So yeah, that will make the guitar feel slightly different because the actual string length affects the kind of strength needed to bend the strings.When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.
Mayer had already worked with Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck and produced a number of different fuzz boxes by the time he met Hendrix at a gig at the Bag Of Nails pub in London. The two hit it off and Mayer showed Hendrix his Octavia, a unit that added an octave overtone to the original note. Hendrix loved the sound and used it on the solo to Purple Haze. After that we became close friends and started hanging out; and as they say, the rest is history, Mayer says. He went on to look after Hendrixs gear both live and in the studio, gaining a unique understanding of his requirements, playing style and working methods. Today Mayer produces a range of pedals that take his original designs into the 21st century. Mayer says an important part of Hendrixs sound was due to his use of carefully selected string gauges, which evened out the guitars response from string to string. First of all, we werent using a flat-radius fretboard, Mayer says. We were using the normal one, not the very high radius but definitely curvy. ![]() The string gauges would run.010,.013,.015,.026,.032 and.038. The big difference there is that youre using the.015 for the third, because if you use the.017 for the third, the actual sound of the guitar is very G-heavy. The electrical output of the strings is dependent on the square of the diameter; if you square all the diameters and look at them, you can get much more of an idea about the balance of the guitar. You should always remember that, because many, many times people use a set of strings that are completely imbalanced and they just dont sound that good. Most people would say a.010 to.013 is the correct jump. And the.015 is much better for the G than a.017. An.015 squares out at.225 and.017 is 289. So youre going to get 28 percent more output just with a two-pound different in string size. Although Hendrix used a custom string gauge, Mayer certainly didnt mess with the stock pickups in his Strats. When I was working for the government, we had access to certain kinds of equipment. We were encouraged to have a hobby, so I went through all the different number of turns you could have on a pickup very quickly, right from square one. Basically, what became very apparent with pickups is exactly what I thought before we started: They really dont make much difference I would say theyre one of the most vastly overrated parts of the guitar itself. If you understand electronics, you understand that as the inductance of the pickup increasesthat is, as the number of turns on the pickup increasesall that happens is you get a larger output, and you effectively get less high-frequency response due to the fact that the inductance of the pickups rises. Its a trade-off. And after making several experiments, which probably covered all the number of pickup turns that are available now, I came to the conclusion that Leo probably had it about right There wasnt much to be gained by deviating from the 7,000 turns or so on a regular pickup. Naturally, because Hendrix was a left-handed guitarist playing a right-handed guitar strung for a lefty, the guitar responded slightly differently to if it was a left-handed guitar. When you flip the guitar, the actual cavities in the guitar now appear on the bass strings, right Because the volume control and all that is facing toward your head. What happens then, of course, is that now youre faced with the fact that the actual string length on the bass string is now the other way around and conversely, on the treble strings.
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