Phil-X :: Tips and Tricks - Episode 1 :: Why one pickup?

In this episode Phil X explains why he takes out the neck-pickup on his guitars and the science behind it. We're calling this "Episode 1" with the hopes to get Phil X back in the studio real soon to shoot more Tips and Tricks. Please subscribe and share!
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[@erickleefeld4883]

The main reason to have a one-pickup guitar is that it forces you to spend less time fiddling with switches and different pickup selections, and more time just playing the thing and figuring out what to do with your hand techniques. When you learn to stop “chasing tone” and start chasing NOTES instead, the tone will eventually take care of itself.

[@RichLunaMusic]

Plus you can always EQ that bridge into a neck. If you’re good enough at that kinda thing.

[@tomrp9815]

How can't you love this guy. He is absolutely hysterical and informative. Never takes himself too seriously and appears to be having the time of his life at all times. I watched my first Phil-X video today and had no idea how famous the guy is. It was a pentatonic lesson and the dude is funny, smart and not pretentious at all. Now I am checking out his other stuff and it keeps on getting better. Thanks for Bringing a little fun and laughter to the subject and also not sucking at guitar or lacking knowledge

[@aceventura9292]

Phil X never fails to make me smile.

[@ChuckNorrisCutsMyLaw]

Now I understand why my guitar sounds better today than it did 20 years ago. Since smoking is no longer allowed in clubs my strings are no longer expose to secondhand smoke so they can now breathe better. I'm going to see if I can get my strings to starting doing a cardio workout a few times a week to get them to breathe even better.

[@gingerleyham]

If you make them practice circular breathing, they can sustain forever. Longer than Gary Moore

[@dogbiscuit1649]

+Heinrich Himmler Hey Heinrich, how are your false teeth mate..? Not wobbly or anything..? You feeling OK, yeah..? FFS ;-))

[@dogbiscuit1649]

***** All I can really say is oh dear...

[@buzzsaw63]

Snake Plissken lol

[@alexavecilla9401]

Snake Plissken ii

[@hannissesaysbtw]

That is Brilliant! I would have never thought about the neck pickups stealing my vibes. Phil you ROCK! Love learning this stuff!

[@hannissesaysbtw]

not a moron or expert just an enthusiast. you sound to be one yourself. you have my respect in that we could likely learn from each others experience. thanks again Phil for sharing yours.

[@333Facex2Krusher666]

I will not play on a guitar with a neck pickup (it makes my playing to muddy; neck pickup toggled on or off - worse when toggled on). I take my neck pickups out as well due to this. I feel using only a bridge pickup gives more clarity and overall solid tone (sustain, etc). I also concur with you on the neck pickup magnets effecting the string vibrations. I was starting to wonder how many people actually knew about that or cared to know, as I figured it out on my own very early on as a guitar player. I've tried lowering them as far as they'll go, and they still get in the way. So one day I cut the wires and uninstalled it; I noticed a difference instantly in the clarity of the tone (even with just stock pickups). I use DiMarzio DP102 X2N in the bridge position, and that's all I need. It makes for an amazing single pickup guitar. I single pickup guitar in my personal opinion along with experience, is simply a very well and all around more solid/balanced guitar. Keeping things simple is sometimes the best direction to go; especially with guitars.

[@joesimon2018]

The magnetic pull issue is true. Also the pickup rout at the neck takes out some beef and sustain. Also the bridge pickup signal has to go through an engaged switch which might effect things slightly. Some guitars with one pickup are able to get a little farther away from the bridge with the pickup and get a sweeter sound by not being as crowded up against the bridge like Danelectro guitars with just one pickup.

[@onzkicg]

Oh thanks for the advice.. Saved me a penny for upgrading my pickup:) Now I will get a very good humbucker:)

[@amihol]

Best guy on the planet. Really positive!

[@mh-ez8ls]

Dude. You are actually pretty damn cool. I appreciate you more every time i watch you. Thanx.

