Electric guitar with acoustic sound

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EDIT: This might come out as a duplicate. Please ignore the other thread.

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Hi, I have a bunch of metal songs that contain some acoustic parts that are recorded in the studio with a miked acoustic guitar.

Now... here's the thing.

I want to play these songs live. I currently own only one electric guitar. I would like to play all the parts of the song using that guitar.

Some options I considered is to mount a miked acoustic on a stand on stage, and when the time comes to play that acoustic part, I would move to that mounted guitar, and when I'm done, move away from it. It sounds difficult though.

Then I considered using acoustic electric guitars. It just doesn't feel right, and the humming problem on stage is ridiculous.

The last two options are to either play the acoustic parts using regular clean electric guitar sounds, or skip the acoustic part completely. Not good. :(

After some Google-ing, I read about these "piezoelectric pickups". If I understand it correctly, they are pickups you install on to your electric guitar to get a sound close to an acoustic guitar, and with a little creative wiring job, you can make the switches on your guitar toggle electric guitar and acoustic sounds.

I also read about John Petrucci's signature guitar models that ship with said features. These guitars aren't available for me though, and not to mention a little on the expensive side...

So I've decided that I'd like to try to modify the guitar myself. I have experience in installing pickups, so I think I'll be able to do this.

Now comes the problem. I've tried searching for piezoelectric pickup products but I couldn't find anyway. I've tried several search queries but nothing seems to pop up. The only things that come up are piezo pickups for acoustic guitars.

I then realize that I don't fully understand what I want. What exactly am I looking for? Piezoelectric guitar pickups right? Doing searches on "piezoelectric" and "piezoelectric pickups" didn't really lead me to any product pages...

So...

I hope someone can help me out on this... and sorry for any errors in this post, English isn't my first language...
 
Hello,
There may be several solutions to your problem.

You can for example change some parts of your Tremolo
to have it piezzo equiped.

for example see http://www.guitarelectronics.com/product/GTG8000F These ar replacement saddles for a startocaster type tremolo. Each saddle have a piezo element in it so that each string's vibration is independantly captured. there is a little "mixer unit" to be install on the guitar in order to have a standard Mono Jack output.

Different brands make such systems.

If you want to go the cheap DIY way, you can try to paste a piezo element on vibrating parts (on strats, you can try on the tremolo part where the springs are attached.). You can find small piezo elements at radioshacks or other of you can find them in musical postcards (the ones that play music when you open the postcard). In these ones, the piezo element is what produce the sound. you just have to connect the 2 wires to the two wire of jack cable (the plate face of the piezo should be on the ground wire).

This will not replace great acoustic guitar but will certainly extends a lot the sound palette of your guitar. Some guitar brands are now selling piezo equiped electric guitars...

Hope this helps

Sylvain Clement aka wphantom
 
Gracie Stand was the way I've seen it done.... But that's prolly what you meant by mounted to begin with....
 
I do believe that L.R. Baggs has a single coil pickup that will give your electric an acoustic sound. It would be worth checking out. I have used Baggs products on my acoustics and mandolins for a number of years and, I haven't found anything that compares. I hope that this may help you out. Kennyboy Skaggs
 
Split your signal with a Y cable & send 1 leg through your usual gear & the other through something like the Behringer acoustic pedal (the type that simulates the sound of an acoustic guitra that is).
Not a hi fi option & you'll have to do something about signal degration - maybe into a pre 1st or a DI that splits signals etc etc etc.
OR get another guitarist - that'd be nice for the economy & musicians' union.
Cheers
& sorry if I've covered someone else' previous comments OR if I'm just the newbiegumby I say i am.
Cheers
rayC
 
There are several bridge mounted piezo pickups. I've tried most of them, and to be honest NONE of them sound much like an acoustic guitar. You can get interesting sounds out of them, but it is not an acoustic sound. You do, however, need to get the built-in preamp for all of these pickups. If you want ease of installation, go with the Fishman (MUCH easier to install, as it doesn't involve as many surface mount solder joints). If you want gold hardware, you have to go with the LR Baggs, as Fishman simply does not do gold. Don't ask me why, I've asked and they haven't given me a decent response.

