Evertune Bridge Review

guitarfishbay

TLDR: It works, it's fantastic, the only slight drawbacks are the feel is very slightly changed and the initial setup is a bit fiddly.  Otherwise it's IMO one of the hugest leaps forward in guitar technology there has been.  It will appeal to some people more than others, but if you get frustrated with the limitations of guitar tuning stability, intonation especially chords higher up the neck, dynamics being tied to tuning (more noticeable on lower tuned guitars) and don't use a trem, then definitely consider trying one.

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I recently got a guitar modded by Jon Shuker http://www.shukerguitars.co.uk/ to have an Evertune bridge. Jon is a top notch guy, very professional (he sent me pictures of the routing process and kept me up to date on progress in general) and he did a great job.

I'll write out my review answering my own questions and hopefully if you had the same ones it'll be useful to you too. Feel free to ask any questions I've not covered.

How does it feel:

Under the picking hand, it feels good. It is comfortable and easy to mute on, there aren't any parts that could stick in to your palm. When you dig in it feels maybe a little less spongy to me than a normal guitar. But it didn't take me any time to get used to it.

Under the fretting hand, which was my main worry, it feels about 90% the same as playing a normal guitar if you set the bend sensitivity very close to zone 3. Zone 2 is where the note is held straight, and zone 3 is where the note can be bent. How close you go between zone 2 and 3 depends on if you want vibrato to be possible, or not, and at what point. You go between them by adjusting the tuning pegs, it is very simple and intuitive.

The ideal way to set it to me is where you can play hard and fret chords with decent technique and it'll always be in tune, but you can bend and vibrato as well. This means setting it right up to the edge of zone 3.

There's a tiny additional amount of additional pressure required to activate bends/vibrato in this state. It's not a deal breaker to me, but it's not unnoticeable if you A/B between an ET guitar and a normal guitar, though you get used to it almost immediately I find. I'd only discourage people who focus on lead playing and need to have that direct immediate connection with the string at all times. It isn't quite as liquid in feel, that's just a limitation of the design.  You only really notice this in use with very subtle soft vibrato.  Anything else I forget about it very quickly.

How does it sound:

Acoustically it seems a little different. I guess slightly less loud and bold sounding. Nothing drastic on this instrument, though I bought it very recently used, specifically to be modded, and only had it a few days until I could drive across to drop it off for the install.

Electrically, in all honesty I can't tell you. I had no intention to take A/B clips. It's not reversible (a lot of wood gets removed from a hardtail install), so I was either going to love it, or want to sell it immediately.  Thankfully I love it and the guitar sounds like it should do so I'm happy.

General notes:

It's a little fiddly to change the setup. It kind of feels like every string is setting up a floyd rose - you've got to balance the pitch, intonation, and action round in a bit of a circle until it's dialled in. Jon copied my previous setup really well and I could've left it, however I decided to lower it a hair due to the slight additional stiffness from the bridge, and it's a bit of a pain going round it circles re-intonating each string after each height adjustment. All tuning is done via allen key, tuning pegs are only to get the guitar into zones.  It takes quite a lot of turns of the key to go between notes, but this is also useful as it allows easy fine tuning of the pitch of the string, which is important as it'll hold straight on whatever note it is tuned to in zone 2.

Once it is set up, it's set up. You can change strings like for like and when you're in zone 2 you're done, you don't even have to stretch the strings if you don't want to. When Jon handed me the guitar to test he informed me he hadn't stretched the strings at all. It was dead in tune. It remained dead in tune for hours of playing until I decided to tweak the setup the next day.

However, as strings stretch in they still 'detune', which means the bridge will be compensating. This means if you're trying to set it up on the edge of zone 2 and zone 3 you'll be going further from zone 3 as your strings stretch in, meaning you might need to move the tuning pegs to get it back to your own personal sweet spot. So you do have to stretch the strings in if you want a consistent bending experience, even if they don't actually go flat (it's a bit weird at first!).

In terms of the whole dynamic/pitch envelope thing I love it, from the first chord I new I'd be happy with it. I play in drop B, and it's so easy to send a B string 10-15+ cents sharp with a strong attack, even with a thick (and therefore muddy) sounding string. I usually use a .064, and gave Jon one of those to go with the 11-56 set I use (I just discard the .056 usually). He emailed me during the week saying it was fine set up with the .056, and it is even with my gorilla thrash technique. No noticeable fret buzz, doesn't feel floppy, has a nicer attack to it than the thicker string, plus in the extreme long run I'll be saving some money as I won't need to buy the additional thick low B. You can play chords wherever you want against open notes and they sound great. There's still the limitation of the straight frets on the guitar, but it sounds so much more in tune than a non evertune guitar in this tuning that really it doesn't matter.  There's a calculator on the website FAQ under 'what tunings are supported' to see if your string gauge will work for your tuning https://evertune.com/faq/faq.php#

I'm undecided on modding my existing guitars, and I actually do think there's something to the sound of the slight out of tune-ness of guitars, plus the feel of being able to apply very subtle vibrato easily on a regular guitar is nice. But the way I play, and the parts I write at this moment in time, the evertune means I can actually do full takes of passages that otherwise I'd be stopping and retuning for by position/dynamics very often.