[@adaptiveagile]

Interesting and makes sense. Phil is too funny. I think he did hit the spot actually. I'm not good enough for jazz, but I do like neck pickups for blues & rock rhythm, but that's me.

[@mike1967sam]

Aw Phil I am so happy, watched you a couple of times, great playing and all and thought man this kid is good...then I went to wikipedia and saw 1966...cuz I'm fucking freaking out that everybody is younger than I am except obviously old people (duzzat make sense?) and whooda thunk it you're actually already 50 and I still have one year to go...Rock on.

[@Blacksunrocks]

I used to attend a jam that Phil ran years ago. Anyone that can play Frankenstein to a "T" without a synth guitar has my respect! Tell 'em how it's done brutha!

[@brucifer0]

I bought a 1960 Silvertone u-1 just because it was a vintage guitar that was affordable. It quickly became my couch guitar because it plays great and it made me want to play it, additionally I think because its basically a hollow guitar it sounded great acoustically (for an electric). After months of couch duty I brought to my rehearsal space and it soon became my favorite plugged in guitar! Basically I only want to play this cheap Masonite guitar. Pretty surprising!

[@chocomalk]

There is no way to completely eliminate the interplay between string vibration and the neck on a guitar. If you want lower action with the same response as a higher action, use a heavier string gauge.

[@NosceTe]

true

[@1965kid]

This guy is out there.

[@colmlindsay]

Yes I watched it but I missed that part while typing the comment I think! I actually went and tried it, and recorded my guitar with and without, didn't notice any loss in resonance/vibration or any change in tonality, before or after, both when I was playing and when I was listening back to my recordings. Its a very interesting concept.

[@TristanJCumpole]

Makes sense but sometimes I wonder why people spend so much time chasing down 0,1% of their tone and often ignore the things that make up the other 99,9%.

[@RickyHortonMusic]

Cause the 99% requires practice and hard work. It’s easier to tinker and spend money

[@TheOneAndOnlyKurtNobrain]

One time, I mean recently, I screwed up a magnet transplant to the bridge pickup of my Epiphone ES-339 pro. I stabbed the one of the coils one too many times. This lead me to try a single pickup in the bridge, although I moved my neck pickup to the bridge. The strings' vibration was no longer altered by a pickup in the neck pickup slot. The result was a fuller, more open tone; also, there was a middle ground between brightness and a rich beefiness by putting a pickup meant for the neck position, in the bridge position. It's especially viable if you play sludge or doom metal and want that ballsy tone but without the restrictions of a neck position pickup's magnetic pull.

[@jongonzalez6917]

I don't know about all that, but I will say this: I have this very plain Les Paul Junior (or special) with a single-ply Spanish Cedar body and 1 P-90. My cousin received it for free when he bought his Goldtop years ago (I believe from MF). It's been mine ever since (maybe 2003?). That guitar plays and sounds amazing. Not sure how or why, being so simple. It's fun to play, loud acoustically, and sounds killer plugged in.

[@franken-aye1177]

Ha 😆 you are nutty. The new shoes bit cracked me up.

[@gcensing6351]

This issue has been discussed for a long time, usually without any good answers at the end, even the ToneQuest people had a go at it. Anywho, Dr. Phil X makes complete sense here, no matter what he seems to have been smoking }8^) You just can't fight the science of it!

[@larrysdinner]

Ah, so now I know why Malcolm Young said his Gretsch sounded better without the neck and middle pickups.

[@stringspicksandfiddlestick6388]

I have 2 older Line 6 Variaxes. No pickups at all. Just a piezo bridge. If one is better that none is better still. I do like Cleartone strings.

[@DarkHorseJ27]

@SteelSkin667, the average vintage output humbucker actually pulls less on the strings less than the average strat pickup. This is because a humbucker has the magnets placed farther away from the strings. They have a pair of bar magnets placed near the bottom of the humbucker. In a strat pickup the pole pieces are also the magnets. Also, a strat pickup has three times as many magnets as a humbucker, though the humbucker's magnets are considerably larger.

