It may have been totally unconscious. Have you ever gone to a store and purchased 3 or 4 items, and realized, after the fact, that the packaging of each of those items was the same color? Why did I grab a code red, nacho Doritos and a red apple? Crazy sh*t!
@ahhthatsjustgrand6502 I meant like the feel of a sound, yeah you can describe a tone like that but it doesn't describe the tiny differences you can hear but can't put their finger on it
I lower my neck pickup (Schechter with Duncan designed's) and it has a huge impact on the volume and bass output, distortion or clean. The neck pickup is normally way louder than the bridge, but volume is even with neck lowered and bridge raised.
@@theboomers420 I have an ESP LTD Viper that had this issue, drove myself up a wall crazy trying to find out the cause, ended up being that the bridge pickup was too close to the strings.
after changing strings and pickup height adjustments, you make most pickups sound so hot. it’s amazing how something so small and for absolutely free (maybe aside from the strings) can help with making the guitar much more hot. love the videos glenn thanks for all the hard work you put into making videos for us and the laughs as well. much love and respect Glenn
It does not make it more hot, you get the same effect from increasing gain or volume. If you want to make your guitar hotter but some p90s or active pickups
Pick up height makes a huge difference! If they are too close, it can affect your sustain. If they are too far away, you won’t get enough clarity and pull from them.
Pickups, string gauge, other guitar adjustments are all personal and are for the players feel not just the tone alone. Sure the tone might not be different enough for the listener but it’s the same with adjusting your seating position in the car. Your passenger won’t give a crap but your body will.
Yessir, it makes a pretty big difference, depending on what kind of music you play. I wish I knew this as a young 14 year old. This was before RUclips and Google. 🤘😆🤘
I can usually hear the absolute tiniest difference based on position, but here it’s pretty much exactly the same. With my eyes closed (to hide the captions and prevent subconscious bias), I couldn’t tell any difference at all! Maybe the distortion masked the difference, but tbh it’s usually such a subtle difference anyways that you’d be better off rotating any single amp knob a single degree than adjusting the physical hardware for how tiny a change it makes
I think it makes a bigger change as far as how it reacts with the amp in the room and how it feels as opposed to how it sounds in a mix. I've got a hollow body guitar with low output pickups, and big changes in pickup height make a BIG difference in how it reacts to the amp... a much bigger difference than I notice with my guitars with higher output pickups.
The first few listens, I could not tell a difference. After maybe 15, the raised sounded more beefier, but it took so much effort to tell. I don't know if I could tell in a mix, and if non-musicians would know On speakers, it's much harder (I have a swamp cooler running). I most likely wouldn't be able to tell in a mix I am wondering about sustained notes since most of this was fast riffing. For example, even DragonForce has sections in Through the Fire and Flames where they have power chords ringing for a few measures so that we can actually hear the lead singer and other instruments. The chugging parts were incredibly close. It was when the guitar was playing longer notes when I was able to tell.
Dear G, Since Alexi died, there have been no comfortable Vs on the market. I am practically an old fart who places big chairs everywhere to place my butt on to stand/sit, but in private, ergo 80 percent of playing time, i sit my ass down and grab the cheapest regular guitar to find. Any V, modern or traditional, is designed to look cool on stage, but only Laiho and Rhoads made one to use perpetually. Give Democracy a chance and do a poll Sincerely
These comments clearly don’t know how long Stels been banging this drum for. It’s not just about this loss. It’s about keeping the ownership accountable. As for Ange I’m not worried. Levy would be a fool to not back him after Ange saved his reputation with the fan base. In Sir Angelos Postecoglou we trust.
You have to be a little cautious about raising the pickups to close to the strings. After all. It is a magnet. And they are made out of metal. Especially aftermarkets like EMG, or, high-end Seymour Duncan. Set it too high, and you can have issues with holding your tuning.
