TONE QUEST: Did you get MORE or LESS picky over time?

Top-L said:
The whole "putting people into a hierarchy" depending on present/past income in music industry, and then dismissing their forum posts because they don't "rank"... not into that. Also don't think the three-chord college band (years ago) or church band lends someone more forum cred either.
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I judge gear experience and knowledge based on post count; that's how you really know if someone is on top of their game.

:13:
 
Iron1 said:
I'm meaning professional musicians in the sense of people who can maintain some semblance of an income as a musician, not necessarily celebrity status.
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I used to play out MANY years ago, then my band broke up and I got into doing sound, which turned into a career. I got to charter busses and make money selling merch, did a few festivals et all, but in the end, I never got the opportunity to drop a full-length studio recorded EP, spend any real time chronologing my works, or really at a point in my playing where doing so was worth it. By the time I quit playing out, digital recording at the homebrew level was just beginning. A year or two after I started doing sound, the Digi 002 was the first mobile recording platform I was using to capture live recordings of the bands I was working for. Once I was on the other side of the stage I didn't really care anymore about my playing and works, my focus turned to making everyone else's as best it can be.

Music is a self-made industry, I was better at doing sound and my work sold itself to my clients. I am not a bad guitarist, perhaps damn good relatively, but I was better at selling my sound services than I was at selling my guitar playing ability. I have seen absolute hacks of a guitar player make a damn good living playing guitar and presenting their music, not because their music was great, but because they were AMAZING at selling themselves to people and making people interested in them. Their personality, their charisma, and their soul drew people to them. I loved working for them not because the music moved me, but because I cared about the artist.

Being picky about gear is kind of the same thing. For musicians that NEED that gear to stand out, feel justified ( ego if you will ), or simply because they want it and can afford it, is 100% up to them. They sell it to themselves, just as they sell themselves to the people. I think for many, having high-end gear makes them happy just as much as it solidifies their level of seriousness in the industry. They don't need it to be a great player, they only need it because it is their icing on the cake. For bedroom guitar god dreamers, it works in other ways. Mainly for inspiration, slightly for their ego, and perhaps largely because they can afford it to begin with. Picky is a bad analogy. Taste is what I think ultimately changes with age. When I was younger I was more interested in Mesa Dual Recs, as I got older, I now realize I am happiest with a clean, pedal platform amp.
 
"Be the best you can be"

That is the mantra for some and it encompasses many aspects: gear selection, playing, practicing, listening, studying, writing, tone-chasing, building, mixing, eq-ing, Mel Bay, etc ad infinitum.
 
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im as picky now as ever, i know what i want to hear and feel from my rig. that said, i can make almost anything work if the need arises.
 
I generally think of a sound in my head and search for the gear (or build a system) to create it. Once I get there, I am fine for quite awhile. I won't buy gear to see what I can create with it- I usually have very specific ideas of what I want. It is awesome if I stumble upon a sound I wouldn't have thought of, but that isn't the main driver for getting new stuff.
 
I don't think I got picky but actually more practical. I dragged a 12 space rack, midi-controllers and multiple cabs around in the 90's. My rig now is for lack of a better word smarter. Less points of failure and less to trouble shoot if I have a problem. My more practical setup sounds a lot better than the 90's rig did.
 
The beauty of playing electric guitar is you can redirect the attention from playing the instrument itself to gear...tone, tone, and tone. You have the luxury to suck at playing and hide behind tone discussion and slowly gain 'forum cred' by contributing from your experience using specific gear or just plain reading. F**k you can even make money and be a YouTube 'influencer' (this term is so millenial the it got popped out by the spell checker...lol) on gear like that Tone King dude.

You don't see piano player or sax player or violin player discussing gear. They focus on playing. How does that make you feel? I feel like a second class citizen really...lol.
 
I can't afford to be picky.

I tend to favour gear that suits my wallet :laugh2: and I'm far from obsessive about tone. I have long realized that I can make most amps & guitar's sound the way I'd like them to ..dial in sounds that I think work/sound great & that's good enough for me. So no, not picky.
 
Demanic said:
I like puppies and kittens!

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I'm more discerning but also more experienced at getting what I want from amps & guitars.
Coincident with that, I've gotten much better at doing more with less.

More convinced than ever that - short of actual playability issues - pretty much any guitar/amp combination can be made to produce at least one good usable sound (though some may need to be cranked to achieve it.)

I'm also experienced enough to know that even using the exact same guitars and rig, tone will vary from one night to another, even aside from the fact that no two soundspaces are ever identical. But I also know that when it sounds a bit off initially, my ears will adapt: by the third tune, tone and feel will have normalized.
 