[@gingerleyham]

Makes sense. But you gotta have your guitar setup however it works best for you. I personally could never live without a neck pickup.

[@wesmatron]

As long as there isn't any fret buzz, surely a low action is getting enough room to vibrate...or it would buzz as it hit the frets?

[@Rigel7WasAlreadyUsed]

I got from it that he meant the distance between the string and the pickup which would be remedied by lowering the pickup. But he may have meant something else.

[@wesmatron]

Rigel7WasAlreadyUsed Now, THAT makes sense. Mind you, I did see a video on here of a guy who set his Telecaster pickup high so he could use it as a 24th fret :)

[@Tim.Pierce]

wesmatron can ya provide a link to that vid? Id like to see that too thx man

[@scotty]

Very good thanks for explaining the one pick-up thing. Holdsworth too uses the one. I sort of like the neck pick-up sound, lower in tone and rich in sound.

[@egotripband]

excuse my ignorance but don't humbuckers have one set of magnets facing north and the adjacent set facing south..which means they might sort of cancel out an overall pull down on the strings or a push up that a single coil pickup might have..which means the string would continue to oscillate for longer..of course no neck magnet = zero sring interference at the point where it can exert more leverage on the string than at the bridge position..just my2 cents worth ..rockon phil

[@heyimjoshnicetomeetya]

One humbucker and one knob (coil split optional) - all you need

[@stonerh]

Did you not watch the video? The point is that the magnet in the neck pickup is still pulling on the strings and affecting it's natural resonance and vibration even when you aren't using it, so he takes it out altogether.

[@throwitinthebinUnt]

not unless you know nothing about the guitar and the "tone" knob is actually a pickup blender haha.. we were talkin bout how to reduce the twang brightness of the bridge pup for a cleaner sound, using ONLY what the guitar has to offer (vol and tone knobs[if there are any]) one thing you can try is a compressor pedal and a tiny amount of transparent non tone sucking drive to sweeten it up.. if your extreme you can do all that and then shape it up with an EQualizer have fun!

[@knikk77]

On that junior also there is more wood than the special... More wood around the neck joint, the more vibration into the body of the guitar.

[@jpizzleforizzle]

this is why lace sensors are awesome. no string drag. but i totally agree, one pickup only! yes!

[@Ghost17110]

Well, I love the twanginess of the bridge pickup, its just that I play more neck for cleans and for lead, with bridge mainly for rythm, and a few of the guitars I have been considering to purchase only have 1 pickup, the bridge (ESP LTD Alexi 600, ESP LTD Static X's EX, and a PRS Single P90 Korina Body Singlecut)

[@BonJovi1987Fan]

I love the bridge position on strats. The Kramer Baretta Special is the guitar for those that love 80s guitars and Don't want any bs in the beginner phase. I love the 87-89 Era of Bon Jovi mainly because of Richie Sambora's Kramer guitars.

[@manuelbettencourt4213]

This guy must be the happiest man on earth.

[@WayneMemphisMojo]

Thanks again Phil -X- It's interesting your take on the 1 pickup phenomenon. Tuck Andress has a dummy pickup in the bridge position of most if not all of his guitars and (even though I can't prove it) I think he connects only the volume pot ALL in an effort to clean up the signal chain before it goes to his amp. Two different worlds, same thought process. Keep on rockin' with your BBQ grill self

[@iris21ful]

Very good video. Beginners should start with low action and gradually increase.

[@jeffbarnes2596]

So that's why I love cheeseburgers......what? But seriously it's great that people are getting to know Phil X! He is so talented and such a fun dude!

[@zero2umashi]

i wouldn't go with too high action because then you can come across intonation problems unless you have custom frets that compensate for that, not to mention the closer you get to the bridge the more dead the strings will sound because of too much string tension, i like my string height somewhere in the middle not too high to where the string gets too stretched and doesn't play right near the 24th fret and not too low to where fret buzz is introduced.

