burstbucker 61s in my Les Paul Standard. They sounded so awful to me, absolutely no definition in the low end once you tuned the guitar lower then Eb. Replaced them with Duncans and the difference was massive. Much more clarity and less harshness. I could give many examples.

Anyway, here's the video I'm talking about, I'm curious as to what you guys think:


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## MaxOfMetal (Dec 31, 2022)

I've done my part to avoid the YouTube Guitar Influencer circle jerk, I wish it wouldn't spill over so much.

None of these chodes actually believe any of this shit, it's just for clicks and to get the guitar nerdo-sphere worked up.

It's a self feeding engine by a bunch of dipshits and the absolute most cringe part of being a guitar player.


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## Guitarjon (Dec 31, 2022)

MaxOfMetal said:


> I've done my part to avoid the YouTube Guitar Influencer circle jerk, I wish it would spill over so much.
> 
> None of these chodes actually believe any of this shit, it's just for clicks and to get the guitar nerdo-sphere worked up.
> 
> It's a self feeding engine by a bunch of dipshits and the absolute most cringe part of being a guitar player.



A lot of guys seem to take his claims pretty seriously but I agree that this has to be taken with a big grain of salt. Also that tonewood doesn't matter etc (which in my opinion it does). However, aside from Glenn's opinion, there's still an interesting conversation to be had on whether the differences between certain pickups are perhaps more subtle than we tend to think etc.


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## MaxOfMetal (Dec 31, 2022)

Guitarjon said:


> A lot of guys seem to take his claims pretty seriously but I agree that this has to be taken with a big grain of salt. Also that tonewood doesn't matter etc (which in my opinion it does). However, aside from Glenn's opinion, there's still an interesting conversation to be had on whether the differences between certain pickups are perhaps more subtle than we tend to think etc.



Anyone who plays guitar often enough to be bothered by it already knows, or at least has deeply held beliefs that a YT vid or some other dude anonymously on the internet won't change. This is the sort of conversation that takes part between guys who spend thousands of dollars to sound really close to Metallica (or whatever) for 10 minutes a week. 

But it's okay, because it's totally harmless to believe that you need pickups with hand hewn magnets made by a wizard in The Everglades to sound good. 

It's also okay to argue about this sort of shit. It's the kind of low stakes human interaction that's somewhat healthy. 

Once you realize everyone is trying to sell you something, be it a fancy new pickup, or the idea that you don't need a fancy new pickup, this sort of stuff just seems more silly.

I know you're fairly invested in this YT guitar thing, so please don't take any of what I say personal.


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## John (Dec 31, 2022)

Maybe if he could produce anything that didn't sound awful on such a consistent basis, he'd make a better point.

In Glenn Fricker-fashion (and the way of the wannabe influencer, really), it's inevitably some clickbait and grasping at straws for material to ramble on about. Not worth the time dignifying with a click, nor a subscribe, nor the time to check out rAIDS Shadow Legend. Case in point with pretty much the same vibes, he stopped by a group a few years ago just to suddenly rag on comp-ing takes and pitch correction, insisting any recorded material with either of the two is garbage with nothing actually substantial to back it up, certainly nothing exhaustive nor empirical anyway.


This will continue to remain relevant so long as he's around and/or mentioned:


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## narad (Dec 31, 2022)

I mean, I'm not going to believe this without a ton of properly done experiments (beyond Glenn's ability), given that the amount of anecdotal evidence I've accumulated. But I think one thing we could rule out wrt your initial post -- active pickups shouldn't be included in this argument (and therefore the fishmans not being a counter example), since that preamp can be doing boosting, EQing, clipping, etc. Unless Glenn wants to start talking about how pedals can't change your tone, the argument is dead there just from understanding what it means to be an active pickup.


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## Kyle Jordan (Dec 31, 2022)

Stopped paying attention after he did one of his "debunking" videos that had clear, audible in the mix differences in the guitar sound/tone right along side him claiming otherwise. 

He had some decent info on recording every now and then, but turned in to a clown. 

Learned more from Frightbox Recording in a few vids then I ever did from Fricker.


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## Deadpool_25 (Dec 31, 2022)

My experience tells me otherwise.


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## Guitarjon (Dec 31, 2022)

Deadpool_25 said:


> My experience tells me otherwise.



Exactly! The annoying thing is that once you make that claim to folks who believe Glenn, they'll say you're an idiot...

What I did find interesting though is that when I did a comparison of my own (with EMGs, Duncans and Fishmans) a lot of people said they couldn't hear a difference between the Duncans especially. I could hear a difference albeit perhaps subtle but there definitely was a difference between say the Distortion and the Nazgul. This is especially noticeable when you play them yourself.

Sometimes it baffles me a little bit how people can't hear differences between pieces of gear in general though. I had a comparison of 53 amps and some people claimed they all sounded the same while they clearly didn't. I guess it's hard for those folks to hear differences that perhaps are more on the subtle side.


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## lewis (Dec 31, 2022)

One time i went to Download Festival in the UK. Think it was 2009. Next to where I put my tent, was a guy from Scotland who had put up a full Gaezbo setup with his tent

day 2, I wake up at around 9am to someguy shouting and swearing at the top of his voice?. I went outside the tent to see what was happening and it turns out my camping Neighbor was already drunk, sitting on a deck chair, screaming at the sky. He was literally shouting for some clouds to fuck off etc.
Including giving the sun the middle finger - all this happening in a Glaswegian accent made it even more hilarious.
anyway, this random guy and his opinions on the clouds, were more informative than Glenn


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## Dayn (Dec 31, 2022)

In true internet fashion, I'm not going to bother to watch the video and proceed to comment with my thoughts anyway.

I use the same patches for my digital amps for all four electric guitars that I have. Every single one sounds different. The two guitars with different Fluences sound similar, but they _are _different (I prefer the Abasis over the Moderns). And the very fact they have multiple voices within the single pickup that sound different is proof enough.


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## Guitarjon (Dec 31, 2022)

Do you guys believe the majority of people who watch these videos believe him? Or do most of the viewers know better?


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## narad (Dec 31, 2022)

Dude, Steve Terreberry is a thing. Do not try to understand the minds of the youtube viewer.


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## Guitarjon (Dec 31, 2022)

narad said:


> Dude, Steve Terreberry is a thing. Do not try to understand the minds of the youtube viewer.



Point taken!


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## Dr. Caligari (Dec 31, 2022)

I just don't care.

I know that different pieces of gear including pickups sound different. What other people think, what some loud person screams about on youtube, that doesn't matter to me.

I use my ears and use what works for me.

I know if I said I prefer this or that guitar with a certain pickup some people would scream at me that I'm an idiot and that it doesn't make a difference. Whatever, I don't care about them.

I think it's very convenient for a lot of people to be served a truth to cling on to in a 10-minute youtube video. It makes things easy. So good for them. I like to come to my own conclusions and see what works in my situation. And I know for me, not all guitars and pickups work well. Even stuff where I think on paper it should or shouldn't work, sometimes don't behave as I expect.


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## HaydenLM1 (Dec 31, 2022)

Not much to say but, Of course there are differences!

However, i would argue that you could edit the guitars in post to make any pickup sound like another (except feel and output).

E.g., if you record a DI, before the amp sim, you could EQ the raw signal etc..!


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## CanserDYI (Dec 31, 2022)

To me most of a pickups "goodness" is it's _feel _which is lost in recordings, which is all Glen does. Have you heard the dude play guitar? I hate ragging on people for talent, but you are just _not allowed _to brag about 30+ years of playing or experience in the field of guitar, then proceed to play like that. Just not allowed. 

He's always talking about getting the best performance out of guitarists, and in my experience, a dull feeling pickup with no bounciness will get a way cruddier performance out of me. That being said, when I listen to pickup comparison videos I'm often left scratching my head if I heard many/any differences, but if I were to _play _all of them I bet Id find way more.


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## ExMachina (Dec 31, 2022)

It's clear that a lot of people commented without watching, which is fair since it's Glenn. 

His main point was that the pickup change has one of the smallest effects on the tone so maybe it's not worth it to spend a bunch of money to change pickups. For the most part, the EQ changes due to passive pickup changes are pretty small, the change in output is a bigger factor, but then again, pedals exist.

Obviously, swapping from active to passive is a big change. That's an edge case and wasn't even what the video argued about. 

As much as it pains me, I actually agree with the video . Then again, Im much more practical about guitar tone.

But dude, "tonewood", you serious Clark?


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## Lemonbaby (Dec 31, 2022)

Guitarjon said:


> This time Glenn is claiming that aside from output levels, pickups don't change the frequency response.



Not sure how he changed the laws of physics, but I don't have the time to watch the video.


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## Edika (Dec 31, 2022)

I don't agree with him but he looks a tad things from a recording perspective. In a dense mix with double or quadrupled tracks there might not be a significant difference in the recorded tone. It might still be audible, but nothing to make you say I can't record with a a Nazgul vs a EMG81. PAF's might be a different story lol. It might even be true for tube rolling in the preamp section and even changing 6L6 vs EL34.
But it makes a big difference when playing guitar by yourself or even live. The sound and feel will inspire a better performance, if you like what you're hearing. I tried several sets in the same guitar with the same strings and tuning and got different results. I even tried the same pickups in different guitars with same tuning and string gauges and they sounded different. In each case I had the difference between sets but still the sound of the instrument affected it. Even the argument that the amp makes not a significant difference he makes is silly.

But, one thing I agree with him is that the speaker and cab make a huuuuge difference. That was really obvious with your test with the Kraken and Invective were you used the IR with the Greenbacks and most people, including myself, thought the Invective did not sound good with the Invectives. Then you used the IR with V30's and it was like hearing a different amp! In live sound and recording. And the microphone has a big impact too.


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## Kosthrash (Dec 31, 2022)

Even different guitar picks (thinner/thicker, harder/softer, plastic/metal etc) make subtle differences in final tone, how come anyone believe there are no differences by changing the pickups...
However, if a guitar has already installed a decently manufactured pickup and not a cheap, mass production one, I'll try first to dial in my desired tone by using an 8 band eq pedal between the guitar & the amp (physical or modeling ones... ) and only if I don't manage to bring the tone in my liking, only then I'll change the bridge pu with a super distortion one


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## laxu (Dec 31, 2022)

Guitarjon said:


> Do you guys believe the majority of people who watch these videos believe him? Or do most of the viewers know better?


People constantly quote that Jim Lill video about guitars as fact even though it is a flawed experiment just like most of his other videos. "Tonewood" is a marketing term, but Lill basically ignored that two tables are just as much a body and neck as some guitar shaped parts. 

A lot of this stuff feeds the kind of people who:


Want to feel better that they can't afford that super pricy guitar they really want. They feel vindicated that this guy on YT is debunking this stuff.
Want to feel they are in some secret inner circle that knows how things _really_ are. This is the same type that tends to latch onto conspiracy theories too.

With pickups these days there is a whole ton of marketing though. I haven't felt that pickups get truly better beyond the Seymour Duncan/DiMarzio price range. You don't need some exclusive rare pickups wound by a bearded guru on top of a mountain. Even SD has way too many models in their lineup nowadays, targeting specific niches like metal guitarists when we used to just throw in a Custom or Distortion or whatever into our guitars and happily played the heaviest stuff with those.

At the moment I have pickups from the following brands in my guitars:


Seymour Duncan
Suhr
Kiesel
G&L
Fender
Bare Knuckle
Vintage Vibe
Wolfetone
Mastertone (an Australian active pickups manufacturer from way back)
Tesla

All of them sound good in their respective guitars. My least favorite is probably the BKP Juggernaut in my 8-string Skervesen. I don't feel it's exactly the right pickup for it but replacing it is expensive since it needs to be slanted and everything. The BKP Mule in the neck position is great.

My take is that pickups do sound different and so do guitars. Pairing the right pickup in the right guitar is when magic happens. I've thrown the same pickup in a few different guitars and it didn't sound the same.


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## Guitarjon (Dec 31, 2022)

laxu said:


> People constantly quote that Jim Lill video about guitars as fact even though it is a flawed experiment just like most of his other videos. "Tonewood" is a marketing term, but Lill basically ignored that two tables are just as much a body and neck as some guitar shaped parts.
> 
> A lot of this stuff feeds the kind of people who:
> 
> ...



Dude! Some good points right there!


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## STRHelvete (Dec 31, 2022)

Glen makes clickbait stuff to start fights with internet people who take the internet too seriously. That's how he makes his money. He's a YT music troll.
Now that being said I judge things based on recording since to me that's where the real proof is. I somewhat agree that pickups don't matter as much in the sense that in a mix you can't tell one from the other. In metal with several tracks and gobs of distortion and studio magic anything can be anything so getting super anal on pickups isn't really needed. That being said pickups DO sound different on their own and I believe a guitarist gets used to the EQ curve and feel of the pickup so they prefer it.

My go to is the SD Custom. It's on all of my guitars except one which has a Dean Time Capsule in it. Do I hear a difference? Yes. In a mix is it noticeable? Not really. It's only because I'm tracking guitars that I hear it but once the mix is done and I forget what guitar I used and stuff I have no goddamn clue what's what...BUT when I'm playing alone I prefer the feel and the EQ curve of the SD Custom, I break out the Time Capsule for some variety.

My main thing is, in an overall mix does it matter and in that context I DO agree that tubes and pickups and shit like that aren't important. Glen definitely has "old man yells at cloud" syndrome, but his main point is people do these swaps thinking new tubes or pickups will revolutionize their tone when that's simply not true. Hell the amp you use isn't even as important in a lot of situations. The right speakers and the right combination of things as well as your playing style make the real impact. In the studio anything can be anything so I've learned not to stress too much on the small stuff.

Also, kudos to you @Guitarjon for trying to be more active in the forum. You're one of the good ones, kid. <3

Oh and for the record, high priced boutique pickups is a con job and exactly the kinda shit Glen is talking about.


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## jaxadam (Dec 31, 2022)

Pickups don’t matter because the EMG 81 18 v mod exists.


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## KnightBrolaire (Dec 31, 2022)

Glen is like Louis Torres where he brings nothing actually useful to the gear conversation, he just want to clickbait people and enrage them with inflammatory statements.

I've spent the last few years on here demoing pickups in the same guitar with the same strings/pickup height, amp eq and IR choices, picks, riffs and they absolutely do make a difference. I even have a bunch of DIs floating around if people want to run them through their rig/reamp. 


The pickup's voicing is the starting point of the overall eq profile imo. While you can absolutely make pickups sound relatively similar with a 10 band eq or post processing, it doesn't mean they don't matter. Approaching pickups as a one size fits all thing is the equivalent of dialing in every amp at noon and then complaining when one doesn't sound good. It's asinine and misleading.


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## odibrom (Dec 31, 2022)

This Glen guy is a funny one. I'm personally tired of his constantly yelling but he made some points there. This video is not the best way to advertise his perspective, but I tend to agree with him to some degree. This subject is a matter of perspective and preferences, so it becomes very subjective to each one of us on how much important a pickup is in the overall sound.

Last guitar I got had a DiMarzio Illuminator set installed. I liked the sound of those pickups after my first electronics setup (new pots and switches), but there was some high frequency thing going on in those that made me sell them and get new ones on my go to formula. Aahh, what a peace of mind when the new pickups were installed, no more that annoying high frequency thing... was the tone that different? NO.

Where do pickups differ from one another? Output as said, harmonics response, compression / feel response... and obviously their "fixed" EQ curve. How hyped are these things is what makes people go mad and that's marketing. Is a BKP worth 200€? not in a life time in my opinion. A passive guitar pickup is not fairy dust made, it's just magnetized copper wire wound around a bobbin. The pickup's winding geometry (taller or wider, and the amount of winds), its wire gauge, the magnet type and strength, poles' type, shape and material (mass), its baseplate and cover (if existent) material, potting formula and potting time will all interfere on how a pickup sounds and reacts. But this is only the beginning, its distance to strings, pots used, caps used will also make a huge difference on how one perceives its tone.

Whenever I see a pickup comparison video, there always seems to lack these infos on how a pickup is setup, making said comparisons kind of nuked at start. When I play, I'm hearing a pickups' output, its EQ curve, its compression / feel, its harmonics overtones. One puts some dynamic FX (compressor, limiter, boost, EQ...) in the chain and all this goes out the window and becomes almost non relevant. Almost, because pickups are like the underpants of a guitar's overall tone and as so, they directly interfere on the player's balls/boldness/expression.

... but it's easy to sell the magic that this or that tone comes from a pickup since it's also a fairly cheap piece of hardware to swap (way cheaper than an amp or cab) and that's when the brands' marketing enters the game. For the player's perspective, pickups are one of their first tools to work with and one they cannot work without (unless they go for piezos, acoustic, MIDI or light sensors). For a producer, not so much, they're focused in overall or end of the line tone.

IMO, the cheapest way to improve a guitar's tone (which is what is spoken here) is its setup and the player's PRACTICE... and right after, the pots/caps setup, one swaps a volume pot or removes a tone pot and there's a huge difference... bigger than a pickup swap for another with similar specs and for way less wallet weight.


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## Jon Pearson (Dec 31, 2022)

Glenn reminds me of this family friend that delivered bread for Arnold (a bread company). I really wish I had video to back this up, you would all be amazed at the similarities.

Anyways, who cares about the "empirical data" or whatever Glenn is trying to do here? The experience I have playing different pickups is different. Given that the only thing that separates me from some AI music generator is that human experience, I'd say it's a pretty big deal. I know we live in a world that claims to be driven by objective scientific observation, but at the end of the day we are all still irrational creatures more driven by personal experience than charts and tables. Leave that shit in engineering where it belongs - empiricising music is one of the ugliest things a person could do.


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## technomancer (Dec 31, 2022)

It would be really nice if people would just stop reposting this crap and giving him clicks... it just feeds the circle of stupidity


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## GunpointMetal (Dec 31, 2022)

I think they do sound different, just not enough for me to not just have EMGs in everything and not worry about it.


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## Jon Pearson (Dec 31, 2022)

technomancer said:


> It would be really nice if people would just stop reposting this crap and giving him clicks... it just feeds the circle of stupidity



What else would we talk about though? I gotta get my pettiness put somehow, I got a family to think about.


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## TheBlackBard (Dec 31, 2022)

I was about to say that @KnightBrolaire has produced plenty of evidence to accurately and definitively whittle down Fricker's claim to nothing more than a chunk of steaming dog shit, but our hero arrived without anyone summoning him. KB is not the hero we deserve, but the one that we need.


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## STRHelvete (Dec 31, 2022)

TheBlackBard said:


> I was about to say that @KnightBrolaire has produced plenty of evidence to accurately and definitively whittle down Fricker's claim to nothing more than a chunk of steaming dog shit, but our hero arrived without anyone summoning him. KB is not the hero we deserve, but the one that we need.


Glenn's point was never they all sound the same. What he's saying is in a mix, the overall bigger picture the pickups don't matter. He's right in that.


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## odibrom (Dec 31, 2022)

STRHelvete said:


> Glenn's point was never they all sound the same. What he's saying is in a mix, the overall bigger picture the pickups don't matter. He's right in that.



The problem is the way he expresses that idea and what he also says between the lines... again, it's a perspective thing and therefore very subjective to each one os us...


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## Marked Man (Dec 31, 2022)

Kids, you have your own ears, you don't have to be Johns to guitar camwhores who are always hungry for clicks. Anybody's clicks.


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## STRHelvete (Dec 31, 2022)

odibrom said:


> The problem is the way he expresses that idea and what he also says between the lines... again, it's a perspective thing and therefore very subjective to each one os us...


Yep..that part. He purposely baits people into anger fits and makes clickbait overgeneralizing statements. I wish he'd just go back to acting like an adult because the shit he says makes sense (usually), it's just covered in 13 year old weblord nonsense.


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## NoodleFace (Dec 31, 2022)

I hate Glenn


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## ExMachina (Dec 31, 2022)

Guy buys 400 dollars of BKPs to replace EMGs, immediately puts OD pedal in front of amp turning 600 dollars of pickups and pedals back into EMGs.


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## Shorts_Mike (Dec 31, 2022)

If people can't hear a difference between Seymour Duncan pickups, I'm honestly at a complete loss for words


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## CanserDYI (Dec 31, 2022)

Shorts_Mike said:


> If people can't hear a difference between Seymour Duncan pickups, I'm honestly at a complete loss for words



I don't think one person in the forum said people can't hear a difference between pickups. At most people were arguing that in a full dense mix it doesn't matter.


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## Shorts_Mike (Dec 31, 2022)

T


CanserDYI said:


> I don't think one person in the forum said people can't hear a difference between pickups. At most people were arguing that in a full dense mix it doesn't matter.


In the video, theres a clip of each pickup in a mix and by itself. In both cases, the differences are very evident. I've always found the "you wouldn't hear it in a mix" argument for almost anything to be quite weak. The difference either exists or it doesn't.


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## ExMachina (Dec 31, 2022)

Guitarjon said:


> Don't forget boobs... Big boobs...





Shorts_Mike said:


> If people can't hear a difference between Seymour Duncan pickups, I'm honestly at a complete loss for words





Read that second paragraph, that's the point. You're going to end up turning a knob on the amp to counteract the differences anyway.


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## Shorts_Mike (Dec 31, 2022)

ExMachina said:


> View attachment 119035
> 
> Read that second paragraph, that's the point. You're going to end up turning a knob on the amp to counteract the differences


You can use EQ or different equipment to try to counteract some of the differences, but the fact is that the differences still exist and are quite evident when compared side by side.


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## CanserDYI (Dec 31, 2022)

Shorts_Mike said:


> T
> 
> In the video, theres a clip of each pickup in a mix and by itself. In both cases, the differences are very evident. I've always found the "you wouldn't hear it in a mix" argument for almost anything to be quite weak. The difference either exists or it doesn't.


