Let's discuss Baritone guitars and lower tunings

Creed_Clicks · September 2017

littlethoughts said:

I've heard quite bad things about the Fender blacktop baritone. As in, it's a good guitar in many ways but it is fundamentally poorly designed, and to properly intonate it on the low strings you need to modify the bridge since the travel isn't enough as stock.

Hi guys and gals. Long time no post. I have dragged up an old thread, but maybe I should have started a new one?

A baritone related question. I have a homemade tele style which I'm moving on soon, and am going to look at an alternative option. For whatever reason, most baritones seem to have single coil pickups, and not many come with trems.

Maybe the reason is obvious: humbuckers would be muddy and the trem would be a nightmare on baritones?

I wouldn't be playing metal on a baritone.

I had been thinking of another tele, neck conversion, vibramate bigsby, but fear I could run into problems, especially based on the above previous post.

I like the idea of warmer sounding pickups and not single coils, so in theory, could change pickups in a tele style.

My other options with a trem would be the Gretsch or the Eastwood Sidejack, or more expensive Airline. I wouldn't need to go high end.

I'd probably have to order one of these online, as I'm in Ireland and baritones are rare enough to come across in shops, and Eastwoods would be pretty difficult to find.

Reverend make a shorter scale bari with a Wilkinson trem.

Plenty of PRS options as well currently, but I was never a huge fan of them visually.

I've never played the Danelectro ones, so don't know what they'd be like.

Schecter, I'm not too sure what's available these days.

The Squier Jazzmaster looks really cool, but no trem, which *maybe* I'd get over. I'm a fan of offsets too.

I wouldn't be too inclined to go for a Bass VI either.

ToneControl · September 2017

Creed_Clicks said:

littlethoughts said:

I've heard quite bad things about the Fender blacktop baritone. As in, it's a good guitar in many ways but it is fundamentally poorly designed, and to properly intonate it on the low strings you need to modify the bridge since the travel isn't enough as stock.

Hi guys and gals. Long time no post. I have dragged up an old thread, but maybe I should have started a new one?

A baritone related question. I have a homemade tele style which I'm moving on soon, and am going to look at an alternative option. For whatever reason, most baritones seem to have single coil pickups, and not many come with trems.

Maybe the reason is obvious: humbuckers would be muddy and the trem would be a nightmare on baritones?

I wouldn't be playing metal on a baritone.

I had been thinking of another tele, neck conversion, vibramate bigsby, but fear I could run into problems, especially based on the above previous post.

I like the idea of warmer sounding pickups and not single coils, so in theory, could change pickups in a tele style.

My other options with a trem would be the Gretsch or the Eastwood Sidejack, or more expensive Airline. I wouldn't need to go high end.

I'd probably have to order one of these online, as I'm in Ireland and baritones are rare enough to come across in shops, and Eastwoods would be pretty difficult to find.

Reverend make a shorter scale bari with a Wilkinson trem.

Plenty of PRS options as well currently, but I was never a huge fan of them visually.

I've never played the Danelectro ones, so don't know what they'd be like.

Schecter, I'm not too sure what's available these days.

The Squier Jazzmaster looks really cool, but no trem, which *maybe* I'd get over. I'm a fan of offsets too.

I wouldn't be too inclined to go for a Bass VI either.

consider a steinberger transcale, HB but EMG with active EQ, it can take baritone strings, and is 28.6" scale
If it doesn't work out for you, they also work with normal gauge (10s), tuned D-D

No trem though
I have found that bending sounds shit on low-tuned baritones, so I would assume that's why you cannot find ones with trems, I would leave that alone until you have several hard tail baritones if I were you

ToneControl · September 2017

Creed_Clicks said:

littlethoughts said:

I've heard quite bad things about the Fender blacktop baritone. As in, it's a good guitar in many ways but it is fundamentally poorly designed, and to properly intonate it on the low strings you need to modify the bridge since the travel isn't enough as stock.

Hi guys and gals. Long time no post. I have dragged up an old thread, but maybe I should have started a new one?

A baritone related question. I have a homemade tele style which I'm moving on soon, and am going to look at an alternative option. For whatever reason, most baritones seem to have single coil pickups, and not many come with trems.