[@charlie33009]

this is why i got a duesenberg senior52...one pickup sounds awesome

[@stanlindert6332]

I learned something,and had a very good chuckle...

[@Pabloignacioalvarez]

I totally understood the snickers exemple

[@KenMickey]

Nice explain on the two pickup magnetic pull goof on strings !!

[@onsesejoo2605]

The low high action makes sense, playing on high action gives the fingers excercise.

[@lauriedepaurie]

+1 on higher action. It also increases downward pressure on Tune-O-matic style bridges, increasing resonance (thus volume). It's an old jazz-player's-thing. They would raise the action on their jazzboxes, to project more in order to be be heard over the other band-members. Combine it with higher gage strings and you make a beautiful sounding, shredder killing beast out of your guitar... Sure does the trick for me!

[@youreallygotmenow4855]

That's super interesting! Thanks for your input on this topic, man :)

[@allnations31]

Effects won't be much of a factor though. A chorus pedal won't increase your sustain for example. If we are talking about boosting the signal with od pedals etc than we agree but you can do that by increasing the gain or just flat out having a high gain amp. Tonal flexibilitiy is relative and depends on your playing most of the time. Hell, your setup and amp are much more important. Check joe bonamassa in his NY gig wiht single PU les paul. Marty friedman , van halen etc are also good examples.

[@DonDon-ou7jt]

I have a one pick up guitar the hello kitty stratocaster it sounds awesome

[@jmichaelm0]

Phil, you don't even need a guitar to blow minds...

[@SamLazier]

Actually it's just an urban legend that neck pickup decreases the vibration. Sure theres real physics happening there. There was legit testing about this and the difference between neck pickup inserted and removed was so minimal even audiophiles will struggle to figure which is which 😂

[@5urg3x]

The part about the action I agree with -- but that depends on a few things though -- first, the angle of the neck, the tension of the strings, and mainly the height of the frets and the relief of the neck (truss rod) -- when these are set properly, and you have "fall away" frets from like 17 up or 19 up you can get the same sound with low action as you can with higher action...However, I am a proponent to the ideology of just practice with heavier strings and higher action and eventually you won't even notice it.

[@rusholmemike]

what about "shorting" the pole pieces of the neck p/up by placing a soft (i.e. high Fe content / permeability) material across the poles of the neck pick-up. This would drastically limit the field string interactions - as the mag flux would prefer to travel in the shorting piece rather than the surrounding air. Eliminating the need to rip out the neck pick up esp if the p/up esp if it were set as LOW as poss' too. Add a groovy image on the metal plate and BINGO instant 'Phil X-ification'

[@agent1543]

Usually the smacking is when I'm getting High Action ;) ... Love your videos and playing Brother. Happy NewYear !!!

[@batbag12]

That is why you take it AND the pickup selector out... Just wire the single pickup into the volume and tone straight to the output...

[@awonderingoneil206]

I go with a lowmedium action setup, just low enough without causing fret buzz with still some room to vibrate.

[@throwitinthebinUnt]

gotta love the chord he plays is in tune to the sanford theme song

[@euniversal1]

I believe the the string vibration cycles are at their fullest at exact middle but I dislike pickup in that spot, so I opt for one bridge pick up.

[@ClearColorCloud]

Actually, not really. The string vibration is greatest at the middle point between the bridge and whatever fret you're on. So, each note is different. But, string vibration is greater initially by the bridge, because that's where you pick, and then it quickly changes to being greatest at the middle point. So, a bridge pickup gets the pick attack more, which is a significant part of the guitar sound. Also, the tone of the string by the bridge helps the notes to cut through, even if the actual output is not greater. The last thing is that you can put a bridge pickup a lot closer to the strings without killing sustain, so in practice you'll get a higher output.

[@euniversal1]

Nick Adamson Thanks for breaking that down to the absolute. Now, I am aware of much more . I was thinking in general non- fretting terms.

