Fishman Fluence Modern Question

[Alan]

For those who have used Fishman Fluences, specifically the Moderns, I'm curious if this only happens to me or if it's more common:

I had a used guitar show up with Fishmans, and at first take I actually enjoyed playing them. The extra clarity is nice, they are quite noiseless, and I was enjoying the sounds out of them. But after a week or so with the guitar, there is one thing that bugs me - on the bottom string specifically, the pickup really seems to accentuate the string slapping the last fret on the fretboard. I tend to pick hard, and definitely over do it at times, but none of my passive equipped guitars do this. Maybe it is the way everything is eq'ed, but I'm trying to not make drastic changes as I jump between guitars. It only seems to happen on the low E - I can't seem to replicate it on the higher strings. It almost sounds like a quack.

Any input? Or is it just me and my backasswards way of playing?

[Chris]

I'm ignoring your posts until you post a proper NGD thread of the glorious goodies you just got.

(And also because I've never used the Fishmans)

[Coop]

Interesting. I can't say I have noticed this issue with mine and I thrash the hell out of my strings.

I honestly thought I was going to hate the Fluence moderns and almost ordered replacements before my guitar even showed up as I have never liked actives. Absolutely love both voicings depending on what I am playing. I took the new guitar over to JJ's and he had a set ordered by the time I got home.

[Lozek]

I can't say I've noticed this on mine (I have three guitars with Moderns). I did have one set that I was using live where I had then set too high, and the plastic has been worn away by the string, but even then I didn't notice anything tonally.

[Leon]

I'm not sure if the Moderns have this feature, but there's a "High Freq Tilt" thing going on with my Open Cores. The Fishman design makes them really, really hi-fi sounding, which can let a lot of signals normally filtered out by ancient pickup technologies come right through. You could try activating it. I have mine setup on a push/pull pot, so when I pull-up, it activates the HFT.

It doesn't really attenuate the high end like a tone pot would do, it's more like making the pickup sound less hi-fi, is the best way I can describe it

[Naren]

I'm guessing that's just you. I've owned my guitar with Fishman Fluence Modern Humbuckers for over a year now and I've never experienced what you describe.

[Greg McCoy]

Could be a resonant frequency issue. Resonant frequency interactions between parts of a guitar can cause weird noise problems that manifest in super specific ways. Everything has a resonant frequency, and a guitar has many systems, each with their own resonant frequency, it can be hard to pinpoint. You would have to post a clip, those kinds of super specific things are hard to convey with words.

It could be any number of resonant frequencies interacting badly to cause issues. Does the problem occur in all positions on different settings of volume and tone controls?

It could also be an issue of intermodulation distortion. Which is a complex sort of thing. Basically since so many things are interacting on a guitar, sometimes two things just don't work together for whatever reason.

It's a difficult concept to wrap your head around though, and depending on circumstances, you can't really fix it. It's just how multiple systems come together.

Lowering the pickups and switching to 18v for more headroom are the first things to try if the problem is clipping, but I'm not quite sure if the problem you are describing is clipping or not.

[Greg McCoy]

If the issue isn't fret noise or lack of the proper amount of neck relief the first thing I would do is just get a ten band EQ (more bands is even better), and just start cutting bands completely and seeing how your problem responds to that. Try a different amp as well. That can help narrow down if the issue is due to frequencies interacting in a way that creates undesirable noise or beating.

If you entirely cut one band and the noise is gone that will narrow down what kind of problem it is. It could be an inharmonicity problem as well. Strat style guitar?

In the guitar world those kinds of problems are often known as "Stratitis", Sweetwater has a good definition here. https://www.sweetwater.com/insync/stratitis/ It's not exclusive to any one type of guitar, but certain combinations of specs are more susceptible than others.

[Lozek]

I'm not sure if the Moderns have this feature, but there's a "High Freq Tilt" thing going on with my Open Cores. The Fishman design makes them really, really hi-fi sounding, which can let a lot of signals normally filtered out by ancient pickup technologies come right through. You could try activating it. I have mine setup on a push/pull pot, so when I pull-up, it activates the HFT.

It doesn't really attenuate the high end like a tone pot would do, it's more like making the pickup sound less hi-fi, is the best way I can describe it

Yeah, Moderns and Classics both have HF Tilt pads

[Iron1]

My open cores don't do that. Instead they rule.

