"Changing the Guitar Industry": An Interview with Anders Nicklasson of True Temperament

A few weeks ago, at Guitar Summit 2025, I had a conversation with Anders Nicklasson of True Temperament – partly for a feature I was working on for Rolling Stone Germany (you can read that here). True Temperament shared a booth with Mattias “IA” Eklundh, whose Freak Guitar Lab instruments are also equipped with the company’s distinctive fretting system. For anyone unfamiliar, True Temperament is the Swedish company behind those instantly recognizable “squiggly frets” — a groundbreaking fret design that delivers near-perfect intonation across the entire neck.

True Temperament was originally founded by the late Swedish guitarist and inventor Anders Thidell — a visionary whose aim was to finally solve the age-old problem of imperfect guitar intonation and make every note on the fretboard ring true. In our conversation, Anders Nicklasson told me about the company’s beginnings and philosophy and why True Temperament might (and should) just change the way guitars are built.

Here’s the full conversation with Anders.

Anders, how long has True Temperament been around?

Quite a while. It started in the 1980s when Anders Thidell, the inventor, got so frustrated because he couldn’t get his guitar perfectly in tune. He spent about twenty years figuring out the exact placement for every note.

If you go way back, it’s similar to what Andreas Werckmeister did in the early 18th century when he tempered the grand piano — the thing that made J.S. Bach write The Well-Tempered Clavier and basically changed music forever. Anders Thidell did the same thing for guitar, which is much more challenging than a piano.

For the first fifteen years, nothing much happened because he was just one inventor working alone. About five years ago, we restarted the company, brought in new people from the guitar and other industries, and took the fretting system to the next level. Our mission now is to change the whole industry.

That kind of forward thinking seems very Swedish — pragmatic but visionary.

Maybe, yes. We don’t just sit back and accept that things “are the way they are.” We think, “There must be a solution.” We can’t stand guitars that aren’t properly tuned.

What’s funny is that many players say, “I don’t need that,” and then they strum a chord and slightly bend the neck to hide the bad intonation — giving it a bit of “vibe.” They don’t even notice they’re compensating! Why not just get it right from the start? With our fretting system, you can play in any key with perfect intonation and consistent tone across the neck.

We also discovered something unexpected: when you eliminate the “beating” between notes — that subtle interference — you actually get better sustain and a clearer sound.

Guitar players are known to be conservative folk. How was True Temperament received in the beginning?

At first, people didn’t understand it at all. We had to explain why this problem even exists — many guitarists didn’t realize it could be solved.

Now, it’s totally different. Everyone gets it. We have hundreds of top players saying, “Hallelujah — you fixed it.” You can find our instruments in studios everywhere.

But the industry is conservative. Many of those players can’t use our guitars on stage because they’re endorsed by brands that haven’t changed their designs in 50 years. Still, there’s an underground movement — younger brands and open-minded musicians are adopting it. The professionals are on board; the old guard not yet. But we have some interesting things in the works.

Like Strandberg guitars — people looked at them and thought, “What’s that?” But now they’re kind of mainstream because of their ergonomics. Do you see True Temperament the same way — as the next standard?

Exactly. That’s our goal: to make True Temperament the new normal, at least in the premium segment.

Think about it: would we want to go back to untempered pianos? Of course not. So if you look at a high-end guitar with straight frets, you should ask, “Why?” A premium instrument should have True Temperament because it’s simply more accurate.

Yes, it’s more expensive to produce, but once you’ve developed musically to a certain level, you start to appreciate what perfect intonation gives you. It lets you take your playing to the next level.

What are the questions you get asked the most?

The two big ones are:

1. “Can you bend strings?” — Of course. You bend by ear, not by distance — until the note sounds right. No problem at all.

2. “If I play a True Temperament guitar, does everyone in the band need one?” — No. It’s like a keyboard: the guitarist is in perfect tune, and everyone else adjusts naturally.

Another common one is about tuning. Our system uses slightly offset values, so we have tuners on the market with our presets. But you can also tune by ear — if you tune all strings relative to A, you’ll be fine.

You play guitar yourself, right? So when you go back to a normal guitar now, what happens?

It’s painful! [laughs] It just doesn’t sound right anymore. Not just to the ear — the whole feel is off. You start avoiding certain notes. That’s actually a downside of our system — it’s addictive.

For example, when Tico Lariedo got his first True Temperament guitar, he said, “Now I have to change all my guitars!” We might need to include a warning label. [laughs]

For someone who hasn’t tried it — when is the difference most noticeable?

Surprisingly, not just in complex chords or the upper registers. Our early adopters were often progressive players who already played very precisely, but the biggest difference is actually in rhythm and riff playing — open chords, heavy riffs, stuff that rings.

I once showed it to a rock guitarist, and he said, “This is how it’s supposed to sound.” That’s where it really shines — when many notes ring together cleanly.

Before we started to record this, you told me about your history with Lemmy from Motörhead — you worked with him and ended up on the cover of Rolling Stone.

Yes, that was another project. Around 2012 or 2013, I wanted to design a really good pair of headphones for rock music. Back then, most headphones emphasized bass, but I wanted to focus on mids — the guitar frequencies.

I thought: who would be the perfect band to collaborate with? So I approached Motörhead. They said, “Yes, of course.” We developed the Motörheadphones brand — headphones made for rock.

He was incredibly professional. Totally in control of his brand and image — very hands-on, even if he didn’t talk much.

I worked with his trusted team — the same people who worked with Metallica — and we went back and forth with prototypes and mixes. I’m from Gothenburg, a good place for rock and metal, so I also involved local producers to get that “perfect guitar midrange.”

Funny story — a journalist from The Guardian, who had worked with David Bowie, reviewed them and wrote: “They wanted to make rock ’n’ roll headphones — and failed. These are good for everything.” [laughs] We solved the midrange problem that had existed for 15 years.

We even launched the brand in Las Vegas — the only place Lemmy would travel to outside of LA or touring. It was a great time. He joked that if I didn’t get it right, he’d threaten me with violence — and I think he meant it! (laughs)