I wouldn't recommend one to a beginner because I think it's important to learn how to fret properly and to develop your ear for pitch on a standard instrument.

But if you feel like you lose your life to retuning between takes/by position/chord, especially if you record heavy handed drop tuned stuff where you have to tune according to dynamics, definitely consider trying an Evertune.  Or if you play against instruments that don't go out of tune, e.g. synths, or if you just want to play your guitar and not worry about it going out of tune every time you do a few bends or if you want to be able to move about on stage without worrying your fretting will pull the chords sharp.  

guitarfishbay

The guitar itself - just a used MIM Telecaster, the bridge + install cost more than the guitar itself.  I couldn't bring myself to get an existing guitar modded in case I didn't like it.  The guitar has Bare Knuckle Flat 50's fitted which sound great.

I went for the brushed nickel bridge, I felt like the chrome was a bit too shiny for my tastes.  The pickup needs to be installed upside down but it's not an issue.



Also got one of those Rockinger control plates with the moved volume knob.  It's quite an improvement over the traditional design, much easier to use the switch.  Unfortunately they only do a chrome one but it doesn't bother me that the metals are mismatched.

Winny_Pooh

Very interesting 

blueskunk

Ugly tings though :-/

guitarfishbay

blueskunk said:

Ugly tings though :-/

Well, I mean it’s a Telecaster so it was never off to a great start to begin with.

guitarfishbay

Winny_Pooh said:

Very interesting 

To be able to actually record parts as intended in complete takes will sound better than trying to piece together tuned to the chord punch ins to compensate for tuning.

It is incredibly liberating from a writing standpoint. 

I didn’t actually realise how long it’d been around. This testimonial from Alanis Morissette’s guitarist is from 2010.

https://youtu.be/6g-1OYg7efY

guitarfishbay

Not to mention you can loop record a section as long as you like and be able to cross fade between takes and the tuning will be the same on all takes. Can’t do that with a normal hard tail guitar.

blueskunk

guitarfishbay said:

blueskunk said:

Ugly tings though :-/

Well, I mean it’s a Telecaster so it was never off to a great start to begin with.

 

guitarfishbay

blueskunk said:

guitarfishbay said:

blueskunk said:

Ugly tings though :-/

Well, I mean it’s a Telecaster so it was never off to a great start to begin with.

 

Personally I wouldn't want a guitar with the chrome one, it's a big piece of metal and the chrome is too shiny for my own tastes.  It seemed even more shiny in person, I got to look at both units side by side and the nickel was the obvious choice to me.

I think the black one looks pretty smart too on a more metal looking guitar.  





I don't have a Floyd Rose guitar anymore, but I think the evertune probably takes up roughly the same amount of space on the front of the guitar, but with it being a solid block it looks a bit more imposing. 

Sassafras

They're a bit expensive, aren't they?
Not sure I care that much about being perpetually in tune.

guitarfishbay

Sassafras said:

They're a bit expensive, aren't they?
Not sure I care that much about being perpetually in tune.

Yeah it's not cheap.  The bridge plus labour was £350 for this install.  That's more than the guitar itself cost.

It won't appeal to everyone.  In fact when they've been discussed on here in the past the general concept has had a mixed reaction.  I think @ToneControl has tried one of these bridges, but I don't remember many other people having had a go.

I guess it's pretty simple to work out if you should try one.  If you think you could benefit from it then try it, because honestly it does work.  If you don't see a point then I probably would just stick to a normal guitar.

mistercharlie

How is that Tele control plate different from just flipping a standard one, and re-jigging the knobs?

guitarfishbay

mistercharlie said:

How is that Tele control plate different from just flipping a standard one, and re-jigging the knobs?

Because if you flip a standard plate you still wind up the tone control right up against the pickup selector in one position.  Personally I find it important to be able to access both controls on a Telecaster.  With this plate it's easy to access the switch without the knobs getting in the way.

https://www.rockinger.com/index.php/en/Rockinger-Control-Plate-for-Tele,-SPECIAL/c-WG152/a-2500C 



vs

mistercharlie

guitarfishbay said:

mistercharlie said:

How is that Tele control plate different from just flipping a standard one, and re-jigging the knobs?

Because if you flip a standard plate you still wind up the tone control right up against the pickup selector in one position.  Personally I find it important to be able to access both controls on a Telecaster.  With this plate it's easy to access the switch without the knobs getting in the way.

https://www.rockinger.com/index.php/en/Rockinger-Control-Plate-for-Tele,-SPECIAL/c-WG152/a-2500C 



vs

Got it! Subtle...

guitarfishbay

Yeah subtle but makes a noticeable difference.

I don’t understand why it’s not the standard position to be honest. It barely looks any different but it’s much more usable.

p90fool

Thanks for the excellent, detailed review, not least because it makes it evident that it's not for me.