[Webdood]

My Merrows (open core) dont do that either.

[Alan]

I'm sure it's just me and my terrible technique. I only asked here because I scoured the web and couldn't find anyone had any similar experiences. I will keep tinkering but probably will end up with passives in it anyways. Thanks for all the feedback guys.

[Drew]

I'm sure it's just me and my terrible technique. I only asked here because I scoured the web and couldn't find anyone had any similar experiences. I will keep tinkering but probably will end up with passives in it anyways. Thanks for all the feedback guys.

Any way you could share a clip? I'm trying to picture this. Could be a setup issue too, but... that's a strange one.

[Iron1]

I'm sure it's just me and my terrible technique. I only asked here because I scoured the web and couldn't find anyone had any similar experiences. I will keep tinkering but probably will end up with passives in it anyways. Thanks for all the feedback guys.

I think everyone has playing idiosyncracies. I can't play with a middle single coil cause my pick clanks off it all the time. I have a buddy who can't play a Soloist cause his pinky knocks the volume down on every downpick.

[Greg McCoy]

I'm sure it's just me and my terrible technique. I only asked here because I scoured the web and couldn't find anyone had any similar experiences. I will keep tinkering but probably will end up with passives in it anyways. Thanks for all the feedback guys.

New guitar and new pickups? I would bet it's most likely an inharmonicity thing if I am interpreting your description correctly. It's actually a pretty widely known phenomenon on stringed instruments. There are so many things interacting though that you would have to identify which parts of the problem are mechanical and which parts are electrical and go from there. Technique problems don't tend to manifest themselves on specific guitars on specific strings. It's actually a problem that exists on all stringed instruments, but it usually less than audible unless another system on the guitar is acting sympathetically to make it audible. Either the resonant peak of the pickup is located in the same area to make it audible on another resonant frequency is interacting sympathetically to make it audible.

There's no easy description, but Manfred Zollner's book is probably the best you can get.



The English translation of the relevant chapter concerning the mechanical physics is located here.

https://www.gitec-forum-eng.de/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/poteg-1-3-inharmonicity.pdf

Realistically speaking, the reasonable answer for quick results is just, "Fuck with things until the problem isn't there".

In guitars it tends not to manifest as audible unless if interactions with another system are amplifying it, but on pianos and shit, it's one of the many reasons dudes who restring pianos charge so much and require ridiculous amounts of training. The same concepts are also why things like "stretched" tunings exist.

Reintonate the string and see if that helps, a poorly intonated string can make inharmonicity worse. Raise the action a bit as well, check relief, all that good stuff. Especially if the "quacking" sound is a bass type slap and pop thing coming from hitting the frets.

Of course, as someone who isn't a big Fishman fan, I say just replace them anyways.

[Greg McCoy]

Check the battery too obviously. A near dead or dying battery can effect things in weird ways.

That's how most of the really quacky sounds people have trouble replicating on envelope filters were recorded. Dying batteries. Some of the other fishman stuff on their acoustics unit are even designed with included envelope fuckery to help with dynamics, don't know about the fluences.

[Alan]

Bigger update:

Over the weekend I wired up a 500k pot and a Duncan Antiquity JB that I had laying around - which seemed to make the problem disappear, though the JB was tubby as hell in the guitar (which is all mahogany with a bolt on maple neck).

Last night I installed a used EMG85 that I snagged since it uses the same wiring as the Fishmans. I was hearing similar things.

I started thinking more about how I was picking and what was happening. So after reading your posts Greg (and between meetings) I increased the relief a little bit and lowered the action, it seemed to help with the "slap". It is a Floyd guitar (that is blocked) and I've been playing Gibson style for years, so I need to work on my technique and not pick downward as much. I have a second guitar here that is quite similar with passive electronics and a Floyd, and it is not nearly as noticeable on that guitar, so it is more my poor technique being amplified by the clarity of the active electronics.

The relief and action on the guitar is about where I'd normally set them, so I didn't think anything of the actual setup itself.

[noodles]

It's absolutely your picking technique, since I had the same thing going on. It was never anything I heard until I started recording, and then it would pop up on certain parts. Whenever I was playing riffs on the A string with an open E string pedal, I'd get the E string occasionally clacking off of the top fret. It happened when I'd lift my picking hand over the A string and back down onto the E string, since I was coming down on it too hard. It was a chore to get rid of, since I was basically picking too hard, and we all know picking hard = metal.

