A guitar more beautiful than the angels

Robert Delahunt

Robert Delahunt

Showmasterologist
Ok, let's try something interesting. Say you wanted a solid-body six-string 25.5" scale electric guitar, but you wanted to build it so that the woods and pickups gave you the following:

1) A tone more beautiful than the angels in heaven. Beautiful clean tone is #1 priority. The body wood can shine through, but not overpower the beautiful tone.
2) The ability to play metal, or hard rock.

I'm just wondering what pickups and woods you would choose. Me, so far, the most beautiful combo is the Lite Ash Strat: swamp ash body, maple neck and fretboard, with Alnico II Pro Staggered trio of pickups :D

What would you pick?
 
Re: A guitar more beautiful than the angels

I am going to pick a Jackson kelly Body,Mahogany body and 5 piece mah/walnut neck.3/4" flamed maple cap,27 frets ,neck-thru ,scalloped ebony fretboard with 6100 SS fretwires,1 Humbucker (Miracle Man or PATB2) ,1 single (PASTK1).that's all.No tone knob.just one push-pull pot!(1Mohm)
 
Re: A guitar more beautiful than the angels

Alder, maple neck, A5 vintage in the neck & middle with something slightly warmer in the bridge position. To my ears the A2 neck and middle pups don't have the chime or low end of vintage fender pups, which is the clean tone most people who play Strats want.

Some folks who have that tone.....Hendrix, Knopfler, SRV, Clapton etc.

Plenty of metal has been played with this combo.
 
Re: A guitar more beautiful than the angels

Alder body, maple neck+rosewood fretboard Strat.
Vintage A5 pickups in the middle and neck and something more powerful in the bridge (depends on how metal do you want to get).

That's the perfect clean tone IMO combined with a rocking bridge pup.
Not sure it's the best guitar for what I want but for the thing you've described... can't beat it in one guitar. And it's a guitar that I do want. :cool:
 
Re: A guitar more beautiful than the angels

Rickenbacker 650 series.

I know you wouldn't think of metal+rickenbacker but the 650s are made for lead work and heavy music. They still have the rickenbacker cleans.
 
Re: A guitar more beautiful than the angels

My 50s reissue Strat, with a set of Surfers with the Custom Bridge. Chimy cleans from the neck, twangy cleans from the bridge/middle, and a hotter sound from the bridge (based on everything I've heard about them, though I'll have a set soon enough to see if everything I've heard is true!).
 
Re: A guitar more beautiful than the angels

hr01.jpg


This is my perfect guitar. I'm not one to debate clean tone much, however. It's not that important to me.
 
Re: A guitar more beautiful than the angels

UV777BK w/ Duncan Custom and 59 pickups.

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Re: A guitar more beautiful than the angels

Guess this is kinda typical but.. no strat so far ive played sounds feels and plays as good as my strat. Its an ash body (not sure if its light or hard ash) maple neck, rosewood fingerboard.. trem (4 springs, IxIII), cuz a hardtail strat is not a real strat :P and has a '78neck/HS-2/Texas Special pickup combo (the 78 is in the bridge).. it does sweet and warm glassy tones to hard agressive tones, it get have quack and play blues to funk easely and you can defently get it growling for hard rock or kick in some gain and play some metal leads.. if id lose this one somehow id get myself one based on these specs

Sunday003.jpg


if i wanted to get myself a second strat, with a more simple vintage vibe, less versatyle but stil lots of mojo to it id get this:

http://www.fender.com/products/search.php?partno=9270007803
 
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Re: A guitar more beautiful than the angels

I'm a mahogany man! Mahogany is always my first choice in body woods. For spectacular grain, its hard to beat AAAA flame maple or quilted maple as a top wood. But rather than a Mahogany neck, I would do a maple (maybe flamed as well) for the application you have in mind. Then an oily Indian rosewood fingerboard to take away some of the brightness of the maple neck with jumbo frets. Probably a Floyd with a straight pull peghead setup for locking trem.

I love Duncan pickups but my favorite Duncans would probably be a mismatch for this application. So I would look at Dimarzios instead. My favorites in DiMarzios are the are Air Norton or the Fred. I must admit that I don't know much about the full line of DiMarzios other than my two favorites. Those I mentioned might be well suited for shred. If you want something heavier then go with the higher output DiMarzios or even, ** GASP! ***, should I say it ..., EMG active PUs.

The end product should be about the thickness of an Ibanez/Ibeenhad. Definateley no thicker that a strat or tele. That should negate some of the heaviness of the mahogany body. I would choose pot values the same as I would for a strat to avoid being too bright on the tonal spectrum. You can wire for coil tapping and different phases as well.

This might work out or it might not. I would definately look at some of the guitar mfgs sites like Ibanez, Schecter and ect. to see what materials they commonly use in their axes. Less of a chance of going wrong that way IMO.
 
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Re: A guitar more beautiful than the angels

This one does it for me....alder US strat with an HS guard, 3 way toggle, and Custom/59 A5 hybrid and Chubtone 63. VH to SRV is what this one is all about. I built it with a rare black pearl Dust Strat Plus body from the 90's, a 2004 50th Ann. neck/hardware, a Warmoth guard, and pickups that beat anything else I could come up with.
SilverburstHS1.jpg
 
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Re: A guitar more beautiful than the angels

Uh well, i'd pick a mahogamy body, maple top and ebony fretboard. For the design ? Well there's so many great guitar designs out there so anything i like ?
Mockingbird, or one of these japanese weirdies (Copyright Orange ^^)
Or just a jackson super strat.
The pickups would be a screamong demon and a pearly gates.

But well, there's no such thing as a perfect guitar. You always need one more to cover *this* particuliar sound.............
Always something wrong. too bright, too dark, too light, too heavy, not enough treble, not enough low end..............

It's like girls, no matter how good they look you still wnat to try something else ^^
 
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Re: A guitar more beautiful than the angels

Alder. Maple neck/fretboard (one piece). Seymour Duncan JB humbucker in the bridge spot. Fender Custom Shop Texas Specials in the neck/mid spots.

Rock on ~ kac
 
Re: A guitar more beautiful than the angels

TwinReverb said:
Ok, let's try something interesting. Say you wanted a solid-body six-string 25.5" scale electric guitar, but you wanted to build it so that the woods and pickups gave you the following:

1) A tone more beautiful than the angels in heaven. Beautiful clean tone is #1 priority. The body wood can shine through, but not overpower the beautiful tone.
2) The ability to play metal, or hard rock.

I'm just wondering what pickups and woods you would choose. Me, so far, the most beautiful combo is the Lite Ash Strat: swamp ash body, maple neck and fretboard, with Alnico II Pro Staggered trio of pickups :D

What would you pick?
Click to expand...

Maple cap on a mahogany neck and body with an ebony board, seth lover neck pickup and custom bridge.
 
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