Timber Tones Guitar Picks tagline is “Luxury Guitar Plectrums” (plectrum is the English word for Pick by the way) and are available in a number of different shapes, sizes and most importantly materials. As the name suggests they are most famous for their guitar picks made from exotic woods such as African & Macassar Ebony, Curly Maple, Purple Heart, Zebrawood, Cocobolo etc. but they also make picks made from Bone, Stone, Shell and precious metals such as Gold and Platinum if you are exceptionally wealthy! It was very difficult to accurately demonstrate the differences in these picks as the change in tone is pretty subtle when amplified, I think it is more about what material and shape feels the best to you.
I bought the following selection of picks to test:
African Ebony
Macassar Ebony
Indian Rosewood (Groove Tone)
Royal Blood Rosewood (Groovy Tone)
Buffalo Horn Black (Groove Tone)
Buffalo Horn (regular)
Mother Of Pearl
The Groove and Groovy Tone picks include a special groove on the underside of the pick to rest your index finger in and the size of this groove seems to vary between the Groove and smaller Groovy picks. The Groovy Tone had a slightly wider groove and felt more natural to me (at least my pick did) and the Buffalo Horn was quite a narrow a very defined ridge which I didn’t feel so comfortable with. This is really down to how you as a player hold the pick and I tend to fidget around when I play moving the pick. There is also a concave area for your thumb which I love and makes it very comfortable to grip with no chance of dropping it while playing. The difference between the regular shape is that the Groove/Groovy tone picks have more of a point which I prefer. The regular picks do have a bevelled edge but in the case of the wooden picks I felt that they probably needed to wear in a little until they were perfect for me. The Buffalo Horn was my favourite with it’s highly polished finish that glides across the strings, the Mother Of Pearl was my least favourite despite sounding amazing because it was too shiny and I felt I might drop it. If I was to go on looks however the Royal Blood Rosewood, Indian Rosewood and Macassar Ebony picks look absolutely amazing and feel really great to hold as wood obviously has great natural grip, maybe I will try sanding the tips a little and see how that affects the feel for me.
Picks are a very subjective matter for guitarists, I have tried too many different types to mention over the past couple of years but I always like picks which are close to the old Tortoise Shell picks so the Buffalo Horn stood out as my favourite of the selection but it was a little thicker than I am used to. The Groovy Tone Royal Blood pick was really comfortable and I think I would really like a Buffalo Horn version of this so I may try that next.
To check out the range of picks head over to the Timber Tones Shop http://www.timber-tones-shop.com