[@bytwyzz]

Eric Johnson said string recoil is our friend

[@morrisdelarosa]

I agree at all. One pickup and high action makes sense when you are a really good guitar player... or you have a very cheap guitar, and you need to take out all the little particles of mojo.

[@gstube1]

'uoise, I'm comin'!

[@DarkHorseJ27]

Actually, with humbuckers and normal single coils of similar output ratings, the single coils have more pull. Since they have less wire windings than other designs, to achieve the desired output they have to use more powerful magnets than their humbucker counterparts, powerful enough that they still have more magnetic pull despite having half the amount of magnets.

[@askingstuff]

I prefer a low action and a single pickup for those exact reasons. Though my understanding of low action is an action as low as it can get without touching the frets. So I guess I'm actually for medium action.

[@throwitinthebinUnt]

There is a vid of Scott actually saying he does that roll off (look for it, its the same vid he mentions the volume knob) he does it momentarily, rather than just leavin it on there.. thats the confusion part of it In no means was i trying to prove you wrong (about the rear pup sound like a neck) with that example; i was mentioning what tonemasters do with knobs btw im foremost a player than a tech, im the type whose never satisfied with sound, and advocates simplicity over using pedals etc

[@throwitinthebinUnt]

ill paint you a portrait.. look up Scott Henderson (uses a vintage type strat), he does wacky stuff like leave his vol POT permanetly on 6; ..for fun he rolls his tone POT all the way down on the rear pickup to confuse other guitar nerds whether hes using a neck pup or not (which is cool; i admit to being a guitar nerd) ,. see, its that kind of subtlety, finicky business with tone that im talking about, i was opening up the possiblities of using the POTS alone on the lone guitar for retribution

[@geraldhills41]

you are right

[@japasetelagoas]

I appreciate your sarcasm, really.

[@throwitinthebinUnt]

the single pickup for the rear is only for serious players not gonna fool around with cheap solos... its where the only thing they play are notes, not special effect I first heard the too-much-pull theory from either allan holdsworth, or eddie van halen, but i never heard them saying that they actually tested A to B, so its real cool Phil did this commentary... its funny, i did this to my main guitar for this reason, then i forgot that reason; heres phil reminding me haha

[@richicious]

depends on what you play, how hard you chug and and how many notes per string you play e. g. in a month. If you play like Phil X or Joe Satriani you have so many notes played that the coating does not protect you from any mechanical wearout. But Elixir's and Cleartone's strings are both great. It's a matter of your style and taste,

[@DavidGriffis]

you crack me up dude. good point about the single pickup. need to find a solution for the empty hole...

[@shaggy125551]

Fill in the routing with a hard wood!

[@dogbiscuit1649]

Lower it and remove the screw poles, it should then 1- Not pull so hard as only one coil is fully magnetised, and 2- Sound quite a bit like a quiet single coil, as it almost is - one coil is fully magnetised, but it still has its sister coil to counteract hum. Ps this is not my idea but its not bad, and is obviously reversible. If you are really having problems, maybe you can build a tiny, little aquarium to fill the hole in your guitar. Ps, this is my idea, which is why it's shit.

[@jefftaylor8709]

Malcolm Young was the first i ever saw do this, great sound with a hollow body electric :)

[@lfscrazy]

Malcom's tone was always fantastic. My R8 is getting this treatment later!

[@wyssmaster]

also the controls are potentiometers or "pots" rather than knobs, which are the plastic pieces on the pots BUT WHATEVER

[@Mordecai06]

Everyone its own, Clapton and Hendrix played with a 3 pickup strat and they were gods, LP Custom have 6 coils and they sound killer, so like I said.

[@grant5603]

A strat is different because people tend to use the neck pickup a lot more than, say, a tele. And Phil isn't saying that multi-pickup guitars sound bad at all. It's just an observation/preference for the resonance of a single pickup - particularly P90s.

