My Tone Quest Story - Dave
Let me start by saying that there is no ultimate guitar tone for everyone. UGT, as I’ll refer to it from now on, is a totally subjective thing.
What is the UGT for Eric Johnson isn’t the UGT for Angus Young, nor should it be. Eric’s tone is very smooth and violin-like for the most part, while Angus’s is very raw and rough and in-your-face.
Most players tend to like playing with one particular sound, using it on just about everything they play. To me, that’s pretty limiting.
Some players, the ones who really stand out in my mind, are those who’ll use four or five different guitars on stage in one performance, so they can produce that perfect tone for each song. Of course, not everyone has four or five guitars to haul around everywhere, and must make do with what they have.
This is where a guitar with combinations of pickup types comes in very handy. Jackson makes some guitars with a humbucker in the bridge, and then two single-coils placed as middle and neck pickup, a la Stratocaster. This makes for a very versatile guitar, tone-wise. Richard Thompson, folk-rocker, has a very oddball guitar with a humbucker, a P-90, and a single-coil Fender type pickup in it.
Talk about tone variation!
Generally speaking, you can achieve just about any tone you could want with two guitars, a Fender or derivative thereof with single-coils, and a Gibson or derivative with humbuckers. Throw in another one with P-90’s, and you have all bases covered, except for maybe that good ol’ rockabilly twang you get from those old DeArmond or Gretsch pickups. But a P-90 approximates that pretty well.
And having two amps onstage doesn’t hurt, either. If you’re all-tube, one could be a Fender Twin, and the other a Marshall, for clean and overdriven tones, respectively.
If you can’t afford two amps and seven guitars, though, this is where effects come in. I like to have at least two different overdrive/distortion units available. One will be set up for a mild, bluesy overdrive, and the other for a harder distortion. Put the OD in front of the distortion in your effects chain, and when both are kicked in, you have all-out, spleen-ripping tone-shred going on.
Since my musical gear budget isn’t unlimited, I make do with two guitars, one amp, and several effects units. I can make a bunch of different noises with just that.
It isn’t how much gear you have that determines the sounds you can get, but rather, what you learn to do with what you have. Get very familiar with the controls on your guitars, amps, and effects. You’ll be surprised at what you can crank out without having a lot of different gear.
Play around with settings, experiment, and most of all, just play. If you can’t really afford the UGT for you, then learn to approximate it as best you can with what you have. That’s what all those knobs and switches are for!
For me, in a ‘classic rock’ setting, nothing, but nothing, beats a Les Paul Junior (P-90 pickup, of course!) and a good tube amp. Can you say ‘Leslie West’ or ‘Jethro Tull'? How about ‘Foghat’ or ‘Humble Pie’?
If it’s BLUES you’re craving, it depends a lot on what style we’re talking about. What's your flavor?
- Texas Blues wants a Strat played on the neck or middle pickup with some overdrive.
- Nasty ol’ Delta Blues wants an old Teisco Del Ray and a 1965 Silvertone tube amp.
- Chicago Blues wants a Les Paul or an ES-335 with a Fender Twin cranked up just to the saturation point or slightly above.
- ‘Shredding’, a la Steve Vai or Joe Satriani, needs an Ibanez, Jackson, or ESP twin-humbucker-with-whammy-bar guitar and a high-gain tube amp like a Peavey 5150 or a Carvin Vai Legacy.
- Jazz? Try an Ibanez ‘Artcore’ hollowbody or a Gibson ES-175 with a Fender Twin set clean, or just about to start clipping, but not quite there.
So, to reiterate, there is no one single Ultimate Guitar Tone. There’s only your Ultimate Guitar Tone!
Use the equipment you have and find the ultimate tone from it. When you get newer and better gear, you can update or upgrade your own UGT. But whatever you’re using, realize that it takes some experimenting, researching, and just plain work to find your UGT.
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