Obsessive Compulsive said:
The beauty of playing electric guitar is you can redirect the attention from playing the instrument itself to gear...tone, tone, and tone. You have the luxury to suck at playing and hide behind tone discussion and slowly gain 'forum cred' by contributing from your experience using specific gear or just plain reading. F**k you can even make money and be a YouTube 'influencer' (this term is so millenial the it got popped out by the spell checker...lol) on gear like that Tone King dude.

You don't see piano player or sax player or violin player discussing gear. They focus on playing. How does that make you feel? I feel like a second class citizen really...lol.
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I think everyone knows that G.A.S. is really just trying to fill a void with possessions, and hanging out in gear forums is a way to handle lonliness.

At best forum discussions are a form of procrastination. At their worst they devolve into bullying and egotism. I think in alot of ways, gear elitism, being hyper critical / discerning is a form of egotism. (Defining ones self with possessions.)

A painter mixes a new shade of paint, he doesn't post on the internet "Hey look at this mesmerizing red I mixed". Thats what guitarists are doing on gear forums. "Hey listen to this awesome distortion tone!" (plays generic riff) "I made it with _(expensive amp)_ played into __(expensive load box)" etc.

Somewhere along the way I cured the GAS, but I still spend more time on internet forums than I would like.
 
Actually, some art forums are just like that. I don't think it is exclusive to guitarists. There are probably more art stores and art magazines than ones for guitarists, all promising better art if you only buy this one new thing.
 
I can make decent gear work if I have to BUT--. I am really picky about what I WANT to play. I want my guitar and my amp to respond to me in a particular way and it's not about brand or how expensive or looks. No it's all about how it responds to the way I play. Yes I have gotten very picky about what I play over the years because I have learned what works for ME! Also over the years I find I rely more on the tones of pure guitar and amp interaction more and use fewer effects. Less is more and my rigs have become much simpler.
 
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Little Pigbacon said:
Its up to each of us to decide what to focus our resources on. Its not my fault that gear is awesome. Complaining that people focus on gear on an electric guitar forum is like complaining about all the car talk on a racing forum.
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Dude why do you have to change your reply every time? You can't expect people to take you seriously.

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Obsessive Compulsive said:
The beauty of playing electric guitar is you can redirect the attention from playing the instrument itself to gear...tone, tone, and tone. You have the luxury to suck at playing and hide behind tone discussion and slowly gain 'forum cred' by contributing from your experience using specific gear or just plain reading. F**k you can even make money and be a YouTube 'influencer' (this term is so millenial the it got popped out by the spell checker...lol) on gear like that Tone King dude.

You don't see piano player or sax player or violin player discussing gear. They focus on playing. How does that make you feel? I feel like a second class citizen really...lol.
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What is your basis for this statement? All musicians talk shop. My brother is a professional musician and has been in that circle for a long time. They all obsess over minute details. Violinists and their bows, saxophonists and their reeds, mouthpieces, pads necks, etc. The thing that makes them professional is that they afford the appropriate time/attention to those things and focus more time on practice and networking.
 
Top-L said:
I remember in my 20s and 30s questing for something called "the sound in my head", but in retrospect it was just G.A.S. and lack of knowledge. Now several decades on, I find I'm less picky about my tone. I can get most gear to work.

If you read TGP you are left with the impression that a bunch of old men are engaged in a high stakes game of cork sniffing. For me, the opposite has occured. I'm less particular about my gear.

For instance... I know the kinds of pickups that work for me. I could probably pick 5-10 different pickups from the Dimarzio and Duncan catalogs and be fine with any of them. For that matter, even stock pickups can sound pretty great. I find that if you buy a pointy guitar, it usually ships with the kind of pickups a pointy guitar player would want. If you buy a vintage guitar, it usually ships with the kinds of pickups a vintage player would want. Maybe guitar electronics have gotten much better, but I've been pleasantly surprised with stock pickups and don't have an urge to "rip them out".

Same is true with amps. I know the kinds of speakers I like. I know how to use EQ and boost pedals. I also know that when I play something long enough, my ears and expecations morph so that I'm able to get the best from what I'm using. I have some amps, some effect processors, some plugins that work just swell and I don't think my life will be enriched by changing to something else.

Even if something is not amazing (like the reverb on my amp), it doesnt really matter to me. It does what it does, it doens't mean its time to buy a new amp. I actually prefer delay, but if I don't have a delay pedal handy, I will just turn up the reverb and live with it.

There are only a couple things I am picky about. Fret work and intonation. And things that are defective, like scratchy pots and loose control jacks.

I thought this came from experience and confidence, but over on TGP you've got some high order cork sniffers who are probably boomers. So maybe other people go in the opposite direction.
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I'm a boomer,and I think just like you. But I resent that box you shoved me into. NUFF SAID.

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