Tends to be that higher gives more volume, and that will a more "gainy" sound, while lower will give more dynamic range and clarity. For metal, higher pickups can be good, but you don't want that in jazz
It makes a big ass difference , putting it higher or lower changes the tone a lot. Also making it easier to play your guitar without unnecessary sounds when put at the right height. Feeling wise it makes the strings more or less sensitive , the pickup uses a magnetic field and will pick up a stronger signal the closer you put the 2 together.
Difference is really here BUT only if I listen from my BD DT990Pro VERY closely and loud. IMO the p/u heighth only plays on the output signal strength, which might help, for example, with some very "hot" inputs on some audio interfaces, like if it's clipping at the lowest gain possible. Tho it's better to swap that i-face to smth more reliable and put the other one back to trash bin where you probably had found it initially:D
I have an Explorer & V with identical specs all around, manufactured 2 yrs apart. Long story short, due to the geometry of string angle coming off the bridge, the V's bridge pickup can never be as close to the strings as it is on the Explorer & there is a very noticeable difference. Mostly felt in the fingers/high gain string response, it is also heard in overall less bottom end mud & growl on the V.
tone.. no Drive.. Big time! Although iv always believed its more of a sweet spot than high means better as its a magnetic field that arcs around the strings. obviously you felt the difference by how the sound is reacting to your playing. for example take your volume knob down a bit, youl feel the difference in how much harder you have to pick but it wont show much on a playback either
The difference notice mostly in the sustain... Not that much in the sound (with distortion), What i've notice is that without distortion the attack is powerful but sustain go down quicky (that with pickup closest to the string)
I prefer my pick ups to err on the side of being lower. I can always fatten up the output with a boost or overdrive but if they’re too close it makes my guitars sound sloppy and they lose all of their clarity.
It does make a slight difference. If you have them too close to the pickups, you'll actually kill most of your guitar's sustain. They should be pretty low as the amp should be able to compensate for the loss in volume since the loss in the volume is very minute
@@calebr9736 Don't bring the tone wood into here. We all know the wood is the key to the tone. Like how the hell are you gonna get the charcoal blacks and ember reds if you haven't used your 59' Gibson Les Paul as a firewood? This starts to feel like we are soon going to argue which place is the best to store your vintage Marshall in the English Channel to get the only correct ocean mellows!
In this case I was shocked to hear so little difference. I've got a strat, and changing height DRAMATICALLY changes the output and high end. Higher pickups have more output, and are brighter, more presence.
The real question is what year it Coke can? Some of the early vintage years of can had thicker aluminum which gave it a warmer and more robust sound compared to modern cans 😂
I agree with this guy about pickups not making much difference but this sounds so brittle and not smooth. I was obsessed with being obsessive about amps but this just sounds really poor. I have the same feelings for most kiesels. I get better tonnes from my cheap s series with rosewood fretboard.
Didn’t he do a video a while back showing how the more distortion you play through, the less difference you can hear in different pickups/ settings etc.? If you want to hear a difference in pickup height adjustments, maybe try dropping the metal distortion.
Oh yeah, took active PU and saw no difference. Take passive good old TB-4 and try them - huge difference. I like to drop PU on the frame level, that way it sounds great.
I play with my pickups as high as I can get away with. I don't understand why people buy expensive pickups and then set them as low as possible. They are clearer, more of the tone comes through and in most cases pedals and amps react better depending how hot your set is, sure some pickups might be so hot you need to lower them but why you playing pickups that hot then? Waste of money to buy a hot set of pickups like that just to lower them, get a shit set thats cheaper and raise the damn pickups.....
That was a really good way to demonstrate the difference, just one continuous section of music with the changes throughout, instead of two separate videos. That would have worked also, but this has a much better capacity for that.
Strings move closer to the pickup when plucked, closer if plucked harder. Pickup distance from the string changes the signal intensity just just as distance from any sound to a microphone.
There’s a lot to do with how the instruments feel with any adjustments that tricks the brain that it sounds better or different. Definitely something that effects the player.