Im not arguing there's no difference? I said "at most, people were arguing that it doesn't matter in a dense mix"  for what it's worth, I do think there are a lot of differences in that video, but most of it was going from Nazgul to something else.

At the end of the day, all the tones sounded great and I'd have an extremely hard time telling my "favorite" without playing it, because my point stands firm, the pickup is ultimately for the player. This videos' demo track, each individual one could be played to a non guitar player and I bet they'd thumbs up every single one of them, play them side to side, sure I bet they could tell a difference, but the demo track wasn't a very dense mix to be honest.


Edit: and also, just to be nitpicky, if he's changing pickups per track (obviously) do we know he's changing strings too? Did he have a lot of coffee on the Nazgul clip and was pushing through the strings harder? Was he using IR's or did he mic a cab? Did the mic get bumped? I'm honestly not sure on all that.


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## ExMachina (Dec 31, 2022)

Shorts_Mike said:


> You can use EQ or different equipment to try to counteract some of the differences, but the fact is that the differences still exist and are quite evident when compared side by side.


No one said the differences didn't exist, that was never the point of the video.


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## CTID (Dec 31, 2022)

once upon a time i was subbed to glenn's channel and used to feel like i learned a thing or two from it. once he started demoing and talking about gear that i'd personally used instead of just production techniques/gear that i'd never used, i came to realize he's full of bad faith arguments and/or completely inept at using guitar gear. 

saw this quote on reddit about elon musk that while i'd never consider glenn a genius (or elon for that matter) can be a bit apt imo:

He talked about electric cars. I don't know anything about cars, so when people said he was a genius I figured he must be a genius.

Then he talked about rockets. I don't know anything about rockets, so when people said he was a genius I figured he must be a genius.

Now he talks about software. I happen to know a lot about software & Elon Musk is saying the stupidest shit I've ever heard anyone say, so when people say he's a genius I figure I should stay the hell away from his cars and rockets.


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## odibrom (Dec 31, 2022)

ExMachina said:


> (...) You're going to end up turning a knob on the amp to counteract the differences anyway.



Jackpot! Pickups matter as much as one wants them to matter. That is, I think, the whole point which most of us are trying to stand by. In the final mix, a non guitar player doesn't really care what pickups or strings were used, only that it sounds good to his/her ears. As for the player, it matters as with some pickups things may feel too much or lacking something.

It must also be said that if a pickup has too much high end, it can be dialed down, if not enough high end, it can also be compensated further down the chain, but it's not exactly the same thing. To some, it might be a grain of salt, to others might be the world.


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## op1e (Dec 31, 2022)

You can't put "I'm fighting/not fighting my guitar" thru a tone spectrum analyzer. I had Titan neck pickup in the bridge of a cheap 7 string Warlock and it was amazing. I got rid of the Warlock and put it in an EC-257 and it was lacking somehow and replaced it with an 81-7. I played my buddies $100 Vendetta with a Dimebucker and new electronics in it and couldn't get it to move, but all my $200 guitars even stock were running circles around it. I'd put p90's in everything if I could. Make me a 7 string one and I'll lick your feet. Pretty much what John Browne said in a video while back.


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## Marked Man (Dec 31, 2022)

Shorts_Mike said:


> T
> 
> In the video, theres a clip of each pickup in a mix and by itself. In both cases, the differences are very evident. I've always found the "you wouldn't hear it in a mix" argument for almost anything to be quite weak. The difference either exists or it doesn't.



A mix can be made into anything the mixer wants. Good or bad. 

It's important for a player to feel that his sound is nailed to the highest possible degree. The extra little bit of mojo can come from different pickups. The rest is arguing with the soundman/producer, but that's a different discussion.


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## wheresthefbomb (Dec 31, 2022)

Of course they do, but there's definitely sharp diminishing returns IME. For example, I had a cheap set of dragonfire p90s in my Bari LP for years. I finally upgraded them to BKP Supermassives, which were about 10x the cost. They were better, but were they 10x better? Hard to quantify, but I lean heavily toward "no."


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## Dayn (Dec 31, 2022)

CanserDYI said:


> To me most of a pickups "goodness" is it's _feel _which is lost in recordings, which is all Glen does. Have you heard the dude play guitar? I hate ragging on people for talent, but you are just _not allowed _to brag about 30+ years of playing or experience in the field of guitar, then proceed to play like that. Just not allowed.
> 
> He's always talking about getting the best performance out of guitarists, and in my experience, a dull feeling pickup with no bounciness will get a way cruddier performance out of me. That being said, when I listen to pickup comparison videos I'm often left scratching my head if I heard many/any differences, but if I were to _play _all of them I bet Id find way more.


The 'feel' aspect is something I never knew was a thing until I felt it. The moment I noticed was when I had my RG2228's EMG808Xs with the 18v mod swapped out for Fluence Abasis. Everything responded quicker, like I was playing with latency on my EMGs. I never felt such a close connection to what I was playing. And that's not including the sound difference that I greatly preferred.


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## Deadpool_25 (Dec 31, 2022)

Guitarjon said:


> Exactly! The annoying thing is that once you make that claim to folks who believe Glenn, they'll say you're an idiot...
> 
> What I did find interesting though is that when I did a comparison of my own (with EMGs, Duncans and Fishmans) a lot of people said they couldn't hear a difference between the Duncans especially. I could hear a difference albeit perhaps subtle but there definitely was a difference between say the Distortion and the Nazgul. This is especially noticeable when you play them yourself.
> 
> Sometimes it baffles me a little bit how people can't hear differences between pieces of gear in general though. I had a comparison of 53 amps and some people claimed they all sounded the same while they clearly didn't. I guess it's hard for those folks to hear differences that perhaps are more on the subtle side.


Also keep in mind that YouTube compresses the crap out of videos so some of the differences, subtle or not, can easily be lost. Add that to the fact that a lot of people listen on devices that can also mask the differences, and the fact that a lot of people can't even hear those differences in the first place unless you point them out specifically and demonstrate them, and I'm not surprised by those comments.


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## MatrixClaw (Dec 31, 2022)

I remember Glenn from the Sneap Forum long before he was a YouTube personality. He seemed to know his shit back then, but since he's moved to YouTube he's just become super clickbaity. Can't really take anything he says seriously anymore. Is he even recording bands anymore? I understand YT probably pays him more, but I wouldn't want to record with him after seeing his BS all over the internet.

Also, FWIW, this claim is total BS. Pickups definitely sound different.


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## ShredmasterD (Dec 31, 2022)

fricker annoys the shit out of me. therefore, i will not watch him. anymore. as an aside, there is a pete thorn video using different pickups in the same guitar on the same song with the same amp and the same settings. there are differences. they are clear.


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## tedtan (Dec 31, 2022)

Glen Fricker is like Rudy Guilliani - he used to be knowledgeable and competent (at least to some extent), but now he’s just a joke (at best), or worse.


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## nickgray (Jan 1, 2023)

I'm not gonna watch 18 minutes of Glenn.

That being said, I do think pickups mostly don't matter. Having tinkered with digital stuff for years now, the amount of parameters you can tweak is insane. Pick between a pre-eq and a boost. Just this alone gives you a wealth of options. Try tweaking your bridge humbucker with a pre-eq to sound like a neck by boosting the lows and lowering the highs and the mids to get rid of that bridge quack, you can get closer than you can probably think. Dial the low end down to control the mud, dial the high mids just right to add or remove that honk and sizzle. Then it's the choice of amp (which plays together with the pre-eq/boost, of course), the amp's parameters, and the IRs. The IRs make the biggest impact by far, relatively speaking (as in, as long as we're not comparing a clean Fender to a 5150). Then it's post-eq. After all that, if we're talking about mixing, we still have just the guitars, so it doesn't matter how great they sound by themselves, they have to fit in a mix, and the mix itself has to sound good as a whole.

So that's why getting crazy about ultra minute details is, by and large, pointless, imo. Not to say pickups are unimportant, but thinking about a pickup change before you even got the guitar because it has OEM pickups is pretty insane. Similarly, I can get good tone out of all my guitars which all have different pickups. Amusingly, a cheap budget guitar with OEM pickups has one of my favorite tones for downtuning, but alas, they're OEM and not available for purchase.

More generally, hunting for that one ultimate tone is also pointless. Consider how different guitar tones can be, and how different they are on your favorite albums. That's because there's quite a large Goldilocks zone for guitar tone. A lot of stuff works. There is no one tone to rule them all, stop chasing it, it does not exist.


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## that short guy (Jan 1, 2023)

In short I strongly disagree. Even something as simple as changing the thickness of your pick can cause an audible difference in tone. Pickups, unless you pick several that are voiced incredibly similarly, will definitely have a major impact on tone


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## Dr. Caligari (Jan 1, 2023)

I don't like the "you can't hear it in the mix" argument. I think that's gonna lead to a lowering of standards, settling for things that shouldn't be settled for and ending up with a problematic mix that's not as good as it could have been. If it sounds good it sounds good, but I think the wrong pickups can make a mix sound worse for sure.

I'm not a pro mix engineer but if I paid someone for a good mix I'd be annoyed by that attitude.

And I think with pickups, often they're fine and sound "good" but they can also be wrong for the guitar. What if you have a guitar that by its nature has a dark tone with heavy lows and low mids and muted top end, and it's got a pickup with the same characteristics? Where will you get your treble? I think you'll struggle if you just try to turn up the presence on the amp, because the base tone of the guitar is so tilted towards the lows. And if the guitar/pickup combo is lacking body you can't dial that on the amp. You could try an eq pedal but I don't think that would sound as good as a balanced and good sounding guitar. I've been fucking around with eq pedals before and I don't like it.

But... whatever. I'm gonna use the pickups I like and I don't care if other people buy new pickups or not. The whole argument is pretty useless because everybody can do what they want. Why did I even write this? Oh well, might as well post it now.


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## RevDrucifer (Jan 1, 2023)

My own experiences do not reflect Glenn’s vid. (I didn’t watch it because fuck him, I‘m going off the comments discussing pickup changes within a mix).

Mixing is the *only* time I get really nit picky about guitar tones. When I write a song, I use whatever is in the ballpark to get the demo done. When I re-record it, I spend a fair amount of time dialing in all the sounds so I’m doing less EQ’ing after. It’s these exact subtleties I’m paying attention to. 

I can see if your general workflow is to toss an EQ on everything and make everything work by EQ’ing the shit out of everything, but I much prefer getting the sounds as close to the final product before I press the R button. 

I had one song I tracked with my SZ with the stock pickups, once I changed them out to the Fishman’s, the first thing I did was re-record the song because if I were to match it in the mix, I’d need to add a little more distortion and EQ the shit out of the original tracks. It would have taken me longer to figure out how to match the tones instead of just playing it over again. 

And with everything in a mix being relative to the other instruments in the track, where you’re getting as detailed as “I want 3db of 1kHz added to the guitars”, it seems quite daft to me to not acknowledge the subtleties in pickup changes.

Also, @Guitarjon, your pickup demo is what made me want to get a Nazgul for my Solar. Funny people said they couldn’t hear the differences. Some dude on RigTalk told me the other day I don’t need to worry about changing pickups because I play an AxeFX and they make everything sound the same. The funny thing about this is that he meant this as an underhanded dig that I don’t understand/appreciate tone because I use a modeler, but he’s the one who can’t differentiate different guitar tones.


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## Guitarjon (Jan 1, 2023)

RevDrucifer said:


> Also, @Guitarjon, your pickup demo is what made me want to get a Nazgul for my Solar. Funny people said they couldn’t hear the differences. Some dude on RigTalk told me the other day I don’t need to worry about changing pickups because I play an AxeFX and they make everything sound the same. The funny thing about this is that he meant this as an underhanded dig that I don’t understand/appreciate tone because I use a modeler, but he’s the one who can’t differentiate different guitar tones.



Awesome! How are you liking the Nazgul? I think it's a great pickup! In my old Schecter Merrow guitars with the ash bodies that pickup sounded really aggressive. In my LTD Phoenix the sound is more balanced but just great for rock and metal.


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## PuriPuriPrisoner (Jan 1, 2023)

This is just an insane thing to claim. Sure, they might not make as much of a difference as some might think. Some guitars I've owned have had a certain inherent distinct tone to them (not getting into the tone wood debate) that still sticks around after a pickup swap, but to say the difference in marginal can only be said by someone who either hasn't changed out a pickup before, or is lying for clickbait.


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## STRHelvete (Jan 1, 2023)

Shorts_Mike said:


> T
> 
> In the video, theres a clip of each pickup in a mix and by itself. In both cases, the differences are very evident. I've always found the "you wouldn't hear it in a mix" argument for almost anything to be quite weak. The difference either exists or it doesn't.


There are a million factors that go into recording and mixing. Pickups DO sound different but in a mix it's small to no effect on the bigger picture. If you're sitting there zooming in on just the guitar trying to hear a difference you'll find something, even if it's just in your head.

But if I handed you a song, told you to listen, and then told you to tell me which pickups the guitarists and bassists were using you'd have no clue.

Nobody has EVER said "Man I went to see -insert band- live and the guitarist really should have gone with SD Black Winters instead of that Bareknuckle Warpig..totally ruined the show for me" or "I really like this song, they must be using Fishman Fluence Moderns!"

Nobody but gear nerds (who believe hype) even thinks in those terms and sits there trying to hear the guitar tone and hear how the pickups made any sort of difference.


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## ThunderUnderground (Jan 1, 2023)

Surely this can be settled with nothing more than a spectrum analyser in a DAW on the master channel?

Its bewildering that this even made it to a 3 page thread. The pickup is the first point of contact and serves as the raw source material, the quality of the pickup largely determines what you have to work with, no amount of digital trickery can change the magnetic pull of an A2 mag vs a Neo mag.

SSO should go full on 4D chess with this and start heavily upselling stock Ibanez INF pickups as if they were Dimarzio SD's, wait til the circus rolls in to town and sell them in to market at a premium


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## LCW (Jan 1, 2023)

Sorry but Glenn is on crack


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## tedtan (Jan 1, 2023)

STRHelvete said:


> There are a million factors that go into recording and mixing. Pickups DO sound different but in a mix it's small to no effect on the bigger picture. If you're sitting there zooming in on just the guitar trying to hear a difference you'll find something, even if it's just in your head.
> 
> But if I handed you a song, told you to listen, and then told you to tell me which pickups the guitarists and bassists were using you'd have no clue.
> 
> ...


By this logic, guitarists should just play peices of plywood with strings and pickups because no one can tell what guitar they played in a mix. And drummers should just play cardboard boxes for the same reason.


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## STRHelvete (Jan 1, 2023)

tedtan said:


> By this logic, guitarists should just play peices of plywood with strings and pickups because no one can tell what guitar they played in a mix. And drummers should just play cardboard boxes for the same reason.


Honestly...yes. If it gets the job done then it's all that matters. Instead of obsessing about the right pickups, tonewood, tubes, and other crap, you should worry about the band's overall sound and where you sit in it. You can make a great album with shit gear and a shit album with great gear.



Glen's overall point is a musician's energy shouldn't all go into non important things like what strings, pickups, etc to use and instead work on performance, good songwriting, and how to pay attention to the bigger picture.


That's why you could hand someone like Van Halen any guitar and it'd sound like him. Every guitarist has preferences but you don't NEED a certain pickup and the people who claim that are more often than not the kind of people who should spend more time practicing and listening instead of staring at gear mags and trolling gear forums


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## tedtan (Jan 1, 2023)

I agree that songwriting, arranging, performance, etc. are the priorities, but those little things like strings, picks, pickups, drum heads, sticks, etc. affect the feel, which impacts the performance. So while we shouldn’t obsess over them, they do matter.


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## STRHelvete (Jan 1, 2023)

tedtan said:


> I agree that songwriting, arranging, performance, etc. are the priorities, but those little things like strings, picks, pickups, drum heads, sticks, etc. affect the feel, which impacts the performance. So while we shouldn’t obsess over them, they do matter.


Everything matters on some level. We all agree that Glen makes misleading generalizations for clicks


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## CTID (Jan 1, 2023)

pickups definitely make an appreciable difference, but that being said i don't think anyone would ever be able to name which pickup is which in a blind test like you might be able to do with amplifiers


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## Guitarjon (Jan 1, 2023)

Some thoughts:

The argument of "the little differences between pickups can always be negated by just dialing in the amp's eq" isn't really valid in my opinion because amp EQs tend to work on broad strokes/shelves. I think the frequency responses of pickups are much more detailed with many resonant peaks and dips etc. So no matter how you tweak your amp, there's still a good chance the inherent sound of the pickup you're using will come through. For example, the burstbucker 61s (that I hated) will always sound muddy in the low end with anything lower than Eb/D, no amp eq could fix that.

Someone mentioned that video in the thread earlier where some guy claims that tonewood doesn't matter. The one where he uses the tables? I haven't actually watched that video but I get the idea. However, I think based on my assumption of how the video plays out that this only proves that you can "get a tone without a wooden guitar body". This doesn't prove in any way at all that tonewood doesn't matter. If you can "prove" that two identical guitars with different woods sound the same, it still doesn't mean that it's always the case either. Just that it's the case with those pieces of wood.

One more thing regarding the Merrow Seymour Duncan comparison: I haven't watched it in a while but if I compare it to the pickup comparison that I did myself, the changes in the overall frequency response seemed way more drastic between all the pickups. I honestly assumed that he was using different amps/settings/cabs or EQ for each pickup. If that really wasn't the case it would surprise me a little. I still think that pickups definitely have their own frequency response of course, but sometimes the differences are subtle.

Here's one of my recent comparisons with a bunch of pickup types through a 6505. Some people did say that they felt the differences were very subtle, yet I didn't feel that way. For "science":


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## cmpxchg (Jan 1, 2023)

Guitarjon said:


> Some thoughts:
> 
> The argument of "the little differences between pickups can always be negated by just dialing in the amp's eq" isn't really valid in my opinion because amp EQs tend to work on broad strokes/shelves. I think the frequency responses of pickups are much more detailed with many resonant peaks and dips etc. So no matter how you tweak your amp, there's still a good chance the inherent sound of the pickup you're using will come through. For example, the burstbucker 61s (that I hated) will always sound muddy in the low end with anything lower than Eb/D, no amp eq could fix that.
> 
> ...



the "tonewood doesn't matter" video (here) is more complicated than that. Take a Tele and get another "guitar" to sound identical; in the video, it comes down to bridge, pickup, other electronics, pickup height/position, strings, scale length (because string tension). Wood doesn't matter: a partscaster, a 2x4, and the aforementioned "table guitar" are all the same. Overall this makes sense to me. The critical components are the points of contact for the string, the thing that picks up string vibrations, and any additional components that could color that signal. Wood can't impact the third thing, I have a very hard time believing it would impact the second ("the pickups vibrate with the wood," yeah right), and the first seems easy enough to test that if it made a difference somebody would have done it by now. That said, I totally believe there's a difference in how the guitar feels when played based on the wood. There's the connection of what your brain is telling your hands to do, what you feel resonating from the guitar through your body, and what you hear back from the amp that is synthesized into one perception. I don't think it's easy to isolate that. Even if a guitar made of the least resonant material possible vs the same guitar in the best possible wood sounded identical when recorded, I think nine out of ten players would swear the latter sounded better because it would feel so much better.

I think pickups are in the same category of what your hands are doing + what you feel from guitar + what you hear = "sounds better to me as the guitarist." Pickups are not going to make or break the sound assuming that it's being recorded and EQ'd and mixed with everything else, but the wrong pickup in a guitar can make that guitar in that signal chain feel wrong to play because you're not getting what you want at the end. Yes, you can often do something else in the chain to compensate ("get a graphic EQ pedal" is up there with "used Prestige" on the list of memes/good ideas), but it comes down to what you want to change. Hell, I've been playing through a cable that's way longer than what I need right now, and that might be why every time I switch to my guitar with active pickups I'm shocked by how bright it seems. Everything matters a bit.


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## Matt08642 (Jan 1, 2023)

STRHelvete said:


> "I really like this song, they must be using Fishman Fluence Moderns!"



Generally this is true, except like 12 years of Metalcore basically being "I really like this song, they must be using EMG 81s!"


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## nickgray (Jan 2, 2023)

Guitarjon said:


> because amp EQs tend to work on broad strokes/shelves


That's very true, and they're also overwhelmingly post-preamp, so you're equing the signal coming from the preamp.

Pre-eq is where it's at, you'll be eqing the direct signal coming from the guitar, or looking at it from a different perspective, you're telling the preamp how much certain frequency ranges are going to get distorted. So with your example of muddy pickups - just dial the lows down or use the low cut via a pre-eq. That's also the reason why metal players like boosts, TS style boosts have a fairly drastic low cut (and a boosts in the high mids for that slightly honky sizzly sound).



Guitarjon said:


> I think the frequency responses of pickups are much more detailed with many resonant peaks and dips etc


From what I know, this is not the case. It's a fairly smooth curve with a peak in the high mids. It's nothing like the frequency response of an IR, that's the main point.



Guitarjon said:


> Some people did say that they felt the differences were very subtle, yet I didn't feel that way


I really have to agree that the differences are _extremely subtle_. Maybe the issue is what we think as subtle and not subtle. I would say a difference between neck pickup and bridge pickup is vastly larger than a difference between any bridge pickups, as long as we're comparing pickups with roughly the same output. Single coil vs humbucker tone is a bigger difference than between any two humbuckers (as long as we don't drown the single coils with tons of gain).

To be honest, I'd say that virtually all guitars sound fairly similar to one another. A snare drum sounds very different. Solid body guitars with humbuckers sound near identical to one another.

Think about it, you can't possibly tell what guitars with what pickups were used on records. Can you tell which amp was used? Which cab with which speakers? What kind of mics? The position of the mics?


