Guitar, Guitar

Given that I’m currently shaping my guitar tone armed with nothing more than my fingers, a box of air and a microphone you might find it odd that it’s exercising my imagination quite so much.

It's probably because I'm having to think about every note and force my hands to play it. I'm hearing things when I'm out walking and then having to find a way to play it when I get back. Flow is coming back, but it's nowhere near where it was or I'd like it to be.

It's also because the sound you hear when you play a guitar is different to the sound you hear when you record it and play it back.

Narrowing the gap between the two is a challenge.

That’s because a guitar’s tone is a thing made up of a constantly shifting combination of variables interacting in ever-changing ways.

No two notes on a guitar sound exactly the same, even when they’re the same notes.

No two guitars sound the same - even when they’re the same model and make, and were produced side-by-side in the same factory on the same day by the same machines and luthiers. Make, model, wood choices, whether the luthier or factory hands involved were having a good or bad day the day they shaped the braces, glued the top or the back, set the neck angle or cut the nut - it all makes a difference.

The sound your ears hear when you play and the sound you hear during playback are all subject to variables. Ability, attack, personal preferences, mic, amp and cables used, the room, the desk, the engineer, the inboard and the outboard, eq, fx, mixing, mastering, the playback speakers ...

Listen, for example, to John Martyn pulling Solid Air of his strings and compare it to, say, Tony McManus working through Gordon Duncan’s equally sublime The Sleeping Tune. Both are in significantly altered tunings. But Martyn’s sound is slappy and snappy and percussive where McManus’s is sonorous and rich with overtones. Both are shaped by the production values of the time as well as the preferences and style of the player.

This is why you should never buy a signature instrument with the intention of sounding like your heroes.

It's also why when I hear talk about such-and-such a brand or model or such-and-such a tone wood being the ‘Holy Grail’ or even just ‘better’ than another model, make or brand, I bite my tongue.

Really?

Does the Holy Grail come with studio, the mics, the desk, the producer, the engineer, the rest of the band, the songs and the cultural moment?

No?

Shush, then.

It's never just the guitar.

A nickel's worth of free advice?

Don't buy the brand you're told you should.

Don't buy the model you're told you should have for your style of music.

Don’t buy the guitar you think you want.

Buy the guitar that you can't put down when you pick it up.

Seriously, there’s one in every guitar shop. It’s never the one you think it will be … and if you close your eyes and get out of your way, you’ll know it when you pick it up.

Yes, guitars are beautiful works of art.

First and foremost, though, they're tools to make music with. A carpenter’s plane is no less a work of art because it’s functional.

What matters is not the tool but what it produces.

And what it produces is up to the craftsman.

Ultimately, the most consistent thing in the production and shaping of a guitar’s tone is ...

... the player.

Here's how you can tell:

Stand your guitar in a corner.

Walk away.

Listen to it.

Hear anything?

No?

Pick it up.

Play a chord.

See?

It's all on you, man.

What makes a great guitar sound and a guitar sound great is the person playing it.

©℗ A. I. Jackson

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The first Origin(al) Stories Journal was a blog launched to track the writing and recording of the Northumbria album. You can read about the thought processes behind that here.

Following the launch of The Landing Stage website, I’ve decided to continue with the Origin(al) Stories posts.

The Landing Stage showcases some of the things I do.

The Origin(al) Stories posts show some of the thoughts and processes and activities that go into those acts of doing.

Drawn from my personal diaries and journals, the posts might often seem unconnected, elliptical and fragmentary.

This is because the Origin(al) Stories blog doesn’t offer the definitive conclusions, hacks, lists or ‘how to …’ advice beloved of Youtube gurus, bro-science and self-help manuals.

This is because there’s no one road through the forest, no one route to the top of the mountain, no one path to where you want to be and what you want to do.

The Origin(al) stories only shows how I’ve found a path through to doing something.

The path always has to give you as much as the destination.

They are, as I noted in the original post about it, postcards from the journey. Snapshots of work in progress - which is what all lives and endeavours are.

If you’ve liked an Origin(al) Stories post, or it’s helped you with something you’re doing in some way, please share it to your socials, and give credit. All content on this website is copyrighted and attributable.

If you’d like to listen to Northumbria, download it here.

If you’d like to listen to Alnwyck Jameson Badger, download it here.

If you’d like to listen to Broken Oars Podcast, download it here.

Thanks for reading. Have a great day. Tell the people you love that you love them. Be a positive force.