Hot-rodding my stock Artist Guitar! What does this mean?

Greetings all,

You have come to the master of hot rodding your favourite guitar… Myself, Raul, the resident metal head here at Artist Guitars – singer/songwriter and rhythm guitarist of the Australian Thrash Metal band, Dark Order.

But I am also a "Guitar Hot Rodding" nut. What does this mean?

If have bought an electric guitar from Artist and it’s your favourite guitar, believe it or not, you can make it even better.
If you’re a beginner then this blog may not make much sense to you, but for those of you who have a passion for their tone and sound, and are thinking how to improve it and have never done this before, then I am here to help.

First of all you need to ask your self what sound are you after? Is there a favourite guitar sound you have heard and you really want that persons sound?

Once you have answered this, then you must follow this first basic rule for the rest of your guitar playing life:

Always start with you guitar and NOT your amp.
Too many people attack tone with Pedals or amps first without realizing the basic rule of all sound, and that is you are only as good as your sound source.

Let's start with Electric guitars. Are you wanting MORE of that Bluesy sound, Metal sound or rock sound? Do you need a brighter sound, heavier sound, or more oomph? Do you want to sound even more like one of your guitar heroes? More of that good tone?

The best place to start is with the heart and soul of any guitar or bass. The Pickups.

Here at Artist, our guitars come equipped with Wilkinson pickups and sound very fine with what they do. But all pickups have their good and bad points, and that is always a point of view that differs from person to person and is entirely dependent on what YOU are looking for.

There is no right or wrong.

Let's start with an example of our LP guitars. You, the owner of our Artist LP guitar, may like Jimmy Page so much that you want to have his exact sound. Well, you can contact myself and I would recommend you purchase a set of Seymour Duncan "Whole Lotta Humbucker" set for your LP.

It may be that you love Slash a lot and you want his exact sound, I would then recommend you buy a set of Seymour Duncan "Alnico II Pro" pickups.

You may love Death Metal or Thrash Metal and want to sound huge and angry but have a tight clear sound with a cutting edge, I would then recommend having a Seymour Duncan Distortion SH6 in the Bridge and a Seymour Duncan '59 sh1 in the neck....

By now you can tell that I like Seymour Duncan pickups, and I frequent the Seymour Duncan forum often.

BUT, there are many great brands of pickups out there, and I have owned and experienced many brands such as 'Bare Knuckle Pickups", Seymour Duncan, Dimarzio, Gibson and EMG pickups.

Please feel free to email or call and ask for myself, Raul, anytime if you're on a quest for a tone and how to improve your favourite Artist Guitar model.

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I hope this article has helped. if you need any assistance please email:

sales@artistguitars.co.nz or call us on 0800 025 467

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