I wrote before that my preferred picks are thin, but of late I have had a change of heart. I read an article in which a guitarist extolled the virtues of heavy picks, saying, “the heavier the pick, the bigger the sound” (or something to that effect). I didn’t believe it initially and went to my guitar to confirm to myself that my choice of picks was correct. I strummed a few chords and heard the familiar percussive sound of soft plastic meeting tense steel, and I went away satisfied.
But then in a recent trip to Manila, as I was doing my usual rounds of guitar stores, I decided to buy some picks. The store (JB Music Mart, if I remember correctly), however, didn’t have light picks and offered me some heavies; I hesitated for a while and then told myself, what the heck, I’ll try them. In the back of my mind I knew it was a mistake, but for 15 pesos apiece it was not going to be an expensive mistake.
When I got back home to Davao City I tried my new picks, and what I heard blew me away. Instead of sounding harsh as I had feared, the heavy picks gave very bright, very chunky, very percussive, very full, and very heavy sounds. No matter if I picked or strummed, the heavy gauged plastic gave a richer sound. It even made me play a little bit better because I had more control of each note.
So now I’m packing heavy picks, and so should you.
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Always going “middle of the road”, I have consistently gone with medium picks, Jon!
Thin picks split on me a lot, and thick picks always felt too thick in my hand. After reading this, though, I’ll have to go out and get some thick picks!
Jon,
So sorry ngayon ko lang nadagdag sa links ko blog mo.
Please visit Nick’s blog (www.mamutong.com) and read April 27 post.
fr. ron! i used to be a medium guy but turned to thins some time ago, thinking they were better. hey, send me some of those thick picks you’re buying!
pete: thanks for the heads up, and thanks for telling nick my identity. i actually didn’t know na wala palang pangalan ang web edition ng columns namin, so i’ll have to have that fixed.
my personal favorite is the ibanez heavy picks…it just feels so right…of course a medium pick works well on acoustics but sometimes i hate the plastic pick scapes it produces
hi george. i’ll have to score myself some ibanez heavies. do you think they have big equilateral ones available?
i think they do, but i haven’t tried the big ones, it hampers my playing style i think unless of course all i do is strum