Thing is it also feels different. You can really get various tones during the production from one guitar but sometimes that extra bite that a pick up will give you can give you room to not dig into the strings with your pickups as much. It’s a matter of feel more than the final tone when it comes to instrument adjustments.
scratchiness at best? like its so minute that honestly it amounts to personal feel to play lol maybe if it were low output pickups then yeah you'd hear a massive difference and thats a maybe
Do not raise your pickups please. It creates a warble and detunes the strings slightly. It only sounds different because it is better able to pickup the louder sound due to being closer to the strings, you get the same effect by turning your gain up or volume up
Interesting. My gibson V has blackouts in it which were installed sitting way higher than any other pickups on other guitars I have and old band members have pointed out that my gibson is probably my best sounding guitar. We all thought the blackouts were just that badass.
My question is, did Glen pick his outfit to match the guitar or the guitar to match his outfit? 😂
Got to match so everything is balanced 😂
Both of them have fashionable color schemes going on it seems lol
To match the Doomslayer outfit, of course!
It may have been totally unconscious. Have you ever gone to a store and purchased 3 or 4 items, and realized, after the fact, that the packaging of each of those items was the same color? Why did I grab a code red, nacho Doritos and a red apple? Crazy sh*t!
Bro both are matching
I absolutely love how indescribable but tangible guitar tones can be
@ahhthatsjustgrand6502 I meant like the feel of a sound, yeah you can describe a tone like that but it doesn't describe the tiny differences you can hear but can't put their finger on it
@ahhthatsjustgrand6502you hit the nail on the head. i could spot a def leppard song without even hearing it prior
No no no, everybody knows that the _REAL_ tone lies in the choice of wood 🤤🪵
Sounded the same to me but then I’m listening through a crappy phone speaker
Glenn tryin' a piano : plays painkiller.
that'd sound badass though
He is not screaming!!! His normal voice is actually quite pleasant
This is his outside voice
@@bearwithit lol!!!
@@bearwithit😂😅 Well played
happens if you change pickup height
@@rgerber hahaha
I lower my neck pickup (Schechter with Duncan designed's) and it has a huge impact on the volume and bass output, distortion or clean. The neck pickup is normally way louder than the bridge, but volume is even with neck lowered and bridge raised.
Be careful, if pickups are too close to the strings it will be hard to tune because the strings are sucked down by the magnets.
facks
It also can make open strings sound warbly or out of tune even when they are in tune.
@@DaisyHead666, exactly - the strings 'orbit' in & out of the magnet's range, causing the stings to go up & down in pitch... & warble.
@@theboomers420 I have an ESP LTD Viper that had this issue, drove myself up a wall crazy trying to find out the cause, ended up being that the bridge pickup was too close to the strings.
Free chorus pedal
after changing strings and pickup height adjustments, you make most pickups sound so hot. it’s amazing how something so small and for absolutely free (maybe aside from the strings) can help with making the guitar much more hot. love the videos glenn thanks for all the hard work you put into making videos for us and the laughs as well. much love and respect Glenn
It does not make it more hot, you get the same effect from increasing gain or volume. If you want to make your guitar hotter but some p90s or active pickups
Ha, Painkiller is always my go to riff to check out how well a guitar does a metal sound
Pick up height makes a huge difference! If they are too close, it can affect your sustain. If they are too far away, you won’t get enough clarity and pull from them.
Oh dude is that Colin from GS Guitars? Love the science of loud. Glenn this is an excellent collab.
Pickups, string gauge, other guitar adjustments are all personal and are for the players feel not just the tone alone. Sure the tone might not be different enough for the listener but it’s the same with adjusting your seating position in the car. Your passenger won’t give a crap but your body will.
Pickups being closer makes the signal to noise ratio better, which is super important with some pickups
Yessir, it makes a pretty big difference, depending on what kind of music you play. I wish I knew this as a young 14 year old. This was before RUclips and Google. 🤘😆🤘
I can usually hear the absolute tiniest difference based on position, but here it’s pretty much exactly the same. With my eyes closed (to hide the captions and prevent subconscious bias), I couldn’t tell any difference at all!