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## AussieTerry (Jan 2, 2023)

Australian scientists, tested this, inregards to wood, wood does not do shit to your electric guitar tone.


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## Guitarjon (Jan 2, 2023)

Anybody see the warmoth videos where they compare tonewoods? I would recommend checking those out.


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## narad (Jan 2, 2023)

AussieTerry said:


> Australian scientists, tested this, inregards to wood, wood does not do shit to your electric guitar tone.



The topic has been scientifically tested many times, poorly.


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## Stuck_in_a_dream (Jan 2, 2023)

Haven't watched the video, but per claim (from video) that OP posted, it just isn't true. Pickups' feel and how they respond to picking, in addition to how vastly they can sound aren't just myths. Yeah, sometimes the differences are v. subtle and only matter to the player, but so what, it's my money & my life at the end of the day. Glenn should probably FO and get a life.


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## Guitarjon (Jan 2, 2023)

Regarding the tonewood discussion, this is worth a watch:


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## Dr. Caligari (Jan 2, 2023)

"You can't tell what was used on a record."

To me this is a nonsense argument. So what that you can't? That doesn't mean that things don't sound different.

Tell me to record rhythm tracks for an album. Put a blindfold on me. Hand me 5 guitars with different pickups. Will I be able to tell what they are? No, most likely not. But even so, they will sound a bit different to each other, with some sounding a bit better to me and some a bit worse. If I can tell what they are or not is completely irrelevant. That argument always drives me crazy because it makes no sense.

And wood does make a difference to the tone of an electric guitar. Not even just species of wood but the individual piece of wood. You might care about it or you might not but it does make a difference.


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## nickgray (Jan 2, 2023)

Dr. Caligari said:


> To me this is a nonsense argument. So what that you can't? That doesn't mean that things don't sound different.


It means you should worry about more important stuff like playing and composing. No one will ever be impressed or even be aware that you've managed to find the perfect pickup for your guitar that has a +1.3141db boost at 1742.235hz that you can perfectly A/B blindfolded against your other 500 pickups.

To make my point clearer, I'm not writing this for those chasers' sake, if your goal is to collect guitars and gear and listen to minute details - that's fine. If your goal is to practice and write music, worrying about shit like this is extremely counterproductive. There is such a thing as "good enough" where none of your little problems are a limiting factor to what you're trying to achieve.


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## Lemonbaby (Jan 2, 2023)

Bass pickups don't matter when you're playing tracks on Metallica's "And Justice for All".


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## Emperoff (Jan 2, 2023)

When I saw this video posted I thought "I'm sure it's the same bullshit as the tubes one he did". And I was right 

This guy has made a following based on ridiculizing everyone that doesn't share his opinions, shouting every two seconds in an attempt to... be funny? His tests always claim to be "scientific" and show no difference. I can always hear clear differences in his videos. His ear doesn't seem to be very good for being a "producer" 

Now, onto the topic itself:

No one can quantify how important things are for someone else. Pickups don't matter for you? Fine. You will spend less money! It's all good. For someone like Eric Johnson everything matters, and someone like Marty Friedman doesn't give a fuck about gear as long as he has enough gain. Different strokes for different folks.

For me, they matter. To the point that if I don't like the pickups on a guitar, I don't feel motivated to play it. I am not a pickup swapper. I try my best to choose the right set from the start and never touch it again, but sometimes guitars are very picky.

I see pickups as the first layer in how we shape or tone. As others pointed out, any EQ we do before the preamp will shape *how *the amp distorts. So if we have muddy pickups, we will amplify muddiness. And that's why people use boosts. Now, obviously slamming the front end of the amp with a boost cutting a lot of lows and compressing the signal to hell and back will make most pickups sound very similar. But I don't use boosts, so why would the "pickups don't matter" apply to everyone?

The "into the mix" argument is only valid if you are "into mixing". Period. Plenty of people play guitars just for the fun of it. Not liking a pickup set is not fun. Having to do extra work on EQing your tones for a particular guitar which pickups you don't like is not fun. We buy gear to make our playing experience more satisfying, and in turn, perform better. That is what the audience will hear. No one buys pickups thinking the audience will hear them. We are naive, but not that much 

Then there are other aspects people overlook on youtube because they only translate live. Do you have a pickup set with too much mids? Chances are that if you swap guitars mid show the guitar may feedback between stops at high volume. Same thing with output differences. You'll need specific presets for specific guitars, which is also a pain in the ass (specially using analog gear). So for me is very important that pickups are all in the same ballpark (in my case mid-output A5 pickups) for the sake of consistency live.


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## dr_game0ver (Jan 2, 2023)

Glenn video is like: "Can you tell the difference between a P90 and 3 variations of PAFs?"


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## Dr. Caligari (Jan 2, 2023)

nickgray said:


> It means you should worry about more important stuff like playing and composing. No one will ever be impressed or even be aware that you've managed to find the perfect pickup for your guitar that has a +1.3141db boost at 1742.235hz that you can perfectly A/B blindfolded against your other 500 pickups.
> 
> To make my point clearer, I'm not writing this for those chasers' sake, if your goal is to collect guitars and gear and listen to minute details - that's fine. If your goal is to practice and write music, worrying about shit like this is extremely counterproductive. There is such a thing as "good enough" where none of your little problems are a limiting factor to what you're trying to achieve.



So I don't entirely disagree but I think there's room for both music and gear considerations.

I know I have/had pieces of gear that just don't work well for me. When I switch to something I like better, all of a sudden everything is easier and I stop feeling like I'm fighting my gear. I don't have to deal with stuff like pick noise from an overly bright guitar, or palm mutes sounding bad. Instead I can focus on the making music part.

And there's plenty of examples of pro recorded albums where I would like them a lot more if the guitar tone was different.

Maybe I'm unusually picky, but that's how it is for me.


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## 4Eyes (Jan 2, 2023)

well, as he is still using that over clipped, compressed to hell sound clip as intro to his videos and it hasn't changed for over couple of years, I take his opinions about mixes and what sounds good or bad with grain of salt. the guy must definitely deaf from all that yelling...

but on the other hand I can't say I don't agree to some extent. He says B without saying A just for clicks. A is all pieces of the chain starting from picking hand, going through picks, strings, wood, pickups, amps, speakers... make some difference. some make bigger, some smaller. The B is that in greater context a finished recording most of those differences are not very important, some not even noticeable. 

So I won't to believe that these guys want to help us to point our focus at things that are actually worth it in the sense of finished recording, so we can be more effective, without wasting precious time at things that do not make much difference in the end. But they present the B in such way, that with the same logic we can say that in the context of grand scheme of an album and songs even amps, cabs, speakers don't matter, because song is what's important and most importantly because 99% of people listening to the song don't care about those things.

does the last sentence make me want to stop messing with pickup height at 1/4 turn increments? hell no!


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## Emperoff (Jan 2, 2023)

*- Fortin:* Makes constant memes on social media making fun of digital modelling.
*- Also Fortin:* Releases Fortin Nameless plugin with NDSP.

*- Fluff:* Says pickups are irrelevant and he won't make pickup comparisons ever again.
*- Also Fluff:* Releases Fluff Fishman signature pickups.

*- Glenn Fricker:* Whines all the time about drum samples and bass players.
_*- Also Glenn:*_ Releases drum samples pack.


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## ExMachina (Jan 2, 2023)

Emperoff said:


> *- Fortin:* Makes constant memes on social media making fun of digital modelling.
> *- Also Fortin:* Releases Fortin Nameless plugin with NDSP.
> 
> *- Fluff:* Says pickups are irrelevant and he won't make pickup comparisons ever again.
> ...



Don't hate the player, hate the game?


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## Stuck_in_a_dream (Jan 2, 2023)

What game? So legal = moral in ur book? I understand there is some wiggle room, but making outrageous claims merely for more clicks is not acceptable imo.


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## ExMachina (Jan 2, 2023)

Stuck_in_a_dream said:


> What game? So legal = moral in ur book? I understand there is some wiggle room, but making outrageous claims merely for more clicks is not acceptable imo.


Really? Morality? 

Having the opinion that tube type and pickups are t that important in the scheme of guitar tone isn't outrageous either.


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## Stuck_in_a_dream (Jan 2, 2023)

ExMachina said:


> Really? Morality?
> 
> Having the opinion that tube type and pickups are t that important in the scheme of guitar tone isn't outrageous either.


I do believe in the sense of community, say like the one we have here in SSO. Integrity does matter, at least what I like to believe. 

Re Glenn's video(s), if you follow what he's been doing for a while, let's say it is neither scientific nor true most of the time. To give one more example, saying that Vai's tone is mostly in his hands is prob. true, but I'd like to see him try and play a gig w/ a 60s Strat. In fact, there was an old video of Satch where he tried to play one of his classics on a Strat (copy) and although it sounded pretty close, he said at the end that playing it was torture compared to his sig. Just saying'.


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## narad (Jan 2, 2023)

nickgray said:


> It means you should worry about more important stuff like playing and composing. No one will ever be impressed or even be aware that you've managed to find the perfect pickup for your guitar that has a +1.3141db boost at 1742.235hz that you can perfectly A/B blindfolded against your other 500 pickups.
> 
> To make my point clearer, I'm not writing this for those chasers' sake, if your goal is to collect guitars and gear and listen to minute details - that's fine. If your goal is to practice and write music, worrying about shit like this is extremely counterproductive. There is such a thing as "good enough" where none of your little problems are a limiting factor to what you're trying to achieve.



You don't actually have to do one or the other. Brandon Ellis would be a perfect example. Amazing player. Just watched him talk about how he "frankensteined" together a custom pickup himself because he wanted an alnico magnet because he likes the sound of it, but they're low output, so he wanted to make them hotter with more winds, but that made them darker, so he took a coil from a different pickup so that the mismatch between them resulted in adding some brightness.

So are we allowed to care about "little problems" again? I just can't chalk up furthering your understanding of your instrument with low cost adjustments as being "extremely counterproductive" to making music. Misha... Nolly... also good examples. Putting out more music than basically anyone else here... also anal about the details.


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## Sleazy_D (Jan 2, 2023)

MaxOfMetal said:


> I've done my part to avoid the YouTube Guitar Influencer circle jerk, I wish it wouldn't spill over so much.
> 
> None of these chodes actually believe any of this shit, it's just for clicks and to get the guitar nerdo-sphere worked up.
> 
> It's a self feeding engine by a bunch of dipshits and the absolute most cringe part of being a guitar player.


Well said


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## ExMachina (Jan 2, 2023)

I was playing the other day and could sense a fraction of dB attenuation at exactly 2.34 kHz, so I checked my tone fingers. I noticed my calluses were 0.1 mm too thick on the anterior portion, a quick file, and all was right again. Lesson learned, always check your tone fingers before playing.


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## Neon_Knight_ (Jan 2, 2023)

lewis said:


> One time i went to Download Festival in the UK. Think it was 2009. Next to where I put my tent, was a guy from Scotland who had put up a full Gaezbo setup with his tent
> 
> day 2, I wake up at around 9am to someguy shouting and swearing at the top of his voice?. I went outside the tent to see what was happening and it turns out my camping Neighbor was already drunk, sitting on a deck chair, screaming at the sky. He was literally shouting for some clouds to fuck off etc.
> Including giving the sun the middle finger - all this happening in a Glaswegian accent made it even more hilarious.
> anyway, this random guy and his opinions on the clouds, were more informative than Glenn


Last summer was probably the first time I've been to a festival where this didn't happen (I go to Bloodstock every year and occasionally Download). I did hear "Fuck off sun!" many times though.


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## John (Jan 2, 2023)

Lemonbaby said:


> Bass pickups don't matter when you're playing tracks on Metallica's "And Justice for All".



Not cool, man. This is not the roast of Metallica.

That was in 1992.


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## lewis (Jan 2, 2023)

Neon_Knight_ said:


> Last summer was probably the first time I've been to a festival where this didn't happen (I go to Bloodstock every year and occasionally Download). I did hear "Fuck off sun!" many times though.


Off topic but damn I find bloodstock superior.
I played it that same year I believe it was. Best experience ever


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## EPOTH (Jan 2, 2023)

Really don't agree .

I turned 50 this year, and I see that from my experience there are two things that are not well shared in life. the first is the intelligence, the second is the ear.

When some people have a bad ear, it does not really make the difference to change the pickup, the amp or the cab ...

From my experience , guitar sound is a mix of strings , pickups , amp and cab , each can make a big difference in the final sound .


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## CTID (Jan 2, 2023)

narad said:


> Misha... Nolly... also good examples. Putting out more music than basically anyone else here... also anal about the details.


probably, but they're also the kind of people who will create no matter what. if nolly and misha weren't currently rocking the highest end stuff they possibly could, they'd still make music with what they had, which i think is something that a lot of people get caught up in


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## DECEMBER (Jan 2, 2023)

Different pickups will completely change the tone of a guitar.


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## Sleazy_D (Jan 2, 2023)

I keep checking back to see folks taking a shit on him.


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## Cpt_Adama (Jan 2, 2023)

CanserDYI said:


> To me most of a pickups "goodness" is it's _feel _which is lost in recordings, which is all Glen does. Have you heard the dude play guitar? I hate ragging on people for talent, but you are just _not allowed _to brag about 30+ years of playing or experience in the field of guitar, then proceed to play like that. Just not allowed.
> 
> He's always talking about getting the best performance out of guitarists, and in my experience, a dull feeling pickup with no bounciness will get a way cruddier performance out of me. That being said, when I listen to pickup comparison videos I'm often left scratching my head if I heard many/any differences, but if I were to _play _all of them I bet Id find way more.


By the time that video hits YT and they compress the $h!t out of it and your listening on a phone, any chance of hearing any subtle differences are long gone. Really it's a useless exercise to do comparisons in that manner.


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## budda (Jan 2, 2023)

Damn 101 replies and 6 pages.


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## jaxadam (Jan 2, 2023)

budda said:


> Damn 101 replies and 6 pages.



Just wait for the “String Brands Don’t Matter” thread.


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## nickgray (Jan 2, 2023)

jaxadam said:


> Just wait for the “String Brands Don’t Matter” thread.


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## narad (Jan 2, 2023)

CTID said:


> probably, but they're also the kind of people who will create no matter what. if nolly and misha weren't currently rocking the highest end stuff they possibly could, they'd still make music with what they had, which i think is something that a lot of people get caught up in



I'm not sure what people who specifically want to make music spend enough time looking at pickups to not make music. It seems like it's just conjecture / projecting that these people exist. But one thing about Misha or Nolly is that basically on day 1, they made it a point to get good gear. The very first rig I saw Misha playing through was a JP6 into an Engl Invader into an orange cab. The first rig I saw Nolly playing was a blackmachine into a VH4. Both in like < 2010 before Periphery I, when almost no one in the community had anything better.

So in that sense, it'd be a lot more meaningful if someone was in here talking about how pickups don't matter, and they also had a slew of good albums they made with a squier strat or something with a bunch of in-house $5 pickups in there. And to which people said, "Man, I love the guitar sound on these albums". Of course someone can in theory make music on shit gear and shit pickups (and music that's not intentionally trying to sound shitty tonewise) but it seems to be correlation (/not causation) that people who spend a ton of time trying to make music also find it easy to make investments into their gear that they find meaningful.


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## Gmork (Jan 2, 2023)

I decided a while back that I'm sick to death of "good tones" so nothing matters lol. 
Turn it up! and use too much lowend!


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## gunch (Jan 2, 2023)

I think Nolly had a white/black f hole PGM before the blackmachine


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## odibrom (Jan 2, 2023)

Gmork said:


> I decided a while back that I'm sick to death of "good tones" so nothing matters lol.
> Turn it up! and use too much lowend!


This is the way!

If one doesn't explore one can't find shit...


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## GreatGreen (Jan 2, 2023)

Glenn: "PICKUPS DON'T MAKE ANY DIFFERENCE.*
*plays different pickups and shows in his own video that pickups do in fact make a huge difference even though he tried to sabotage the experiment to throw off the listener*
Glenn: "OK THEY MAKE A TINY BIT OF DIFFERENCE BUT NOT A HUGE DIFFERENCE"

Narrator: "but changing the pickups absolutely did make a huge difference."


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## STRHelvete (Jan 3, 2023)

Glen's mission was accomplished. Make inflammatory statements, have people who get his point understand, have gear forums lose their minds and fire up the "We H8 Glenn" machine while sharing his vids and getting more clicks and money.

Well played, Frickface. Well played..


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## CTID (Jan 3, 2023)

narad said:


> I'm not sure what people who specifically want to make music spend enough time looking at pickups to not make music. It seems like it's just conjecture / projecting that these people exist. But one thing about Misha or Nolly is that basically on day 1, they made it a point to get good gear. The very first rig I saw Misha playing through was a JP6 into an Engl Invader into an orange cab. The first rig I saw Nolly playing was a blackmachine into a VH4. Both in like < 2010 before Periphery I, when almost no one in the community had anything better.
> 
> So in that sense, it'd be a lot more meaningful if someone was in here talking about how pickups don't matter, and they also had a slew of good albums they made with a squier strat or something with a bunch of in-house $5 pickups in there. And to which people said, "Man, I love the guitar sound on these albums". Of course someone can in theory make music on shit gear and shit pickups (and music that's not intentionally trying to sound shitty tonewise) but it seems to be correlation (/not causation) that people who spend a ton of time trying to make music also find it easy to make investments into their gear that they find meaningful.


i don't disagree, but that wasn't my point in the first place. obviously anyone who is serious about music (or anyone with plenty of disposable income) is going to shoot for having high-end gear, we all want nice stuff because it's fun and can also make your life a lot easier when you're not fighting gear. all i meant was that someone who is serious is going to make music with a $200 squier or a $3k JP6, it doesn't really matter to the end listener _what _they used to write/record something, unless they're one of us neurotic guitarists who is curious about the signal chain. conversely i think we all know (or are) people who are great at falling victim to the fallacy that the next piece of gear they buy is the last piece of the puzzle for what they want/need to write great music, when instead it just requires the effort and commitment to actually put the work in, instead of getting shiny new toys.



STRHelvete said:


> Glen's mission was accomplished. Make inflammatory statements, have people who get his point understand, have gear forums lose their minds and fire up the "We H8 Glenn" machine while sharing his vids and getting more clicks and money.
> 
> Well played, Frickface. Well played..


joke's on him, i didn't click the video, and there's plenty of people in here who it seems didn't either


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## STRHelvete (Jan 3, 2023)

CTID said:


> i don't disagree, but that wasn't my point in the first place. obviously anyone who is serious about music (or anyone with plenty of disposable income) is going to shoot for having high-end gear, we all want nice stuff because it's fun and can also make your life a lot easier when you're not fighting gear. all i meant was that someone who is serious is going to make music with a $200 squier or a $3k JP6, it doesn't really matter to the end listener _what _they used to write/record something, unless they're one of us neurotic guitarists who is curious about the signal chain. conversely i think we all know (or are) people who are great at falling victim to the fallacy that the next piece of gear they buy is the last piece of the puzzle for what they want/need to write great music, when instead it just requires the effort and commitment to actually put the work in, instead of getting shiny new toys.
> 
> 
> joke's on him, i didn't click the video, and there's plenty of people in here who it seems didn't either


Still devoted several pages to him. So even if they didn't click they're still talking about him. It worked


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## CTID (Jan 3, 2023)

STRHelvete said:


> Still devoted several pages to him. So even if they didn't click they're still talking about him. It worked


true, but he's not receiving ad revenue from the mere act of us talking about him


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## Emperoff (Jan 3, 2023)

STRHelvete said:


> Still devoted several pages to him. So even if they didn't click they're still talking about him. It worked



"Several" pages shitting on Glenn are not enough


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## Guitarjon (Jan 3, 2023)

budda said:


> Damn 101 replies and 6 pages.



I guess I'm sorry? 



CTID said:


> true, but he's not receiving ad revenue from the mere act of us talking about him



We're not just talking about him, we're also discussing the differences in tone between various pickups. I think this (partially) spawned a healthy discussion.


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## STRHelvete (Jan 3, 2023)

CTID said:


> true, but he's not receiving ad revenue from the mere act of us talking about him


There's no such thing as bad publicity. Mention him places he shows up in google searches, the more his name is dropped the more people go to his channel to see what the fuss is about, etc. He's a YouTuber. Anytime people are talking about him it's a good thing and it feeds into his narrative of "Gear nerd idiots hate me because I speak truth, see I have proof"


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## STRHelvete (Jan 3, 2023)

Guitarjon said:


> We're not just talking about him, we're also discussing the differences in tone between various pickups. I think this (partially) spawned a healthy ddiscussion.


That's the one good That's come of it


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## narad (Jan 3, 2023)

STRHelvete said:


> There's no such thing as bad publicity. Mention him places he shows up in google searches, the more his name is dropped the more people go to his channel to see what the fuss is about, etc. He's a YouTuber. Anytime people are talking about him it's a good thing and it feeds into his narrative of "Gear nerd idiots hate me because I speak truth, see I have proof"



If people go check out his stuff on account of this thread and don't find him to be an idiot, that's fine by me. If they find him to be an idiot and make a mental note to stay away from him for forever, that's also fine by me. The only thing not fine by me is having to change my behavior to not call an idiot an idiot on account of some notion of him winning when being proven wrong. Like some Jedi shit... "you've killed me - ha ha ha! now I have become even more powerful!!"


