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Where an electric guitar's tone really comes from, tested

Jim LillRecommended by 4 people on Hacker News, 2022–2026
YouTube
2.9M views · 4 years ago · gear review

Jim Lill swaps parts on a kit guitar one at a time, then builds a guitar from a plank of wood and finally from almost nothing, to find which parts change the amplified sound. Pickup height turns out to matter most.

A careful experiment that tests gear folklore instead of repeating it, and a useful lesson in listening tests for anyone who records guitar.

  1. 0:00 What am I doing?
  2. 1:00 Introducing the Partscaster
  3. 2:00 First Tests
  4. 3:43 Questioning My Methods
  5. 4:47 The Height Revelation
  6. 6:07 The 2x4 Guitar
  7. 8:44 The Air Guitar
  8. 11:01 Outro Jam

1 comment from Hacker News

@dmbche Recommends it · View on HN

he shows experimentaly that the guitar itself has little to do with tone.

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