that "shattered shards of crystal ice" guitar sound

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dougeast

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Hey Guys,

The time has come to delve into the world of effects. I have a Marshall Valvestate 100 amp which is fine for clean & dirty but how to go those few steps further and achieve that magnificent mid 80s Johnny Marr (The Smiths) or Will Sergeant (Echo & The Bunnymen) pristine "shattered shards of crystal ice" - to quote the once great now defunct Melody Maker - guitar sound.

Anyone any idea? I'm guessing Delay, Chorus & Compressor must be in there somewhere but I could really do with some advice.

Also I need a live set up more than studio. I know this is the rack forum but i thought it was still the most appropriate. Rack/pod advice is still good anyway as I'm in the process of starting up a small home studio as well so...

Thanks.

doug east
 
Post a sound byte, I'm not quite sure what you're talking about.

I'm gonna go yodel now.
 
sound byte

OK but that could take a while as I don't have my laptop set-up for sound very well just yet. But check out any early Smiths records eg This Charming Man, What Difference Does It Make or the Bunnymen on the LP Ocean Rain (especially Killing Moon) & that's the guitar sound I'm looking for. It's kinda similar to The Edge but way cooler.


Thanks for your interest.

Ciao.

doug east
 
Hello Doug,
i think the most important factor would be the guitar itself. What I immediately think of when I read your description of the sound you want, is a decent Fender strat with fresh strings, slightly distorted and with some compression with slow attack to bring out the snap of the guitar pick hitting the string (try the RNC from FMR Audio, great for other stuff in your home studio as well). Sure, some digital delay would be nice too. With that you should be able to get the sound of The Edge of U2 in songs like "Where the streets have no name" and such.

Chorus is too much 80's for me, but if that's what you're after, then why not. I'd prefer a Phaser in that case.

On lots of live pics you can see Johnny Marr with a Rickenbacker guitar. I don't have very much experience with those, but maybe you could try it out. BTW try a 12-string while you're at it.

Cheers
/Henrik
 
Kinda similar to The Edge but way cooler? I've never heard Johnny Marr or Echo and the Bunnymen's guitar player (whoever he is) described that way...

Just about every rack unit made from 1988 - 2000 has this sound in it. It's called some cheeseball name like "crystal" or "ice," and to me it sounds like 80's metal ballads. Any Digitech rack processor has this sound, or Rocktron, or ART, or Roland... you get the picture. Basically, it's super clean, compressed, with chorus, and you can throw a delay on there at the tail if you want to be "less cool" like The Edge.
 
Now we're rockin'

OK cool, now I have more idea of what I'm after but to take each one at a time:

Henrik: I use a Fender Squire, as mid to cheap end price range guitars go I'm very happy with the sound but interesting that you should name my two ideal guitars were I to have that kind of cash to throw around.

What exactly is the RNC? A rack unit? I'm afraid that up until a very short time ago the extent of my tech knowledge amounted to how to put the amp plug into the wall socket & how to put the guitar jack into the amp input & press the on switch. I've moved along pretty fast since then of course but still lacking in many areas.

Re chorus yes I agree but then I don't wanna sound like The Cure just maybe the barest touch to add some body to the sound.

Re delay yeah I always said The Edge should pay his share of the royalties to whichever brand of delay he uses.

Charger: Will Sergeant is the guy's name (Bunnymen) & he had that guitar sound down pat way before U2 arrived, in fact U2 ripped off the Bunnymen in many ways but here is not the place to go into that.

Great advice re the Digitech rack units will look into those. Are you suggesting that that sound has been dropped from more recent models? It is a bit out of fashion I agree but I don't care about that.

Funny that you can use the same sound set up to make such awesome records as those by the aforementioned & such awful ones as the 80s metal ballads you talk of - eesh thank God those have died a death. I guess the guitar choice would be significantly different. Don't recall too many 80s metal bands playing Rickenbackers.

Last point for both of you Henrik you say "slightly distorted", Charger you say "super clean". Guess the sound does vary a fair bit. Some Bunnymen tracks def have zero distortion but usually you can hear it in there with Johnny Marr.

OK many thanks have something to work with now :-)

Ciao amigos.

doug east
 
RNC = Really Nice Compressor. About £200. Are Echo and the Bunnymen big in Spain?
 