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## CTID (Jan 3, 2023)

i get your point @STRHelvete but i'll also sleep just fine whether glenn feels vindicated at this thread or not. idiots need to smacked in the nose with a newspaper, even if it makes them double down. eventually people will catch on that he's a moron, or they won't. like narad said, i'm not going to walk on eggshells about this dude just because i might give him ammunition to scream about on his youtube channel


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## STRHelvete (Jan 3, 2023)

CTID said:


> i get your point @STRHelvete but i'll also sleep just fine whether glenn feels vindicated at this thread or not. idiots need to smacked in the nose with a newspaper, even if it makes them double down. eventually people will catch on that he's a moron, or they won't. like narad said, i'm not going to walk on eggshells about this dude just because i might give him ammunition to scream about on his youtube channel


I'm pretty much of the same camp. I don't hate Glenn and sometimes I find him amusing but most of his stuff is just unnecessary. Eventually people will grow up and see he's not all that entertaining. Or maybe they won't. Either way it doesn't impact my life so I don't care much.


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## Wolfhorsky (Jan 3, 2023)

Typical YT drama. Clickbite’y title, stating something controversial to gain attention. After few days put on the vid with the sad face in the thumbnail with „I WAS WRONG” and then show the oposite findings with the different experiment. All that matters is clicks, views, subs…


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## RevDrucifer (Jan 3, 2023)

Guitarjon said:


> Awesome! How are you liking the Nazgul? I think it's a great pickup! In my old Schecter Merrow guitars with the ash bodies that pickup sounded really aggressive. In my LTD Phoenix the sound is more balanced but just great for rock and metal.



Hahaha I didn’t buy it yet, I had two more guitars come in that I wanted to focus on first. The stock Solar isn’t bad by any means, so it’s on the back burner.


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## Demiurge (Jan 3, 2023)

Well, you rarely see reasonable even-handed takes getting reposted on discussion boards, so at least Mr. Fricker knows what he's doing in at least _one_ way.

Look at any piece of a guitar's construction or signal chain and you can find some corner of the market that obsesses over it. You can say that whatever piece "doesn't matter" as much as everyone thinks that it does and point-out some other piece that matters more than everyone thinks. Rinse & repeat- there's a Youtube career.


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## RevDrucifer (Jan 3, 2023)

narad said:


> I'm not sure what people who specifically want to make music spend enough time looking at pickups to not make music. It seems like it's just conjecture / projecting that these people exist.



Agreed, simply because my own experience. I got an Orville LP last Friday, don’t dig the very low-out PAF’s it has in it, still played it all weekend and wrote some music with it while I decided whether or not I was going to switch it out.

There’s also been times in the past where I was so broke I couldn’t afford a new pickup, my SZ had the stock shitty Duncans in it for years because of that and I wrote more music on that thing than any other guitar I own, all the while wanting different pickups.

That said, I do come across plenty of guys in guitar forums who are indeed spending more time thinking about gear than they are playing. There’s a dude on TGP who, literally, claims every two weeks he finally figured out the perfect rig….then two weeks later posts an updated version, using mostly new shit with one or two pedals from the previous rig….and now that one is the perfect one. He doesn’t even realize it, despite the people pointing it out. You figure if he’s replacing THAT much stuff, he’s got to spend all that time investigating it, buying/selling/shipping, building a new rig….there can’t be too much time left over for actually playing the damn thing.

But guitarists are weird. I know for a fact there are some Fractal owners who only come out of the woodwork when there’s an update. They’ll check out the update then you won’t hear from them again until the next one, unless they come in to F5 in a thread about updates.


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## vertibration (Jan 3, 2023)

people who focus too much on gear and tone have a disorder. If you think about it, it actually seems like a real disorder. Obsessive, impulsive, and can cause a person to lack responsibility in their personal lives and finances. If someone always needs to have new things, or cant settle on something, they could risk hurting their finances because they have to continue to spend money that should go toward building their future whether its supporting a family or buying a home....so on


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## odibrom (Jan 3, 2023)

vertibration said:


> people who focus too much on gear and tone have a disorder. If you think about it, it actually seems like a real disorder. Obsessive, impulsive, and can cause a person to lack responsibility in their personal lives and finances. If someone always needs to have new things, or cant settle on something, they could risk hurting their finances because they have to continue to spend money that should go toward building their future whether its supporting a family or buying a home....so on


... you're not wrong there...


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## Emperoff (Jan 3, 2023)

vertibration said:


> people who focus too much on gear and tone have a disorder. If you think about it, it actually seems like a real disorder. Obsessive, impulsive, and can cause a person to lack responsibility in their personal lives and finances. If someone always needs to have new things, or cant settle on something, they could risk hurting their finances because they have to continue to spend money that should go toward building their future whether its supporting a family or buying a home....so on



And so our watch begins...


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## odibrom (Jan 3, 2023)

Pickups do and don't matter, depending on one's *objectives, purposes and context*. At this moment, all my guitars have different pickups, most are similar to some degree, some are a bit different. All my 7 stringers deliver the goods in the same level of sound/tone quality and performance, meaning that I can do whatever from any of which (except the fretless and acoustic for obvious reasons). Yes, I feel the difference between them but _it's not that relevant_. My bandmates don't argue about which guitar I should take to rehearsals and I rotate them quite a bit.

However, a long time ago, I bought a DiMarzio set of HSH pickups for my S540 thinking "yeah, she's gonna sound awesome"... well, she did except for the PAF pro in the neck position and the chosen single (which I keep forgetting which it was)... 66% of the pickups didn't fit to my likes in that guitar... the result was the guitar was barely played for a LOOOOOOOONNNG time. Then, after my experience on going custom, I did order some "Off the shelf" pickups from a semi local brand kind of similar to my now preferred specs and they fit almost perfectly. Almost means that they're a way better fit than the previous DiMarzios and although they might feel a little lacking in some aspects, they deliver the goods in the ballpark of all the other guitars... and ballpark is perfectly fine for a guitar that is not part of the PSIORB's needs.

Also, when I was recording PSIORB's, I recorded one of the guitars for a specific song and somehow it didn't sound great (good, not great), so I re-recorded the song with another and there it was what I was looking for. So pickups matter when one doesn't want to change whatever settings are after the guitar nor do extra EQ in post production.

Pickups don't really matter when I'm rehearsing either with the band or home alone...

... I felt the need to lay this out, things in life should not be understood in absolutes... that's the _Sith_ way and the _Sith_ way is not the way...


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## TheBolivianSniper (Jan 3, 2023)

Pickups make a decent enough difference for feel that I think all my swaps have been worth it. Changing the EMGs to Bare Knuckles in my stealth completely changed the way I approach it but then again so did a fresh string change and setup. Swapping the stock pickups in my Ormsby was a massive change and then removing the Fishmans for Lundgrens was another. I didn't like the sound of the guitar stock, thought it was better but not quite there with the Fishmans (they also didn't fit and were a pain to use) so once I got the Lundgrens in the guitar sounded how I wanted by itself and I changed how I wrote with it. 

Does it sound different in a mix? Actually yeah, I went from a low mid focused dark pickup to a scooped very bright pickup, so it cuts better and has a more aggressive low end. More important than that, both pickup swaps made me write and play differently with both guitars, and that's more valuable than differences in a mix.


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## Deadpool_25 (Jan 3, 2023)

Emperoff said:


> No one can quantify how important things are for someone else.


The lack of acceptance of this fact is the root of humanity's problems.


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## narad (Jan 3, 2023)

RevDrucifer said:


> You figure if he’s replacing THAT much stuff, he’s got to spend all that time investigating it, buying/selling/shipping, building a new rig….there can’t be too much time left over for actually playing the damn thing.


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## narad (Jan 4, 2023)

Thanks to this thread my video recommendations have been adjusted. This was interesting though. I used to do consult work for Paul's company which is basically a derivative of this measuring work he developed for his pickups (/ based on his father's work or trying to give his father more of a legacy):



I think it kind of makes me wonder how far he "pickups don't matter" guys, who usually are trying to show how 3 different PAFs don't yield an appreciable difference in tone, would go with that argument. HB vs single coil? Why not?


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## Deadpool_25 (Jan 4, 2023)

narad said:


> Thanks to this thread my video recommendations have been adjusted. This was interesting though. I used to do consult work for Paul's company which is basically a derivative of this measuring work he developed for his pickups (/ based on his father's work or trying to give his father more of a legacy):
> 
> 
> 
> I think it kind of makes me wonder how far he "pickups don't matter" guys, who usually are trying to show how 3 different PAFs don't yield an appreciable difference in tone, would go with that argument. HB vs single coil? Why not?



That's a great video. He does a wonderful job teaching. His attention to detail and knowledge gives a clue why PRS Guitars are so successful. 

And now I kinda want a test guitar like that.


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## ExMachina (Jan 4, 2023)

I think the hyperbolic title of the video is obfuscating the main argument. Pickups certainly have difference EQ profiles, it's basic physics. However, the variance between them doesn't tend to be too huge. My opinion tends to be, that for me personally, they aren't that important. But, I also use an AxeFx, and in the digital world I have so much more flexibility that differences in pickups just start to be moot. Just to reiterate, what the video really wanted to show was that relative to the other components affecting guitar "tone" pickups are small. Ignore, the amplifier for a moment and just think pickup and cabinet/speaker, we can multiply the two frequency responses together to get the final output. The IR will dominate the output and the pickup will only be a minor modulation of that IR, essentially a low pass filter. 

Here are some measurements of 3 SD pickups, keep in mind that deltas less than 1 dB aren't really perceptible. 


A youtube channel is a business, and we see tons of blowback on the hyperbolic presentation, angry guy schtick, questioning of credibility, but it's all in the interest of generating more clicks/sales. However, a pickup company is also a business, and we are convinced to buy from a huge choice of pickups. Yet, we never get a full picture of the sound of the pickup on the manufacturers website, they show a coarse 3 Band EQ with no numbers, and DC resistance which provides very little information. I'm guessing that if they showed the whole picture, all those pickups could fall into maybe 4 buckets where there differences within each bucket is minute. So in my opinion, the pickup manufacturers are withholding information to increase sales. 

I clearly have the most refined aural palette, so you should just listen to me, but if you like swapping pickups, you do you brother.


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## Emperoff (Jan 4, 2023)

ExMachina said:


> Here are some measurements of 3 SD pickups, keep in mind that deltas less than 1 dB aren't really perceptible.




Cool video. I always said that if pickup makers used frequency graphs like speaker companies do, they would all probably be bankrupt 

The Jazz and 59 graphs are almost identical yet you can still hear a difference. Although probably not according to Glenn.


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## narad (Jan 4, 2023)

Eh, pickups don't make a huge difference in the overall sound, but I don't think it's being appreciated in those sorts of videos that they're one of the cheapest and easiest tweaks you can make, and they can make/break whether you like a certain guitar. If I could swap 4 speakers and sell the old ones anywhere in the world for < $15 shipping and a $70-$200 total investment, I'd care more about trying out a variety of speakers until I found the right ones. In reality, playing around with amp or cab variables is at least an order of magnitude more painful than swapping a pickup. 

After a lot of research and with high confidence I tried a pair of DV77s, took forever to get them in the cab, don't really like them that much, they're taking up a ton of space, and it's going to be a huge pain to move them on, it's going to take forever to sell and I'm going to have to give a decent discount. I swap a pickup I don't like, I'm probably going to lose about $10 and 30 mins of my time.


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## ExMachina (Jan 4, 2023)

Emperoff said:


> Cool video. I always said that if pickup makers used frequency graphs like speaker companies do, they would all probably be bankrupt
> 
> The Jazz and 59 graphs are almost identical yet you can still hear a difference.


Yea, gotta be careful with demos sometimes, if the outputs aren't normalized our perception of the tone changes too lol. The whole thing becomes a clusterfuck.



> Eh, pickups don't make a huge difference in the overall sound, but I don't think it's being appreciated in those sorts of videos that they're one of the cheapest and easiest tweaks you can make, and they can make/break whether you like a certain guitar. If I could swap 4 speakers and sell the old ones anywhere in the world for < $15 shipping and a $70-$200 total investment, I'd care more about trying out a variety of speakers until I found the right ones. In reality, playing around with amp or cab variables is at least an order of magnitude more painful than swapping a pickup.
> 
> After a lot of research and with high confidence I tried a pair of DV77s, took forever to get them in the cab, don't really like them that much, they're taking up a ton of space, and it's going to be a huge pain to move them on, it's going to take forever to sell and I'm going to have to give a decent discount. I swap a pickup I don't like, I'm probably going to lose about $10 and 30 mins of my time.



changing an IR is even cheaper


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## Emperoff (Jan 4, 2023)

What I find the stupidest about Glenns logic is:

1 - Don't waste money on pickups. Speakers make a bigger difference!
_"Sure, let me swap the speakers on my cab real quick because I don't like how this guitar sounds". _

2 - Moving the mic makes a much bigger difference!
_"Sure, I'll move the mic to a different spot whenever I change a guitar. I'm sure the FOH engineer will *love* me."_

Some people just thinks everyone lives in "Studio World", using IRs, digital rigs, EQs everywhere, etc. Call me crazy, but if a have a problem I'd rather address it straight from the source than patch up things that don't need it.


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## eaeolian (Jan 4, 2023)

Honestly, the best test videos I've seen pretty much say it's the exact opposite - pickups, pickup types, and pickup height are the only things that DO matter on electric guitars.
Fricker exists to sell clicks. I don't even watch his videos because I already know they're crap.


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## Kyle Jordan (Jan 4, 2023)

eaeolian said:


> Honestly, the best test videos I've seen pretty much say it's the exact opposite - pickups, pickup types, and pickup height are the only things that DO matter on electric guitars.
> Fricker exists to sell clicks. I don't even watch his videos because I already know they're crap.



I need to dig up the link, but someone translated the book done by the German physicist that essentially boils down to this. The strings, bridge, and nut have impact too, but the electronics are by far the predominant force.


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## Emperoff (Jan 4, 2023)

Kyle Jordan said:


> I need to dig up the link, but someone translated the book done by the German physicist that essentially boils down to this. The strings, bridge, and nut have impact too, but the electronics are by far the predominant force.



BUT THAT CAN'T BE RIGHT BECAUSE I DO SCIENTIFIC TESTS AND NO ONE CAN TELL THE DIFFERENCE!!! AND I KNOW I AM RIGHT BECAUSE I SCREAM A LOT!!!!

_"-Glenn Fricker"_


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## eaeolian (Jan 4, 2023)

Kyle Jordan said:


> I need to dig up the link, but someone translated the book done by the German physicist that essentially boils down to this. The strings, bridge, and nut have impact too, but the electronics are by far the predominant force.


Sure, they have some effect, but it's so small it's pretty easily compensated for. For the kind of high-gain sounds we usually talk about here, the amp even matters more than the pickups, and in the context of a modern compressed mix? Not noticeable.
Finally ending the tonewood chase is the biggest outcome, and one I heartily endorse.
Setup matters, too - if the strings hit any of the frets, for example.


----------



## Metallica35 (Jan 4, 2023)

His entire point is that swapping pickups has less of an effect on the tone than swapping mics, mic placement, or swapping cabs/speakers. He is totally right about this. He doesn't claim pickups don't matter. He just questions whether that's the best place to spend a couple hundred bucks as opposed to swapping cabs or mics. 

He is also completely correct about pickups being a magnetic induction system (an electro-magnetic generator to be precise), not a microphone. So cry all you want about tone-wood, but it's not a real thing on an electric guitar. Wood can't affect a magnetic field. Flame me all you want, but this is high school level Physics. Bridge saddles and nut can affect tone because it changes the way the string behaves/vibrates which in turn changes how that string disrupts the magnetic field and generates signal. Wood doesn't. Neither does bolt on versus neck-thru construction. Bottom line is if it's not affecting the way the string vibrates, it's not changing the signal being generated. This is why your strings are made of metal. If they were nylon, you'd get no signal! 

I know there is some clickbait-ness to his videos, and obviously the loud and boisterous on-camera personality. But, he's not wrong about anything he said or showed in this video. If you listen to the third test block in the video where he doesn't mess with you and just swaps pickups, you can hear a small difference in each pickup. Nobody is saying pickups don't matter. But if you're going to blow $200-300 because you want better tone on your tracks, you should think about where that money is going to have the biggest impact. He's correct that mics and cabs will do more to change/color the tone than pickups will. That said, if you have unlimited funds, swapping pickups is worth it for that final refinement. 

Also fwiw, i'm kind of a pickup junkie and love trying out new pickups  But I spend most of my time messing with IRs (cabs, mics, and mic placement) when recording to get the tone I want.


----------



## technomancer (Jan 4, 2023)

^ he's actually not correct about a pickup being just an inductor, it's actually an electromechanical transducer. A straight inductor can't be used as a pickup. 

I won't get into the argument of whether the components of a vibrational system impact the vibration as that borders on religion  But I will say I lean towards the opinion of the guy with defense contracts based on analysis of vibrations through solids and the reassemble of signals based on that.


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## Erockomania (Jan 4, 2023)

I find it wild that people take anything he says with anything more than a grain of salt. I feel bad for people that actually believe him.


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## Scottosan (Jan 4, 2023)

Glenn is either deaf, a fool, a troll, a drama queen, or all of the above


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## frank falbo (Jan 4, 2023)

It’s no different than saying “all cars get you where you’re going” and that faster cars don’t really get you to your destination any faster, because traffic patterns are the main determiner of travel times. 

It completely ignores the user experience.


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## technomancer (Jan 4, 2023)

Scottosan said:


> Glenn is either deaf, a fool, a troll, a drama queen, or all of the above



The last two, for the purpose of selling clicks and getting attention. This thread shows he's pretty good at it


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## Scottosan (Jan 4, 2023)

Metallica35 said:


> His entire point is that swapping pickups has less of an effect on the tone than swapping mics, mic placement, or swapping cabs/speakers. He is totally right about this. He doesn't claim pickups don't matter. He just questions whether that's the best place to spend a couple hundred bucks as opposed to swapping cabs or mics.
> 
> He is also completely correct about pickups being a magnetic induction system (an electro-magnetic generator to be precise), not a microphone. So cry all you want about tone-wood, but it's not a real thing on an electric guitar. Wood can't affect a magnetic field. Flame me all you want, but this is high school level Physics. Bridge saddles and nut can affect tone because it changes the way the string behaves/vibrates which in turn changes how that string disrupts the magnetic field and generates signal. Wood doesn't. Neither does bolt on versus neck-thru construction. Bottom line is if it's not affecting the way the string vibrates, it's not changing the signal being generated. This is why your strings are made of metal. If they were nylon, you'd get no signal!
> 
> ...


He's not right about any of it. He's looking at it from the standpoint of does it make different if he manipulates and recorded signal, boost or cuts frequencies and blurs the raw signal with post processing. For most viewers, casual players and gigging musicians, even who mic cabs for gigs, pickups make a huge difference. How many people from the forums or viewing audience spend most of their time in in the studio. I'm no a big fan of IRs for this very reason they impart their own color and signal manipulation. They serve their purpose though. He's just selling opinion from a very myopic standpoint.


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## bostjan (Jan 4, 2023)

Metallica35 said:


> His entire point is that swapping pickups has less of an effect on the tone than swapping mics, mic placement, or swapping cabs/speakers. He is totally right about this. He doesn't claim pickups don't matter. He just questions whether that's the best place to spend a couple hundred bucks as opposed to swapping cabs or mics.
> 
> He is also completely correct about pickups being a magnetic induction system (an electro-magnetic generator to be precise), not a microphone. So cry all you want about tone-wood, but it's not a real thing on an electric guitar. Wood can't affect a magnetic field. Flame me all you want, but this is high school level Physics. Bridge saddles and nut can affect tone because it changes the way the string behaves/vibrates which in turn changes how that string disrupts the magnetic field and generates signal. Wood doesn't. Neither does bolt on versus neck-thru construction. Bottom line is if it's not affecting the way the string vibrates, it's not changing the signal being generated. This is why your strings are made of metal. If they were nylon, you'd get no signal!
> 
> ...


Oh no, sound the sirens, he said the "t" word...

Just as you are pointing out that no one is saying "x," a lot of your arguments are attacking ideas I haven't really seen anyone present in this thread. 

And if you covered how mechanical energy from a vibrating string interacts with mechanically coupled resonators made of different materials, then, wow. I studied physics at the university and we didn't get that deep into mechanics until junior year.


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## Dr. Caligari (Jan 4, 2023)

Metallica35 said:


> He is also completely correct about pickups being a magnetic induction system (an electro-magnetic generator to be precise), not a microphone. So cry all you want about tone-wood, but it's not a real thing on an electric guitar. Wood can't affect a magnetic field. Flame me all you want, but this is high school level Physics. Bridge saddles and nut can affect tone because it changes the way the string behaves/vibrates which in turn changes how that string disrupts the magnetic field and generates signal. Wood doesn't. Neither does bolt on versus neck-thru construction. Bottom line is if it's not affecting the way the string vibrates, it's not changing the signal being generated. This is why your strings are made of metal. If they were nylon, you'd get no signal!



I always think these "because physics!" arguments are weird. Physics is science, no? Based on empiricism? Like, testing shit out? But these arguments are always "because reasons". Why would you want to reason yourself to this answer rather than trying it out and seeing if you can hear a difference or not? Doesn't seem very scientific...

And wood clearly matters, so your physics must be off.


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## silvio (Jan 4, 2023)

I used to enjoy the Glenn Fricker persona to some degree, mever thought that much about whatever he had to say. Kind of like a sitcom ... Once he started doing "Raid - Shadow Legends" commercials on his videos a couple years back, I blocked all his content in my feed. Nothing wrong with getting paid for your work, but with this kind of "Sponsor" I can't take any of this "community" / "honesty" / ... talk any more. 

Especially for that kind of channel, creating controversy is the road to attention = money. So whatever he claims - it's nothing substantive and not worth it giving it any consideration in terms of possible validity of his arguments.