[Jeff]

I tried this after I read this thread on a couple different Fluence Modern guitars, and they don't seem to have any issue.

[Greg McCoy]

It is a Floyd guitar (that is blocked) and I've been playing Gibson style for years, so I need to work on my technique and not pick downward as much.

Give switching string brands a shot. Especially if you aren't using D'addarios. Floyds have a number of issues TOMs don't experience. The claws and springs can both make added noise due to sympathetic resonance. Guitars are a super complex series of interactions, but if you don't have the problem on other guitars and the trem is blocked it's not just technique.

You are going to drive yourself crazy if you attribute it to technique and it's something else, or more likely a combination of things. A lot of people have done that with Jazz IIIs. Including me. Becoming so obsessed with something that you think is a technique issue that is actually due to the complexities of all the bits interacting. That's why so many people switch to the Intune shaped Jazz ones. If it's not something you are getting on other guitars its at best something that is only made worse by technique.

DRs sometimes get it really bad. I'm a huge DR fan too. It's not as visible on guitar strings as it is on bass due to the string size, but it's part of the reason most string brands wind on hex cores for wound strings, when round cores are traditional. Make sure you are stringing ball end at the headstock too.

It looks like this on bass, most bass players have seen it. Basically the windings are coming loose and unraveling and causing a number of problems. That's why soldering the ends used to be a big thing on floyds, some people still do it. Keeps the wraps nice and tight and gets them to come in tune quicker. You have to stretch them more on a floyd for them to settle too. I'm not a fan of permanently blocking for that reason. There are some string makes that just aren't suitable for Floyd Rose style trems. It can result in some weird slappy sound you drive yourself crazy trying to find. Especially if you aren't stringing ball end at the top and you are cutting off the ball end bit and putting it at the bridge.



The Fender bullet strings are actually made partly for that reason. All the jazzmasters and those kind of guitars are already noisy as fuck, but if the windings start to come loose they are a shitty sounding mess.

[Leon]

Alan, you're a bass player first, right? I notice when I go over to my bass I have to recalibrate a bit to pick harder to get a good sound, and going back to one of my guitars with 8's on them, it takes a WHOA NELLY EASY THERE BUB second for me to adjust back

[Greg McCoy]

It's absolutely your picking technique, since I had the same thing going on. It was never anything I heard until I started recording, and then it would pop up on certain parts. Whenever I was playing riffs on the A string with an open E string pedal, I'd get the E string occasionally clacking off of the top fret. It happened when I'd lift my picking hand over the A string and back down onto the E string, since I was coming down on it too hard. It was a chore to get rid of, since I was basically picking too hard, and we all know picking hard = metal.

This is clearly why tall narrow frets are best. I've played a bunch of guitars with low action and extra jumbos that basically sounded like a slap bass with fret bouncing noises.

Recessed trems as opposed to un recessed trems are also more prone to fret clank IMO. Unrecessed and properly angled neck is better for picking.

[Alan]

It's absolutely your picking technique, since I had the same thing going on. It was never anything I heard until I started recording, and then it would pop up on certain parts. Whenever I was playing riffs on the A string with an open E string pedal, I'd get the E string occasionally clacking off of the top fret. It happened when I'd lift my picking hand over the A string and back down onto the E string, since I was coming down on it too hard. It was a chore to get rid of, since I was basically picking too hard, and we all know picking hard = metal.

Since I've pretty much only been a bedroom guitar player for many many years now, I'm finding that I've picked up a lot of bad habits. I used to think I could only play certain neck shapes/sizes, and come to find out it has to do with how I sort of hold the guitar classical style when playing. But because of my body shape and beer gut, the lower half of the guitar tends to be angled way from my body, which in turn makes for some weird wrist angles when trying to play. Because of that body angle, I end up picking downward more than I should, and since picking hard = metal, apparently these noises are the by product, and the active electronics only amplify them.

I've been primarily a bassist for 13 years now even though I started on guitar 23 years ago, so stuff like picking or plucking at a downward angle is cool ala Steve Harris. I've mainly played guitar this last year, and started recording some material I've been working on with a friend, so this shit sticks out like a sore thumb now. It's annoying to find and fix, but what can you do right? It's amazing what you find when you put your playing under a microscope.

Thanks for everyone's input, which helped me confirm it was my dumb ass.