Tone Snobs

[Jag]

My favorite Yngwieism comes from Guitar Aficiando,

Less is not more, less is less! MORE is more!

LOL

[Rhodesplyr]

Over on the Hammond Organ list, we joke about saving all the leaky paper and early mylar capacitors we've had to replace and selling them for top dollar to guitar players for "magic tone." I had one guitar collector lecture me over the phone about how you HAD to have a $40 Jensen paper in oil capacitor as your Strat's "tone cap" if you wanted it to sound right.

But this happens everywhere. There's a guy who buys ordinary polyester capacitors for 10-15 cents and sells them for around $2 each as sets for Hammond tone generators, claiming that they are specially tested and selected by esoteric methods that he's developed over years of experience. Despite the fact that I've exposed it, people continue to buy them from him because it makes them feel more secure about it.

The only reason I own an electric guitar (a Chinese Squier Strat) is because guitar players started asking me to work on their amps. I can play enough to tell if something's working right or not. Historically, were most people who designed and built guitar amps actually great guitar players? Somehow, I doubt it. It's a different skill set.

[defaced]

As if to state that all amplifiers are the same and that changing things like tube brands/types and where you bias them can somehow perform this night/day transformation on the amp's tone, or on your tone for that matter.

So you're telling me that Blackface Twin over there can sound just like a Soldano SLO100 just because I'm the one playing it? I need that cork!

[g1]

Glad someone else mentioned it first, don't want to stir the pot but mods, mods, mods! I realize there are good & useful ones but how many guys just want a modded amp. "Do you know any mods for model X?" You ask them what they want to achieve and it's more like they want to accessorize a Harley or something. Same thing going on I guess, much easier to obsess over tone than practice or write songs.
Was just reading a blog entry about the whole procrastination via tone obsession thing here:
DC Guitar Journal: Stop Obsessing and Play Some Music

[Steve Conner]

RG calls it BUMS: Blind Urge to Mod Syndrome.

There's also BURP: Blind Urge to Replace Parts.

So you're telling me that Blackface Twin over there can sound just like a Soldano SLO100 just because I'm the one playing it?

Stick a good distortion pedal in front of it and go to town. I guarantee your heavily pierced teenage groupies will never tell the difference.

[Robert M. Martinelli]

RG calls it BUMS: Blind Urge to Mod Syndrome.

There's also BURP: Blind Urge to Replace Parts.



Stick a good distortion pedal in front of it and go to town. I guarantee your heavily pierced teenage groupies will never tell the difference.

+1

...And don't forget BUST ( Blind Urge to Search for Tone )

The problem with the obsessive search for a good tone has (at least) a couple of (bad) reasons: First of all, many find easier to keep searching for "good tone" instead of actually learning how to play. Secondly, they can always blame the "poor tone" for their crappy playing, and keep arguing and discussing about it for decades.

I am convinced (and always will be) that "good tone" has its main root in the players' fingertips, knowledge and artistic sensibility. If and ONLY IF these building blocks are in place already, we can start to argue about the right TONE to complement them.

JM2CW

Best regards

Bob

[MWJB]

I know lots of very good players, who might hit a great tone one gig, and not the next...they can hear pitch & intervals fine, but often struggle to hear complexities of tone, timbre etc. I also know guys who just strum around the house who have an excellent ear for tone but who would struggle to fill a set. Of course, there's a lot of ground in between and I certaqinly don't mean these examples to be taken as precedents.

But, what I get from the OP, is the phenomenon of guys who buy gear that is perceived as desirable & then list that gear as if it is some sort of validation of their skill, "Yeah, I got a '61 Strat & a handmade tweed Fender..." really means I'm farther up the evolutionary ladder than you...until it comes to delivering the goods! You see the same thing with Hifi & audiophiles, scotch whisky buffs, jazz collectors, car owners (500bhp makes me a better driver than you)...if you can afford good tools, buy all means buy them, but they don't do the work for you. Keen hobbyists with large disposable incomes are typically the guys who keep boutique builders in business, the companies get turnover & food on the table, the living room player gets an amp to show off & stroke, the odd full-time player may get an endorsement...it's not bad/wrong it's just the way of things.

As Steve says, guys who are doing a lot of listening are doing less playing. The only qualification for owning a "paragon of tone" guitar or amp, is having the readies, no-one has to pass a test.

[Alex R]

I guarantee your heavily pierced teenage groupies will never tell the difference.

Oh, those girls, they don't appreciate the finer points of ANYTHING.

[JacksonRR]

You know how often I practice runs and licks with no amp? Quite a lot. It really lets you hear every little mistake in your pick attack. I love to watch movies or TV and just practice sweeps for a few hrs. Of course I like to hear it overdriven in a certain way.....

[Chuck H]

I'm with Enzo. The nature of the thread is ironic. But I will offer this caveate...

These guys that profess tone and threfore excellence even though they can't play are doing the best they can with what they have. They have the $$$ and the desire and the hope to partly make up for a lack of skill. Not everyone's body and mind are built for playing a guitar. I've known guys who practiced just as much as I did and never got past sounding like a first year player. It happens. So these guys (the ones who can afford it) buy top gear and hope for the best but are also very proud of the cool stuff they have. Seems reasonable to me. As far as tone being in the hands, playing, whatever, I'm not so sure. I think it's a package deal. Imagine how these guys would sound playing through crappy gear.

On that premis I'm going to continue trying to design the best sounding amps I can so players that want to "sound" better can. Whether they can play or not.

Chuck

EDIT: I want to add that I'm not poo poo-ing the intent of the OP. This is my take on one aspect of it. In keeping with the spirit of the OP I'll say that often people who are less sometimes try to have more thereby making themselves greater than less by association with the stuff they own. And sometimes if these types can make you less, or at least believe you are, well. that sort of levels everything out for them. This is annoying but we all blow a little smoke up our own asses occasionally about something. And if anyone thinks they don't, well...

[tubeswell]

What Chuck said - music is a matter of personal taste. Whether its BURP, BUMS or BUST, if it floats your boat then whatever ...

[defaced]

So these guys (the ones who can afford it) buy top gear and hope for the best but are also very proud of the cool stuff they have. Seems reasonable to me. As far as tone being in the hands, playing, whatever, I'm not so sure. I think it's a package deal. Imagine how these guys would sound playing through crappy gear.

Exactly. Tone is in the gear. Style and technique are in the hands.

Personally, I'm pretty happy with my tone and style, but my technique/abilities/chops are not where I want them.

[mooreamps]

I am told this is a true story......

A kid goes into a store looking to buy a violin. He plays on an old beat-up looking instrument, not very well, and asks the clerk how much ? The clerk replies ; "200 hundred dollars".

A master concert player goes into the same store looking to buy a violin ; plays on the same instrument and asks the clerk how much ? The clerk replies ; " 2 thousand dollars".

-g

[olddawg]

At the end of the day Santana will sound like Santana no matter what he plays, as will Clapton, Beck, Page, or Hendrix would or did, or any real artist you can think of. I don't know how many times I've had people tell me their rig sucks and I've had no problem at all when I set in with it. Yeah, some equipment is superior to others. So what. Am I a tone snob because I don't care for soild state Crate amps? But within reason...garbage in equals garbage out. It's only worse with more garbage in between.

[Wilder Amplification]

Am I a tone snob because I don't care for soild state Crate amps?

Not at all. By "tone snobs" I'm referring to the guys who focus so much on the type of discrete components they have in their amp yet their playing clearly illustrates that the weak point of their tone is in their own playing (i.e. they can barely play).