How often has your taste in tone changed?

Sean

I assume this sort of thing would happen more in the beginning of one's interest in guitar playing. I suppose this is one of the contributing factors to a person’s propensity for buying and selling gear (I suppose the main reason is the pursuit for quality)

So I’m curious, especially with regard to those of you who have been playing for many years, has your taste changed much, or have you more or less stuck to what you were attracted to from the very beginning?

MikeM

My taste is in flux. Hehe. Changes too often and I like too many different things.

That's why I think that one should have a hb, p90 and sc guitar and two amps ?

That's an ideal world hehe..

PeteM

Sean wrote: I assume this sort of thing would happen more in the beginning of one's interest in guitar playing. I suppose this is one of the contributing factors to a person’s propensity for buying and selling gear (I suppose the main reason is the pursuit for quality)

So I’m curious, especially with regard to those of you who have been playing for many years, has your taste changed much, or have you more or less stuck to what you were attracted to from the very beginning?

When I started playing my preference in tone was influenced by the guitarists of the day. I started out trying to sound like them and as I developed so I found my own sound with the gear that I had. As I progressed further I adapted the tone to the type of music I was playing.

vic

Very interesting question and I'm sure there will be a lot of views and opinions on the topic.
In my case (been playing actively since Noah's flood ? ), I prefer a guitar that can give me the Chuck Berry-, and Harrison- and early Clapton/Cream-and ol' time rock'n roll sounds.....This is where I find the Gibson Les Paul to be very useful.
No, my tastes have not changed much over the years...never liked single coil sounds (unless I had to play Shadows)....but then one can also get a fairly decent Marvin sound with a Gibson and the right echo and reverb. Interestingly, there is an article which attributes the early Marvin sound to a Gretsch Country Gentleman (I think)
But overall, the richness and warmth of the Gibson tone is what appeal to me most.

[deleted]

Sean wrote: I assume this sort of thing would happen more in the beginning of one's interest in guitar playing.

I would've thought it would be the other way around - the more you become able to hear nuances between sounds and know how to get them...

I suppose this is one of the contributing factors to a person’s propensity for buying and selling gear (I suppose the main reason is the pursuit for quality)

Ja, I think we see a lot of that as excuses. ? But it makes me wonder - it should be possible to get a decent tone out of most combinations in the right ballpark, if you take the time to work on them.

So I’m curious, especially with regard to those of you who have been playing for many years, has your taste changed much, or have you more or less stuck to what you were attracted to from the very beginning?

I think this is a really good question. For the most part I've stuck to the sounds that appealed to me first, and funnily enough my most recent tone overhaul (I tend to fiddle with my tone probably every few months, maybe more often) brought me right back towards striving for the kind of sound that was the first guitar tone I'd ever identified with being pleasing (even before I'd picked up a guitar): Mark Knopfler's tone from the Alchemy concert. I'd like to be able to achieve a variety of tones because I've come to like a lot of them for different scenarios...but if you want me to pick one tone that's influenced me most (and still does), it's that one.

Keira-WitherKay

yeah great question,,,,

when in my distant past i played in cover and show bands....... the tone had to suit/match the song we would cover hence a midi controlable pedal board with both a humbucker and single coil guitar

when i retired from cover/show bands and started in acoustic scene tone took on a more important meaning cos it was my original music with my sound........... and yes i know what it is......... and how to get it ........ whereas in the cover band you just cribbing the sound off the cd....

and i find with acoustic i can get the "right" (to me) tone out of many instruments....... it's more in the fingers than the guitar ......... but strangely now that i can almost pick up any nylon classical and get good tone ...........now i'm hung up on natural volume....... as in natural acoustic volume...... meaning how the guitar projects..........i like a loud sound without having to play too hard...........

? but when i play plugged(which is all my gigs) in that case the natural volume does not matter one bit ....as i just turn up the amp..........as BB king once suggested on being asked how to get a fat sound outa light gauge strings ....

PeteM

Keira WitherKay wrote: ........ whereas in the cover band you just cribbing the sound off the cd....

We play 'covers' in our band across a number of genres, because people know them and identify with them, much like a jazz band plays the standards, but we don't try to sound like the original CD. We have rearranged them, and I adapt the tone on my guitars to what I think best suits each individual number. I think there is nothing more boring for an audience to hear the same sound out of one instrument over say 3 sets of 40 minutes each.

chris77

Not really changed from one to another, but rather evolved gradually. I still like what I liked way back when, but have added different and new tones over the years. A plus is that I now know more or less what I'm hearing, which I didn't when I started playing.

MNM7

Topics like these are always interesting.

Thought I haven't been playing for many years, My tone has always been somewhere between hard rock, alternative, punk and classic rock. I'm also in abit of a flux like Mike M between say AC/DC(Classic rock), Blink 182 and Sum 41(Punk), Breaking Benjamin and Seether(alternative and Hard(ish)). Luckily with my pedal it's easy for me to change between those tones. I love the twangy sound of a single coil but also the the full fat tone of a Les paul and the flat(ish) fat hb tone of SG. Fo rme personally it depends on the song.

singemonkey

I started off loving the sound of a Les Paul Standard, came to appreciate Fender tones through surf music, and P90 guitars through rockabilly. I'm probably only now starting to think about really using them outside their pre-ordained roles. But I still don't like a stratocaster sound for blues and feel that just about any given blues player sounds better on a humbucker, short-scale guitar than a strat.

Jack-Flash-Jr

Started with the Satisfaction fuzz at 13 but then quickly progressed to these favourites (recent examples) and been like that for 22 years:

I also get the warm and fuzzies from heavy Sabbath bass and White Zombie growls.