【Gear Lab 02】Electric Guitar Beginners, learning the Basic Tone of Electric Guitar

Last Updated on 2024-07-25

In the previous article, I have provided the basic introductions of beginner electric guitarists’ musical instruments：

✅ basic instruments

✅ effects pedals

✅ brands of electric guitar

✅ brands of electric guitar AMP

If you are a beginner of electric guitar and haven’t read the previous article【Gear Lab 01】, I recommend you read it before you read this one.

If you want to learn more about the characteristics of the “electric guitar AMP”, then you can also refer to the next article first:

After you have some understanding of the basic instruments, this article will introduce the basic characteristics and tone-color of the electric guitar structure.

1. Tone-color

# 1.1. Device Structures of Electric Guitar

If you want to know the basic tone-color of the electric guitar, you can start with the structures of the electric guitar for a preliminary understanding.

◆ Pickup

When you pluck the strings of the electric guitar, the Pickup under the strings will “pick up” the sound signal through the physical characteristics of “electromagnetic induction” .

These sound signals “picked up” by the Pickups can be used to provide instruments such as Electric-guitar, AMP, and Effects-pedals.

Then, through the circuit structure of these devices, “signal processing” can be performed on the sound signal.

The types of Pickup will determine the basic “tone-color” of the electric guitar.

>>> Types of Pickups

✅ Single-coil are commonly called S.

✅ Humbuckers are commonly called H.

>>> Single-coil v.s. Humbucker

>>> Common Pickup Configuration

The “Pickup configuration” description in this table is for the basic tone of the electric guitar under the condition of “regardless” of External Musical Instruments such as Effects Pedals.

The description of the music genre is just to let you better understand which tone of these “Pickup configurations” are good at.

However, as long as the “combination of instruments” and “playing techniques” are used properly, you actually do not necessarily have to follow these genres suggestions.

💡Tips： When choosing equipment at the beginner stage, you can “don’t” be too entangled in the tone-colors; after all, it is very normal to “not know how to distinguish the tone-colors” at this stage.

However, if you already have a genre that you love it very much, then “Pickup Configuration” will still be a good reference!

Here is an easy-to-understand example： Suppose you really want to play “heavy-metal” music, and you will dream about it every day when you sleep , then “HH” will be a very recommended Pickup configuration~

>>> Relatively Rare Pickup Configuration

• S
• H
• H-S
• H-H-H

Above, the most common pickup configurations have been introduced.

As for some “configurations not listed”, they can be regarded as special configurations.

( If Blues-Feng has a chance to play with these special configurations, I will introduce them to you! )

◆ Wood Types

The body and neck of an electric guitar are made of wood, and the types of wood used for the body and neck will also affect the tone-color of the electric guitar .

This principle is due to the difference in physical properties： different woods have different densities.

Just imagine, when you knock on a “full” water bottle, it makes a different sound than when you knock on a “half-full” water bottle, right?

The difference in wood density will also cause similar results.

>>> Body Wood

• Alder
• Ash
• Basswood
• Mahogany
• Maple
• Korina

>>> Neck/Fretboard Wood

• Rosewood
• Ebony
• Maple
• Pau Ferro
• Richlite

◆ Electric Guitar Knobs

In addition to pickups and wood types, we can also control the tone-color by turning the knobs on the electric guitar .

>>> Knob Types

>>> Common Knob Configurations

• Volume x1 、Tone x2
• Volume x2 、Tone x2
• Volume x1 、Tone x1

◆ Electric Guitar Brands

Do you still remember the brands of electric guitars that were introduced in the previous article【Gear Lab 01】?

The purpose of introducing brands, in fact, is not just to allow you to distinguish them.

Another purpose of knowing the brands is to:

"Each brand has a different view

on the aesthetics of sound."

Therefore, when you start to delve into the field of electric guitar and want to have a more in-depth development.

At this time, you may start to pursue timbre and want to create the tone-color of “your own Personal-style” .

Therefore, learning to understand the “tone characteristics” of these brands will become one of your topics.

2. Conclusion

This article provides some introductory information that electric guitar beginners can spend time researching before purchasing instruments.

【Gear Lab 02】The focus is mainly on the elements of the “Device Structures of Electric Guitar” that affect the tone-color.

Before the end of the article, let Blues-Feng take you to quickly review the key points of this time!

Basic Tone of Electric Guitar:

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