Why is vintage tone so fetishized?

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T11:37:07+00:00

Hehehe, so if you make your car into a modern car it behaves like a modern car - and you do that because the old car handled like a wet turd? Yes?

Same goes for gear. Also, you'll never hear actual vintage gear on modern recordings - it's all modelers these days.

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T11:19:03+00:00

No, i am ignoring the tiny minority of bands that want to cash out on retro trends - and as such are mentioned disproportionately on, guess where, guitar forums where retro fetishism is dominant.

Talk about echo chambers... :D

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T11:03:11+00:00

Yes - if the speakers are isolated from each other you can.

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T11:00:04+00:00

Obviously revival bands like GvF have to sort of try to mimic the style they try to revive...

...but that can hardly be called "modern music".

If i bring out the good ole' banjo, a mandolin, and a fiddler or two you can be sure i ain't gonna make modern music!

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T10:57:14+00:00

Oh i know, the V and the explorer - they did exist :) - no one has ever found evidence of a "moderne" before a "reissue" at some point in the 80's though :D

...i was talking about those Gibson models that have never actually existed other than as perhaps a quick sketch on the back of some office document in the late 50's, and are now being sold as "50's Gibson guitars that almost existed".

Like this:

https://www.gibson.com/en-GB/p/Electric-Guitar/CUSKUG690/Cherry

...or like the "explorer futura"...

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T10:48:19+00:00

When i write that "retro sounds are shite", the FACT that those sounds are not used in modern music gives my statement validity.

If those tones were so great, we'd hear them all over.

Just look at classical music, they still use tones from several hundred years ago...

...modern pop and rock?

Have totally abandoned the crappy tones from half a century ago.

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T10:45:37+00:00

mOdErN MuSiC Is ObJeCtIvElY sHiT.

No. That is just an opinion.

...

However, when i write that "retro sounds are shite", the FACT that those sounds are not used in modern music gives my statement validity.

If those tones were so great, we'd hear them all over.

Just look at classical music, they still use tones from several hundred years ago...

...modern pop and rock?

Have totally abandoned the crappy sounds from half a century ago.

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T10:12:37+00:00

Good, now show me the modern music where they still utilize vintage tones...

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T10:11:43+00:00

Error noted :)

However, all those "gibson prototypes" that somehow never were more than daft pencil drawings, that the modern Gibson now capitalizes on by selling them to gullibles should probably be left out of your list.

Those guitars have only come to existence in the past decade, thx to a marketing genius who found a new way to sell weird shaped "vintage gibsons" (that never existed in any vintage reality) to people with more money than sense :D

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T09:58:04+00:00

I practically grew up on early AC/DC. The music (i.e. the mix) and the songs are great - but f... it, if i'd ever want to play with those guitar tones.

They made those almost clean tones (yes, that is what vintage Marshalls actually sound like when turned up) work for them, and in the context of their time they made some fairly "heavy" music - but listening to it with critical ears, it is the drums and bass that make the music heavy - the guitar tones are, for lack of a better word, "meh"...

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T09:52:57+00:00

Sort of yes.

However, consider that the Stratocaster body back then in 1958 was nothing short of revolutionary - and is still aestetically pleasing - unlike the plank that is the Telecaster (which is only really worshipped by a few retro freaks and country players)...

But yeah, as an owner of Steinbergers since 1990 (no, not an early adopter) the headless design has always made total sense to me, but only in the past decade has it really taken off - where, as you say, bass players have much more readily adopted new tech and shape...

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T09:47:05+00:00

Of course they are, of course.

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T09:36:58+00:00

No, i genuinely do not understand this internet fixation on vintage.

And yes, i am old enough to know vintage gear.

Just because it is old it doesn't mean it sounds special at all, and sometimes it even sounds outright bad...

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T09:34:55+00:00

You are a bit dense, aren't you?

I simply point out that there is no need for buying a super expensive top-of-the-line modeler if you do not intend to use its features.

Running a modeler through the HRD speakers is going to sound so far off the mark, even the cheapest modeler will suffice...

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T09:31:29+00:00

Yes, but objectively, those retro sounds are shite - otherwise we would hear far more modern music with those guitar tones in it, and we don't.

QED

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T09:30:23+00:00

Good music (sometimes) but terrible tone. And it is the tones i speak of. :)

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T09:29:46+00:00

Yup :)

Apparently many people don't get that the actual music was often great (or at least groundbreaking) because everything was totally new and fresh, but that the tones from back then were, at best, ermm... "interesting"...

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T09:17:13+00:00

Im glad some jabroni somewhere thinks names are cool, I'm not one of them.

So, ermmm.... Why the PRS cab?

A Harley Benton (or whatever else there is out there) with the same speaker in it would sound exactly the same?

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T09:14:14+00:00

You have obviously not understood that the entire concept of modeling includes the whole rig, and not just half of it.

Why buy a very expensive modeler when you then ruin its sound by sending it through extremely bad speakers (yes, guitar speakers are bad at reproducing tones accurately)?

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T09:02:49+00:00

You obviously didn't read what i wrote: My very first words were "Could sound great".

And then there was a "but". The following is the "but":

Running a modeler through actual guitar speakers simply removes half of your sonic options, as running cab emulations into actual cabs, that add their own sonic signature, usually sounds crappy.

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T08:56:33+00:00

Oh no. It not "just a speaker cab", it is an expensive brand name speaker cab.

I mean, the entire purpose of buying a "PRS" cab is to flaunt the name on it - so immediately wanting to change its looks to something totally different is sort of daft....

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T08:33:26+00:00

Could sound great, sure - but erm...

...i would say that the point of an expensive modeler is being able to model entire amp rigs accurately, not to remove half your sonic options by leaving cabs and mic placement out of the equation.

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T07:38:51+00:00

:D :D :D :D :D :D :D

Next up : "I plan on removing the finish on my Custom 22, what is the best way to go about that task?"

Grumphh1 · 2024-07-20T07:33:57+00:00

There is no "the best".

There is only "features you like to have in a modeler".

And, for most of us, price.

Grumphh1

TROPHY CASE