Yeah, that's what RNC means. You can find the company that makes it here: www.fmraudio.com . It's really a very good and very inexpensive compressor for most sources, a must for the home recordist. One disadvantage for live guitar use would be if you you'd want to turn it on and off while you play, because there is no foot pedal for it. Other than that, it's pretty much the best way to spend 200 bucks. You can make a search for it here at the bbs, and read other's opinion of it.

Well, it sounds like you have the amp and guitar you need (there are many good Squires as well as some really lousy ones). I think Charger is right about the Digitech stuff. Most of those guitar racks probably have a compressor built in, that would be OK for a guitar (but I still think you should try the RNC as well).

LOL at 80's metal bands playing Rickenbackers! Hockey sticks is what we over here call those guitars where the head is like 90 degrees to the neck (you know like Jacksons, Kramers, Hamers, Larrivees).

Cheers
/Henrik
 
Yeah, Johnny Marr gets a little more distortion, but he probably uses Fender tube amps. Edge uses Vox AC30s, so he gets a little "edge" in his sound too.

I just went back and listened to the sounds on Boy and October (U2, 1980 and 1981) and the sound was already there. Listen to Twilight on Boy, or any song on October except Gloria and you hear the signature, slightly distorted, delayed, very slightly chorused sound. His sound is also pretty dark, sounds like the bridge pickup in most cases.

Then I went back and listened to Echo and the Bunnymen, Heaven Up Here and Ocean Rain (1981 and 1984), and I heard what you're talking about. To me, it sounds like he's using Fender amps, maybe a Deluxe or a Twin or both, with a pretty clean strat, and a chorus pedal, and some reverb from the amp. On the later albums (Lips Like Sugar, etc.) it sounds like he switched to solid state, maybe a Roland JC120, so the sound is cleaner and brighter, but it was never really distorted. For this sound, I would recommend any Digitech processor. For the earlier sound, get a Fender amp and a Boss chorus pedal. Sounds like the bridge pickup + the middle pickup.

If you're gonna argue that one ripped the other off, you're gonna have a hard time convincing many people--it's apples and oranges. They're not even close to the same sound. Echo' sound is a lot more reverby and chorusy, Edge doesn't sound like he uses much chorus, and prefers delay to reverb. Edge's sound is dark, where Echo's is bright. Echo uses more stacatto chords, a la the Police, where edge uses a lot more single-note lines combined with open strings. They both had albums in 1980, 1981, and 1984, and they both had their signature sounds pretty much set already.
 
Duh!

Now I feel like a real newbie! RNC = really nice compressor. He-he, well, you gotta ask to learn!

Henrik amusing end post there but don't worry not into flames. Nice to find a fellow Bunnymen fan. Still maintain the Bunnymen were there first & yes while there are significant differences in sound for OUR ears if you play Bunnymen to non-pro music fans you get a tiresome amount of sounds like U2 comments.

Charger I think you're right about the Fender amp, we were using one in a rehearsal room & the sound I got was VERY similar to Bunnymen even without any effects or an RNC. Would possibly prefer a decent Fender to the Marshall but when you're reliant on sencond hand prices & you need an amp like yesterday you have somewhat less choice than you would like.

Henrik, yeah I remember the Jacksons etc, he-he, get the reference to hockey sticks. God, appalling. You yanks just loved all that shite in the 80s. Thank God for Nirvana!

Ciao ...and thanks again :-)
 
Well, to be fair it wasn't just the yanks...us Swedes made an unforgettable contribution with Europe. Remember those hairballs strapped with hockey sticks? "The final countdown"? But on the other hand: It was the yanks that bought their records...

Cheers and good luck with your guitar!
/Henrik
 
Eek dont remind me!!

Ahhh! Horrendous!! And I think that was number one in England too. Terrible! God now I have that bloody chorus in my head must go play some music (REAL music) quick...

doug east
 
In the 80's it seemed like almost every pro had either the Roland SDE-2500 or SDE-3000 digital delays in their rack. If you combine one of those with a thick sounding chorus pedal you get that sound.

The Roland SDE's can be found on Ebay or in used guitar stores and they are great delay units. Lots of character.
 
A huge Johnny MArr fan here. I know what you are talking about in terms of the sound you are looking for.

As you probably know Marr was pretty much guitar purist in The Smiths and used a Fender Twin Amp for a really clean sound. His treble was set high, and he used a capo frequently.

The kind of crystal sound you speak of was brought on by the frequent use of a chorus effect. He essentially used very minimal effects. Tremolo and chorus seemed to be his favorites.
His finger style chord techniques are what gives him the chimey sound.