Maybe the reason is obvious: humbuckers would be muddy and the trem would be a nightmare on baritones?

I wouldn't be playing metal on a baritone.

I had been thinking of another tele, neck conversion, vibramate bigsby, but fear I could run into problems, especially based on the above previous post.

I like the idea of warmer sounding pickups and not single coils, so in theory, could change pickups in a tele style.

My other options with a trem would be the Gretsch or the Eastwood Sidejack, or more expensive Airline. I wouldn't need to go high end.

I'd probably have to order one of these online, as I'm in Ireland and baritones are rare enough to come across in shops, and Eastwoods would be pretty difficult to find.

Reverend make a shorter scale bari with a Wilkinson trem.

Plenty of PRS options as well currently, but I was never a huge fan of them visually.

I've never played the Danelectro ones, so don't know what they'd be like.

Schecter, I'm not too sure what's available these days.

The Squier Jazzmaster looks really cool, but no trem, which *maybe* I'd get over. I'm a fan of offsets too.

I wouldn't be too inclined to go for a Bass VI either.

what are you trying to sound like btw?
I have had a few baritones, so could possibly help advise

btw have you considered buying a Warmoth baritone tele neck and adding it to your current tele?

and also - single coils sound warmer on a baritone than they do on EADGBE
Consider single-coils on basses - they sound warm surely?

Creed_Clicks · September 2017

The tele style I have is a custom made job but the body is a Frankenstein shaped body. The pickups are tele style. (Iron Gear).
It's more the design that's wanting me to move it on.
I had thought of the regular tele with a conversion neck but have read that it's not as simple as it sounds.(bridge position and intonation issues?)
have also considered the latest Jazzmaster baritone...
id be playing slightly overdriven, post rock / shoe gaze in places but mainly slightly dirty

ToneControl · September 2017

Creed_Clicks said:

The tele style I have is a custom made job but the body is a Frankenstein shaped body. The pickups are tele style. (Iron Gear).
It's more the design that's wanting me to move it on.
I had thought of the regular tele with a conversion neck but have read that it's not as simple as it sounds.(bridge position and intonation issues?)
have also considered the latest Jazzmaster baritone...
id be playing slightly overdriven, post rock / shoe gaze in places but mainly slightly dirty

AFAIK the conversion necks are intended to avoid the need for bridge repositioning, but as with any neck swap, they will assume a current size for the neck pocket, and the distance from bridge to neck pocket. Therefore if your tele has any non-standard dimensions, there might be tweaks needed:

http://www.warmoth.com/Guitar/Necks/Warmoth_BaritoneNeck.aspx
they say:
" It is not necessary to modify the body or move the bridge. After installation simply re-intonate your guitar to match the new scale."

Basically you are adding extra frets at the headstock end, all the other frets will be identically positioned to the ones on the original neck.

see the necks in parallel view:
http://www.warmoth.com/Guitar/images/Necks/ConversionNecksCompared.jpg

However it sounds like you want a new guitar body anyway, so perhaps not an ideal solution this time, BUT - if you see a candidate guitar to modify, this can work for you, e.g. a Chinese vibe tele would be considerably improved by a warmoth neck

ICBM · September 2017

Trems work perfectly well on baritones. The Fender/Squier Bass VI comes stock with a Jaguar-type trem, and I've successfully converted a standard-scale Bigsby Tele to a baritone - all you need are the right string gauges and to open the nut grooves out.

You can use a longer-scale neck if you want it to feel more like a bass, but it isn't necessary.

Remember that five of the strings are the same as for normal guitar tuning - just moved across one position - and it's only the new low B which is different. (The G becomes an F#, but that's fine with the same string gauge, usually a 17 or 18.)

I used a double-ball-end 65 gauge bass string for the low B, with the large ball end cut off - the small one is the same size as a guitar string.