The point about recording is interesting though, there are occasions where I tune a guitar in a session to suit the specific fingering I'm using but I do it less and less these days, simply because it all starts to sound like guitar soft synths if you do it obsessively. 

guitarfishbay

p90fool said:

Thanks for the excellent, detailed review, not least because it makes it evident that it's not for me.

The point about recording is interesting though, there are occasions where I tune a guitar in a session to suit the specific fingering I'm using but I do it less and less these days, simply because it all starts to sound like guitar soft synths if you do it obsessively. 

I guess it comes down to the intended aesthetic of the music, and how achievable that is with the instruments a person already has.

Of course technique plays a factor too, but as you’re aware there are some passages where retuning to the part is necessary if the desired result is as close to in tune as possible. This can be further complicated by the lower tunings and heavier handed dynamics - sometimes parts are supposed to be played harder to sound right, and lower tunings generally mean less tight strings which are more prone to going sharp.

I think evertune has more merit for a person doing drop tuned modern heavy music, or playing along with synths in a slick modern pop type setting, than to someone playing classic rock type music. But that’s not to say it wouldn’t be useful, it just might not be necessary. And I do think there’s an element of imperfect tuning that is part of the character of some styles and songs. 

You can detune zone 2 underneath the note, and tune to zone 3 and have it play like a regular guitar if you want. Being honest I doubt I’ll do that, I’d just pick up a different guitar instead

p90fool

guitarfishbay said:

p90fool said:

Thanks for the excellent, detailed review, not least because it makes it evident that it's not for me.

The point about recording is interesting though, there are occasions where I tune a guitar in a session to suit the specific fingering I'm using but I do it less and less these days, simply because it all starts to sound like guitar soft synths if you do it obsessively. 

I guess it comes down to the intended aesthetic of the music, and how achievable that is with the instruments a person already has.

Of course technique plays a factor too, but as you’re aware there are some passages where retuning to the part is necessary if the desired result is as close to in tune as possible. This can be further complicated by the lower tunings and heavier handed dynamics - sometimes parts are supposed to be played harder to sound right, and lower tunings generally mean less tight strings which are more prone to going sharp.

I think evertune has more merit for a person doing drop tuned modern heavy music, or playing along with synths in a slick modern pop type setting, than to someone playing classic rock type music. But that’s not to say it wouldn’t be useful, it just might not be necessary. And I do think there’s an element of imperfect tuning that is part of the character of some styles and songs. 

You can detune zone 2 underneath the note, and tune to zone 3 and have it play like a regular guitar if you want. Being honest I doubt I’ll do that, I’d just pick up a different guitar instead

Absolutely, it's another useful tool in the box, and even I would love one on a gigging acoustic!

ToneControl

I have 2 guitars with an evertune bridge
Both of them are VGS, a Euro brand, these models are now not available new
one of them was SRV-strat style, I replaced the neck with a True temperament Warmoth, and put in EMG SAs and an 89, with active Bass-style EQ.

to be honest, I have played this guitar 90% of the time since I got it, ignoring the 6 boutique guitars that hang next to it.
That should give you some idea of my opinion.

What I also notice is that the strings feel 1 gauge up from what they actually are, I think since is because the resistance to bending is slightly more than a "normal" guitar

my other VGS is the one 2:00 into this video:

I have not altered this one at all. IN fact I have not retuned it or played it for over a year (neck is ~Mex quality, so not as popular as my other guitars with me), let me try it now:
all 6 strings in tune, but they are all about 1 or 2 cents below normal pitch, so it probably needs a tweak
I think I should put a new neck on this

My fingerboard on my main guitar is the same as on the first guitar in this video, but without that model is a bit too metal-looking and I don't like the EMG SLVs (https://www.amazon.co.uk/VGS-Radioactive-Denander-Signature-Evertune/dp/B0098NB9GY)

ToneControl

p90fool said:

Thanks for the excellent, detailed review, not least because it makes it evident that it's not for me.

The point about recording is interesting though, there are occasions where I tune a guitar in a session to suit the specific fingering I'm using but I do it less and less these days, simply because it all starts to sound like guitar soft synths if you do it obsessively. 

I'm not sure what you mean, surely a soft synth would be providing guitar noises in "Twelve tone equal temperament" TTET https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equal_temperament ;

Whereas if you tune a guitar for the fingering, you are probably closer to  "just intonation" I think?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equal_temperament#Comparison_to_just_intonation

Or do you just mean retuning so that higher voicings are in tune with TTET?

ToneControl

guitarfishbay said:

In terms of the whole dynamic/pitch envelope thing I love it, from the first chord I new I'd be happy with it. I play in drop B, and it's so easy to send a B string 10-15+ cents sharp with a strong attack, even with a thick (and therefore muddy) sounding string. I usually use a .064, and gave Jon one of those to go with the 11-56 set I use (I just discard the .056 usually). 

I would emphasise this point further
I have a heavy right hand technique generally, using a 3mm stubby (but probably not as hard as someone doing djent chords, yet I use 9-46 sets, which do change pitch noticeably if you hit them hard

On my Evertune guitars, the bass strings are far more stable, with no noticeable change in pitch, and are more like a set of 11s or 12s