What is it?
In my exploits I have determined that an Ash Body, combined with a Rosewood board is my ideal. Ash body (especially with a thin paint coat or nitro-- usually the case since its Ash for looks) + Maple board sound way too harsh and bright for my liking, this is over many guitars tested, strats and teles. I think it looks good on paper, and in reality, the ash grain with Maple fretboard have an appealing look, but I feel that they combine to create this very bright almost "saturated" overall Tone.
Alder body combined with Rosewood to me is acceptable, it is just a solid combo, for single coils to use as their foundation. Alder and Maple seems to be a good combo, especially on Strats I feel, such as the more 50's styled strats, which is weird because they were supposed to be Ash and Maple originally, but then maybe that is not so weird, because maybe they realized also that the Ash/Maple combo was simply too bright, combined with the single coil sound.
Now, Ash/Maple could actually be good (now that I think of it) if you were using humbuckers, I am now envisioning, a "packaged" sound, meaning, the Ash/Maple combo would be so bright, yet all those harsh harmonics would be "contained" by the humbuckers.
But yea, I definitely feel, strongly that Ash/Maple is just not a good combo, it's like it sounds "fizzy" and overly hollow, when combined with the single coils. I think the single coils, need something substantial, to "sit upon", they need something with some actual density, and while i have pointed out that Ash is actually denser than Alder, Alder bodies almost always have thick finishes on them, which create a more stabilized sound. The more coats of paint you put on top of the wood, the less and less, the type of wood matters.
In my exploits I have determined that an Ash Body, combined with a Rosewood board is my ideal. Ash body (especially with a thin paint coat or nitro-- usually the case since its Ash for looks) + Maple board sound way too harsh and bright for my liking, this is over many guitars tested, strats and teles. I think it looks good on paper, and in reality, the ash grain with Maple fretboard have an appealing look, but I feel that they combine to create this very bright almost "saturated" overall Tone.
Alder body combined with Rosewood to me is acceptable, it is just a solid combo, for single coils to use as their foundation. Alder and Maple seems to be a good combo, especially on Strats I feel, such as the more 50's styled strats, which is weird because they were supposed to be Ash and Maple originally, but then maybe that is not so weird, because maybe they realized also that the Ash/Maple combo was simply too bright, combined with the single coil sound.
Now, Ash/Maple could actually be good (now that I think of it) if you were using humbuckers, I am now envisioning, a "packaged" sound, meaning, the Ash/Maple combo would be so bright, yet all those harsh harmonics would be "contained" by the humbuckers.
But yea, I definitely feel, strongly that Ash/Maple is just not a good combo, it's like it sounds "fizzy" and overly hollow, when combined with the single coils. I think the single coils, need something substantial, to "sit upon", they need something with some actual density, and while i have pointed out that Ash is actually denser than Alder, Alder bodies almost always have thick finishes on them, which create a more stabilized sound. The more coats of paint you put on top of the wood, the less and less, the type of wood matters.
