Pi

Bob Dylan on an upright piano in 1965 How’s it going music fans? For the past couple of articles, we here at PAL have been focusing on the very versatile piano. After giving you guys a brief history lesson on the instrument, laid out the basics on certain things that can affect tone – such as humidity or the positioning...

Yesterday, we here at Pro Audio Land brought you guys an introduction to the little known instrument referred to simply as the piano. We began by giving our readers a brief history lesson on its origin as an offshoot of the other popular keyed instruments at the time and its subsequent evolution into what it is today. Not only that...

Around here, we've talked a lot about home studio recording. Makes sense, right? If you’ve taken the time to learn the tough but highly respectable craft of musicianship, sooner or later, you’re going to want to perform with other players, maybe even start a band. And then after that comes the demo! But you probably don’t want just any demo...

Let Scott here tell you a little something about coil tapping Few modifications can alter a guitar’s primary tone as much as switching those all-important pickups. Responsible for turning string vibrations into a decipherable electrical signal, there are seemingly hundreds, even thousands of variations out there of the electric guitar pickup. And even as you cipher through all of the different makes and models, there are still plenty of other modifications and design variations that each have their own signature tone characteristics – and we’re not just talking about humbuckers versus single coils here! With the exception of those fancy new optical pickups or the acoustic-centric variety, all electric guitar and bass pickups pretty much work the same way – a thin copper coil wrapped around magnets that create a magnetic field which produces an electrical signal that can be sent and made into sound by an amplifier – but what many newer players don’t realize that everything from the direction of the coil winding to the magnets used in their construction can alter its tone. And while plenty of players out there are happy with their stock set and choose to customize that tone trough effects, preamps and the like, more knowledgeable guitarist’s are exploiting plenty of these altered or slightly modified non-standard pickups in order to meticulously carve out their own custom tone. Ever heard of a “hot” pickup? Coil tapping? Humbucker? Okay, you probably all got that last one but in case you might have missed either of the first two, how about we check out some of these less common pickup mods? Continue reading →

The essential components of a single coil pickup Here at PAL, we like to give our customers the most accurate and helpful information in their quest for finding that perfect setup. Whether it’s through our series of reviews or tech articles, we believe that the more you know about your gear the more you will ultimately get out of it...