Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

[beaubrummels]

I'm noticing that when I play up by the neck on my single pickup guitars, I get much more warmer mellower and more varied sound than if I use a two-pickup guitar with the bridge pickup selected and play up by the neck. In fact, on my two-pickup guitars, there's very little difference as I move up onto the neck with the bridge pickup selected.

However, I only have a couple one-pickup guitars. I'd like to hear from folks with a wider variety of single-pickup guitars like various shred sticks, Les Paul Jr., Malcom Young Gretsch, Tom Delonge ES, Fender Carbronita, etc.

Have any of you guys noticed playing up to the neck and back and getting more variety of tone from the bridge pickup when it's the only pickup in the guitar?

Thanks.

 

[kramersteen]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

I think you have gone la la loopy my friend. :18:

I am still thinking about the question.

 

[ItsaBass]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

My main guitars are all single pickup, and I have five single pickup guitars. I am a firm believer that the magnetic pull issue is a non issue. If you are noticing any difference at all, it can probably be chalked up to imagination, normal variation between different guitars, and/or differences in how you are able to use your pick/fingers when playing up by the neck (i.e. you potentially have more control when playing by the neck on a single pickup guitar, as there is no neck pickup to potentially get in the way).

 

[beaubrummels]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

Hmm, I think I'll have to record an audio sample to demonstrate it. Can't do it today, however.

 

[Edgecrusher]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

Yeah i'm not with yah on this one. I have a bunch of single pickup guitars and never noticed this effect. Its just the difference between 2 guitars

 

[beaubrummels]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

That could be, that's why I asked. I don't have enough guitars to compare.

 

[Nacho8807]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

I switched my Strat from SSS to a single hum config, and I can't say I've noticed a difference when it comes to this.

 

[vinta9e]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

Single pickup guitars can be extremely responsive but not all responsive guitars are single pickup.

 

[EDX]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

in comparison to other guitars even some lp's i always have had the feel my V (the one on my avatar) feels beefier and a long time i gave the credit to my string gauge (i even used .12 to .60 on E standar)

 

[Vajazzled]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

That could be, that's why I asked. I don't have enough guitars to compare.

Are the ones that you do have available to compare the same scale-length?
The closer the aspects on your one-pickup guitar and your multi-pup ones are, the closer you can get to narrowing down the phenomenon.

What are the Differences and similarities between them?
Pickup types would play a role, I imagine, as well

 

[uOpt]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

Easy to test by removing the neck pickup and re-recording, if you suspect it is the magnet.

If you think it's the route then well, there's always a router

 

[tubecrunch]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

I don't have two of the same to compare, a dual and a single. Tough to verify. I also like to brag about my single pup guitars, so there....

 

[koshikas]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

Easy to test by removing the neck pickup and re-recording, if you suspect it is the magnet.

If you think it's the route then well, there's always a router

this :18:

 

[DreX]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

I strongly suspect magnetic pull is a 'selling point' difference rather than a difference-difference. It's so outrageously difficult to A/B things like single puckup/dual pickup, A2/A5, zinc/steel that guitarists end up telling themselves they hear a difference, apart from whether or not the difference is even audible.

In the literature that comes with Lollar's Tweeds, he notes that you can get the weaker A2 pickups closer to the strings without suffering the same string dampening you would with more powerful A5 pole pieces, but the thing of it is, the higher output afforded by an A5 or ceramic magnet creates a far greater sense of added sustain than would ever be realized from reduced string pull. It's not as though Lace Golds turn your Strat into a Big Muff-like sustain monster. Metal guys who rely on good sustain to pay the bills aren't buying Lollar Tweeds with their dainty magnets, they're buying humbuckers with black hole sucking ceramic bars. But since it's otherwise intuitive that less string pull means slightly less impeded vibration, every carries on as though it actually matters somehow.

 

[beaubrummels]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

FWIW - my original premise wasn't assuming string pull in particular. It could be caused by having the body routed and a chunk of metal and wire screwed in there at the neck that does something to dual pickup guitars, meanwhile single PU guitar just have pure wood body up through the neck and maybe that makes all the difference. I don't know for sure and didn't assume the cause, but I did indeed notice the sound difference while playing and asked if anyone else noticed something similar. It could be just different guitars and not related to number of pickups. My next test will be to pull the neck pickup out of my Tele to sort of make it an Esquire and see if I get a different sound up by the neck.

 

[kramersteen]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

I am still thinking about this bro. I sort of understand what you're talking about.

Wheres dominus?

 

[uOpt]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

FWIW - my original premise wasn't assuming string pull in particular. It could be caused by having the body routed and a chunk of metal and wire screwed in there at the neck that does something to dual pickup guitars, meanwhile single PU guitar just have pure wood body up through the neck and maybe that makes all the difference. I don't know for sure and didn't assume the cause, but I did indeed notice the sound difference while playing and asked if anyone else noticed something similar. It could be just different guitars and not related to number of pickups. My next test will be to pull the neck pickup out of my Tele to sort of make it an Esquire and see if I get a different sound up by the neck.

Good post.

I disagree with DreX that it is difficult to test. Record a clip through some modeler, change pickup, record again. You can even do self blind tests. The only thing difficult is the routes question, but I already know from before/after recordings that routing a SS Tele to HH changes things a bit.

Also, the average single pickup guitar is much higher quality than regular guitars.

 

[t1r12003]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

FWIW - my original premise wasn't assuming string pull in particular. It could be caused by having the body routed and a chunk of metal and wire screwed in there at the neck that does something to dual pickup guitars, meanwhile single PU guitar just have pure wood body up through the neck and maybe that makes all the difference. I don't know for sure and didn't assume the cause, but I did indeed notice the sound difference while playing and asked if anyone else noticed something similar. It could be just different guitars and not related to number of pickups. My next test will be to pull the neck pickup out of my Tele to sort of make it an Esquire and see if I get a different sound up by the neck.

Here you go. Not saying he's known as a tone expert by any means, but this seems related. Got to around 2:20 or so.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BurVUBeTG5I

 

[vinta9e]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

Record a clip through some modeler

Bad idea, given how much detail modelers kill.

 

[uOpt]

Re: Single pickup guitar owners, have you noticed this tone difference?

"detail kill"?

If anything most modelers fail to kill the details like a good tube amp does.