Poplar is a crap tone wood? Replace my '97 MIM Strat's body with Alder or Ash?

[JetCityMatt]

 

Jet City, if you are still around just a couple more thoughts. If shrillness is your problem, you might want to sell the Callaham Steel block and get one made of brass (GFS has one at a good price). This one upgrade made a world of difference to my poplar Strat. I've tried the steel big block and found it to be overwhelming and now I have one with an American Fender block (regular size) and the other with an oversized brass block. Also, flat toothpick pieces work great as shims for stripped out screw slots.

 

 

For only $25 I'm gonna give that a shot and see how it sounds. Thanks!

http://www.guitarfetish.com/Solid-Brass-Upgrade-Tremolo-Blocks-_c_217.html

 

I repaired my stripped holes years ago with wood dowel since I already owned a drill and drill bits it was pretty easy- just like drilling holes to build a 747!

[JetCityMatt]

You should listen to Iron Maiden then put a super distortion in a 57 Strat.

 

Haha! Nice. I know exactly what you're talking about! I've seen the picture of that guitar and it just screams " Fender Blasphemy"!

 

None of that Super Distortion crap for me- I like the Duncan Custom Custom.

"The Custom Custom is our SH-5 Duncan Custom humbucker with an Alnico II magnet for warm and smooth highs, more midrange, and a spongier bottom end than the SH-5. It's a good choice for players who need a traditional vintage tone with increased output... For brighter toned instruments. Works especially well with maple and ebony fingerboards."

 

I started with teh Pearly Gates in 1998 (before I had a tube amp) and ditched that bright icepick in the ear for the Duncan Custom, then years later I found out that Michael Wilton of Queensryche used the Custom Custom and went for it. It is not quite as biting and "Metal" as the ceramic Custom, but it is less sterile and more warm with the alnico magnet.

Years after that Duncan redid their website to FINALLY say that the Custom Custom was good for bright guitars while the Custom was for darker guitars.

[JetCityMatt]

 

i have a poplar warmoth tele and it sounds fantastic. The only complaint i have about it is that i super heavy. i have never had any problems with screws not staying in.

 

 

Interesting. The poplar body of my strat weighs practically nothing.

 

Here this is weird: Shortly after I bought this guitar in September '97 I moved into an apartment blocks from that music shop called "Poplar Lane Apartments". Can you hear the Twilight Zone music? I can.

[JetCityMatt]

 

Tone is in the pickguard. I thought everybody knew that. Thin pickguard = thin tone. Want to fatten up your tone get a thicker pickguard. This ain't rocket surgery.:poke:

 

 

Yeah when I found that out I bought a router and put a swimming pool route in my strat so that I could install a thicker pickguard- it's a 12 ply and makes all the difference in the world!

[Angry Tele]

you know Ol Lemon Face retired that Strat, the first concert I saw was maiden with the rYche (not a rych fan though TBH) in 87. He stopped playing it that year I think.

 

 

Haha! Nice. I know exactly what you're talking about! I've seen the picture of that guitar and it just screams " Fender Blasphemy"! None of that Super Distortion crap for me- I like the Duncan Custom Custom. "The Custom Custom is our SH-5 Duncan Custom humbucker with an Alnico II magnet for warm and smooth highs, more midrange, and a spongier bottom end than the SH-5. It's a good choice for players who need a traditional vintage tone with increased output... For brighter toned instruments. Works especially well with maple and ebony fingerboards." I started with teh Pearly Gates in 1998 (before I had a tube amp) and ditched that bright icepick in the ear for the Duncan Custom, then years later I found out that Michael Wilton of Queensryche used the Custom Custom and went for it. It is not quite as biting and "Metal" as the ceramic Custom, but it is less sterile and more warm with the alnico magnet. Years after that Duncan redid their website to FINALLY say that the Custom Custom was good for bright guitars while the Custom was for darker guitars.

[JetCityMatt]

 

Actually, the Strat he used on that song had a mahogany body (it was the white one with the black pickguard used on the Exit...Stage Left concert video). Supposedly, a real heavy body on that guitar. I thought I read somewhere else that his other Strats that he put together in that era were made with ash bodies. Could be off on that one though. HAH! Now you have even more to think about!

 

 

Damn you, interweb! You have failed me again!!! I wonder where I read that? Maybe I never read that but imagined it?

I know that the article DID say that they took the amps outside and cranked them and they heard it echoing off of the moutains or something like that.

 

It's interesting that the Phil Collen (Def Leppard of course) signature Jackson is a super strat with a maple neck and fretboard, but with a mahogany body with a maple cap. Since mahogany supposedly equates to warmth, oomph, and sustain I've always wondered if that is the magical combination... LP body, with a strat neck bolted on. Interesting...