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## bostjan (Jan 4, 2023)

Dr. Caligari said:


> I always think these "because physics!" arguments are weird. Physics is science, no? Based on empiricism? Like, testing shit out? But these arguments are always "because reasons". Why would you want to reason yourself to this answer rather than trying it out and seeing if you can hear a difference or not? Doesn't seem very scientific...
> 
> And wood clearly matters, so your physics must be off.


I mean, the science of transfer of vibrational energy tells us, that, in theory, wood, which resonates in different parts of the acoustic spectrum, should resonate, well, at different parts of the acoustic spectrum, when attached to a vibrating string with a band of vibrations, in frequency space, which overlap with the band where the wood is susceptible to resonating. And, such a coupling will deplete the vibrational energy of the string within those bands until the vibrational energy is at equilibrium between the wood and the string.

A lot of the "t" word debate was targeting how luthiers would tap a specific piece of wood and say that it sounded better than another specific piece of wood. I mean, the science clearly backs up the luthier, even in those most extreme cases, in theory. YET, the reason most millennials state for why the wood doesn't matter is "because physics." And we've done a shit ton of data collection on this topic - recording performances and analyzing spectra to show how there are different peaks, and it's always hand-waved away like "well, you didn't control this or that well enough, so your study means nothing to me." And that's fine, but it does nothing to promote the science unless you provide some actual data yourself or whatever. But, after almost ten years of this tedious debate, it ultimately boils down to confirmation bias on both sides, and no one gives any actual number of shits about any data or any actual theory.

I think that's why this debate usually gets immediately shut down. Ultimately, if it matters to the end user, it matters, and if it doesn't matter to the end user, it doesn't matter. All else is just details that will ultimately be ignored.


----------



## Scottosan (Jan 4, 2023)

Metallica35 said:


> His entire point is that swapping pickups has less of an effect on the tone than swapping mics, mic placement, or swapping cabs/speakers. He is totally right about this. He doesn't claim pickups don't matter. He just questions whether that's the best place to spend a couple hundred bucks as opposed to swapping cabs or mics.
> 
> He is also completely correct about pickups being a magnetic induction system (an electro-magnetic generator to be precise), not a microphone. So cry all you want about tone-wood, but it's not a real thing on an electric guitar. Wood can't affect a magnetic field. Flame me all you want, but this is high school level Physics. Bridge saddles and nut can affect tone because it changes the way the string behaves/vibrates which in turn changes how that string disrupts the magnetic field and generates signal. Wood doesn't. Neither does bolt on versus neck-thru construction. Bottom line is if it's not affecting the way the string vibrates, it's not changing the signal being generated. This is why your strings are made of metal. If they were nylon, you'd get no signal!
> 
> ...


He specifically said the they are NOT transducers like a microphone and that they are inductors. This is undeniably incorrect. While they are inductors, they are absolutely transducers as well, basically an inductor with a magnet. A simple inductor cannot reproduce or convert signal from ferrous strings interfering with the magnetic flux. Take your choke from and amp, which is an inductor, and install it like a pickup. Good luck on converting signal . It's an inductor, shouldn't matter, right?

Then through determining both the induction and capacitance of the pickup, you determin it's resonant peak. Furthermore, taking the resonant peaks and the DCR, you can then determine the q factor (slope steepness) of the resonant peak. Then you have magnets which affect tone not only through magnetic flux, but also the inductance since iron content varies in different ALNICO types. ALNICO will have a higher inductance than ALNICO 5, which will still be higher than ceramic, which has not enough iron to have any negligible impact on induction. While a magnets strength affects the voltage potential, the tonal differences between magnets is actually due to the effects that the magnets have on the resonant peaks and q factor.

Think of it like the resonant peak is the frequency of a tone knob on an amp, and the q factor would be a permanent setting on the tone knob. Some pickups, certain frequencies are more pronounced than others.


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## bostjan (Jan 4, 2023)

Scottosan said:


> ceramic, which has no iron.


I don't think that small detail is accurate. Generally, ceramic magnets are made of various forms of ferrite, which absolutely contain iron ("ferri-" referring to iron).


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## Scottosan (Jan 4, 2023)

bostjan said:


> I don't think that small detail is accurate. Generally, ceramic magnets are made of various forms of ferrite, which absolutely contain iron ("ferri-" referring to iron).


To what degree that affects inductance in negligible. Perhaps no more than 1% than having an air inductor. I can tell you from my own experience as a pickup makers that the coil inductance going from no magnet to ceramic isn't enough to consistently measure whereas going good from ceramic or nothing, to ALNICO will increase 1-3H based on a given design and a pretty notable difference even between A2 and A5.



https://guitarnuts2.proboards.com/thread/9535/magnet-materials-effect-on-inductance


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## Scottosan (Jan 4, 2023)

Also 


bostjan said:


> I don't think that small detail is accurate. Generally, ceramic magnets are made of various forms of ferrite, which absolutely contain iron ("ferri-" referring to iron).


Ferrous isn't exclusive to iron. Nickel is also ferrous and impacts induction. While I'm not an expert on metallurgy, I certainly can attest to the affects on magnet types and inductance in pickups.


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## bostjan (Jan 4, 2023)

Scottosan said:


> To what degree that affects inductance in negligible. Perhaps no more than 1% than having an air inductor. I can tell you from my own experience as a pickup makers that the coil inductance going from no magnet to ceramic isn't enough to consistently measure whereas going good from ceramic or nothing, to ALNICO will increase 1-3H based on a given design and a pretty notable difference even between A2 and A5.
> 
> 
> 
> https://guitarnuts2.proboards.com/thread/9535/magnet-materials-effect-on-inductance


Are you trying to say that a ceramic core inductor has the same inductance as an air-core inductor? Because that is not true. Or are you trying to say that a pickup will have the same inductance with a ceramic magnet inside as it does with no magnet inside? Because that's a more complex problem, but I'm also pretty sure that's not generally true, either.



Scottosan said:


> Also
> 
> Ferrous isn't exclusive to iron. Nickel is also ferrous and impacts induction. While I'm not an expert on metallurgy, I certainly can attest to the affects on magnet types and inductance in pickups.


It's probably totally beside whatever point you are trying to make, but it is starting to seem as though everything you are saying at this point is slightly off.

Ferrous: 
_adjective_


1.
(chiefly of metals) containing or consisting of iron.


2.
CHEMISTRY
of iron with a valency of two; of iron(II).


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## drb (Jan 4, 2023)

bostjan said:


> ...most millennials ...


Millennials are killing our tone by not believing in tonewood! Is there nothing sacred to this generation?


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## bostjan (Jan 4, 2023)

drb said:


> Millennials are killing our tone by not believing in tonewood! Is there nothing sacred to this generation?


 Although that's not at all what I said, that is very funny.


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## tedtan (Jan 4, 2023)

drb said:


> Millennials are killing our tone by not believing in tonewood! Is there nothing sacred to this generation?


It has nothing to do with tonewood, but they did create the djent tone, so there is definitely evidence that they are killing good guitar tone.


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## Scottosan (Jan 4, 2023)

bostjan said:


> Are you trying to say that a ceramic core inductor has the same inductance as an air-core inductor? Because that is not true. Or are you trying to say that a pickup will have the same inductance with a ceramic magnet inside as it does with no magnet inside? Because that's a more complex problem, but I'm also pretty sure that's not generally true, either.
> 
> 
> It's probably totally beside whatever point you are trying to make, but it is starting to seem as though everything you are saying at this point is slightly off.
> ...


For the sake of contextual accuracy where am I off? The affects of inductance using a ceramic magnet are negligible from any context of audible differences in both resonant peaks and and q factor. If you want to argue that I am wrong based on a .09% variance in measurable induction between air and ceramic, then yes, I concede that I'm scientifically wrong. I'm trying to present some general and contextual arguments in layman's terms. 


I posted a link with examples of induction examples with various magnets. The ceramic magnet tests similar to having an air inductor here it is again




https://guitarnuts2.proboards.com/thread/9535/magnet-materials-effect-on-inductance



As I stated, I'm not a metallurgy expert, but I do know that there are other metals that are not iron that are ferrous and influence induction


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## odibrom (Jan 4, 2023)

eaeolian said:


> Honestly, the best test videos I've seen pretty much say it's the exact opposite - pickups, pickup types, and pickup height are the only things that DO matter on electric guitars.
> Fricker exists to sell clicks. I don't even watch his videos because I already know they're crap.


Don't forget the pots... pots and internal caps (either for treble bleed or tone) are the first filter after the pickups. These can _choke_ or _shine_ a pickup's voice.

Freedom for the pickups, use 1M Ohm pots...


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## Scottosan (Jan 4, 2023)

odibrom said:


> Don't forget the pots... pots and internal caps (either for treble bleed or tone) are the first filter after the pickups. These can _choke_ or _shine_ a pickup's voice.
> 
> Freedom for the pickups, use 1M Ohm pots...


I play Charvels. What are tone pots?


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## eaeolian (Jan 4, 2023)

technomancer said:


> The last two, for the purpose of selling clicks and getting attention. This thread shows he's pretty good at it


Well, he may get attention, but he didn't get a click from me.


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## Scottosan (Jan 4, 2023)

I sent Blake a pickup with the lead wires specifically tucked out of the way and taped for ease of magnet swapping. Same guitar, same strings, same pickup, same everything, just the magnets swapped.

Judge for yourself. Even a part in the same pickup matters.


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## technomancer (Jan 4, 2023)

eaeolian said:


> Well, he may get attention, but he didn't get a click from me.



Me either I refuse to watch his crap


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## odibrom (Jan 4, 2023)

A


Scottosan said:


> I play Charvels. What are tone pots?


A few of my guitars don't feature those as well... have tried 1M ohm pots for volumes for (passive pickups, either hums or single splits...)?

:::::::

1M ohm = 1000k ohm. Conventional passive hum pots are on the 500k ohm and singles on the 2500k ohms. Actives use 25k ohm pots if memory serves me well. I've never tested pot swaps in active pickups... will that interfere with the tone?

:::::::

I think I've never seen a video about passive pickups mentioning the importance and change in tone of a pot swap... imo it's huge... maybe that's because pots are cheaper and that could bring down the pickups' sales...???


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## bostjan (Jan 4, 2023)

Scottosan said:


> For the sake of contextual accuracy where am I off?



Well, as I indicated, there are a number of things you presented that are maybe totally beside your point, but factually inaccurate.



Scottosan said:


> The affects of inductance using a ceramic magnet are negligible from any context of audible differences in both resonant peaks and and q factor.



What do you mean by that? For a pickup? As opposed to what? No magnet? Then the pickup won't work! I don't understand your point. Your claim that a ferrite ceramic in an inductor will not alter the inductance is incorrect. Otherwise, inductors wouldn't have a ferrite bead inside of them most of the time. What you are saying here is just unclear.



Scottosan said:


> If you want to argue that I am wrong based on a .09% variance in measurable induction between air and ceramic, then yes, I concede that I'm scientifically wrong.



But it's not 0.09%  Again, what are you even trying to say here? If you make an inductor, not a pickup, but an inductor, then whether you use an air core or ceramic ferrite core, it's a huge difference. Just look at any inductor you can buy from the store, for example Radio Shack, and note that there is a ferrite ceramic bead inside of it. Why would they do that if it didn't make a substantial difference?! Well, the answer is that it *does *make a difference! Not 0.09% but as much as 300000%.

If you are talking about pickups, then you need to be more specific and try to use fewer words that you don't understand to get your point across. 



Scottosan said:


> I'm trying to present some general and contextual arguments in layman's terms.



Ok, let's hear them...



Scottosan said:


> I posted a link with examples of induction examples with various magnets. The ceramic magnet tests similar to having an air inductor here it is again



Umm, I hate to break it to you, but that's different from what you were talking about. The core of the wind is the pole pieces, and you are looking at how the inductance reacts to how those pole pieces are magnetized. There are tons of inconsistencies in what the guy is saying anyway. If the higher the Henries, the brighter the tone applies to not having a magnet at all, then obviously we have a huge problem, since, without any magnet, you get no tone, because you'd get no sound. 



Scottosan said:


> As I stated, I'm not a metallurgy expert, but I do know that there are other metals that are not iron that are ferrous and influence induction
> 
> View attachment 119287


Umm, I don't know where you got that list, but that is wrong. Lead is not ferrous material.

Look up the word in the dictionary or something if you are unsure. Or, if you are sure, and I'm telling you that you are wrong, and you don't want to look the word up from a proper source, well, that's not my problem, and you are still wrong. But I don't even care. You started saying ferrous anyway when I was saying "ferrite," so, already, we are off to a rough start communicating.

Why don't we forget about everything you said up to now, and you make your statement as best you can using language with which you are comfortable. I'll probably agree if you take out all of the parts that scan to me as nonsense...


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## ExMachina (Jan 4, 2023)

Now I know he's full of crap ^, radio shack doesn't even exist.


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## bostjan (Jan 4, 2023)

ExMachina said:


> Now I know he's full of crap ^, radio shack doesn't even exist.











RadioShack.com Official Site - America's Technology Store


The Shack Is Back! Shop Radios, Headphones, TV Antennas, Cables & Adapters, DIY Tools & Parts, Electronics Maker Kits, and much more brand new arrivals daily! Don't forget to visit any of our 450+ RadioShack locations across America!




www.radioshack.com


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## Scottosan (Jan 4, 2023)

bostjan said:


> Well, as I indicated, there are a number of things you presented that are maybe totally beside your point, but factually inaccurate.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Again, context….. I indicated that an an inductor without a magnet won’t work. I’m saying that the inductive difference between an air core inductor and ceramic core inductor is in the context of pickups is negligible.

The metals physically centered in the coil aren’t the only location in the proximity of coils capable of changing its inductive properties.While the pole pieces are physically the core the inductor, other metals and alloys in close proximity affect the impedance. This is easy to test

Go take an ALNICO pickup and measure the inductance. Remove the magnet and measure again. Now insert a ceramic magnet and measure again. The first will be higher than the second 2, which will measure nearly identical.

Now, outside of the magnetic properties of the pickup, the inductance, capacitance, and impedance are what decides the tonal properties of the pickup.


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## Scottosan (Jan 4, 2023)

bostjan said:


> Well, as I indicated, there are a number of things you presented that are maybe totally beside your point, but factually inaccurate.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


I should have linked that instead of screen shot it as it had drop downs that indicted ferrous or not ferrous for different metals and allous 

But, you're obviously more focused on to he flawed logic of discrediting my entire argument based on pointing out inaccuracies of things not relevant to the original point on induction and it's affect on tone. I pointed out before you did that I'm no metal expert, but can prove with certainty the role of inductance in a pickup, what affects the inductance, and the common materials used.


----------



## Matt08642 (Jan 4, 2023)

All this science talk is bumming me out, lets go back to saying things like "It's got a really smooth high end but still has some hair" so I can describe my pickups using male pattern baldness terms.


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## Emperoff (Jan 4, 2023)

Me reading the last pages of this thread:


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## bostjan (Jan 4, 2023)

Scottosan said:


> Again, context….. I indicated that an an inductor without a magnet won’t work. I’m saying that the inductive difference between an air core inductor and ceramic core inductor is negligible.



For an inductor, it's far from negligible.

Here is the equation for determining the inductance of an inductor:

Inductance = permeability x number of turns² x cross sectional area / length

L = µN²A / l

So, for the same number of turns and the same size, an inductor with an air core an 4 Henries will jump up to about 6000-12000 H with a ferrite core. If you don't believe me, you can look all of this up on your own. If you do believe me, but think that a difference between 4 and 12 thousand is insignificant, then I don't know what else to tell you... 

Or are you talking about a pickup, and not just an inductor? Do you know what the core of the coil is?



Scottosan said:


> The metals physically centered in the coil aren’t the only location in the proximity of coils capable of changing its inductive properties.While the pole prices are physically the core the inductor, other metals and alloys in close proximity affect the impedance. This is easy to test



The impedance or the inductance? Which are you talking about?



Scottosan said:


> Go take an ALNICO pickup and measure the inductance. Remove the magnet and measure again. Now insert a ceramic magnet and measure again. The first will be higher than the second 2, which will measure nearly identical.



Have you tried this? What are you using to measure inductance?



Scottosan said:


> Not context again, outside of the magnetic properties of the pickup, the inductance, capacitance, and impedance are what decides the tonal properties of the pickup.



Agreed. But I think you are mincing a lot of words. Maybe you need to chill on the jargon, since you seem to just be throwing words together and it's not saying what you maybe think it is saying. You seem to have done so an awful lot just in the quoted post.



Scottosan said:


> I should have linked that instead of screen shot it as it had drop downs that indicted ferrous or not ferrous for different metals and allous
> 
> But, you're obviously more focused on to he flawed logic of discrediting my entire argument based on pointing out inaccuracies of things not relevant to the original point on induction and it's affect on tone. I pointed out before you did that I'm no metal expert, but can prove with certainty the role of inductance in a pickup, what affects the inductance, and the common materials used.



I am seriously just trying to make sense of what you are even trying to say. I don't want to discredit your argument. I just want to know what your argument even is at this point.


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## vertibration (Jan 4, 2023)

Why dont people like Fricker? Seems like a dude who has a lot to say about things, and has young men jam on his instruments in his videos


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## The Q (Jan 4, 2023)

I recorded this. 



I'll leave any conclusions to you, but I'll say that I'm not cheating; these are actually different guitars with different pickups in a (very) distorted example, any imperfections notwithstanding.


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## Jamiecrain (Jan 4, 2023)

Pickup differences are definitely overstated. 

There is a lot of fairy dust sprinkled throughout the pickup market and whilst there will be subtle differences especially across brands, a tweak to an EQ will eradicate these. 

Choose a style (eg high gain), choose a colour or name you like, and you’ll be fine.


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## bostjan (Jan 4, 2023)

The Q said:


> I recorded this.
> 
> 
> 
> I'll leave any conclusions to you, but I'll say that I'm not cheating; these are actually different guitars with different pickups in a (very) distorted example, any imperfections notwithstanding.



Yeah, I can't tell the difference at all - wait... (!)


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## The Q (Jan 4, 2023)

Ignore 


bostjan said:


> Yeah, I can't tell the difference at all - wait... (!)


Ignore the initial "attack", focus on the sound after a couple seconds on the riff have passed, not to mention the second part where I switch guitars on the fly. 

Personal opinion: Some people may have golden ears, but damn if I could hear any worthwhile difference (with the exception of the acoustic pickup) between all of them. 

Certainly not nearly enough for me to warrant swapping any decent pickup with any other set, if I were looking to alter my tone.


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## Scottosan (Jan 4, 2023)

bostjan said:


> For an inductor, it's far from negligible.




In the CONTEXT of pickups negligible. Not all inductors or serve the same purpose nor are they the same design.

Kinmam talks briefly on the in the background stuff paragraphs, but he just doesn't explain why it doesn't affect tone .

The inductive characteristics relevant to a guitar pickup and how it affects tone are below






Resonant Frequency Calculator | LC Calculator - Good Calculators


This resonant frequency calculator employs the capacitance (C) and inductance (L) values of an LC circuit (also known as a resonant circuit, tank circuit, or tuned circuit) to determine its resonant frequency (f)




goodcalculators.com





And you can determine the q factor here






Inductor Q Factor Calculator - everything RF







www.everythingrf.com






bostjan said:


> Have you tried this? What are you using to measure inductance?



Yes, literally hundreds of times, as recent as yesterday. You can measure with an LCR meter or a purpose built inductance meter, which I have both. Pickup (a) had an inductance of 6.8h with no magnet. 6.8h with ceramic magnets, and 8.6h with an A5 magnet.

The resonant peak difference was nearly 600hz


----------



## Scottosan (Jan 4, 2023)

Jamiecrain said:


> Pickup differences are definitely overstated.
> 
> There is a lot of fairy dust sprinkled throughout the pickup market and whilst there will be subtle differences especially across brands, a tweak to an EQ will eradicate these.
> 
> Choose a style (eg high gain), choose a colour or name you like, and you’ll be fine.


For treble and base response, I'd agree, but mid controls on an amp are frequency specific unless you have a multiband EQ. If your amps mid control is too far varied from the resonant peaks of the pickup, there will still be an underlying tone from the pickup thats still there. The same can be said for speakers.


----------



## bostjan (Jan 4, 2023)

Scottosan said:


> In the CONTEXT of pickups negligible. Not all inductors or serve the same purpose nor are they the same design.



What do you mean?



Scottosan said:


> Kinmam talks briefly on the in the background stuff paragraphs, but he just doesn't explain why it doesn't affect tone .



I don't understand. Who? Where?



Scottosan said:


> The inductive characteristics relevant to a guitar pickup and how it affects tone are below
> 
> 
> 
> ...



This formula indicates the opposite of what was stated in the other link, about how more inductance means a brighter pickup, since the link quoted above shows how resonant frequency *decreases* when inductance *increases*.

And, once again, that is all for an _inductor and capacitor circuit_. You are talking about a pickup and kind of interchanging when you look at it as an inductor and when you look at it as not an inductor, but, in this case, the page you linked is for something totally different than what anyone here is talking about with pickups. We are not building a radio here, so it's questionable just how relevant this is. But, here again, you are not stating your point. 

So, what is the idea you are trying to suggest?



Scottosan said:


> And you can determine the q factor here
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Again, these formulas are for totally different circuits than the intended purpose of a pickup. This is for radio frequency! None of this applies to this discussion!



Scottosan said:


> Yes, literally hundreds of times, as recent as yesterday. You can measure with an LCR meter or a purpose built inductance meter, which I have both. Pickup (a) had an inductance of 6.8h with no magnet. 6.8h with ceramic magnets, and 8.6h with an A5 magnet.
> 
> The resonant peak differenve was nearly 600hz



Which pickup was it?