Maybe the distortion masked the difference, but tbh it’s usually such a subtle difference anyways that you’d be better off rotating any single amp knob a single degree than adjusting the physical hardware for how tiny a change it makes
Only think is it will affect the vibration of the strings if too close, pickup height really doesn’t matter much aside from that
You sure? I think the raised pickups sounded a bit stronger on the treble end, like there's more clarity.
Fuckin great riffin tone!!!!!!!
Nice tight playing, Glenn. Great song choice!
Glenn tries not to play Painkiller or No More Tears challenge (impossible). Love ya man, never stop being you.
I’m lovin’ this Will Forte as Doug Kenny rocker guy!!!
I think it makes a bigger change as far as how it reacts with the amp in the room and how it feels as opposed to how it sounds in a mix.
I've got a hollow body guitar with low output pickups, and big changes in pickup height make a BIG difference in how it reacts to the amp... a much bigger difference than I notice with my guitars with higher output pickups.
The first few listens, I could not tell a difference. After maybe 15, the raised sounded more beefier, but it took so much effort to tell. I don't know if I could tell in a mix, and if non-musicians would know
On speakers, it's much harder (I have a swamp cooler running). I most likely wouldn't be able to tell in a mix
I am wondering about sustained notes since most of this was fast riffing. For example, even DragonForce has sections in Through the Fire and Flames where they have power chords ringing for a few measures so that we can actually hear the lead singer and other instruments. The chugging parts were incredibly close. It was when the guitar was playing longer notes when I was able to tell.
Dear G,
Since Alexi died, there have been no comfortable Vs on the market.
I am practically an old fart who places big chairs everywhere to place my butt on to stand/sit, but in private, ergo 80 percent of playing time, i sit my ass down and grab the cheapest regular guitar to find.
Any V, modern or traditional, is designed to look cool on stage, but only Laiho and Rhoads made one to use perpetually.
Give Democracy a chance and do a poll
Sincerely
High of the pickups not only affect the output, it can introduce stratitis in your intonation. Like everything in life, balance is the key
These comments clearly don’t know how long Stels been banging this drum for. It’s not just about this loss.
It’s about keeping the ownership accountable. As for Ange I’m not worried. Levy would be a fool to not back him after Ange saved his reputation with the fan base.
In Sir Angelos Postecoglou we trust.
One of those things where on this video I can hear a slight difference but I know from my own tinkering that it's definitely noticeable in person.
Seeing Glen in outdoor sunny weather feels illegal
the tune is not killing the pain of watching glenn and the axe with matching outfits
I guess we should have made more effort to write this stuff down back in the 70s
Faster than a bullet!
You have to be a little cautious about raising the pickups to close to the strings. After all. It is a magnet. And they are made out of metal.
Especially aftermarkets like EMG, or, high-end Seymour Duncan. Set it too high, and you can have issues with holding your tuning.
Tends to be that higher gives more volume, and that will a more "gainy" sound, while lower will give more dynamic range and clarity. For metal, higher pickups can be good, but you don't want that in jazz
It makes a big ass difference , putting it higher or lower changes the tone a lot.
Also making it easier to play your guitar without unnecessary sounds when put at the right height.
Feeling wise it makes the strings more or less sensitive , the pickup uses a magnetic field and will pick up a stronger signal the closer you put the 2 together.
Difference is really here BUT only if I listen from my BD DT990Pro VERY closely and loud. IMO the p/u heighth only plays on the output signal strength, which might help, for example, with some very "hot" inputs on some audio interfaces, like if it's clipping at the lowest gain possible. Tho it's better to swap that i-face to smth more reliable and put the other one back to trash bin where you probably had found it initially:D
I have an Explorer & V with identical specs all around, manufactured 2 yrs apart. Long story short, due to the geometry of string angle coming off the bridge, the V's bridge pickup can never be as close to the strings as it is on the Explorer & there is a very noticeable difference. Mostly felt in the fingers/high gain string response, it is also heard in overall less bottom end mud & growl on the V.
