Lets look at our guitars thread

[Evangelion]

Dr Z said:

... What are some of the favourite guitar tones/sounds of the players here?

In my case:

1 - Fender Strat into a crystal clear Vox AC15 or 30 with a classic tape echo in between.

2 - Tele into a Fender Blackface just on the point of break-up.

3 - Les Paul into a Marshall stack with huge dollops of feedback but not too distorted.

(One of my pet hates is excessive distortion. When you listen to classic guitar sounds of the past, in many cases you'll find that they were not as distorted as you think they were. Something a lot of guys in covers bands have yet to learn. Most of the ones I used to play with, unfortunately.)

[andy-xr]

Dr Z said:

Thanks! I'm often on 2nd guitar duties in the band so it's something I'm working on.

In other news, a strat through a dimed 5E3 is just glorious!

What are some of the favourite guitar tones/sounds of the players here?

When I first heard it, I quite liked what I'd call the Andertons tone that the guys there have when they're doing demos of kit. Slightly on the edge of breakup, slightly rolled back volume pots with perhaps a BlueSky or something in there as well. Kind of a nod to an SRV type tone in a big room.

I spent a while trying it out, and I realised that works well for some people doing a specific thing in specific circumstances. Really though I sound more like me however the amp and guitar is set up. Not that that's particularly anything to aspire to but cleans for me are an ADA pre amp or a silver jubilee. Dirty is mostly a silver jubilee with a boost via an eq where needed. I quite like the graininess of the presence control so tend to have that quite high with the tone rolled back a bit on the guitar

[vournikas]

WRT favourite guitar tones, as I've never been able to afford "top end" kit I can only identify players with specific sounds that have resonated with me. Such as:-

BB King with his 355
Gallagher and his Strat
Moore and the ex-Green LP
Mustaine with his Jackson
Clapton and whatever he was playing live at The Fillmore as Derek & The Dominos
Gilmour

I get some nice sounds from my Ibanez SA through a Princeton Chorus, and in the last 12 months it's certainly altered what tunes I play compared to the PRS through the Vox. I much prefer playing clean with the former setup these days.

[JLC25]

Dr Z said:

What are some of the favourite guitar tones/sounds of the players here?

Currently on the Helix, the 4 patches I'm using the most -

DR103 Clean Channel - on the pedal front a Klon, Analog Delay, 3 knob Compressor and Room Reverb.
Matchless DC30 Channel 2 - With OCD V4, and Room Reverb.
Dumble ODS - With Klon, TS808, LA Comp, Analog Delay, Reverb.
JCM800 - Room Reverb, TS808 and Analog Delay

Seeing me happy so far, very versatile - will probably throw in a good AC30 on the edge of breakup and very clean Silverface to cover everything.

[Chicken Chaser]

vsonix said:

Only just got that! It's a ton o fun! Cost me petrol money, still smells of frankincense every time I take the cover off! I've been mostly subverting it (the accompaniment modes are immense) to make house and techno beats...

Edited by vsonix on Saturday 21st October 19:58

Is it a B series? 55n? Everytime I heard Drake Passion fruit on the radio I'm sure they ripped the sample from the arpeggio section.

[red997]

JLC25 said:

Currently on the Helix, the 4 patches I'm using the most -

DR103 Clean Channel - on the pedal front a Klon, Analog Delay, 3 knob Compressor and Room Reverb.
Matchless DC30 Channel 2 - With OCD V4, and Room Reverb.
Dumble ODS - With Klon, TS808, LA Comp, Analog Delay, Reverb.
JCM800 - Room Reverb, TS808 and Analog Delay

Seeing me happy so far, very versatile - will probably throw in a good AC30 on the edge of breakup and very clean Silverface to cover everything.

Out of interest - what's your fave clean amp model ?
I'm still faffing around, but strangely enough like the J-45 brt clean
Solo aint bad too

[Dr Z]

Some nice tone examples here.

JLC25 said:

DR103 Clean Channel - on the pedal front a Klon, Analog Delay, 3 knob Compressor and Room Reverb.

Would love to check out this setup but through an actual Hiwatt DR103.