[JetCityMatt]

you know Ol Lemon Face retired that Strat, the first concert I saw was maiden with the rYche (not a rych fan though TBH) in 87. He stopped playing it that year I think.

 

I wouldn't have been a ryche fan in '87 either- it was such a screamy 80's metal thing it took some getting used to. I started with their pop-rockish (non-screamy)masterpiece, Empire in 1990. I bought the tape single of "Silent Lucidity" when I was 13. I remember that the B-side had a song off of Operation Mindcrime (from 1988) and I thought, what is this crap?!! I now love that album, but wasn't ready for the 80's metal when I was 13 and hadn't even gotten into rock yet!

 

1987... that would have been the "Rage for Order" album which is REALLY weird! I bought that one in 1999, and, like a frog in a pot of water being turned up gradually so he doesn't jump out, I like much of that album too! Two of the best guitar players on earth, Chris Degarmo and Michael Wilton. And what is really weird is that I work at the same company that Chris works at now (but I didn't even find out until I had been working there for two years). Weird coincidences in life sometimes...

[grumphh]

 

magic

 

 

Send me 500 USD and i will perform some ancient viking chants, meant to appease the olden norse tone gods, for you and your instrument.

 

You will instantly have infinitely better tone than before!

[Yogi_Sizzle]

 

Truthfully I think you may be disappointed if you were to change out the body on your Strat. First of all, it entails a lot of work if you plan to keep your pickups, bridge and trem block, but second of all, I really doubt you will find the tone you are after that way. It sounds to me as though the real culprit is your amp - from what you have said. You have to realize that the MIM bodies were overall better quality then than now as the new ones have up to seven piece bodies as compared to two or three for the 90's fare. I have two 90's MIMs and believe one of them may have a poplar body (oblique finish) as the dust on the screws (when removed) seems too red to be Alder. It is a fantastic sounding Strat with plenty of sustain and character. My other one is a transparent finish and on closer analysis, two piece Swamp Ash. I like them both for different applications. Try another amp, you may be surprised.

 

 

MIM Standards were poplar from their inception up until 200 or 2001 when they started using Alder. Even back then they were made or up to 7 pieces, with an Alder veneer so the body material wasn't any better. Atleast now you are getting actual Alder under the Alder veneer. Even some American Standards in the 90s were poplar with an Alder veneer at one point.

[JetCityMatt]

 

i`m putting together an old Schecter strat, the body is from about 1979, i bolted an old ESP strat neck onto it last night and the interaction between the two pieces was quite amazing. no strings or anything, just wood. knock on it and it rings

 

 

The book in which I read the statement about poplar being second-rate last night also described how to evaluate an electric. It mentioned strumming open chords and plucking the G string and then feeling for vibration on the head of the neck and various parts of the body. I did that last night and this poplar body mated to a USA CG neck is insanely resonant. It vibrates everywhere and with a lot of energy. If I "upgraded" to a new Alder body chances are I would be sorely disappointed when it fell short of what I currently have!

[JetCityMatt]

Send me 500 USD and i will perform some ancient viking chants, meant to appease the olden norse tone gods, for you and your instrument. You will instantly have infinitely better tone than before!

 

What's your paypal address?

 

Actually I think God may have put some mojo in this one already since it resonates so amazingly unplugged.

 

I think that I ruined my sustain years ago when I bought a modern compund radius warmoth neck with the double expanding truss rod... it sustained okay, but I think the frequency of the sustain seemed higher or thinner or something...

I bought this fantastic (conventional construction) USA Custom Guitars neck a couple years ago and I think that brought the sustain and resonance back.

[grumphh]

What's your paypal address? Actually I think God may have put some mojo in this one already since it resonates so amazingly unplugged. I think that I ruined my sustain years ago when I bought a modern compund radius warmoth neck with the double expanding truss rod... it sustained okay, but I think the frequency of the sustain seemed higher or thinner or something... I bought this fantastic (conventional construction) USA Custom Guitars neck a couple years ago and I think that brought the sustain and resonance back.

All i can tell you is that i have two mim strats ('91 + '93) and they do sound different - one of them is great (and just what i wanted from a strat) and the other one is sort of average strat sounding.

No idea of the body wood nor how many pieces (because the finish is so thick that even the closest scrutiny against the light doesn't reveal any lines).

 

I think that you should just enjoy that guitar and your amp + speakers as they are and maybe lower the pickups a little to tame that harshness you don't like.

Not that difficult, and you can always raise them a bit if that doesn't satisfy you.

 

Imo there are no single magic bullets that will alter your tone dramatically - but of course, that is just my opinion.