😂😂😂
Very subtle differences, I prefer the lowered pickups, sounds tighter!
i like the raised personally
In my personal experience, the only thing I’ve noticed when I raise my pickups is the bass gets louder. It’s probably because of the proximity effect.
Sound change is like nudging the camera an inch into the scene your shooting
tone.. no
Drive.. Big time!
Although iv always believed its more of a sweet spot than high means better as its a magnetic field that arcs around the strings. obviously you felt the difference by how the sound is reacting to your playing. for example take your volume knob down a bit, youl feel the difference in how much harder you have to pick but it wont show much on a playback either
The difference notice mostly in the sustain... Not that much in the sound (with distortion), What i've notice is that without distortion the attack is powerful but sustain go down quicky (that with pickup closest to the string)
I prefer my pick ups to err on the side of being lower. I can always fatten up the output with a boost or overdrive but if they’re too close it makes my guitars sound sloppy and they lose all of their clarity.
Sound identical from my phone speaker and RUclips compression.
dynamics range changes. if you are clipping already, higher pickup just compresses more.
I'm listening via monitors & can definitely hear a difference
Even on iPhone I can hear a bit of difference.
It does make a slight difference. If you have them too close to the pickups, you'll actually kill most of your guitar's sustain. They should be pretty low as the amp should be able to compensate for the loss in volume since the loss in the volume is very minute
If there's a difference, it's pretty much the same as if you farted to a Coke can or a Pepsi can.
Louder = better tone! 😅 jk
More difference than tone wood argument
@@calebr9736 Don't bring the tone wood into here. We all know the wood is the key to the tone.
Like how the hell are you gonna get the charcoal blacks and ember reds if you haven't used your 59' Gibson Les Paul as a firewood?
This starts to feel like we are soon going to argue which place is the best to store your vintage Marshall in the English Channel to get the only correct ocean mellows!
In this case I was shocked to hear so little difference. I've got a strat, and changing height DRAMATICALLY changes the output and high end. Higher pickups have more output, and are brighter, more presence.
The real question is what year it Coke can? Some of the early vintage years of can had thicker aluminum which gave it a warmer and more robust sound compared to modern cans 😂
I want that tree that has classical guitars for fruits in the background. I guess they are ripe when the high e string is in tune?
I agree with this guy about pickups not making much difference but this sounds so brittle and not smooth. I was obsessed with being obsessive about amps but this just sounds really poor. I have the same feelings for most kiesels. I get better tonnes from my cheap s series with rosewood fretboard.
Why does that song sound so much better when you play it compared to me
Didn’t he do a video a while back showing how the more distortion you play through, the less difference you can hear in different pickups/ settings etc.? If you want to hear a difference in pickup height adjustments, maybe try dropping the metal distortion.
Color coded..... That's funny... Lol!
Oh yeah, took active PU and saw no difference. Take passive good old TB-4 and try them - huge difference. I like to drop PU on the frame level, that way it sounds great.
"Ghost Guns"
Ghost Accountability and Ghost Parenting
I play with my pickups as high as I can get away with. I don't understand why people buy expensive pickups and then set them as low as possible. They are clearer, more of the tone comes through and in most cases pedals and amps react better depending how hot your set is, sure some pickups might be so hot you need to lower them but why you playing pickups that hot then? Waste of money to buy a hot set of pickups like that just to lower them, get a shit set thats cheaper and raise the damn pickups.....
Wow so the pickups create the tone 😳
I don't get why people buy pickups, doesn't the guitar come with some already?
How did you not know that pickup clearance makes very big changes in the sound, dynamcs. AND harmonics of your tone
Pickups matter in the room isolated, but not in a mix. (at least, thats my inference)
For clean tones it makes a huge difference
What guitar is that? Headstock looks like a Kiesel, but the body is telling me no.
