Personal Sound Tastes

John Sykes' tone is the epitome of Mesa Boogie Mark IIc+ colloseum.

He was guitarist of Whitesnake. And many of Whitesnake pop songs are from his era.

Petrucci also uses (or atleast used) Mesa Boogie Mark IIc+. But his tone sounds processed in comparison to Syke's.

 

I feel Petrucci has nice balance to his sound but he could do with a little less delay. He always sounds like he's playing in the colossium. One guy who totally wastes a perfectly good tube amp is Vai. His pickups themselves are powerful enough to send any amp into super hard clipping. On top of that he uses heavy Distortion, he might as well be playing an SS


any impressions/thoughts about those clips??

 

That might be because he doesn't like his tube amps. His contract makes him use Carvin Legacy, which he apparently strongly dislikes. His preference leans towards Bogner.

In either case, his tone is pretty good. And is an integral part of his music.

 

Wow! Now that is really strange. Why on earth would a man of his reputation endorse a product bearing his name that he himself strongly dislikes. I would think he'd have helped design the Legacy...weird, Anyway I prefer his tone from the days he played Breed pickups and heavier gauge strings, his sound had more character then

 

Its kinda strange I know. But this has come from a trusted person, who has met Mr. Vai in person. And yeah, I prefer the sound of the Breeds too. I even tried to buy them, but apparently no one in Sydney had them in stock. Everyone seems to want a Tonezone.

 

https://www.hughes-and-kettner.com/...de=prod&hus=8824e0efe85c38dd9056681e495750fd#

You think you can make a head like that? And sound like the clip "YOU" recorded a while back for us..?

 

The trilogy is basically three separate preamps in parallel and then a 100 Watt power stage. To me that looks like an amp built for someone who has no clue what he wants to sound like but wants it all just because he can afford to. Nice but its a little ambitious for me at this point. What I can do is half the power and give you a Lead/Crunch, Crunch or Clean channel in front with the same tubes so it will sound the same. I haven't yet worked out Footswitchable channel selection or a parallel effects loop which is what I'm going to try out soon, maybe then. Ask me again after a year or so and I probably can build you a trilogy. In any case those EL34s cost around 400 bucks each so you can expect a very expensive amp to buy and maintain

BUT the whole point here is to have an affordable versatile tube amp you can do much with without getting grandiose about it. Simple amps are better. I feel the best thing is a simple amp that has good clean and crunch sounds. If you want more just stick your favorite pedal in front and you're on.

In any case if you're talking about the light show in front, like I said before if you can figure out how its done and the materials are available I suppose I could try it out, but its going to be up to you to research extensively how its done.

Here's an idea of what such an amp would sound like (EL34s)
https://www.18watt.com/files/mystery_amp.mp3

 

What exactly is the diffference between clean n crunch sounds?

 

The above clip is a good example. the clean he gets in the beginning is just the guitar vol turned down, later he turns is up and is playing a crunch(overdriven) sound.


In todays lingo I suppose Fuzz/overdrive would be the same as Crunch and Lead is the same as overdrive/Distortion

 

Tubes have a natural tendency to compress when they're driven hard I suppose that's where to term came from. If you remember the old days they used to use a blade and slit the speaker cones to get Fuzz sounds. Those were all "Crunch" times

 

Hey...a fuzz is a totally different animal altogether. It has a very distinctive sound, it is not meant to sound like an amp overdrive at all. The torn speaker sound should be closer to it. When you hit a overdriving tube amp with a fuzz, it smooths out the sound a bit but still adds that fuzz flavour.You can simulate the same to a certain degree by running your fuzz into a overdrive pedal.

That clip sounds killer. Tube amp cleans and all those shades between clean and overdrive are just so rich and wonderful sounding

 

Yup I think you're more accurate there, I was searching

 

All said and done, nobody really knows the exact difference between these terms. People just use them to try to describe the sound that's in their head. With so many kinds of pedals and amps, the lines are totally blurred.

 

What would you suggest for a gilmour Comfortably numb sound?

I mean an amp or pedal under 10K

 

It will be more than a year before my next amp...ill stick with the laney till im in IInd PUC.

I'll do enough research by then!

That sound clip is friggin awesome!

 

You just need:
a delay pedal
a chorus pedal
a fuzz pedal

 

Oh wait, i typed wrong.

I meant the differnece between Crunch and Lead.


To me its just that the Lead should sound compressed, whereas the crunch shouldn't preferably.
But otherwise what is the difference?

 

^^add a treble booster to that. and he used a flanger(electro harmonix electric mistress) not a chorus.
the treble booster helped him get a very nasty fuzz.

 

K thanx for corrigendum.


But you know chorus and flanger are practically same circuits. And chorus can be made to sound almost like a flanger.
:

 

For amp builders its just the number of gain stages. To switch between Lead and Crunch you basically bypass one gain stage. Lead has three, Crunch has two. Lead goes into creamy overdrive territory.

So amps like the trilogy/Jsx have one gain stage for Clean, two for crunch and three for Lead. Three separate preamps all going into one power stage. I just build a Lead Preamp and use switches to cut out stages as needed. I just haven't figured out how to make that footswitchable. Involves the use of relays, i've never worked with them yet but I will soon enough...