My 'holy grail' tone is simply being able to go from clean to fairly high gain with just the guitar volume and work with the pick attack to vary how the tone distorts. The PH equivalent of having a 1000 bhp under the right foot, if you like.

This limits the kind of amps I play and very few amps have this response I'm looking for as I also tend to gravitate towards simple single channel amps...ever since I stumbled across Trainwreck amps I've been smitten. One day I will own one or more realistically, a good clone.

I have a tweed deluxe based amp (LazyJ J20) that gets about 99% of the way there and works very well indeed for the kind of stuff I play but the Trainwreck is the ideal.

Couple of examples;

Clapton - Layla:

https://youtu.be/fX5USg8_1gA

IMO, one of his best tones I've heard...love how he goes from clean at the start, winds the volume up and bam!

The solo tone is probably all heavily boosted up but that's cool by me.

Vai - Tender Surrender

https://youtu.be/Yw74sDWPH7U

Again fantastic touch sensitivity, clean to high gain, working the controls and pickups like a dream and tone for days...

I've seen several other clips of Vai doing the tune but don't come close... Pretty much dream tone right there, although some dirt box is probably involved in it.

In terms of most memorable tones of gear I've played;

A telecaster through an RI blackface deluxe reverb with an alnico Jensen (could be the P12Q?). Amazing clean tone.

La Cabronita tele through a massively treble boosted vintage Supro and a vintage Gibson amp. Big sound and rawk.

A '58 RI Les Paul through a big Marshall stack. Now that was something.

A strat through a very simple single channel EL34 amp dialled up to get it cooking through a vintage bassman cab of some description.

And of course my guitars through the LazyJ. A true desert island amp.

[enjo]

vladcjelli said:

Where's best to start? Replace pots? Wiring? Pickups?

Before replacing any parts or spending any money on techs (this would be the next step if you are unsure what you are doing) I'd be spraying some contact cleaner (try not to get it on the finish of the guitar) into the pot and turning it a few times. Has worked for me on similar issues many times.

[andy-xr]

Dr Z said:

Vai - Tender Surrender

https://youtu.be/Yw74sDWPH7U

Again fantastic touch sensitivity, clean to high gain, working the controls and pickups like a dream and tone for days...

I've seen several other clips of Vai doing the tune but don't come close... Pretty much dream tone right there, although some dirt box is probably involved in it.
.

To me, this sounds like the studio track being dubbed over a live video. I know Vai is Vai and could likely play the same thing exactly the same 101 times in a row, but that's tooooo studio on the link posted to have been re-done live.

I've also seen him play it live, and he wasnt as clean as that!

What I think may have happened is a signal was then fed back through processing to get the move from clean to high gain as well as the volume pot / pedal opening up. I dont think (though I'm not certain by any means) that the kit he has would make that kind of a move in gain but I guess some time in a studio and some friendly hands available to twist knobs and press pedals gives you the ability to do many different things.

[Dr Z]

andy-xr said:

To me, this sounds like the studio track being dubbed over a live video. I know Vai is Vai and could likely play the same thing exactly the same 101 times in a row, but that's tooooo studio on the link posted to have been re-done live.

I've also seen him play it live, and he wasnt as clean as that!

It appears you are right! Silly me, can't believe I missed it even after being suspicious of him not being able to replicate it in other more obvious live clips!

[JLC25]

red997 said:

Out of interest - what's your fave clean amp model ?
I'm still faffing around, but strangely enough like the J-45 brt clean
Solo aint bad too

Merits - the DR103 is a great pedal platform that can get very gritty if driven - The JC120 has that brilliant almost sterile tone that loves having a delay fed into it and Silverface gives great spank. I have used a few JTMs over the years so know the cleans can be brilliant.

Dr Z said:

Would love to check out this setup but through an actual Hiwatt DR103.

