Tailoring Your Tone

In the fourth part of our PAF focus, Mark Stow of OX4 Pickups explains how customised PAF repros can help you achieve the ultimate tone

- Mark Stow

Having explored the PAF humbucker’s essential components of magnets and coils in the past two installments of Pickup Lines, we caught up with Mark Stow of OX4 Pickups in Oxford, as he took a break from winding to help us deconstruct the bigger sonic picture.

“Tone is completely subjective,” begins Mark, “and a person’s interpretation of a PAF is personal to them depending on where they got their inspiration. The first PAF I tried was in an ES-345 with a Varitone and in every position, it sounded spanky, tight and warm. But every PAF ES-[series] guitar or ’Burst I’ve tried since has been different. When it comes to PAFs, I like to think it’s the guitar you’re hearing as much as anything else, as if they were mics picking up the sound of the wood.”

Natural variations in materials, construction, and aging provide all guitars with an inherent uniqueness and, according to Mark, the same is true of PAFs.