Tonewood fans! Food for thought...

[Guest]

http://www.petelacis.com/2010/07/08/alder-vs-swamp-ash-maple-vs-rosewood-and-a-neck-swap-the-definitive-comparison-with-audio-clips/

I liked the swamp ash with the one piece maple neck better by far. Interesting comparison. What do you guys think?

[AlexR]

Re: Tonewood fans! Food for thought...

Thanks for posting that.

The best bit about the clips is you can click on them and it instantly swaps between tracks without reloading - and from wherever you last played that particular track from.


I found subtle differences between the fretboard wood only. There was a little more 'top' to the maple f/b than the rosewood. Mids and bass response sounded similar. I guess given that a fretboard for rosewood is only 5mm or so thick plus the rigidity of the glue means the tonal properties of the rosewood are minimal in the overall scheme of things.

The body wood made much more difference to my ear (as you'd expect, and as I've found in practice). The Ash had a high mid push and a slight drop in the thud you get from hitting the bass strings.

I personally liked the Alder/rosewood best (but a maple f/b works almost the same). My best sounding strats are Alder, and I find Ash to be more tricky to get good tones out of - I think my natural tone gets more highs, so rounder toned woods work for me better

[gilaltom3]

Re: Tonewood fans! Food for thought...

http://www.petelacis.com/2010/07/08/...h-audio-clips/

I liked the swamp ash with the one piece maple neck better by far. Interesting comparison. What do you guys think?

+1 for the swamp ash and one piece maple neck.

[TheLivingDead]

Re: Tonewood fans! Food for thought...

SA definitely has a little more treb bite to it.

I also like the SA w/ maple the best.

[Got_tone?]

Re: Tonewood fans! Food for thought...

Wow, thanks for the link. Might have to make some changes to my project based on what I heard.

I totally dig how ash gets more grit with gain and how it adds more snap & bite to the clean tone. I'm biased towards rswd/alder, but ash/maple sounds like a good alternative if you need a bit more edge.

[James Rock]

Re: Tonewood fans! Food for thought...

Was thinking I should have rosewood with my tele but the maple seems to have this attack that is so much nicer I think rsd is probs best with alder (my brothers 62 custom MIJ is this)

[j9fd3s]

Re: Tonewood fans! Food for thought...

very cool! the neck pickup was a bigger difference than the bridge IMO. i did like the swamp ash/maple the best, i thought it was very musical, and fuller.

-mike

[philthis]

Re: Tonewood fans! Food for thought...

after playing both I thought the Ash strat had more pronounced harmonics and chirps then the Alder strats. The Ash had a more pronounced high end and low end kinda like an A5 mag on a pickup but the Alder seemed to have more midrange and a rounder tone on the notes. For cleans I liked the Alder tone better as it was less ice picky with a maple neck and a rosewood neck with a single coil and Alder body got a nice soulfull fat tone where as the maple neck strats seem to be alittle thinner. The Ash however on distortion picked up alot of edgy tone the Alder barley pickup up, like the extra chirps and more pronounced tap tones up on the neck. This is were Ash really excells in my opinion. The taping notes and harmonics are noticabley louder and so is the pick attack on the notes, but so was the icepicky annoying clean frequency tones. to me each wood has its attributes. An interesting combo would be to take an Ash strat and shove seymour Fat Cats in it with a locking super V trem. you could get some wicked distortion tone from it and wild harmonics but for cleans I prefere the alder strats eather maple or rosewood depending on how round you want the notes to sound.

[StrangeSound]

Re: Tonewood fans! Food for thought...

Thanks man. Now I know for certain how my strat should be like..swamp ash and maple neck!

[Chickenwings]

Re: Tonewood fans! Food for thought...

They all sounded pretty nice. It guess it just comes down to what you are after