 

..also i think that V30's are better than their rep

[HELSTRUME]

AGREED! My WGS Retro 30 should ship out on Monday or Tuesday. I know it has more treble than their Veteran 30, but their Veterean 30 sounds like it has a blanket over it... so hopefully the Retro 30 is like a Vintage 30 minus the high mid spike. I actually want more presence than the V30 has (which I get from my greenback) but want to ditch the harsh high mids.

Hey, let me know how that Retro 30 is. I'm interested in em.

[JetCityMatt]

 

Hey, let me know how that Retro 30 is. I'm interested in em.

 

 

Will do! As soon as my online VISA payment is applied tomorrow morning I'm ordering that and also (for the poster who recommended the brass trem block) a Super Vee Blade Runner bridge- which has its own trem block so I'll be holding off on the brass trem block purchase.

[straycat113]

You have a body made of Poplar for 14 years and because you read a poll that said it is the tastes like chicken wood you are now freaking out. What if it said it was the best kept secret of tone woods, would you have let your mind play tricks on you. Well the onething I can say for sure about Poplar and Basswood is that they are ugly woods. But as for Poplar it is the tone wood choice of Steve Morse as all his guitars are made of them, and Basswood is the #1 choice for players like Vanhalen, Vai, Satch and Gilbert amongst many others. John Suhr calls Basswood with a Maple cap the Holy Grail of tone.

[RevRomansky]

All i can tell you is that i have two mim strats ('91 + '93) and they do sound different - one of them is great (and just what i wanted from a strat) and the other one is sort of average strat sounding. No idea of the body wood nor how many pieces (because the finish is so thick that even the closest scrutiny against the light doesn't reveal any lines).

 

Check to see if the worse sounding one is shimmed. No shim, no shimmer.

[grumphh]

Check to see if the worse sounding one is shimmed. No shim, no shimmer.

 

Neither of them is shimmed. I have had the necks off both. Still one sounds/feels better than the other.

 

Guitars are different.

[Lemon Crush]

Tone is in the fingers

 

 

The thing is dude, if your guit is poplar, and you enjoy it, then leave it. The whole "tonewoods" thing is, at best an exaggeration, and at worst a complete fabrication. Just go off of what YOU like, and you'll be fine.

[Foster Zygote]

I think Poplar gets a bad reputation from the fact that it is cheap. But it's cheap because it is widely available, not because it has some intrinsic inferiority as a tone wood. If Brazilian rosewood was common it would be cheap too. Like any piece of tone-wood, tone qualities will vary from one cut to the next. But a good sounding piece of properly dried poplar sounds very nice and simply offers another tonal option that is very similar to alder, but, as some have already mentioned, tends to be slightly brighter and more articulate. The only quality in which poplar can truly be said to be lacking is in the appearance of its grain. Greenish mineral streaks are often present so it is rarely used for transparent finishes, but aside from that I don't think there is anything objectively deficient about poplar as a tone wood.

[diceman1000]

i don't drink the tonewood kool-aid... there are tone controls for a reason:o

[S540]

The thing is dude, if your guit is poplar, and you enjoy it, then leave it. The whole "tonewoods" thing is, at best an exaggeration, and at worst a complete fabrication. Just go off of what YOU like, and you'll be fine.

 

Who are you and what have you done with one of my fav, irrational trolls??!!!!

 

Glad to see you arent completely void of common sense

[Lemon Crush]

Who are you and what have you done with one of my fav, irrational trolls??!!!! Glad to see you arent completely void of common sense

 

{censored} off. You're a smelly piece of feces.

[S540]

 

{censored} off. You're a smelly piece of feces.

 

 

Your words of endearment are both comforting and cherished!

[BoneNut]

There was a guy here once that had a plywood bodied guitar. He was perfectly happy with it and played the crap out of it.

 

He made the mistake of posting about it here and received a hundred responses telling how plywood was terrible "tonewood" and how crappy his guitar was because of that. Keep in mind almost all of those that posted couldn't tell you what wood a guitar is made from by just listening to it, even if their life depended on it. I'm pretty sure they couldn't find their own ass either, even if they used both hands.

 

The thing is, the guy was so turned off by his guitar now, that same one that played and sounded fantastic until he posted here, that he sold it. Never saw him on the forum again.

 

I hope the neck snaps off the guitars of all those assholes that told him his guitar was crap because it was plywood.

[RaVenCAD]

I think it boils down to this: Play what makes you happy. Does wood sound different? Yes it does. Not better, not worse, just different. Only by playing for a lot of years and on a lot of different guitars can you figure out which of those differences works best for you. Finding just the right combination of wood, pickups, string gauges and cable length can take a lifetime. Stop stressing over the stupidity of "the holy grail" of tone, and just enjoy playing.