----------



## Scottosan (Jan 4, 2023)

bostjan said:


> What do you mean?
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Where do you think the resonant peaks specs of pickups are derived? I can't explain any other way why they sound different. These are widely accepted formulas in the pickup winding community and can be easily tested. The pickup I tested doesn't matter, as you'll get the same results on most humbucker and single coil design.

Adding inductance without adding capacitance will lower the resonant peak. That said, since guitar rigs dont occupy the entire spectrum and have prominent frequencies themselves, lowering the peak from a higher non-prominent frequency to a frequency of what we'd consider high mids gives the perception of being brighter.



On the other hand, adding inductance through additional winds in the coil raises inductance, impedance and capacitance and sometimes give the perception of being brighter or darker depending on where the peak is due to a lower q factor. It's a balancing act.


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## ExMachina (Jan 4, 2023)

Dropping coin on a bunch of 2nd order LPFs. I'm going to make a pickup with a ADC built in and an app to change the fir.


----------



## Mathemagician (Jan 4, 2023)

Guitarjon said:


> Exactly! The annoying thing is that once you make that claim to folks who believe Glenn, they'll say you're an idiot...
> 
> What I did find interesting though is that when I did a comparison of my own (with EMGs, Duncans and Fishmans) a lot of people said they couldn't hear a difference between the Duncans especially. I could hear a difference albeit perhaps subtle but there definitely was a difference between say the Distortion and the Nazgul. This is especially noticeable when you play them yourself.
> 
> Sometimes it baffles me a little bit how people can't hear differences between pieces of gear in general though. I had a comparison of 53 amps and some people claimed they all sounded the same while they clearly didn't. I guess it's hard for those folks to hear differences that perhaps are more on the subtle side.




No one listens to Glenn. He’s the living embodiment of “Old Man yells at cloud” meme.


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## Scottosan (Jan 4, 2023)

Stepping down from soapbox


----------



## Marked Man (Jan 4, 2023)

MaxOfMetal said:


> I've done my part to avoid the YouTube Guitar Influencer circle jerk, I wish it wouldn't spill over so much.
> 
> None of these chodes actually believe any of this shit, it's just for clicks and to get the guitar nerdo-sphere worked up.
> 
> It's a self feeding engine by a bunch of dipshits and the absolute most cringe part of being a guitar player.



_Hungry for Likes._

"Thanks everyone, please remember to click 'Like' and Subscribe to my (monetized) channel!!".


----------



## ExMachina (Jan 5, 2023)

Good reference, 



BuildYourGuitar.com :: The Secrets of Electric Guitar Pickups


----------



## Spaced Out Ace (Jan 5, 2023)

I will say that the pickup isn't the most important part of the voicing of your sound; the speakers are. They matter, sure, but don't spend thousands of dollars finding "THEE magical unicorn pickups!" 

The speaker changing could result in a huge difference, while changing pickups is likely to be much more subtle.


----------



## odibrom (Jan 5, 2023)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> I will say that the pickup isn't the most important part of the voicing of your sound; the speakers are. They matter, sure, but don't spend thousands of dollars finding "THEE magical unicorn pickups!"
> 
> The speaker changing could result in a huge difference, while changing pickups is likely to be much more subtle.


I agree but it's easier to sell pickups than speakers hence their improved marketing strategies with magical properties. They're also cheaper (in most cases) and easier to handle, either at the install as on storage... a bad installed pickup won't blow an amp... but you can't say the same for speakers.


----------



## Spaced Out Ace (Jan 5, 2023)

odibrom said:


> I agree but it's easier to sell pickups than speakers hence their improved marketing strategies with magical properties. They're also cheaper (in most cases) and easier to handle, either at the install as on storage... a bad installed pickup won't blow an amp... but you can't say the same for speakers.


If you can't hook up a speaker, then maybe watch a few YouTube videos.


----------



## odibrom (Jan 5, 2023)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> If you can't hook up a speaker, then maybe watch a few YouTube videos.


I didn't said I couldn't... I only mirrored a possible thought... and a pickup change is way more convenient than a speaker swap...


----------



## Spaced Out Ace (Jan 6, 2023)

odibrom said:


> I didn't said I couldn't... I only mirrored a possible thought... and a pickup change is way more convenient than a speaker swap...


The editorial, royal "you," sir/ma'am.


----------



## Rev2010 (Jan 6, 2023)

Here's the thing, everything matters, from the wood to the pickups. The truth of it though is that it matters way way less than people make it out to affect the tone. Tonewood for example, yes there is a difference but it's very minor in most circumstances. It's not like one wood is going to be completely unusable and another is going to be gold. Sometimes there's so little difference that you really can't even hear it, other times there is. With pickups there is also a difference but I will also agree it's mostly EQ based and output-based. So in other words what I'm getting at is that you can take a guitar with a full maple body and a hot rails stacked single coil humbucker and through some mixing and mastering work the track to sound very close or even indistinguishable from someone playing a mahogany bodied guitar with a Duncan or ESP humbucker. Sound is sound there are not many unique variables to the tone and sound other than EQ and harmonics. I think the whole point in using the type of wood you prefer in a guitar and the pickups you prefer in the guitar is so that you're already just about there with the sound that you prefer. I know for a fact I prefer mahogany body guitars. And I mean full mahogany with mahogany neck etc but I have guitars with basswood bodies and maple necks and I'm not crying about it or saying something was off it sounds just as fucking good. Same thing with amps, I'm sure you can do a recording with an Engl Powerball or a 5150, or whatever high gain amp and still tweak out the sound where it sits alongside something like a Mesa Dual Rec with proper eq'ing and such for a mix. But what amp do I want to use live? I'm going to want to use my favorite which is the Mesa. Because I know it has a sound that I want and love and is ready to go without having to "match" the sound.

Now don't get me wrong here I'm not saying each individual thing doesn't have its own unique fingerprint, not saying that at all. I'm saying we're working with sound and just like people can imitate voices (which I do surprisingly well depending on the character I'm imitating) you can also get very close to the sound of another guitar or amp with a little bit of effort. I guess the moral of the story I'm trying to say is that there is not going to be a world of difference between guitar woods, guitar pickups, guitar amps, etc. But there is definitely a difference whether subtle or great and can be adjusted on counterparts to closely match other tones with a little bit of effort.


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## ekulggats (Jan 6, 2023)

For the record, I have always hated Glenn Fricker and his weird overly excitable yet pushy demeanor, he gives dipshit non advice for 'clout and I could really do without him. *Fluff bugs the shit out of me too, maybe slightly less lol


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## vertibration (Saturday at 12:31 AM)

The synthesizer youtube content creator pool is even worse......way way worse.


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## vertibration (Saturday at 12:34 AM)

ekulggats said:


> For the record, I have always hated Glenn Fricker and his weird overly excitable yet pushy demeanor, he gives dipshit non advice for 'clout and I could really do without him. *Fluff bugs the shit out of me too, maybe slightly less lol


They both did something right. Love em or hate em, they both making some money. What erks the shit outa me is how all content creators start doing the same thing as each other for subs. Shit gets boring AF. From the weirdo surprised, or abnormal face on the promo video they pushin, or how the vids are so mixed perfectly you cant get a straight answer on what a product actually sounds like raw. Its getting rediculous

content creators.....stop ripping each other off. Do some original shit. Stop with the weirdo personality. No one gives AF if you have a nice smile or if you can crack lame jokes. People literally only care about the product and how it actually sounds.

I do like Pariah vs Gear. I dont care if his videos arent perfect, the sound is honest. It helped me buy a Ceres pedal, when other videos were just annoying AF.


----------



## ExMachina (Saturday at 2:50 AM)

That's because of the algo, they're all trying to game that.


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## HeHasTheJazzHands (Saturday at 2:57 AM)

ExMachina said:


> That's because of the algo, they're all trying to game that.


Yyyep. It's why they start off pretty unique, then all eventually start becoming too similar to each other. It's what the algorithm awards. Apparently Linus Tech Tips did a test of this and pretty much confirmed shitty clickbait does exactly what it says on the tin; awards clicks.


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## John (Saturday at 3:12 AM)

ekulggats said:


> *Fluff bugs the shit out of me too



Even he has fanboy simps fawning over his belongings (ie- his Hyperion guitar) and his words. As if they're gospel to that lot, no matter what. And it's absolutely weird to say the least.


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## Dr. Caligari (Saturday at 3:48 AM)

vertibration said:


> content creators.....stop ripping each other off. Do some original shit. Stop with the weirdo personality. No one gives AF if you have a nice smile or if you can crack lame jokes. People literally only care about the product and how it actually sounds.



Not sure this is true though. I don't watch these people except very very rarely when they happen to do something I'm interested in (almost never). But if everybody was like that they would barely have any viewers. They must have big followings that watch everything they do regardless what the content actually is. Sort of like a late night talk show or something? Turn on, watch that guy you like talk for a while, turn off. I don't know.


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## Jon Pearson (Saturday at 7:03 AM)

I think there are different audience types for sure, but I have to think it's the harder road to do your own thing and slug it out. You might end up with a more dedicated, if smaller, base that way.

I immediately think of Plague Scythe Studios Ryan, that guy is THE guy as far as gear content goes. Super in depth, quality discussion with no BS, but look at his sub count and it just doesn't even come close to bigger channels. I watch EVERYTHING he does even if I'm not interested in the product though, he just does such a good job.

That Pedal Show is another awesome channel, or Ask Zac, but those guys are firmly outside the metal sphere.


----------



## Emperoff (Saturday at 7:05 AM)

I found this channel a couple of days ago and was pleasantly surprised at the thumbnail design and style this dude uses.



https://www.youtube.com/@xabier.iriarte/videos



The thumbnails are very descriptive even if you don't understand the language. There's no "goofy face", just a silhouette. You instantly know what the video is about. I really, really liked the concept.


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## ExMachina (Saturday at 7:27 AM)

Jon Pearson said:


> I think there are different audience types for sure, but I have to think it's the harder road to do your own thing and slug it out. You might end up with a more dedicated, if smaller, base that way.
> 
> I immediately think of Plague Scythe Studios Ryan, that guy is THE guy as far as gear content goes. Super in depth, quality discussion with no BS, but look at his sub count and it just doesn't even come close to bigger channels. I watch EVERYTHING he does even if I'm not interested in the product though, he just does such a good job.
> 
> That Pedal Show is another awesome channel, or Ask Zac, but those guys are firmly outside the metal sphere.


Plague scythe is good, but his videos are too long and unpolished. Need to put for time stamps if they're gonna be that long.


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## Jon Pearson (Saturday at 7:36 AM)

ExMachina said:


> Plague scythe is good, but his videos are too long and unpolished. Need to put for time stamps if they're gonna be that long.


Timestamps would be good, but I love the long form. I know that's possibly a minority opinion, but it's why I enjoy his stuff.


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## ExMachina (Saturday at 7:47 AM)

Dome does really good videos for pedals, 10 minutes long shows be plots so my engineer is satisfied.


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## vertibration (Saturday at 6:37 PM)

Dr. Caligari said:


> Not sure this is true though. I don't watch these people except very very rarely when they happen to do something I'm interested in (almost never). But if everybody was like that they would barely have any viewers. They must have big followings that watch everything they do regardless what the content actually is. Sort of like a late night talk show or something? Turn on, watch that guy you like talk for a while, turn off. I don't know.


they absolutely do this. Not all of them, but most synth and guitar content creators absolutely do this


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## Legion (Sunday at 12:51 PM)

Did this need to be a thread on SSO

EDIT: Didn't realize this was a week old thread, my apologies. Didn't mean to bump it up.


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## will_shred (Sunday at 1:31 PM)

I wind my own pickups so

Yeah it makes a difference, a pretty big one. You can setup an actual testing rig using a frequency analyser and tone generator and measure the frequency response of different pickup magnets and windings. It is quite literally something that can be tested objectively and accurately and reproduced over and over. I won't elaborate further. Try it yourself if you're inclined. Glenn is full of crap, idk if he actually believes it or is just grasping for clicks. Probably the ladder.



https://guitarnuts2.proboards.com/thread/7723/measuring-electrical-properties-guitar-pickups


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## Legion (Sunday at 5:31 PM)

Ooooookay since I'm here I might as well throw in my two cents.

Glenn has his opinion which is gonna piss off a lot of people. But he's cultivated an audience that rewards that kind of hostility.
That being said, I think people are missing the fact that Glenn is speaking from a producer/engineer's perspective. You're gonna be hard pressed to tell the difference between pickups in a mix, especially when that much gain on. With a nice Led Zep kinda crunch you can tell the difference a decent bit more, although IME it's still subtle.

From the player's perspective, they make a large difference because that difference is more _felt, _and less _heard_. It's a difference in feel (more compressed, less compressed, top end response, etc.) that makes a difference in how you play. For instance, I used to play my two Ibanez RG's very differently because one had some medium output stock pickups in it, the other has fucking crazy powerful Elysian Goliaths in it. Both sound good, but feel a fair bit different. On the Elysian RG I cannot stop myself from chugging away, while on the stock RG with the V6 pickups (I think) I felt like playing more like Cynic riffs on it. Ended up selling that stock guitar a while ago tho...

Bottom line: If you're a player (as opposed to a producer/engineer), you're probably gonna feel the difference, so go nuts and experiment. If not, don't. Do what makes you happy, don't worry about anything else.


EDIT: Oh wow this thread has a lot of physics in it. Haven't gone through all of it, maybe I will later when I feel less bleh about internet arguments...


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## Dr. Caligari (Monday at 2:59 AM)

vertibration said:


> they absolutely do this. Not all of them, but most synth and guitar content creators absolutely do this



Sorry I think my post was a bit unclear. I didn't mean to comment on the content creators themselves but their audience. I should have quoted just the last sentence, like this:



vertibration said:


> People literally only care about the product and how it actually sounds.



This is the part I'm not sure is true. Like I'm not sure the audience always cares so much about the content, but are watching more because it's entertainment that kills time. And then that's why the content creatots can get away with focusing less on content and more on being an entertaining character, copying stuff that the algo picks up and so on.


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## Dr. Caligari (Monday at 3:05 AM)

But yeah, I've seen videos where I got a deja-vu feeling only to realize I've seen the exact same video from another youtuber. Not just the idea, but pretty much the entire script. And that's insane to me. I'd be so pissed if someone took my content (not that I make any) and just copied it word for word in their own video.


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## Jon Pearson (Monday at 6:34 AM)

Dr. Caligari said:


> But yeah, I've seen videos where I got a deja-vu feeling only to realize I've seen the exact same video from another youtuber. Not just the idea, but pretty much the entire script. And that's insane to me. I'd be so pissed if someone took my content (not that I make any) and just copied it word for word in their own video.


I'm sure some of this might be a result of the copy sent to them from the manufacturer, basically the "talking points". I get the feeling you are talking more about the whole persona being stolen, but I figured it's worth mentioning that whatever company provided the product for demo likely has at least a basic script that they want reviewers to use as a guide.


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## Dr. Caligari (Monday at 12:13 PM)

Jon Pearson said:


> I'm sure some of this might be a result of the copy sent to them from the manufacturer, basically the "talking points". I get the feeling you are talking more about the whole persona being stolen, but I figured it's worth mentioning that whatever company provided the product for demo likely has at least a basic script that they want reviewers to use as a guide.



I wasn't actually thinking about gear videos now though, but more like "top 5 tips to do x" or "7 reasons why you x", that kind of stuff. I know I've seen actual plagiarism in this type of videos. Not often mind you, but I have seen it.


----------



## Metallica35 (Monday at 3:29 PM)

Scottosan said:


> He specifically said the they are NOT transducers like a microphone and that they are inductors. This is undeniably incorrect. While they are inductors, they are absolutely transducers as well, basically an inductor with a magnet. A simple inductor cannot reproduce or convert signal from ferrous strings interfering with the magnetic flux. Take your choke from and amp, which is an inductor, and install it like a pickup. Good luck on converting signal . It's an inductor, shouldn't matter, right?
> 
> Then through determining both the induction and capacitance of the pickup, you determin it's resonant peak. Furthermore, taking the resonant peaks and the DCR, you can then determine the q factor (slope steepness) of the resonant peak. Then you have magnets which affect tone not only through magnetic flux, but also the inductance since iron content varies in different ALNICO types. ALNICO will have a higher inductance than ALNICO 5, which will still be higher than ceramic, which has not enough iron to have any negligible impact on induction. While a magnets strength affects the voltage potential, the tonal differences between magnets is actually due to the effects that the magnets have on the resonant peaks and q factor.
> 
> Think of it like the resonant peak is the frequency of a tone knob on an amp, and the q factor would be a permanent setting on the tone knob. Some pickups, certain frequencies are more pronounced than others.


This is a good explanation. My understanding was that you have to have enough winding around the pickup coil (impedance) to negate the noise of the rest of the circuit to ensure that you generate a clean signal. That's why the resonant peak changes with different impedance values. Presumably, there is an impedance value that is too low to generate any kind of meaningful signal no?


----------



## Metallica35 (Monday at 3:33 PM)

bostjan said:


> Oh no, sound the sirens, he said the "t" word...
> 
> Just as you are pointing out that no one is saying "x," a lot of your arguments are attacking ideas I haven't really seen anyone present in this thread.
> 
> And if you covered how mechanical energy from a vibrating string interacts with mechanically coupled resonators made of different materials, then, wow. I studied physics at the university and we didn't get that deep into mechanics until junior year.


My point in addressing some other issues not covered in the video was to simply illuminate the fact that people focus on minutia most of the time instead of the things that have the biggest impact on your tone. He does a good job in the video showing that mic choice, mic placement, and cab/speaker types will have a much more pronounced effect on your tone than a pickup swap will.


----------



## Metallica35 (Monday at 3:36 PM)

Scottosan said:


> He's not right about any of it. He's looking at it from the standpoint of does it make different if he manipulates and recorded signal, boost or cuts frequencies and blurs the raw signal with post processing. For most viewers, casual players and gigging musicians, even who mic cabs for gigs, pickups make a huge difference. How many people from the forums or viewing audience spend most of their time in in the studio. I'm no a big fan of IRs for this very reason they impart their own color and signal manipulation. They serve their purpose though. He's just selling opinion from a very myopic standpoint.


Well, the first two tests I agree. With respect to the last test, he shows you what just a simple pickup swap does. He doesn't claim it makes no difference. His conclusion was just that it doesn't make as big of a difference as people think it does and your money might go farther by changing other aspects of your tone first. The title is click-baity in the sense that it implies pickups don't do anything, which he even admits in the video is untrue.


----------



## odibrom (Monday at 3:45 PM)

@Metallica35 please use the "+Quote" option before replying, it's right besides the "reply" one. It will quote the posts you select to your own post and you can then reply to whomever you want in 1 single post...


... carry on everybody...


----------



## Scottosan (Monday at 3:56 PM)

Its


Metallica35 said:


> This is a good explanation. My understanding was that you have to have enough winding around the pickup coil (impedance) to negate the noise of the rest of the circuit to ensure that you generate a clean signal. That's why the resonant peak changes with different impedance values. Presumably, there is an impedance value that is too low to generate any kind of meaningful signal no?



There's pickups from 4k up to 25k. Inductance is more importance than impedance. Impedance isn't even a factor for determining resonant peak frequency or output. It is important for determining q factor (how dramatic the EQ slope) of the resonant peak.


----------



## RevDrucifer (Monday at 3:57 PM)

I’m really curious about the whole “that’s what the algorithm wants” thing. I would have to assume that “the algorithm” is actually detecting things like surprised faces with their mouths hanging open? I can see it picking up exclamation marks in titles easy enough. 

It just seems like such a fucking stupid thing to ’force’ people into. Like was a meeting held at YouTube and someone actually said “Someone go program the algorithm to only promote videos of people with their mouths hanging open”? 

Those thumbnails will make me not-click something every single time, it’s just so fucking obnoxious and whenever I see it I feel like I’m turning back into the 15-year old Dream Theater virtuoso elitist kid and making fun of all the people who like popular shit when I see a thumbnail of a mouth hanging open and a high view count.


----------



## RevDrucifer (Monday at 3:59 PM)

And I’d like to see Glenn say pickups don’t matter when he’s recording a guitarist using a muddy pickup while trying to execute 16th note palm mutes at 200bpm only for it to sound like a pile of ass, when an 81 would make Fuckers job a lot easier by not having to EQ the mush out of a guitar tone.


----------



## STRHelvete (Monday at 5:21 PM)

RevDrucifer said:


> And I’d like to see Glenn say pickups don’t matter when he’s recording a guitarist using a muddy pickup while trying to execute 16th note palm mutes at 200bpm only for it to sound like a pile of ass, when an 81 would make Fuckers job a lot easier by not having to EQ the mush out of a guitar tone.


That's not what he means...


----------



## BMFan30 (Monday at 5:32 PM)

STRHelvete said:


> Nobody has EVER said "Man I went to see -insert band- live and the guitarist really should have gone with SD Black Winters instead of that Bareknuckle Warpig..totally ruined the show for me" or "I really like this song, they must be using Fishman Fluence Moderns!"


Yep, that. LOL 

Sure would be funny as fuck if someone was going around saying shit like this. People are usually too hammered to notice ol' boy goes into his line 6 app on his laptop but still has the Marshall cabs on looking really fucking badass in the background.


----------



## Emperoff (Monday at 5:50 PM)

What some people don't seem to consider is that changing the mic, the speakers, or the cab, *affects the whole rig*.

Sometimes you just want to fine tune the sound of a particular guitar that is giving you trouble. I don't know why so many folks have a problem acknowledging this and feel the need to be validated by a screaming moron on Youtube.