ToneControl · September 2017

Creed_Clicks said:

The tele style I have is a custom made job but the body is a Frankenstein shaped body. The pickups are tele style. (Iron Gear).
It's more the design that's wanting me to move it on.
I had thought of the regular tele with a conversion neck but have read that it's not as simple as it sounds.(bridge position and intonation issues?)
have also considered the latest Jazzmaster baritone...
id be playing slightly overdriven, post rock / shoe gaze in places but mainly slightly dirty

Reply part 2:

if buying a new guitar:
same as usual, options are:

single coils
HBs
SSH
HSH
Actives
add piezos

Muddy tone may be a problem, normal guitar pickups start to not work so well the lower the note. hence actives being so popular for baritones.
what I would advise is that many bass players use active pickups or EQ, since otherwise it's quite hard to get the tones they want. Both of my basses have active pickups, and 3 out of 4 of my baritones (Whereas only 15% of my standard scale electrics are active). My passive baritone is a tele blacktop (not a very long scale), so only D-D, but I still had to replace the pickups to get a less muddy tone.

Next thing is shape/style/cost
Schecter do the best range, there are quite a few 30 inch models, that can be strung as a baritone or a Bass VI.
Some can be £400 used, which is a good price for the quality.

For huge flexibility, the Steinberger transcale offers it all,but the neck is unusual, so not for everyone

ICBM · September 2017

ToneControl said:

Muddy tone may be a problem, normal guitar pickups start to not work so well the lower the note. hence actives being so popular for baritones.
what I would advise is that many bass players use active pickups or EQ, since otherwise it's quite hard to get the tones they want.

Sorry, but I'm going to have to disagree with this. Normal guitar pickups work perfectly well for bass frequencies, in fact some basses use pickups which are identical to guitar ones - eg the Rickenbacker 4001 neck pickup. There is no real difference other than the dimensions and sometimes the number of polepieces. (And the Rick actually has six!)

Active electronics are not necessary either - it's true that for a lot of music styles which use baritones or down-tuned instruments, actives give more of the type of tone that's generally wanted so they tend to be used, but you can get pretty much any bass tone from a Fender Precision or Jazz too, and they're not active.

ToneControl · September 2017

ICBM said:

ToneControl said:

Muddy tone may be a problem, normal guitar pickups start to not work so well the lower the note. hence actives being so popular for baritones.
what I would advise is that many bass players use active pickups or EQ, since otherwise it's quite hard to get the tones they want.

Sorry, but I'm going to have to disagree with this. Normal guitar pickups work perfectly well for bass frequencies, in fact some basses use pickups which are identical to guitar ones - eg the Rickenbacker 4001 neck pickup. There is no real difference other than the dimensions and sometimes the number of polepieces. (And the Rick actually has six!)

Active electronics are not necessary either - it's true that for a lot of music styles which use baritones or down-tuned instruments, actives give more of the type of tone that's generally wanted so they tend to be used, but you can get pretty much any bass tone from a Fender Precision or Jazz too, and they're not active.

I know you can work with the amp to get those sounds, but there are 2 factors to consider I think for this:

All those bassists who do use active clearly think it's worth the cost and effort, and I think the same pros/cons apply to baritone
Many Bass players have amps with far more EQ-shaping options than do guitar players, so using a passive baritone into a normal guitar amp will offer far less chance to tweak as needed. Admittedly, using a pedal EQ could help. I have found that a scooped EQ pedal can help with the baritones. My favourite baritone is active but has no EQ, and I find I do have to save different patches into my AxeFx to use it, my normal favourite patches just don't work, whereas my active EQ baritones are much easier to work with.

Creed_Clicks · September 2017

Ah I thought baritones with active pickups were mainly for metal players. Hmm, that opens up some possibilities.
Maybe I should have gone with the neck conversion from day one, but even with a standard body am I always running the risk of the neck not quite fitting ?

A bit too ambitious to consider a vibramate bigsby...

anyone play the Gretsch baritones?

Creed_Clicks · September 2017

ToneControl said:

Creed_Clicks said:

littlethoughts said:

I've heard quite bad things about the Fender blacktop baritone. As in, it's a good guitar in many ways but it is fundamentally poorly designed, and to properly intonate it on the low strings you need to modify the bridge since the travel isn't enough as stock.

Hi guys and gals. Long time no post. I have dragged up an old thread, but maybe I should have started a new one?

A baritone related question. I have a homemade tele style which I'm moving on soon, and am going to look at an alternative option. For whatever reason, most baritones seem to have single coil pickups, and not many come with trems.

Maybe the reason is obvious: humbuckers would be muddy and the trem would be a nightmare on baritones?