And by the by, the electric guitar saddle mounted piezos don't even sound as acoustic as the under saddle stuff in an real acoustic. I don't know what it is, but I would guess the added sustain of the electric combined with the (typically) much lighter strings just makes it not sound right. As I said, I do actually LIKE the sounds you can get with the saddle pickups, as long as I don't try to think of them as being "acoustic."



Light

"Cowards can never be moral."
M.K. Gandhi
 
Also Boss has that pedal that's supposed to make an electric sound like an acoustic...I kind of doubt its that convincing but it might give that acoustic edge to your clean sound. At least its another option to consider.

Oh yeah, Schecter makes an electric guitar that has 2 humbuckers plus a peizo under the bridge, so if you're in the market for a new guitar you can add that to the list of ones to check out.
 
Hello. Thanks for the replies, everyone.

faderbug - the Fishman products look tempting. In fact, there's a local Fishman dealer just 10 minutes from where I live in Malaysia! I'll definitely go there and check it out. Thanks!

Oh and the Behringer AM100... no. Tried it, it sucks big time. It just seems to be adding unwanted highs to my sound and I get tons of air hissing...

wphantom - thanks for the link. It does look kind of cheap though. And regarding what you suggested about DIY'ing it... I'm afraid I'm not really THAT experienced, hehehe...

peritus - Yeah, as I said, I don't want to use such stands. I have problems moving around too much... =)

kennyboy_skaggs - I will do a search for LR Baggs and see what comes up. Thanks!

rayc - I'm the only person who can play the acoustic parts... my other guitarist is doing some solos over it.

Light - I understand exactly what you mean, and as I said earlier, I just want something that sounds close, for live use. What I am going to do to my guitar will definitely not replace a proper, true acoustic guitar.

However, John Petrucci's (Dream Theater) acoustic sound in his live performances really amaze me though. o_O It sounds so good... you can hear the high-end sound of the strumming, yet the sound has so much body and tone... if you close your eyes, you'll swear that what you are hearing is the sound hole of an acoustic guitar. Open your eyes, and you'll see that he's using an electric guitar.

His guitars are way too expensive for me though.

Ed dixon and philboyd - I've tried a Variax and although I like it, it's a little bit expensive for me. The Godin guitar you linked to does look good but I imagine it'll cost quite a bit too. My budget's a little tight, can't really buy a new guitar right now. =)

Tadpui - I have a Boss GT8, and have played around a lot with the acoustic simulator features. The sound still isn't convincing enough. And any attempt to make it produce a high-frequency acoustic sound will just add tons of noise and hissing. I'll check out Schecter though. Thanks.

Thanks again everyone. I think there's plenty of information here for me to work on. Cheers, keep on makin' music!

- Nash
 
don't forget about the graph tech f.a.a.s.. that's my favorite for an electric.
 
I believe some of the Parker Fly (Nite_Fly?) models have a switch to go from Electric to a modifier acoustic sound. Don't quote me on that though.

Also Boss has an Acoustic simulator pedal that will give the audience the effect that you are playing acoustic.

Edit: Both the Fly and Nite-Fly guitars by Parker have piezo pickups with a 3-way selector. The Nite-fly is known for its ability to give a great acoustic sound while also producing a nice heavy electric sound.
 
You can always run a piezo transducer thru a sansamp acoustic DI.... people rave about those for live acoustic, for the price. Used on ebay under 100 if you get lucky.

Or you can always dial up a clean electric tone to get through those acoustic parts. You never know unless you try, and it won't/shouldn't cost a thing.
I knew a band that did this. The guy had a 5150 and LP, and just flipped to the neck pup w/vol turned waaay down and got a clean sound for the acoustic parts that were on the album. Didn't even have to switch channels.
 
Nashville Power Tele - has a Fishman power bridge pickup & stereo output.

I believe Godin makes similar guitars also.
 
or there's a Hamer

that does a really good job. Can't remember the model, it was a semi-hollow though. Saw Garbage use it once and the sound was incredible. I don't know what they processed it through, though. And I know, you said no new guitar.

I guess this really wasn't helpful at all. Sorry. :(

Good luck.
 
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