The "no one in the audience is going to notice" argument is also old and stupid. There won't notice the cab or mic choices either. They will be looking at the damn singer. We buy gear because we like what we feel or hear when we play through it. None of us gives a damn about what the audience notices or not


----------



## odibrom (Monday at 6:35 PM)

Emperoff said:


> The "no one in the audience is going to notice" argument is also old and stupid. There won't notice the cab or mic choices either. They will be looking at the damn singer. We buy gear because we like what we feel or hear when we play through it. None of us gives a damn about what the audience notices or not


All true... an idea think about regarding the audience not looking at us, string players, ditch the vocalist/singer in your band, go instrumental!  

... I'm sure most in the audience won't notice the Marshall cab props on stage as empty shells just to add to the scene... "hey, they mic'ed that cab really well"...

... I'm being silly, never mind these words...


----------



## tedtan (Monday at 6:41 PM)

Emperoff said:


> The "no one in the audience is going to notice" argument is also old and stupid. There won't notice the cab or mic choices either. They will be looking at the damn singer. We buy gear because we like what we feel or hear when we play through it. None of us gives a damn about what the audience notices or not


This is true.


----------



## STRHelvete (Monday at 8:00 PM)

For fuck's sake why are people still upset about this? Glenn's point was simple. Expecting pickups to be the saving grace of tone is stupid. In the larger scheme of things pickups aren't the make or break for metal. In a mix, live or recorded, in a metal band with heaps of distortion and shit the pickups aren't gonna factor in as much as people hope.

Spending fuckloads on boutique pickups trying to revolutionize your sound is a waste of money. Buying someone's signature pickups won't suddenly make you sound and play like them. Your stock pickups aren't the reason you don't sound like your favorite records. People should spend more time practicing, developing better playing and songwriting skills, and not obsessing over small things.

No one is gonna notice small differences but you, and you could be spending your time focusing on what matters. 

Glenn's clickbait worked. There's an entire thread with people up in arms over a simple fact. They've blown it out of proportion, got emotional without even hearing his explanation, and went off the rails over a single sentence. They've done EXACTLY what Glenn wanted. He trolls gear nerds because they're easy to troll.


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## tedtan (Monday at 9:31 PM)

STRHelvete said:


> He trolls gear nerds because they're easy to troll.


Meh, I can be a gear nerd, but I’d have to care what someone thinks in order to be trolled.

And while I don’t give Glen clicks because I don’t care for his schtick, I don’t have anything against (or for) him; I’m indifferent.

I assume there are other gear nerds like me.


----------



## Scottosan (Monday at 9:58 PM)

T


RevDrucifer said:


> I’m really curious about the whole “that’s what the algorithm wants” thing. I would have to assume that “the algorithm” is actually detecting things like surprised faces with their mouths hanging open? I can see it picking up exclamation marks in titles easy enough.
> 
> It just seems like such a fucking stupid thing to ’force’ people into. Like was a meeting held at YouTube and someone actually said “Someone go program the algorithm to only promote videos of people with their mouths hanging open”?
> 
> Those thumbnails will make me not-click something every single time, it’s just so fucking obnoxious and whenever I see it I feel like I’m turning back into the 15-year old l





Emperoff said:


> What some people don't seem to consider is that changing the mic, the speakers, of the cab, *affects the whole rig*.
> 
> Sometimes you just want to fine tune the sound of a particular guitar that is giving you trouble. I don't know why so many folks have a problem understanding this and feel the need to be validated by a screaming moron on Youtube.





STRHelvete said:


> For fuck's sake why are people still upset about this? Glenn's point was simple. Expecting pickups to be the saving grace of tone is stupid. In the larger scheme of things pickups aren't the make or break for metal. In a mix, live or recorded, in a metal band with heaps of distortion and shit the pickups aren't gonna factor in as much as people hope.
> 
> Spending fuckloads on boutique pickups trying to revolutionize your sound is a waste of money. Buying someone's signature pickups won't suddenly make you sound and play like them. Your stock pickups aren't the reason you don't sound like your favorite records. People should spend more time practicing, developing better playing and songwriting skills, and not obsessing over small things.
> 
> ...


Glenn's opinion is from a narrow viewpoint of a sound engineer, where he literally boost, shelves, limits, compresses and doubletracks to get mix friendly tones. I'm going out on limb and guessing that most players don't even gig let alone spend an significant time in a professional studio.


----------



## RevDrucifer (Tuesday at 8:42 AM)

STRHelvete said:


> That's not what he means...



I’ve grasped the point of his video at this point, but his argument falls apart if you’re using shit that can’t do what you need it to do. My example was taken from my experience over the weekend tracking a trash metal song at 210bpm; I started the song with a JB in the bridge and no matter how I dialed in a preset, I couldn’t get it tight enough to track 16th notes at 210bpm. Once I put the EMG’s in, without even adjusting the preset(s) I was using, there was all the clarity I needed and I was able to track what I had to without spending forever fucking with it.


----------



## vertibration (Tuesday at 9:25 AM)

Dr. Caligari said:


> Sorry I think my post was a bit unclear. I didn't mean to comment on the content creators themselves but their audience. I should have quoted just the last sentence, like this:
> 
> 
> 
> This is the part I'm not sure is true. Like I'm not sure the audience always cares so much about the content, but are watching more because it's entertainment that kills time. And then that's why the content creatots can get away with focusing less on content and more on being an entertaining character, copying stuff that the algo picks up and so on.


I agree. However, I would like to see more focus on product. I will say, I do like sonic drive studios, pariah vs gear, and rigs on fire. Those three channels are no nonsense, and get to the point. I would like to see more isolated real time playing of gear by sonic drive studios. Cabs, and direct to IR when testing amps but raw, no processing, and I actually like when someone riffs a little, then tweaks settings in real time to explain how setting changes affect sound. When things are too processed, you get a false sense of what the product might sound like in your hands.


----------



## ExMachina (Tuesday at 9:27 AM)

RevDrucifer said:


> I’ve grasped the point of his video at this point, but his argument falls apart if you’re using shit that can’t do what you need it to do. My example was taken from my experience over the weekend tracking a trash metal song at 210bpm; I started the song with a JB in the bridge and no matter how I dialed in a preset, I couldn’t get it tight enough to track 16th notes at 210bpm. Once I put the EMG’s in, without even adjusting the preset(s) I was using, there was all the clarity I needed and I was able to track what I had to without spending forever fucking with it.


Use a boost or EQ before the amp/sim then


----------



## bostjan (Tuesday at 9:46 AM)

Metallica35 said:


> This is a good explanation. My understanding was that you have to have enough winding around the pickup coil (impedance) to negate the noise of the rest of the circuit to ensure that you generate a clean signal. That's why the resonant peak changes with different impedance values. Presumably, there is an impedance value that is too low to generate any kind of meaningful signal no?



If the impedance is too low, your guitar won't transfer signal to your amp efficiently. Alumitones are a great example of a pickup with super low impedance and then an impedance matching transformer.



Metallica35 said:


> My point in addressing some other issues not covered in the video was to simply illuminate the fact that people focus on minutia most of the time instead of the things that have the biggest impact on your tone. He does a good job in the video showing that mic choice, mic placement, and cab/speaker types will have a much more pronounced effect on your tone than a pickup swap will.



Most of the time, yes.



Scottosan said:


> Its
> 
> 
> There's pickups from 4k up to 25k. Inductance is more importance than impedance. Impedance isn't even a factor for determining resonant peak frequency or output. It is important for determining q factor (how dramatic the EQ slope) of the resonant peak.



In theory absolutely, but, thinking instead in practice, your independent variables determining impedance are your wire gauge and number of turns. Both of those have strong effects on both inductance and impedance, so you cannot change impedance independently whilst holding the inductance constant.

Inductance is more important than impedance when measuring a pickup's characteristics, but I suppose you could just measure those characteristics directly if you are going through the trouble. And if you are designing a pickup, you aren't choosing any of those things, but instead wire gauge, number of turns, magnets, poles, and maybe a few geometric factors that hardly anyone thinks about unless you are really cutting edge.



STRHelvete said:


> People should spend more time practicing, developing better playing and songwriting skills, and not obsessing over small things.



 But, if we are here, we obviously aren't practicing technique right now, better get out the microscope and make sure there aren't tiny cracks in my inlays or, Cthulhu forbid, that my string spacing at the nut follows some sort of mathematical formula. Maybe the key to my dream tone all along was having pickup rings or removing my truss rod cover. [This is actually what ss.o posts about]


----------



## RevDrucifer (Tuesday at 10:31 AM)

ExMachina said:


> Use a boost or EQ before the amp/sim then



And then you’re EQ’ing the entire guitar tone just to make one particular thing stand out and the rest ends up sounding like thin shit.

Or you can change the pickup out, resolve the problem entirely and never deal with it again.


----------



## ExMachina (Tuesday at 10:38 AM)

RevDrucifer said:


> And then you’re EQ’ing the entire guitar tone just to make one particular thing stand out and the rest ends up sounding like thin shit.
> 
> Or you can change the pickup out, resolve the problem entirely and never deal with it again.


Dude, what?


----------



## RevDrucifer (Tuesday at 10:59 AM)

ExMachina said:


> Dude, what?



If ya don’t grasp it from what I said, you’ll find out when you get older.


----------



## Emperoff (Tuesday at 11:00 AM)

vertibration said:


> I will say, I do like sonic drive studios, pariah vs gear, and rigs on fire. Those three channels are no nonsense, and get to the point.



Really? Pariah Vs. Gear is literally a dude who can't even properly tune a guitar randomly noodling for like 10 minutes


----------



## John (Tuesday at 11:18 AM)

Emperoff said:


> Really? Pariah Vs. Gear is literally a dude who can't even properly tune a guitar randomly noodling for like 10 minutes


Yikes, Pariah vs Gear is still around? That description is so right, there is nothing left (such is the way of far too many "YouTube guitarists" over gear). So there's that.

Last I heard from him (few years ago, give or take): he was nearly to the point of tears when nobody was in the market for a Solar among a modern guitarist discussion thread about Eclipses and other 'modernized' single cutaway guitars.
He kept spamming them as a suggestion, nobody that responded was fond of said repeat suggestion, and so he angrily went off in huff blurting some cringe along the way.


----------



## ExMachina (Tuesday at 11:20 AM)

RevDrucifer said:


> If ya don’t grasp it from what I said, you’ll find out when you get older.


I was trying to be patient and give you a chance to think about what you said, you don't know what you don't know bud.


----------



## odibrom (Tuesday at 11:24 AM)

STRHelvete said:


> (...)
> Buying someone's signature pickups won't suddenly make you sound and play like them.
> (...)



Shhhh... Shut up man, you're spoiling the game... I was about to launch a new brand of pickups built with fairy dust powered magnet and thinner than hair lava infused copper wires to get all the impossible overtones no one has ever heard of... or ever... It was gonna be the trend for this year, for 2024 I already had programmed to launch a unicorn horn nut for its magical properties over the bone nuts so commonly publicized as greater than me. Damn it, please quite being spoiler man...

You all understand that this is a joke right?...


----------



## STRHelvete (Tuesday at 11:36 AM)

odibrom said:


> Shhhh... Shut up man, you're spoiling the game... I was about to launch a new brand of pickups built with fairy dust powered magnet and thinner than hair lava infused copper wires to get all the impossible overtones no one has ever heard of... or ever... It was gonna be the trend for this year, for 2024 I already had programmed to launch a unicorn horn nut for its magical properties over the bone nuts so commonly publicized as greater than me. Damn it, please quite being spoiler man...
> 
> You all understand that this is a joke right?...


Made of crystal lattice for chewy gain and haunting mids


----------



## bostjan (Tuesday at 11:36 AM)

If I ever released signature pickups, that'd be the only way to market them.

"Buy Bostjan's signature pickups - we promise, you won't sound anything like Bostjan!"


----------



## ExMachina (Tuesday at 11:44 AM)

You think if you emailed seymour duncan or something they'd give you frequency responses of their pickups?


----------



## Guitarjon (Tuesday at 11:45 AM)

I won't bother posting Glen's new video....


----------



## bostjan (Tuesday at 11:49 AM)

Guitarjon said:


> I won't bother posting Glen's new video....


Was it me who said that, technically, guitars don't matter? Maybe he read my comment and took it literally. 

This is great clickbait, though. Incendiary opinions with a healthy amount of truth and just enough bullshit mixed in that people still eat it up.


----------



## ExMachina (Tuesday at 11:51 AM)

Guitarjon said:


> I won't bother posting Glen's new video....


Come on, let's keep this train rolling.


----------



## Dr. Caligari (Tuesday at 11:55 AM)

Nevermind, I'm being cranky and I don't want to.


----------



## RevDrucifer (Tuesday at 12:04 PM)

ExMachina said:


> I was trying to be patient and give you a chance to think about what you said, you don't know what you don't know bud.



Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind.

Explaining it further- if I EQ’d the guitars *just* to ensure those palm muted sections would ring through, I’d either have to automate the EQ for just those sections or let it exist on the track as it is for the entire song, where it’s not an issue except for the palm muted sections, due to the speed of those sections, while taking away stuff from the tone that I dig.

The pickup simply doesn’t work for how I dial in my tones and how I play, so rather than EQ’ing shit and spending time in the studio trying to put lipstick on a pig, I swapped the pickup out and it’s no longer an issue and never will be again.

Additionally, I barely EQ my guitars tracks as it is due to spending enough time with the tones before recording to not require it. I definitely don’t want to have to EQ something when I can resolve the issue entirely in an hour and $150.


----------



## Choop (Tuesday at 12:21 PM)

ExMachina said:


> Come on, let's keep this train rolling.




If the guitar looks pointy then it is definitely going to sound pointier.


----------



## odibrom (Tuesday at 1:09 PM)

... he DOES have a fainted "ALMOST" before the "NO DIFFERENCE" in the title...

I'm not sure I want to watch this video...


----------



## ExMachina (Tuesday at 2:14 PM)

I hate all of you, I'm kind of a contrarian, and now that all of you say you hate Glenn I'm going to end up arguing for him non stop. So thanks.


----------



## Brocephus (Tuesday at 2:46 PM)

Glen is just obnoxious with his constant screaming. He really should be on some Valium or something. 

Just on his newest video: 
There is definitely a difference in tone between guitars, saying anything else is disingenuous. Ola Englund has a video comparing bolt-ons to set-necks and neck-throughs and you can very definitely hear that the bolt on necks are brighter. Not by a crazy margin but enough to notice it if you're listening for it.
That being said there is no way you'd be able to guess which was which with a lot of gain and in a mix.

At the end of the day just play whatever you like. Anyone who tells you that you're wrong about something as subjective as what guitar tone you like better or worse is a moron. I mean a lot of good metal records have been made with minimalist, cheapo rigs and a lot of good records have been made with seriously expensive rigs, it's whatever you like to spend your money on.


----------



## Guitarjon (Tuesday at 2:55 PM)

Maybe I'll do a sort of reaction video. My SC20 will sound very different than my EC1000T for example...


----------



## Emperoff (Tuesday at 3:06 PM)

ExMachina said:


> Come on, let's keep this train rolling.



Please, somebody punch this guy on the face. It will count as community services, not a felony. And no, I haven't even watched the video. Enough is enough


----------



## dr_game0ver (Tuesday at 3:14 PM)

If you haven't watch the video: Different guitar with different PUs sounds different. Shocking!


----------



## bostjan (Tuesday at 3:17 PM)

Brocephus said:


> Glen is just obnoxious with his constant screaming. He really should be on some Valium or something.
> 
> Just on his newest video:
> There is definitely a difference in tone between guitars, saying anything else is disingenuous. Ola Englund has a video comparing bolt-ons to set-necks and neck-throughs and you can very definitely hear that the bolt on necks are brighter. Not by a crazy margin but enough to notice it if you're listening for it.
> ...


Right, well, there are already hundreds of such videos. They compare different scale lengths, different woods, different pickups, different everything. Scale length definitely makes some difference, bolt-on versus set versus neckthrough makes some subtle difference, maple fretboard versus rosewood fretboard makes a very subtle difference. I was just the other day looking for a video someone made comparing different bridges and saddles, and those made a noticeable difference... Our very own @KnightBrolaire has tons of videos comparing pickups in the same guitar, or even different magnets in the same pickup, and it definitely makes a difference. Will it make a meaningful difference? That's subjective, but, from a player's perspective, it seems sort of silly to say that a bolt-on alder 25.5" strat with vintage single coils sounds basically the same as a setneck Les Paul 24.75" with a rosewood fretboard and PAF humbuckers. But to a casual listener, he's right. They hear a guitar and maybe they can tell whether it's a real guitar or a keyboard with a guitar patch loaded... maybe... 

Sure, you can totally pick up an Ali Express guitar and plug it into whatever rig you are using and get a tone reminiscent enough of your main tone, dealing with some notes that might not ring out clearly by just avoiding them, dealing with tuning stability issues by stopping and retuning and punching into the recording wherever your strings went out, etc. But you wouldn't want to.


----------



## Emperoff (Tuesday at 3:39 PM)

I don't even care if he's right or not. Everytime I've watched a video from that moron I had the mouse pointer on the volume bar the whole video going up and down as if I was automating a fader on a mixer. 

Do you guys enjoy being screamed at by other human beings in a regular conversation? Because I sure don't.


----------



## tedtan (Tuesday at 3:41 PM)

bostjan said:


> to a casual listener, he's right. They hear a guitar and maybe they can tell whether it's a real guitar or a keyboard with a guitar patch loaded... maybe...


Well, from a high enough perspective, a guitar sounds like a guitar. You won’t mistake it for a cello, a piano, bagpipes, a flute or a drum set. It’s mostly us guitarists that care about the differences. Producers and engineers, too, but to a lesser extent. The typical lister? They couldn’t tell a difference (as you said).


----------



## odibrom (Tuesday at 3:45 PM)

Guitarjon said:


> Maybe I'll do a sort of reaction video. My SC20 will sound very different than my EC1000T for example...


No, please don't, no reaction video please... a comparison video plain and simple is more than enough... objectiveness, cool songs and great production... right?


----------



## Emperoff (Tuesday at 3:46 PM)

odibrom said:


> No, please don't, no reaction video please... a comparison video plain and simple is more than enough... objectiveness, cool songs and great production... right?



Reaction videos are the stupidest thing ever invented.


----------



## Kyle Jordan (Tuesday at 3:51 PM)

Emperoff said:


> Reaction videos are the stupidest thing ever invented.



The only reaction video needed.


----------



## John (Tuesday at 3:58 PM)

Guitarjon said:


> Maybe I'll do a sort of reaction video. My SC20 will sound very different than my EC1000T for example...



Nope. Probably not the smartest idea, especially if it took you >50 amps just to discover you _can_ scoop the settings of another amp head.


----------



## S4M4R1N (Tuesday at 4:25 PM)

I understand that Glenn Fricker is clickbaiting and trolling for money, but so do companies having ridiculous range of pickups for every niche they can EQ out there. After some experimentation, many of Glenn's claims ring true to me. With proper tone stacking I was able to churn out very similar sounds from Seymour Duncan Retribution, BPK Brute Force and Fishman Fluence Modern pickups. So I agree that from record making perspetive, after mixing and mastering, no one is going to tell which pickup it was. And for similar reason I also agree with Jim Lill's videos, e.g. on amplification. All the tube vs solid state mumbo-jumbo is just trash to me from listening perspective. No one is going to be able to tell if it was recorded with a Peavey 6505 through Marshall Basketweave or a good pre-amp distortion pedal going into a cab sim in your favourite DAW or full digital Neural DSP setup. Microphone and cab choice, complemented by actual guitar playing skills, is going to eclipse any difference there is in pickups.
But when we are talking from player perspective - then it all matters. Different gear is always going to give different tone stacking, feel and just pure vibe. Guitar players are tone and feel seekers in nature, always trying to find most pleasing sound in a particular moment. Even if guitar playing skills suck. Music listeners want killer riffs and good production.


----------



## bostjan (Tuesday at 4:40 PM)

tedtan said:


> Well, from a high enough perspective, a guitar sounds like a guitar. You won’t mistake it for a cello, a piano, bagpipes, a flute or a drum set. It’s mostly us guitarists that care about the differences. Producers and engineers, too, but to a lesser extent. The typical lister? They couldn’t tell a difference (as you said).








Those guys beg to differ  (I actually tried one of these, I didn't buy it, someone gave it to me, I swear - it sounded like garbage, but they advertised that you could use it to make your guitar sound like a violin, piano, oboe, kazoo, burmese monkey fart, etc.)


----------



## Drew (Tuesday at 4:53 PM)

bostjan said:


> burmese monkey fart


Please. I do that well enough on my own. Game over, Jellyfish!


----------



## tedtan (Tuesday at 5:13 PM)

bostjan said:


> Those guys beg to differ  (I actually tried one of these, I didn't buy it, someone gave it to me, I swear - it sounded like garbage, but they advertised that you could use it to make your guitar sound like a violin, piano, oboe, kazoo, burmese monkey fart, etc.)


I tried one and agree it sucked. I ended up giving to someone on SSO for postage.


----------



## torchlord (Tuesday at 5:55 PM)

ExMachina said:


> It's clear that a lot of people commented without watching, which is fair since it's Glenn.
> 
> His main point was that the pickup change has one of the smallest effects on the tone so maybe it's not worth it to spend a bunch of money to change pickups. For the most part, the EQ changes due to passive pickup changes are pretty small, the change in output is a bigger factor, but then again, pedals exist.
> 
> ...


I see his point but with companies like Dimarzio, if you buy from them you can return a pickup via their warranty. 

So yeah, you will only get small changes with a pickup swap those small changes can cost big problems down the signal chain that could require other expensive fixes like needing a EQ pedal, speaker, etc to dial out to much bass or too much treble so that pickup change could be the cheaper option.


