Les paul low end flub

daveyh

So, I’ve always had a problem with the sound of Les Pauls, low E fifth fret and below it’s gets .... flubby. What causes this and how do you fix it? Pickups? Amp?

Lebarque

Get a strat

richardhomer

In anything which is Blackface Fender-like - which tend to have an extended bass response - it seems to be an issue. Through my Mesa Lonestar Special, a Les Paul needs a lot less bass than other humbucking guitars.

Through Tweed and Marshall based amps, it seems to be much less of an issue.

thegummy

richardhomer said:

In anything which is Blackface Fender-like - which tend to have an extended bass response - it seems to be an issue. Through my Mesa Lonestar Special, a Les Paul needs a lot less bass than other humbucking guitars.

Through Tweed and Marshall based amps, it seems to be much less of an issue.

I don't have the luxury of playing a variety of real classic amps but I do use a modeller pedal (Amplifire) which is generally seen as sounding fairly realistic.

I find playing a LP through one of the Fender modelled amps causes massive boominess but when switching to a Marshall model the bass end is far more tamed.

I wonder how Joe Bonamassa does it since he seems to play a Gibson through a Fender more often than not

TimmyO

How high/low are the pickups set?

Branshen

A high pass filter would be able to dial out a flubby bottom end and tighten up your sound. Or use a suitable eq pedal to do the same thing. 

Panama_Jack666

Lebarque said:

Get a strat

...Said nobody ever.

sweepy

PAF pickups and good clones have a lot more clarity and definition than most of the pickups fitted to recent Les Paul guitars, I certainly haven’t noticed this with my LP Trad and OX4 pickups 

stimpsonslostson

TimmyO said:

How high/low are the pickups set?

This. I was astonished by how much difference correctly setting pole piece heights and the height of the pickups from the strings made to the tone of my guitar. 

There are loads of tutorial videos online & best of all it's free and totally reversible-

I used this article:
https://www.premierguitar.com/articles/22114-mod-garage-humbucker-height-adjustment


definitely give it a go before spending any money or rewiring anything. 

stickyfiddle

What pickups? 
Is it both pickups bringing the flub?
What is the rest of the signal chain?

guitarfishbay

Since other people have covered pickups my questions are:

What is your usual main guitar?

Are you trying to use the same amp settings for that guitar and your Les Paul?

If lowering pickups doesn’t help the next free thing to try would be just turning the bass down lower at the amp. 

crunchman

thegummy said:

I wonder how Joe Bonamassa does it since he seems to play a Gibson through a Fender more often than not

Doesn't he use tweeds. Much more mid-range.

bingefeller

Get an EQ pedal and start to roll of some bass frequencies until it tightens up the sound.  

ICBM

They do that. It’s what makes a Les Paul great and anything else that’s touted as being as good as a Les Paul not great. Nothing else quite has that massive bass thump...

mrkb

stimpsonslostson said:

 
There are loads of tutorial videos online & best of all it's free and totally reversible-

I used this article:
https://www.premierguitar.com/articles/22114-mod-garage-humbucker-height-adjustment


definitely give it a go before spending any money or rewiring anything. 

I love watching Dirk Wacker videos.......

daveyh

I’ve always put the low E side of the neck pickup level with the ring and then matched everything to that. 

Ive always had this problem with LPs, whatever amp I’ve been using. But the vast majority of LP sounds I like are customs, and atm I have a killer 2001 studio. Maybe my ears are just expecting something different? 

ICBM

daveyh said:

Ive always had this problem with LPs, whatever amp I’ve been using. But the vast majority of LP sounds I like are customs, and atm I have a killer 2001 studio. Maybe my ears are just expecting something different? 

It sounds like it's the opposite problem to the one I have with Strats. Many of my favourite recorded sounds are Strats, a lot of my favourite players used them almost exclusively, and they sound fine... but whenever I play one they sound a bit thin.

Bucket

That shouldn't be the case - LPs should certainly have a bigger than average low-end presence, but never at the expense of other frequencies. They should have some amount of top-end spank as well - I once heard Pete Thorn say that the best Les Pauls sound a bit like big, fat Teles and I think there's something in that.

Try lower-output pickups. If you're using high-output pickups they'll be more compressed and will probably sound darker and flabbier - I've been fortunate enough to try an original PAF in the bridge position of a well-sorted Les Paul and it was a revelation.

Voxman

My LP is a 1990 Custom and I can't say I've ever had any such problem as the OP. In fact I'd say the bottom end is pretty tight through all my amps. 

Jonathanthomas83

All mine have been tight in the low end too, to the point where I try to get my other (non-LP)  guitars sounding as good as the Les Paul does, because the others I have don't get anywhere near as tight.

daveyh

Bucket said:

That shouldn't be the case - LPs should certainly have a bigger than average low-end presence, but never at the expense of other frequencies. They should have some amount of top-end spank as well - I once heard Pete Thorn say that the best Les Pauls sound a bit like big, fat Teles and I think there's something in that.

Try lower-output pickups. If you're using high-output pickups they'll be more compressed and will probably sound darker and flabbier - I've been fortunate enough to try an original PAF in the bridge position of a well-sorted Les Paul and it was a revelation.

Other frequencies aren't losing out, its just that theres too much low end on the low E, first 5 frets or so. I do like the idea of a big fat tele though, that would be something to chase.

Agreed to the lower output pickups, although choosing could be a problem as I'm thinking LP standards It's Slash, Perry, Gibbons are quite varied.