I had a made in Britain Higain 100w head, the clean channel is based off of a DR103 and are extremely close, teamed up with a transparent OD, and M13 for verbs. This is very, very close - in fact with a 10 band E.Q i reckon recorded they'll be impossible to separate. I loved the Higain but it wasn't overly reliable - the guys at Hiwatt are brilliant, and the first time it came back it sounded even better (they'd done a revalve and servicing as well as the fix. which I wasn't expecting considering I wasn't paying for anything) but taking it on tour was a worry, especially after switching from the absolute tank that is the Peavey 6505+ head.

[dodgepot]

I'm in the process of helping a friend sell some of her deceased husbands effects.

Included in this is a rather nice guitar collection.

I know very little about guitar condition or value so wondering what the best way to get realistic valuations so that she obtains a fair price.

If anyone has suggestions please reply.

For interest, the collection includes

Gibson ES175 ES347, ES 335, ES 355TD, 1990 Firebird, V2

Fender 1976 Thinline Telecaster, 1978 Tele

Rickenbacker 325V59 with Bigsby Trem

Ovation Legend

Hofner President

There are others but these are the most recognisable

Thanks

[niallf]

There are specialist guitar auctions/valuers, such as this...
http://guitar-auctions.co.uk/
It will probably depend a lot on the age of the guitars and condition.

[JLC25]

dodgepot said:

I'm in the process of helping a friend sell some of her deceased husbands effects.

Included in this is a rather nice guitar collection.

I know very little about guitar condition or value so wondering what the best way to get realistic valuations so that she obtains a fair price.

If anyone has suggestions please reply.

For interest, the collection includes

Gibson ES175 ES347, ES 335, ES 355TD, 1990 Firebird, V2

Fender 1976 Thinline Telecaster, 1978 Tele

Rickenbacker 325V59 with Bigsby Trem

Ovation Legend

Hofner President

There are others but these are the most recognisable

Thanks

I may know someone interested in the Fenders - condition is key with instruments like this - are they going to be sold as a players or collectors instruments - if you can get photos or your local to Surrey I'll be more than happy to give you a hand.

[B17NNS]

dodgepot said:

I'm in the process of helping a friend sell some of her deceased husbands effects.

Head over to...

https://reverb.com

You'll need to set up an account (it's free) and then you can look at their price guides. These are actual achieved sale prices from their classifieds.

https://reverb.com/price-guide

You can double check your findings on e-bay.

A note about reverb prices, it's quite a US centric site and guitars (especially USA made ones) tend to be cheaper in the US.

[JLC25]

B17NNS said:

Head over to...

https://reverb.com

You'll need to set up an account (it's free) and then you can look at their price guides. These are actual achieved sale prices from their classifieds.

https://reverb.com/price-guide

You can double check your findings on e-bay.

A note about reverb prices, it's quite a US centric site and guitars (especially USA made ones) tend to be cheaper in the US.

Also 99% of reverb sellers take the absolute piss with their prices.

[vsonix]

Chicken Chaser said:

vsonix said:

Only just got that! It's a ton o fun! Cost me petrol money, still smells of frankincense every time I take the cover off! I've been mostly subverting it (the accompaniment modes are immense) to make house and techno beats...

Edited by vsonix on Saturday 21st October 19:58

Is it a B series? 55n? Everytime I heard Drake Passion fruit on the radio I'm sure they ripped the sample from the arpeggio section.

It's a B-405 so kinda middle of the lineup as far as I can tell. Perfect condition apart from slight cosmetic damage to one of the pedals and a noisy volume pot - but the volume pedal is fine so it's not an issue. And yes, the auto-accompaniment section is great fun - it's inspired me to start making some tracks with very lo-fi production method. Think sampling grooveboxes and four-track recording.

[B17NNS]

JLC25 said:

Also 99% of reverb sellers take the absolute piss with their prices.

That's why you look at the sold prices and not the for sale ones

[LikesBikes]

Hi all. After waiting in all morning like a child on Christmas Eve, a nice man in a DPD van has just left this with me...



Inside (I hope) is a Les Paul Traditional. I'm currently following the instruction on the box to wait a few hours before opening it. It's killing me and probably unnecessary but better safe than sorry and all that.

Pics to follow...

[Eddie Strohacker]

Open the bugger. It's an implement designed to be thrown out of sweaty pubs into cold vans. It can take it.