Technical Help

[Brian_MAy]

I’m a fairly good guitarist and I belong to a band that would like to start gigging soon. The only problem is I don’t have enough technical knowledge on how to deal with the amps and pedals and all that jazz to gig with. So could anyone help me with like the settings and how to get certain sounds for an amp? Just general knowledge about this stuff would be greatly appreciated.

Also I plan on getting enough money by Christmas time to get a decent amp and maybe some pedals to gig with. If you can leave some suggestions on what I should buy that would also be appreciated.

Thanks for the help

Brian May (I wish)

 

[famous beagle]

We'll need a bit more information:

1) What type of music are y'all going to be playing?

2) How much money do you have to spend on the amp and pedals?

3) What type of effects pedals are you wanting to get?

 

[Brian_MAy]

1) Our band tends to play more of a classic rock style, we cover a few Queen and Zeppelin songs every now and than.

2) I’m willing to spend anywhere from 500 to a 1000 USD for an amp

3) I’m not exactly sure what kind of pedals I would like to get, perhaps something with a 70's U.K. Rock sound.

 

[matt rascal]

It sounds like you're going for a marshall/vox type sound. So thats a start. As far as pedals go, you should go out and try a Tube Screamer, Big Muff, and maybe even an arbiter fuzz face.

This is just a jumping off point from what little information you have given us.

 

[Brian_MAy]

I've tried both Marshall and Vox amps in the store and neither of them impressed me, they do produce the sound I want, but none of them seemed to produce that much quality. Is it just my lack of technical knowledge that made the quality seem bad or is there a specific model I should check out?

 

[invisiblenemies]

I bought a Marshall amp a while back & have since regretted the purchase. I could never get the tone I was looking for. If I happened to stumble across a good sound, it wouldn't be the same when I turned it on the next day.

I play thru a '74 Fender Twin Reverb now. Big difference.

Best of luck to you.

 

[Dani Pace]

Fender twin reverb, small enough to haul around, variety of tone, and enough power for most gigs, I agree you can't beat them. Keep pedals to a minimum, a Tube Screamer and a Wah pedal maybe. Don't forget lots of extra cables, you can never have too many of them. If you want a vintage sound, the best way to get it is to use vintage gear, modern amps seem to be more midrange than amps from the 60s and 70s so they don't sound quite the same.

 

[Superhuman]

I have both a Marshall DFX100 and Mesa Boogie Rectifier Recordng Preamp and neither of them have nailed my ideal tone. However I have achieved some excellent tones when jacking either of them up with a Line6 DM4 stomp box. IMO that's the best of the basic stomp boxes out there, you can get pretty much any type of distortion ever created through it. After that, it comes down to how you EQ your amp, ancillary effects (chorus, flanger etc) and the tone the amp itself generates. For example, the Rectifier will created a more nasal crackly type sound under extreme distortion whereas the Marshall sounds a bit tighter... each has it's own place depending on the sound you are looking for. You'll see that one on front of Metallica and U2 (very different sounds). The other alternative would be to go for a Digitech GNX4, it's great for live applications. You can load up your sounds and then never have to worry about getting your sound right again.

 

[freshmattyp]

I woukld suggest looking for a used Fender Blues Deluxe, then add in some flavor of Distortion, and maybe a wah of some sort.

 

[seismetr0n]

i played through a fender hotrod deville 212 before, and i think it would get the sounds you're looking for... it served me well for many years and different styles, until i went back to playing metal... it just wont do that. (by metal i mean 'slayer' metal not 'sabbath' metal... it'd prob do sabbath metal ok.)

If you find an amp that has the sound you're going for , you shouldn'e need any additional (dist) pedals, just some efx.

gl

 

[michigan~]

does it matter how many watts it is?

 

[Farview]

In order to get the sound you describe, you should probably get a Marshall JCM800. The JCM2000 can get that sound as well. No two Marshalls sound the same, they all sound like Marshalls, but they don't sound alike. If you are going for Brian May's sound you need an old Vox AC-30, not these new transistor based- amp modeling things. The Marshall is the sound of 70's rock.