Hello, and welcome back to Mod Garage. After we had a general look at electric guitar “tonewood” last month, we will pick up where we left off to see how important wood is for the sound of an electric guitar, and if everything you can hear when playing it unplugged is present in its amplified tone.I already spoiled the answer in the last part by saying that it’s not the most important factor, and that the correct question to ask is, “How much of what is audible in the unplugged, or primary, sound will be present in the amplified tone?” To be clear, I didn’t say that the wood has no influence on the electrified tone, and that all electric guitars sound the same. To cut to the chase, here is my formula on this, based on proven physics as well as several decades of expertise: The more solidly an electric guitar is built, the less influence its structure has on the amplified tone. We can invert this thinking, too: The more an electric guitar has the qualities of an acoustic guitar, the greater the influence its primary structure will have through an amp.This is not my original wisdom, but is based on decades of intensive scientific research by Professor Manfred Zollner from the German Regensburg University, which mostly matches my experiences from many years in the business. Professor Zollner developed this headnote approximately 15 years ago, and in my opinion, it’s the closest thing to the truth. His actual theory is that the wooden structure of an electric guitar has close to zero influence on the electrified tone.Let’s form a few groups according to different construction methods, which can give us some basic guidelines.Group No. 1: Electric guitars with a set neck and no tremoloThis is the most solidly built family, with guitars like the Gibson Les Paul, SG, LP Junior, etc. and their offshoots from other companies, but also guitars like the PRS McCarty family. Brace yourself: On these guitars, the primary structure has almost no influence on the amplified tone. Yes, mahogany is lightweight, and a flamed maple top looks stunning, but these qualities don’t impact how they sound through a Marshall stack.Group No. 2: Electric guitars with a set neck and tremoloThe next most densely constructed guitars include the Gibson Les Paul Axcess and Firebird, the Gretsch Jet, the PRS Custom and Standard family, a lot of Ibanez guitars, etc. Here, the body mass does a bit more to the tone; later, we will discover why this is.Group No. 3: Electric guitars with a bolt-on neck and no tremoloHere, we have the grandfathers of all electric guitars: the Fender Telecaster and Esquire, but also hardtail Stratocaster models along with the Mustang and Duo Sonic, PRS’ NF53, and many more.Group No. 4: Electric guitars with a bolt-on neck and tremoloThe classic Fender Stratocaster comes to mind, along with the Jaguar and Jazzmaster, the PRS CE family, and a lot of Gretsch guitars.Group No. 5: Semi-hollowbody and chambered electric guitarsThis collection includes instruments from the first group that lean more towards the construction of an acoustic guitar, with guitars like the Gibson ES-335, Gretsch and PRS semi-hollowbody models, the Fender Thinline Telecaster, Coronado, and Starcaster, and countless other models. Applying the guidelines from above, we also have to differentiate based on set versus bolt-on neck, as well as inclusion of tremolo.Group No. 6: Hollowbody electric guitarsIn this last section, we have the “big boys” that are usually referred to as jazz guitars or archtops, like the Gibson Byrdland, Super 400, L5, the Epiphone Broadway, Ibanez George Benson, etc. These are more or less acoustic guitars with pickups, and compared to all the other categories, their primary construction has the most significant effect on the amplified tone.So far, I bet a lot of you will be cursing my name. I know that playing and expressing oneself with the guitar are highly emotional things, and I’m not taking exception with this. But you can’t bargain with the hard facts of physics—if you drop a glass of wine, it will hit the floor, not the ceiling, at least on Earth.Let me explain. First and foremost, woods are for stability, surface feel, and optical appearance on electric guitars. They create a certain feeling, but don’t really change the instrument’s electrified tone. This is the point where we are all humans with emotions, prone to psychoacoustics, conclusions by analogy, and of course, confirmation bias. We see a guitar with a bright maple neck, so we expect a bright tone. We have a dark rosewood or ebony fretboard, so we expect a dark tone. You get the idea.You all know the saying that the tone is in the fingers, and this hits the nail on the head for electric guitars. The tonal influence of the individual playing style of each guitarist is much more powerful than the subtle differences of wood selection. Playing style is also never perfectly consistent, no matter if you are a beginner or pro player. It’s close to impossible to exactly reproduce picking strength, location, and velocity, and these things alone create much more tonal difference than the wood with which a guitar is built.Here’s a story to illustrate the point; you may have heard it before. German guitarist Paul Vincent, who passed in 2016, was one of the best guitar players worldwide, and the studio guitarist for Freddie Mercury during his solo phase without Queen. You can hear his playing on Mercury’s Mr. Bad Guy on hits like “Living On My Own” and “I Was Born to Love You.” These hits were recorded in the Musicland Studios in Munich, Vincent’s hometown. In his Rock Guitar Book from 1993, he describes meeting Brian May at Musicland in 1985 during the recording of the Queen single “One Vision.” After Brian finished his overdub, he walked out of the studio to greet Paul, handed his Red Special guitar over to him, and said, “Go ahead, play a little for me, I want to see your left hand vibrato.” Paul was speechless and totally blindsided, but also full of curiosity and respect. He was holding the original Red Special in his hands, plugged into the famous Deacy Amp and everything else May was using in the studio. But when he started playing, he simply sounded like Paul Vincent, and not even close to Brian May, even when hitting some famous Queen licks and riffs.I think that says it all. Vincent was looking for an escape hatch from this situation, so he handed Red Special back to May, telling him that studio time is expensive and he didn’t want to take up his afternoon. May smiled at him and said, “You are an outstanding player, Paul.”With that settled, next month, we will start to work on our cheap budget guitar, parsing out what really influences the amplified tone of an electric guitar, step-by-step, so stay tuned!Until then... keep on modding!
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