I wouldn't be playing metal on a baritone.

I had been thinking of another tele, neck conversion, vibramate bigsby, but fear I could run into problems, especially based on the above previous post.

I like the idea of warmer sounding pickups and not single coils, so in theory, could change pickups in a tele style.

My other options with a trem would be the Gretsch or the Eastwood Sidejack, or more expensive Airline. I wouldn't need to go high end.

I'd probably have to order one of these online, as I'm in Ireland and baritones are rare enough to come across in shops, and Eastwoods would be pretty difficult to find.

Reverend make a shorter scale bari with a Wilkinson trem.

Plenty of PRS options as well currently, but I was never a huge fan of them visually.

I've never played the Danelectro ones, so don't know what they'd be like.

Schecter, I'm not too sure what's available these days.

The Squier Jazzmaster looks really cool, but no trem, which *maybe* I'd get over. I'm a fan of offsets too.

I wouldn't be too inclined to go for a Bass VI either.

consider a steinberger transcale, HB but EMG with active EQ, it can take baritone strings, and is 28.6" scale
If it doesn't work out for you, they also work with normal gauge (10s), tuned D-D

I'm not familiar with the Steinberger but wI'll check them out .

ToneControl · September 2017

Creed_Clicks said:

Ah I thought baritones with active pickups were mainly for metal players. Hmm, that opens up some possibilities.
Maybe I should have gone with the neck conversion from day one, but even with a standard body am I always running the risk of the neck not quite fitting ?

I have one of these as my favourite for feel:
http://www.schecterguitars.com/international/guitars/hellraiser-c-vi-detail
they've reduced it a lot since I bought mine

Clearly looks a bit metal, but I never use an OD on it, I play it like an acoustic guitar really, to do textural stuff, often with bigsky style reverb, or just a wash of delay and verb with some nice phaser patch

ToneControl · September 2017

Also: if you've never tried it, using a dropped-pitch equivalent of DADGAD on a baritone can open up a lot of creative possibilities. I keep one of my baritones in this tuning

ToneControl · September 2017

Creed_Clicks said:

Maybe I should have gone with the neck conversion from day one, but even with a standard body am I always running the risk of the neck not quite fitting ?

I can't see warmoth selling them for years if problems were frequent?

ToneControl · September 2017

Creed_Clicks said:

A bit too ambitious to consider a vibramate bigsby...

anyone play the Gretsch baritones?

As I said, I would start without a trem, but I have gone off trems, so not an impartial witness

I'm guessing the Gretsches are not very high quality given the price, but have not tried them. I'd always go for used stuff if possible, e.g. in this case paying £400-£500 for stuff that is £800-£1k new

Creed_Clicks · September 2017

ToneControl said:

Creed_Clicks said:

Maybe I should have gone with the neck conversion from day one, but even with a standard body am I always running the risk of the neck not quite fitting ?

I can't see warmoth selling them for years if problems were frequent?

True. I had gotten a mate to build my current baritone with parts and wood blanks I got from David Dyke supplies so the parts are pretty good as well
as the body, it's just my mate was a novice builder so it never quite took off for me.
I could go this route again and get a warmoth neck as opposed to a blank neck wood and then get the body blank but the money id end up spending in total, i could just get something off the shelf.
that Schecter looks interesting.

Creed_Clicks · June 2018

Picking this thread up again

In the meantime I got a Jazzmaster (squier) baritone. Thinking of upgrading the nut and pickups. Any suggestions for pickups ?

ToneControl · June 2018

Creed_Clicks said:

Picking this thread up again
In the meantime I got a Jazzmaster (squier) baritone. Thinking of upgrading the nut and pickups. Any suggestions for pickups ?

use crisp ones,
don't get anything that will get muddy on low notes, or get coil taps or active EQ

Creed_Clicks · December 2019

Back to the baritone drawing board again. Sold on a tele conversión recently. I don’t know what it is with me and teles. We just can’t get on ...

Seziertisch · January 2020

@Creed_Clicks Have you tried the Squier Baritone Jazzmaster?

30” scale so it plays a lot more like a regular guitar.

I tune mine to B and use lighter baritone strings. Using the heavier gauge baritone strings made the low E string (I know it’s not E) behave much more like the D or the G string on a bass.

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