I would say that his chorus sound had a very rich, Electro Harmonix Small Clone sound to it. He muddied it up sometimes on songs like "Suffer Little Chilren, and "Back to the Old house," but set it to brigthness on songs like "This Charming Man," and "Still Ill."

If you lsiten to him play live, you can hear that he has that rich chorus setting on almost all the time.

He simply alters the depth rate on his chorus when he plays those bright, jazz style nelodies.

He used digital delay as well for songs like "Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others," which was laden with it, to give it that broken glass feel.

But really, what gave Johnny that church bells chime, was his use of chorus, and a capo, and his very astute cluster chord, finger style technique. He didn't use many effects in terms of being a gear head, just your staple ones, like delay, tremolo, and chrous. He seemed to move towards geariness near the end of The Smiths.

But to summarize:
1. Brigth Chorus setting for chiminess
2. Capo
3. Clean amp on high treble
4. Tons of fucking talent.

That really is all that he used.
 
Arnold Jackson covered it really well.

The guitar used on most of those early singles is a Rickenbacker 12-string, as far as I know.

Also, email Johnny Marr. I'm sure he'd take a couple of minutes to tell you about his equipment.

Johnny is amazing. Wish I could find some Marr- and Edge-influenced guitarists around here. :)
 
JOhnny Marrs email?

Hey GUys,

Wow, excellent couple of posts. Yeah Marr is one talented bastard. But what exactly are you referring to Arnold when you say "finger style chord techniques" & "a very astute cluster chord"? Sounds intriguing.

Fender Twin sounds like it could well be the amp I'm looking for. It's an old valve amp...right? What does the Twin refer too, anyone know? I suspect that for the time being it'll be out of my price range. Does anyone know if you can replicate the sound using effects units?

Eurythmic, you have def found a Marr influenced guitarist here. We are searching for that clean chimey guitar sound for our band - we're called Space Saucers, I'll post our web site address when I've got the MP3 demos up.

So what's this about emailing Johnny Marr? You know where I can get his email? And he's up for responding to fans? Now that would surely solve the riddle...

Thanks for the interest guys. Ciao.

doug east
 
Re: JOhnny Marrs email?

Fender Twin sounds like it could well be the amp I'm looking for. It's an old valve amp...right? What does the Twin refer too, anyone know? I suspect that for the time being it'll be out of my price range. Does anyone know if you can replicate the sound using effects units?
Click to expand...

It's called the Fender Twin Reverb.

I think that Fender has re-released the Twin, but yes, you do want the older version. Newer Fender valve amps are circuit-boarded - it just isn't the same as classic point-to-point soldering. You definitely want to go with vintage, not reissue.

"Silver-Face" amps are less expensive than the older "Black-face" amps. A friend of mine on college, now an extremely successful amp builder, did that - he used a silver face Twin, and engineered the innards back to black face specs. It was a nice sounding amp, for sure. Problem was, I spent so much time in his dorm room, listening to him noodling on his amp, that I ended up hating the sound of my own amp, and selling it. :) So that's a less expensive way to get the great tone of a black-face Twin.

His favorite guitarist was Johnny Marr. I just never played in a band with him, because he was more interested in capturing tone than playing with others (hence, the amp-building profession I guess! :) ).

As far as effects units go, I'm not sure. The amp is the most important part of your signal chain, as a guitarist - but I bet that you might be able to approximate the Marr tone with a really nice chorus unit. That's something I wouldn't skimp on.

Eurythmic, you have def found a Marr influenced guitarist here. We are searching for that clean chimey guitar sound for our band - we're called Space Saucers, I'll post our web site address when I've got the MP3 demos up.
Click to expand...

You picked a great time to do what you do. Listening to bands like Belle & Sebastian, I'm almost positive that bands weaned on Marr/Morrissey and the Smiths and that beautiful britpop sound are going to be the future of rock and roll. And I think that would be just wonderful. Rock sucks right now.

I'd love to hear your demos, when they're ready.

So what's this about emailing Johnny Marr? You know where I can get his email? And he's up for responding to fans? Now that would surely solve the riddle...
Click to expand...

From his official website. Just look up "Johnny Marr" on Yahoo. I believe there's a section called "ask Johnny" or something like that - he picks questions, and then responds to them on the website. He may even respond to you personally - heck, if you look around the site, he may even describe a lot of what you're looking for in detail!

Good luck.
 
