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Hello all,
My post is about a sense of fatigue with the tone of electric guitar, especially in jazz music. I'm putting it in the gear section because I think the signal chain is the key to my problem.
First, I feel I should give some context to where I'm coming from.
I've been playing for a good long while now, and I've played my main guitar, a heavily modified Gibson ES-139, for over a decade. I have a bachelor's degree in "music performance, popular music - Electric guitar", whatever that really means.
This guitar has been through a lot with me, and every so-called high point of my even more so-called career has been experienced through it.
I fell in love with how it played, and that has never changed. No other guitar has ever played like this one, including the other ES-139 the store had in stock when I bought it.
Because of this, it has been modified so that I don't have to own or play other electric guitars. It has an HSH pickup configuration, with individual on/off switches for all 3 pickups, as well as the option to coil split on the humbuckers. It has 21:1 tuners and upgraded electronics, as well as a faber screw-locked bridge and aluminium tailpiece, though those are about to be replaced with a vibrato bar setup and rolling bridge whenever I can be bothered to do it. All that's original is the wood.
Aside from my weekend in the college and all which that entailed, I worked for 6 years selling guitars for a living.
Recently I turned 30, which means that I've been doing this for 2/3rds of my life. It's strange to think about how important the guitar has been for me, in how it made me relocate with the purpose of studying it in-depth, and with the intention of making a living from playing it. And today, it's not even the first hobby I tell people about. I'll only mention I play guitar to someone who's told me they do.
All of this context is to say that I've done my time and have seen and heard a lot of different ways of dealing with the electric guitar. However, there is an ever-looming problem I've been having. I am so tired of the sound of jazz electric guitar. I can't seem to find any type of tone where I don't get sick of it after a while. This includes many great, inspiring players, too.
Is there something intrinsically fatiguing about the midrange-heavy sound of an electric guitar? Or could it be the approach (John Scofield in a cathedral OR Kurt Rosenwinkel also in a cathedral) that many jazz guitarists use that's saturated my mind to the point of exhaustion? Simply put, I can't seem to get it to work for me. I seem to feel that my own tone gets monotonous quite quickly, even if I try different approaches. Every time, it's the same fallacy as switching shoes; "oh this feels much better" simply by virtue of being a change-up.
It's not just myself I find boring, though. I also frequently skip the guitar solo when I'm listening to music, and I lament the approach many guitarists use to their tone. Yet, I don't know if I have the answer. I feel that the electric guitar somehow has less of an expressive or dynamic range compared to my classical guitar. But, I can listen to hours of Michael Brecker at his top intensity without feeling bored. That's not to say that I have sax envy as so many do, but rather to say that I can listen to one "flavour" of music endlessly.
It's different if it's solo guitar. I love listening to guitarists playing alone, like Joe Pass, Ted Greene, Ralph Towner, and Doug de Vries. The disparity of these styles and tones tells me that it's not about me having an "ideal tone" for all guitar playing. In band settings, though, I struggle to think of great sounds that would entice me through an entire album or concert.
So, while I'm not exactly looking for answers to what I should try in terms of signal chain specifics, I'd love to hear some thoughts on how to approach the tone of the electric guitar. While it is gear-specific, it's more of a methodology question. Is this a familiar rut? How do you get yourself to think outside of the box? Is the electric guitar simply an inferior instrument? Any and all thoughts are, as always, welcome and eagerly awaited. 
In the meantime, it's Friday afternoon and I shall sit down to experiment. Tonight's agenda is ordering a pizza and trying out new approaches almost at random. I hope you all have a lovely weekend.
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What you’re describing strikes me as completely subjective. To you there’s something fatiguing about the sound of electric guitar, but to me there isn’t, at least at not as broadly. I mean, sure, there are players and sounds I find displeasing enough that’ll skip them, but overall I’m as drawn to electric guitar as I ever was.
I have a few guitars, and I switch off between them to keep things fresh, break out of ruts, etc. Even though the differences are not all that dramatic, it works.
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What John A just said. It makes good sense to me, and I do hear what you are saying about maybe...too much of a good thing??
You have to get out of your tonal rut. I'd say there are a few ways to do that.
For myself, and I have gotten bored with a lot of music from time to time, sometimes I don't listen to music at all! It just doesn't do what I need it to do at times.
Possibilities: listen to old 30's and 40's or 50's music. Listen to their craftsmanship, inspiration, beautiful recordings and compositions, their abilities at emotions, and at "swinging". I love listening to the guitarists in that period. They were so different from what we have to endure now 
and many of them excelled at their instruments. Same with the vocalists then.
Other remedies: classical guitar, sounds and studies, a good flattop six string, your own compositional activity, put the electric guitar down for a spell, give it a vacation!!!
But enjoy your musical path, wherever it may lead you.
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Go out and get a strat. Sits much better in a mix. Much larger variety of tones. Switch on and off. Probably won't be as comfortable to play. That might do you some good.
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