[@TheDrhhowe]

yes

[@colmlindsay]

That is a pretty cool idea!

[@hannissesaysbtw]

EVERYONE!!! THIS GUY KNOWS WHAT HES TALKING ABOUT!!!@@@ HE READ IT!!!

[@Weed69Eyes]

I love Phil x!!

[@diegoambrosio]

That was excellent!

[@SteveRicardo777]

That was funny. I dig

[@amnesia271]

It's also probably the fact that there's less wiring = less resistance = more signal = more tone!

[@ClearColorCloud]

That's true, but you have to get the right pickup. Some pickups wired straight to output are too harsh.

[@amnesia271]

Nick Adamson Yeah too much output could kill it, I've a Les Paul Goldtop with a p90 wired straight to the output and it's rather smooth!

[@noi5emaker]

I'd say that's the only factor.

[@knikk77]

Lower action less tone? Only if the string is hitting the frets while it is vibrating. Maybe what Phil X is trying to say also is that if it lower action you cant pick hard, because it will buzz. Also what gives better tone is bigger frets; more vibration from the string into the wood.

[@michaelnatsariym3690]

I'm always high action. Not in guitars, but in life.

[@noi5emaker]

3:35 Exactly.

[@tauruschorus]

This guy fucken rules

[@HowToPlayGuitarVEasy]

ALLLLRIGHTY THEN!...

[@Ghost17110]

My question is, with 1 bridge pickup, how do you make/recreate the clean tones of the neck pickup? (Examples, such as many of Metallica's ballads like One and Fade to black, alot of clean rock and metal ballads, nothing real twangy)

[@silverjaw138]

If you have a tone pot, you can back off the tone and get a very passable neck tone. I prefer a good pickup with only a volume pot and I get amazing cleans just using my volume, this is the brown sound. You need the right amp as well.

[@PaulGrahamGuitarst]

Never heard truer words.

[@DeathskullLord]

So what about lace sensors or emg's. Can you imagine a strat without a neck pickup?

[@ChristoFurious]

What if I lower the bridge pickup to compensate for low action?

[@alejandrosaavedralopez3666]

Hello, where can I see the video comparison?

[@snowleopardism]

Can you just take put a pickup and leave the wiring still inplace ? will all the other pickups still work ? I was looking at a telecaster modernplayer and was interest in taking out the strat pickup in the middle.

[@jonfaerman7518]

emmm people michael schenker or sykes or gary moore couldnt be wrong...so i gonna let the neck pickup in the guitar and use a semi high action on my guitar cause i like to struglin a little but...this is important the standard gibson and the custom one have diferent radius on the fretboard so you could use the custom one a little lower...

[@wyssmaster]

Again, there's a noticeable difference between a neck pickups and a bridge-pickup-with-the-tone-pot-down. Neck pickups aren't inherently muddy or muted the way a pickup sounds with the tone pot set on zero or one. And he's not trying to confuse anyone, he (likely) just likes the way it sounds. And I wouldn't consider that subtle by any means. I WOULD consider the picking in different spots (behind the bridge pickup to somewhere up the neck) a subtlety that most people wouldn't understand.

[@screenpuller]

Or you could take the tone pot out all together & run pickup to volume to out like EVH. ;)

[@weaselsuit]

Incredibly likeable fellow. And not in some bullshit-Guitar Center sales man way either...

[@lfscrazy]

OK Mr R8, you and I have a date with a screwdriver and soldering iron this evening!

[@bloodfarts991]

is that a GoPro on his head stock?

[@nunyabidness4655]

What brand headstock tuner is Phil using? It's pretty big. LOL!

[@ricomarcetti6040]

If I play a hollow/chambered body, does this still apply? Or, only solid bodies? I love my neck/center channel on my hollow body, what about removing the neck pickup? Does it affect the resonance? Thanks, Phil!

[@lenduckworth99]

It seems wacky but it is true. It makes a difference.