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do woods change the sound of an electric?


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indeed it is.

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Guest Litchfield Custom Gutars
yep...mahogany...except for the bottom of the line ...which is agathis...but you don't want that crap

So tell me about this wes. I have wondered about that stuff since Ibanez came out with it on the cheapest of cheap series.

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Guest Litchfield Custom Gutars

Where does it come from? Is it a fake wood (ie. a new name given to crap grade mahogany)? I hear luan is a better mahogany sub, but I have no experience with it.

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I know this might be blasphemous to say, but it is my deeply held belief that when dealing with electric guitars wood matters less than pickups.

The wood is the foundation that the pickups build on to get the final sound. If you start with crapy wood, a good pickup will make it sound better but you will not get a great sound. I know because I tried to get a better sound out of a junk guitar of mine and I could not get a great sound no matter what pickups I put in it.

Mike

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The wood is the foundation that the pickups build on to get the final sound. If you start with crapy wood, a good pickup will make it sound better but you will not get a great sound. I know because I tried to get a better sound out of a junk guitar of mine and I could not get a great sound no matter what pickups I put in it.

Mike

Oh, don't get me wrong woods and pickups interact to make the final sound that you hear. But in this day of high gain modelling digital supa dupa processing I think the wood is almost the least important part of the equation for anything other than a nice, clean tone.

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i agree that the pickups make MORE of a difference.but alder is so cheap and sounds so good ...why use basswood or some other slightly cheaper wood when it won't have as clear a tone?

Off the top of my head?

You like that sound better

You like that sound better

The pickups you have you heard in a ____wood guitar and that's the sound you're going for.

You can't tell the difference

You run your guitar through a dozen FX units

There are bound to be more reasons. But, again, just my opinon that with the state of amplification today body wood (and to a lesser degree pickups) are becoming more and more irrelevant with regards to sound. Fact of the matter is, if you can get a "tele like" sound from a humbucker equipped, basswood super strat (and I've heard that description used for more than one) then traditional ideas about guitar construction start going out the window.

Helllloooooooooo Ken Parker...

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wood doesnt cost THAT much does it? who do people and companies chose crap woods? just to save a few bucks? if they spent a bit more they could sell for more...unless their just trying to make something cheap...but id rather get something nice and spend a little more

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the truth is they don't use basswood in so many guitars today because of it's tone...they use it because it is cheap.basswood imo is only REASONABLY decent for high gain situations and even then alder is better.i don't really care who plays it or how you amplify it.the bottom line is that all that amplification is just to mask anotherwise one dimensional tone.alder,mahogany,and the other good tonewoods all have depth of tone.basswood and agathis and chesswood don't.bottom line is if the guys you are talking about can't tell the difference,then why would they want to argue about it with someone who can.

but the question was and is do woods make a difference.the answer is YES

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