>>Wow, excellent couple of posts. Yeah Marr is one talented bastard. But what exactly are you referring to Arnold when you say "finger style chord techniques" & "a very astute cluster chord"? Sounds intriguing. <<

Well, Johnny used individual finger picks alot. Of course playing finger style allows a much quicker transition between strings, giving you that very chimey, almost stuffed chord sound. A good example would be "You just Haven't Earned it Yet Baby"

I have a guitar player magazine cover article on Johnny and he describes his technique and the tunings he used (he used f and e a lot but also many other open chord tunings)

If you lsiten to Nick Drake as well, he used the cluster chord finger-style technique a lot to, giving it that constant movenment sound as if a million chords are being run through while he plays. I cannot tell you how much I love that sound.

If you like Jefff Buckley, on his first album "Grace" Gary Lucas (formerly of Captain beefheartplays on the titel track and on Mojo Pin and he uses the finger style technique which sounds erily similar to how Marr Played in the Smiths.

I'm trying to transition into that finger-style technique now by using individual finger picks, which allows my note transitions to be really quick and close together, giving me a that constant movement sound.

Key word is "trying."

Get yourself some finger picks and try playig basic chords qucikly with them and you will se what I mean.

Also, kudos to the person mentioning Johnny's site, he asnwers a bunch of e-mails on it.

Give it a shot, and see what he says.
 
More on Marr etc

To answer Arnold first:

So you're talking about normal finger picking but with finger picks & using open tunings, right? But i still don't know what you mean by "cluster chord".

Funny you should mention Nick Drake as I am a huge fan. I got back into playing the guitar after years of not doing because I wanted to learn how to play like Drake. Hasn't quite worked out like that but...Anyway there's a great Drake web site which has nearly all his songs tabbed out & man are they precise! You know usually you try & play what someone else thinks is the song & it just doesn't sound anything like no matter how you vary the rythm, picking, tempo etc but this guy - Chris Healey- has Drake's tunes spot on. Must of took years!

Well the point is that sometimes the placing of the notes is much simpler than you'd expect due to the unusual tuning. Is this what you mean by "cluster chord"?

I didn't know Johnny played like that. I thought he was just into normal tuning with capo. Guess I have more work to do than I expected :-)

Do you know the issue & volume # of the guitar player mag? Maybe I could track it down or maybe the article is posted somewhere on the Net.

Re the picks are you referring to those thin plastic things you strap or tape on as used by the Portuguese guitar players (especially in the Fado) or to those thick, more like plectrum type things that you wear? I have only actually seen those for thumb & couldn't even begin to imagine using one. The other type maybe I could get used to but they are really uncomfortable to wear for any length of time. I didn't think Drake used anything, just his finger nails. But then he only played acoustic.

OK now Eurythmic:

Yeah Fender Twin Reverb but I assumed the Twin meant that they had two reverbs or something & I fleetingly saw one in a shop the other day (before this discussion otherwise I would've paid attention!) & it only had the one reverb. Unless I was most mistaken. As I said before I'm not much cop with amps.

Re the black face being better than the silver face, couldn't you just switch the fronts? I mean the silver looks way cooler purely on image but obviously it's the sound that matters, but if you wouldn't the image too, couldn't you just switch the panels? Well I guess that wouldn't be so cheap either. Anyway, a vintage valve amp is out of my price range until:

a: I actually make it with the band in the first place
b: I get a well paid, secure job & am comfortably paying the mortgage & can afford luxuries.

Both of (or either of) which could take a while!!

Still, no harm in going down the vinatge amp shop & having a blast & seeing what I think. Always nice to know what your target is at least :-)

Re our music yeah I agree with you, I think now is the time more than ever. Just after The Smiths was too soon so you got the second rate rip off tag (and mostly deservedly) & then the world was too obsessed with Kurt Cobain but now seems to be swinging back in our favour again.

I like Belle & Sebastian but the level of fan worship they receive is ludicrous (not that I would complain were we to receive something similar one day) & I feel they are over-rated. Also we are neither so fey & downright indie nor do we have the attitude of the likes of Oasis. We're more in the Teenage Fanclub/Supergrass way re attitude & image. But we aspire more to being in the mainstream top ten. Effectively I want to compete with Elton John & Five not with The Field Mice, know what I mean? Which is what The Smiths achieved after all.

Nice to find a potential fan & fans of this kind of guitar playing on what is, after all, a completely tech orientated site :-)

Ciao.


doug east
 
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