----------



## torchlord (Tuesday at 6:04 PM)

laxu said:


> People constantly quote that Jim Lill video about guitars as fact even though it is a flawed experiment just like most of his other videos. "Tonewood" is a marketing term, but Lill basically ignored that two tables are just as much a body and neck as some guitar shaped parts.
> 
> A lot of this stuff feeds the kind of people who:
> 
> ...


It is possible to get 10 degree and custom baseplates from Bareknuckle.









10 Degree Slanted Baseplate | Slanted Baseplates


Upgrade charge to have your humbucker built for 10 degree multiscale fitments




www.bareknucklepickups.co.uk













Custom Angled Baseplate | Slanted Baseplates


Upgrade charge to have your humbucker built for custom angle multiscale fitments




www.bareknucklepickups.co.uk


----------



## Legion (Tuesday at 6:34 PM)

There's something I want to bring up in the context of Glenn's "scientific" videos that bothers me quite a bit. Granted, this might be my physicist brain nitpicking, but the very notion of an "experiment" is fundamentally reliant on a _reliable measurement._

Glenn's videos play those clips side by side and rely on human hearing as a method of measurement: something that is inherently inconsistent from person to person, so it is inherently not an objective measure. Listening to two clips and concluding that there is/isn't a difference is akin to "eyeballing it". I wish he used something like a response curve. I get that he's trying to prove a very specific point, i.e. in the specific context of metal guitars, a pickup may not be the best spent money, this kinda irks me a bit because I'm a fucking pedant and he's misusing the phrase "scientific method".


----------



## Brocephus (Tuesday at 7:10 PM)

bostjan said:


> Right, well, there are already hundreds of such videos. They compare different scale lengths, different woods, different pickups, different everything. Scale length definitely makes some difference, bolt-on versus set versus neckthrough makes some subtle difference, maple fretboard versus rosewood fretboard makes a very subtle difference. I was just the other day looking for a video someone made comparing different bridges and saddles, and those made a noticeable difference... Our very own @KnightBrolaire has tons of videos comparing pickups in the same guitar, or even different magnets in the same pickup, and it definitely makes a difference. Will it make a meaningful difference? That's subjective, but, from a player's perspective, it seems sort of silly to say that a bolt-on alder 25.5" strat with vintage single coils sounds basically the same as a setneck Les Paul 24.75" with a rosewood fretboard and PAF humbuckers. But to a casual listener, he's right. They hear a guitar and maybe they can tell whether it's a real guitar or a keyboard with a guitar patch loaded... maybe...
> 
> Sure, you can totally pick up an Ali Express guitar and plug it into whatever rig you are using and get a tone reminiscent enough of your main tone, dealing with some notes that might not ring out clearly by just avoiding them, dealing with tuning stability issues by stopping and retuning and punching into the recording wherever your strings went out, etc. But you wouldn't want to.


Nah that's exactly right. I mean even if there weren't a difference in tone, there sure as hell is a difference in feel. Maybe as guitarists we're thinking it's the tone that changes when really it is mostly the feel of the instrument. 

When I had an EMG 707 in my 7 I didn't like the sound of it at all, but looking back it might not have been the sound as much as I prefer the feel of passive pickups. 

As far as instruments themselves go though Glen's argument is moronic. I like different guitars for different stuff. I'm not going to try to play funk on an Jackson Warrior, because I know my Strat will just feel better for that type of work. They are different tools for different jobs in my opinion. Not to speak of the quality of craftsmanship which you can tell just by holding a guitar. My Made In Chinas don't even compare to my PRS SE.


----------



## Legion (Wednesday at 1:53 AM)

Because I'm feeling like a fucking troll LMAO:


----------



## John (Wednesday at 2:06 AM)

Legion said:


> irks me a bit because I'm a fucking pedant and he's misusing the phrase "scientific method".


Well within your right to feel that way. Especially when he reeks the same vibes as the 432Hz stans who grasp at straws to back it up with "scientific research." 
Except their flawed idea of research materials consists of shifty blog sites with equally wacko 'influencer' health ideas and blurbs with nothing empirical nor substantial, for example. Not some actual peer reviewed material that anyone remotely worth their salt would actually take the time to at least gloss over.


----------



## Guitarjon (Wednesday at 2:08 AM)

John said:


> Nope. Probably not the smartest idea, especially if it took you >50 amps just to discover you _can_ scoop the settings of another amp head.



You funny person!


----------



## lord of chads (Wednesday at 2:16 AM)

It's just an electric signal and filtered pink noise. Everything else is just details.

I'm tired of this guitar religion.


----------



## narad (Wednesday at 2:35 AM)

Legion said:


> There's something I want to bring up in the  context of Glenn's "scientific" videos that bothers me quite a bit. Granted, this might be my physicist brain nitpicking, but the very notion of an "experiment" is fundamentally reliant on a _reliable measurement._
> 
> Glenn's videos play those clips side by side and rely on human hearing as a method of measurement: something that is inherently inconsistent from person to person, so it is inherently not an objective measure. Listening to two clips and concluding that there is/isn't a difference is akin to "eyeballing it". I wish he used something like a response curve. I get that he's trying to prove a very specific point, i.e. in the specific context of metal guitars, a pickup may not be the best spent money, this kinda irks me a bit because I'm a fucking pedant and he's misusing the phrase "scientific method".



Just because the measurement is collected via a subjective source like humans doesn't undo the "scientific" aspect of it. I would argue it's really the opposite, because what we care about here is not whether there is a difference - of course there is here, when looking at the audio or response curve - but the extent to which that difference translates into a meaningful difference in this musical context. So while individuals vary, we would care here about the predictive power of changing the pickups as a variable. But yea, typically you'd set this up in a blind manner, fit a model to the responses and check your p-value. Still science. Not when Glen does it, but in theory


----------



## laxu (Wednesday at 2:42 AM)

torchlord said:


> It is possible to get 10 degree and custom baseplates from Bareknuckle.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Yeah I know, you can also possibly reuse one from an existing pickup but BKP has gotten pretty expensive so I haven't bothered changing the pickup, especially when I don't really know what would work better.


----------



## Lozek (Wednesday at 6:45 AM)

My personal experience, it's all guitar dependant. My Charvel is quite bright sounding and you get significant tonal change with different Pick-ups, Trem blocks etc In contrast, one of my ESP's is extremely dark and you get much more subtle change with different componentry, my other ESP sits somewhere in the middle of the two both in tone and changeability.

I don't think it's possible to say X pick-up = Y tonal change, they will impart the same qualities but in different amounts based on the qualities of the individual guitar they are going in.


----------



## eaeolian (Wednesday at 7:25 AM)

I believe I can summarize this entire thread as:

Tone is tone. Get there however you can, for whatever you can.


----------



## BenSolace (Wednesday at 7:53 AM)

Haven't watched the vid but I often see people confuse what the EQ of a certain pickup will do to an amp vs an EQ *after *the preamp distortion. That's one reason I loved the Mesa Triaxis (and I guess by extension the Mark series, though I never played one) - the ability to control the EQ *before *the preamp distortion completely changed the feel of the amp, with the EQ sliders afterwards to alter the actual tone of the distorted signal. Bass control = to flub or not to flub, mid control = compression and saturation, treble control = perceived output and cut (sometimes twang).

Pickups are just a much milder version of that, and my objective is to find a bridge pickup that requires the minimal (preferably no) amount of EQ manipulation before it hits the amp.


----------



## BenSolace (Wednesday at 8:05 AM)

Emperoff said:


> The "no one in the audience is going to notice" argument is also old and stupid. There won't notice the cab or mic choices either. They will be looking at the damn singer. We buy gear because we like what we feel or hear when we play through it. None of us gives a damn about what the audience notices or not


Fucking thank you. Now can we pass legislation so that anyone who says it is bombarded with this message for, I dunno... a month?


----------



## Antiproduct (Wednesday at 9:18 AM)

Nothing ew to say here but here is an interesting read on how pickups actually work, what influences the tone and how you can shape the sound of your electrical guitar even before the signal hits the amp (or first pedal).



BuildYourGuitar.com :: The Secrets of Electric Guitar Pickups


----------



## bostjan (Wednesday at 9:23 AM)

Subtlety is lost on most people: you either don't notice the subtle differences in tone, or you don't understand the argument that, with shitty gear, you get a shitty tone, and your band will sound shitty and attract a shittier singer, so you should just get a used prestige and an axe fx and bareknuckles (or lundgrens) and then make instrumental tracks in your bedroom; that way no one will look at your singer.


----------



## Guitarjon (Wednesday at 9:27 AM)

I'm making my own guitar comparison now. Spoiler: I can hear a difference AND I can recognize them all!


----------



## Neon_Knight_ (Wednesday at 10:43 AM)

narad said:


> I'm not sure what people who specifically want to make music spend enough time looking at pickups to not make music. It seems like it's just conjecture / projecting that these people exist.


Yet I wouldn't be shocked to hear that Time II has been put on hold because the right pickup hasn't been invented yet.


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## Legion (Wednesday at 12:05 PM)

narad said:


> Just because the measurement is collected via a subjective source like humans doesn't undo the "scientific" aspect of it. I would argue it's really the opposite, because what we care about here is not whether there is a difference - of course there is here, when looking at the audio or response curve - but the extent to which that difference translates into a meaningful difference in this musical context. So while individuals vary, we would care here about the predictive power of changing the pickups as a variable. But yea, typically you'd set this up in a blind manner, fit a model to the responses and check your p-value. Still science. Not when Glen does it, but in theory


I'd like to push back here just a little bit: subjective measurement is not inherently invalid and I'm happy to grant you that, but when differences between your control and test samples are are very small, you absolutely need to set up a measurement system with much higher sensitivity.

I recognize that you and I aren't _exactly _disagreeing here, but I just wanted to clarify. I phrased myself rather poorly :/


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## STRHelvete (Wednesday at 12:06 PM)

bostjan said:


> Subtlety is lost on most people: you either don't notice the subtle differences in tone, or you don't understand the argument that, with shitty gear, you get a shitty tone, and your band will sound shitty and attract a shittier singer, so you should just get a used prestige and an axe fx and bareknuckles (or lundgrens) and then make instrumental tracks in your bedroom; that way no one will look at your singer.


...who hurt you, baby? Who hurt you?


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## ExMachina (Wednesday at 12:22 PM)

Tons of studies are done with surveys. I'm not sure the sensitivity is the problem it's the sample size and collection method. If he really wants to look at this scientifically, he would need to set up a site where a listener hears a series of pairs of clips with either the same pickup or different pickup played within each pair and ask them to identify whether there was a difference or not. My guess is that pickups would fall into maybe 4 clusters, where within each one it was rare that a typical listener could identify a difference. 

I actually went through the merrow Seymour Duncan and extracted all the isolated parts. The magnet type and dc resistance really did do a good job of predicting whether there would be a substantial difference in the frequency response and audibly as well (for my ear). For instance, the invader was basically a black winter. Not sure anyone cares, but I can post plots of you're interested.


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## eaeolian (Wednesday at 12:25 PM)

Guitarjon said:


> I'm making my own guitar comparison now. Spoiler: I can hear a difference AND I can recognize them all!


Well, that's not exactly double-blind, now, is it?


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## odibrom (Wednesday at 1:41 PM)

Guitarjon said:


> I'm making my own guitar comparison now. Spoiler: I can hear a difference AND I can recognize them all!





eaeolian said:


> Well, that's not exactly double-blind, now, is it?



@Guitarjon should then send the DI files of each guitar to someone else to shuffle their names and only then re-amp their tones for the final video... better yet, let a third person redo the shuffling an re-amping part so no one will actually know what is what.

@Guitarjon records and plays always the same riff in DI tracks, named after each guitar. Sends those files to a second person who will secretly number each file, removing the guitar reference out of the files' names and obviously make record of what relates to what. This second person now sends the numbered files to a third person who will then renumber and re-amp the files to be sent back to @Guitarjon who will do the final montage of the video. The double renumbering action (the second could be with letters instead) is to get things really shuffled. This way, neither of these game players will really know what is what.

The 2nd and 3rd players in this game could be SSO users chosen from this thread, just to make things interesting... I'm all about suggestions, but don't ask me for re-amping files, I don't have the means to.

PS - besides this last turn of events for guitar comparison vids, this thread is like...


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## KnightBrolaire (Wednesday at 1:46 PM)

ExMachina said:


> Tons of studies are done with surveys. I'm not sure the sensitivity is the problem it's the sample size and collection method. If he really wants to look at this scientifically, he would need to set up a site where a listener hears a series of pairs of clips with either the same pickup or different pickup played within each pair and ask them to identify whether there was a difference or not. My guess is that pickups would fall into maybe 4 clusters, where within each one it was rare that a typical listener could identify a difference.
> 
> I actually went through the merrow Seymour Duncan and extracted all the isolated parts. The magnet type and dc resistance really did do a good job of predicting whether there would be a substantial difference in the frequency response and audibly as well (for my ear). For instance, the invader was basically a black winter. Not sure anyone cares, but I can post plots of you're interested.


>dcr predicting anything 
mmkay


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## ExMachina (Wednesday at 1:49 PM)

Legion said:


> I'd like to push back here just a little bit: subjective measurement is not inherently invalid and I'm happy to grant you that, but when differences between your control and test samples are are very small, you absolutely need to set up a measurement system with much higher sensitivity.
> 
> I recognize that you and I aren't _exactly _disagreeing here, but I just wanted to clarify. I phrased myself rather poorly :/





KnightBrolaire said:


> >dcr predicting anything
> mmkay


It's a correlation, mmkay


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## KnightBrolaire (Wednesday at 1:57 PM)

ExMachina said:


> It's a correlation, mmkay


Elaborate then. Are you talking a very general trend where you think as dcr increases then high end cuts off, output goes up, or something else?


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## Legion (Wednesday at 2:05 PM)

ExMachina said:


> Tons of studies are done with surveys. I'm not sure the sensitivity is the problem it's the sample size and collection method. If he really wants to look at this scientifically, he would need to set up a site where a listener hears a series of pairs of clips with either the same pickup or different pickup played within each pair and ask them to identify whether there was a difference or not. My guess is that pickups would fall into maybe 4 clusters, where within each one it was rare that a typical listener could identify a difference.


Studies done with surveys tend to study perception of a phenomenon rather than a phenomenon itself. This, here, is a physical phenomenon, i.e. a frequency response, at least that's what he SEEMS to be going for. But then again it's ultimately it's a perception game so your point is fair.



ExMachina said:


> I actually went through the merrow Seymour Duncan and extracted all the isolated parts. The magnet type and dc resistance really did do a good job of predicting whether there would be a substantial difference in the frequency response and audibly as well (for my ear). For instance, the invader was basically a black winter. Not sure anyone cares, but I can post plots of you're interested.



I've been curious about that video for a while. I have never achieved THAT drastic a tone shift from pickups alone. I have always wondered if there was something else going on.


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## odibrom (Wednesday at 2:06 PM)

Quoting this post from 13 pages ago because of a revelation...



Marked Man said:


> Kids, you have your own ears, you don't have to be Johns to guitar camwhores who are always hungry for clicks. Anybody's clicks.



... if one reads this unfocused, the *C* + *L* lower case letters combined in the words *clicks* can be understood as a lower case letter *D*... it brings a whole new meaning to this sentence and to the "click bait" youtube way...


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## ExMachina (Wednesday at 2:23 PM)

KnightBrolaire said:


> Elaborate then. Are you talking a very general trend where you think as dcr increases then high end cuts off, output goes up, or something else?


Yea pretty much, I didn't quantify the extent of the correlation, but just looking at some data that seemed to be the trend. Here's one example of the JB and the Pegasus, both A5 with JB at around 16K and Pegasus around 12K. Clearly the pegasus will be brighter.



Here's an invader vs a black winter. Both 16K and ceramic. Invader is a bit scooped, resonant peak around 2.5kish I'm guessing. 



Personally, I'd rather use an EQ


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## tedtan (Wednesday at 3:45 PM)

KnightBrolaire said:


> >dcr predicting anything
> mmkay


If you know the wire gauge used, the DC resistance will tell you the number of turns/winds of wire. Otherwise, I’d rather know the inductance, the magnet type, etc.


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## odibrom (Wednesday at 4:08 PM)

ExMachina said:


> Yea pretty much, I didn't quantify the extent of the correlation, but just looking at some data that seemed to be the trend. Here's one example of the JB and the Pegasus, both A5 with JB at around 16K and Pegasus around 12K. Clearly the pegasus will be brighter.
> View attachment 119625
> 
> 
> ...



If one is swapping pickups for others similarly spec'ed, yeah, no big change...


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## Lemonbaby (Yesterday at 7:34 AM)

Legion said:


> I'd like to push back here just a little bit: subjective measurement is not inherently invalid and I'm happy to grant you that, but when differences between your control and test samples are are very small, you absolutely need to set up a measurement system with much higher sensitivity.



Exact Lee. And that's why the term " subjective measurement" is bullshit to begin with.


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## Emperoff (Today at 2:45 AM)

Also, something that no one has mentioned yet is _pickup balance_ that to me is perhaps more important than the pickups themselves. 

If you're the "bridge for chugs, neck for cleans and leads" kinda player you probably won't worry about this. But if you play all kinds of stuff and switch positions a lot you will hate when the overall EQ gets totally mismatched (from super full neck pickup to very thin bridge pickup, etc.


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## ylemp (Today at 4:35 AM)

Hey @Guitarjon, I am doing well and I hope you are too.

I’ve been following this thread and I feel that there is a piece of the conversation that is missing when talking about guitar. Namely the physics of how electric guitars, amplifiers, speakers, and microphones work. 

There is an excellent book by the German physicists Manfred Zollner, “Physics of the Electric Guitar”. The book is originally in German but there is an English translation available online. 

I haven’t finished reading it but what I have read so far has been eye opening and I highly recommend it.

Here is a link to the English translation of the book broken into PDFs for each chapter. They do get long, but each subject is thoroughly discussed with many experiments to demonstrate how guitars work.
Physics of the Electrical Guitar

I don’t think everyone needs to read all of it, maybe just jump to the topics you find most interesting, and at the very least read the summaries.

Here’s a short paper on guitar tone also written by Zollner that gets to the point a lot quicker. Very much worth the read.


The Physics of E-Guitars: Vibration – Voltage – Sound wave - Timbre
Grüße


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## Neon_Knight_ (Today at 8:30 AM)

Emperoff said:


> Also, something that no one has mentioned yet is _pickup balance_ that to me is perhaps more important than the pickups themselves.
> 
> If you're the "bridge for chugs, neck for cleans and leads" kinda player you probably won't worry about this. But if you play all kinds of stuff and switch positions a lot you will hate when the overall EQ gets totally mismatched (from super full neck pickup to very thin bridge pickup, etc.


Switching mid-solo just isn't an option with imbalanced pickups.


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## Nicki (Today at 9:18 AM)

I like Glenn. I agree with some of his content (such as that if all other variables are static, changing the speaker or mic placement will produce the biggest tonal difference and which brand of tubes you use won't) and disagree with others, such as this particular video.

I count four problems with this video:

1. He already has a bias towards "the tone comes from the speaker" based on his own past experience. He is therefor listening with an already established bias and as much as he preaches not to listen with your eyes, he should not be listening with his bias. His fuckery at the beginning of the video establishes and reinforces his biased opinion.

2. There is a CLEAR audible difference in the second set of pickups in that it has more upper-mids than the other two sets, yet he is patently ignoring it or trying to convince his audience it's something else entirely(?).

3. He tested one scenario. High gain. Most subtler tonal differences in high gain applications aren't noticeable because the amount of gain being used covers up those difference. This is the same idea that high gain hides or covers up your mistakes VERY well, but when you play with no or very little gain, those mistakes are very clearly noticed.

4. He's tested too small a sample from a single manufacturer. 3 sets of pickups. From the same manufacturer. This invalidates the test and likens it to claiming that all amps from all manufacturers are going to sound the when you only test 3 amps from a single manufacturer. Duncans don't sound the same as Dimarzios. BKPs don't sound the same as Toneriders. PRS pickups don't sound like Gibson pickups. Glen's test only spots the iceberg from a telescope. It doesn't chart the whole thing or even lands the boat close to the iceberg. So, this doesn't even count as a "take it with a grain of salt" type of video. This is a video that he one way or another turned into a advertisement for the new Celestion V30s that he's been raving about. That's it.

Overall, my opinion is the video is total click-bait and his results are skewed towards his bias making them invalid.


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## ExMachina (Today at 9:20 AM)

ylemp said:


> Hey @Guitarjon, I am doing well and I hope you are too.
> 
> I’ve been following this thread and I feel that there is a piece of the conversation that is missing when talking about guitar. Namely the physics of how electric guitars, amplifiers, speakers, and microphones work.
> 
> ...


Awesome, this is the most beautiful overkill analysis I've ever seen. As a trained engineer this is right up my alley, and there's some good humor in there as well.


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## STRHelvete (Today at 2:26 PM)

Emperoff said:


> Also, something that no one has mentioned yet is _pickup balance_ that to me is perhaps more important than the pickups themselves.
> 
> If you're the "bridge for chugs, neck for cleans and leads" kinda player you probably won't worry about this. But if you play all kinds of stuff and switch positions a lot you will hate when the overall EQ gets totally mismatched (from super full neck pickup to very thin bridge pickup, etc.


Chyle ain't nobody got time for that. Bridge pickup, wide open, nothing else, go. Simple as that. My neck pickup is just for show since I like the symmetry of two.


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## elkoki (Today at 3:23 PM)

I will say that many metal artists when recording their guitars will process the hell out of their tone with a ton of post production eqs, filters, compression, and ofc most metal guitars are double tracked or quad tracked .. so in that sense pickups probably don’t matter as much , people manipulate their tone so much that it almost doesn’t matter what’s in their guitar .


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