I learned a nifty new trick a little while back and I thought I should pass it along.

You're trying to record an electric guitar but it's buzzing like crazy. When the player touches the strings, it goes away. When he stops touching the stirings to change chords or whatever, it comes back. You can take any bare wire (I used one wire from a short speaker cable) and wrap one end around the low E string between the nut and the tuners. The other end goes in the guitar players pants, between his skin and waistline. Tada!

Thanks to John from New Pornographers for turning me on to that. I just wish I'd thought of it ten years ago.

Anyone else have a good trick to share?

Seaside Lounge wrote:I learned a nifty new trick a little while back and I thought I should pass it along.

You're trying to record an electric guitar but it's buzzing like crazy. When the player touches the strings, it goes away. When he stops touching the stirings to change chords or whatever, it comes back. You can take any bare wire (I used one wire from a short speaker cable) and wrap one end around the low E string between the nut and the tuners. The other end goes in the guitar players pants, between his skin and waistline. Tada!

Thanks to John from New Pornographers for turning me on to that. I just wish I'd thought of it ten years ago.

Anyone else have a good trick to share?

I have done exactly that myself (single coils w/ distortion pedal). Does anyone reading this feel there would be an increased possibility of shock/electrocution ? Electroclash even ?

The output jack's ground got disconnected from somewhere, probably off the bridge. connect it back to there. In electrical failure, you'll be the ground. You don't wanna.

The best way to accomplish this is to get a length of wire and solder an alligator clip on one end and a penny on the other. Stick the alligator clip on the bridge or a tuning peg and stick the penny in your sock.

A better solution would be to shield your guitar's cavity, and remove any ground loops from your guitar's wiring lay-out.

I used star grounding on my recent strat project to great effect.

Also worth checking your cables. I recently got back into playing my guitar and was having noise problems. Found out the cheap shitty cable I was using was unshielded, ie, the ground wire connected to the jack sleeve was not braided round the signal/tip wire, but independent.

Replacing with proper cables more-or-less solved the problem.

I heard you're supposed to stick the string into your peehole. Works better they say.

Freakin' guitarists.

Seaside Lounge wrote:I learned a nifty new trick a little while back and I thought I should pass it along.

You're trying to record an electric guitar but it's buzzing like crazy. When the player touches the strings, it goes away. When he stops touching the stirings to change chords or whatever, it comes back. You can take any bare wire (I used one wire from a short speaker cable) and wrap one end around the low E string between the nut and the tuners. The other end goes in the guitar players pants, between his skin and waistline. Tada!

Butt crack - it's easier and it stays there better.

Seaside Lounge wrote:You're trying to record an electric guitar but it's buzzing like crazy. When the player touches the strings, it goes away. When he stops touching the stirings to change chords or whatever, it comes back.

If this is the case, the guitar has a bad ground. It would be better to fix the problem permanently. Guitars either buzz ( like with single coils) or they don't. If you are having an intermittent buzz the wiring needs to be looked at.

Boombats wrote:I heard you're supposed to stick the string into your peehole. Works better they say.

Freakin' guitarists.

Nah, this is only if the guitarist is a real tone chaser...like, if he REALLY LOVES chasin' tone...