I love that song
That was a really good way to demonstrate the difference, just one continuous section of music with the changes throughout, instead of two separate videos. That would have worked also, but this has a much better capacity for that.
Strings move closer to the pickup when plucked, closer if plucked harder. Pickup distance from the string changes the signal intensity just just as distance from any sound to a microphone.
They sound exactly the same on tape here. Might feel different in the hands, but the tape doesn’t care.
Thinner strings also yield more full bodied tones. The more easily they can breathe the more they can bark. It’s science.
Science says strings don’t breathe as lungs would be required.
I'm actually curious to see a whole video on this. You plan to make one glen? To me it sounds like there's a little more twang.
Guitar nerds imagining differences no one else can hear.
It's a little more clear and bitey with the pickups closer
I think its more a difference in response, you may not hear it if you're not playing, but if you are then I think you'll notice
Sounds gnarly 👍
Woah. Welcome to planet Earth
Had to try a lot judging by all those jump cuts
90 percent of it is guitar response while playing. The average person probably won't hear it but it will affect your playing.
There’s a lot to do with how the instruments feel with any adjustments that tricks the brain that it sounds better or different. Definitely something that effects the player.
Thing is it also feels different. You can really get various tones during the production from one guitar but sometimes that extra bite that a pick up will give you can give you room to not dig into the strings with your pickups as much. It’s a matter of feel more than the final tone when it comes to instrument adjustments.
change is minimal
think it as spice but i would still either get thicker strings or different speaker
scratchiness at best?
like its so minute that honestly it amounts to personal feel to play lol maybe if it were low output pickups then yeah you'd hear a massive difference and thats a maybe
Whats the green guitat called?
Raised sounds sharper, lower sounds fuller.
What guitar are you playing there? I like that reverse headstock.
Do not raise your pickups please. It creates a warble and detunes the strings slightly. It only sounds different because it is better able to pickup the louder sound due to being closer to the strings, you get the same effect by turning your gain up or volume up
That might be the nicest Ibanez I’ve ever seen. Please tell me what it is and where I can buy.
It's not an Ibanez, it's a Harley Benton Amarok ;)
Those AZ's are a consummate professionals axe, ain't nothing you can't do with such a blade
bruh if you can clearly hear the difference through some phone speakers, theres a difference lol
He said there's a difference, so therefore.. there's a huge difference
Almost priest 😂
Interesting. My gibson V has blackouts in it which were installed sitting way higher than any other pickups on other guitars I have and old band members have pointed out that my gibson is probably my best sounding guitar. We all thought the blackouts were just that badass.
Nah man it’s just because it’s a Gibson 😂
@@jaymesmustaine684 The neck up by the headstock cracked and I had to pay about $500 to have that thing fixed still sounds amazing though.
I'd gladly see the whole vid on it, also with different string gauges, just to see the possibilities.
There is a longer version of this video, posted while he was still on his journey.
Oh god damn there was no real change there 😂
I messed with this before I think the most major difference after adjusting for difference in gain and whatnot is the dynamics
this video will be followed up by a video saying that pickup height doesn't make a difference.
it wouldn't be the first time.
I wish i could make the pickups flush with the body. I hate hitting them with my pick. But, yeah. I'm a sloppy guitarist.
Glenn looks like a 70 year old hippie lady from a farmers market
Hey I think I saw you talk about that guitar a lot it's a Harley Benton right what model is it you seem to really dig that one
What kind of guitar is the green guitar?
Hey man, I don't think it would matter what guitar you play....
If the pickups are too close to the string you will get a warbling sound.
Ma dude is thick
Your right..no real change😂
Yeah, but changing pickup height is nothing without adjusting polepieces.
I've done this and it's not as noticeable on recording
George Lynch?,,nope Glenn Tipton
everybody talks nice things but nobody told me HOW he changed pickup height and WHAT is changing? higher/lower?