which amp used in a song

[Bilsdragon]

Since there are many threads on which amp to buy, I thought I'd approach the matter from a song perspective. I'm a two year player that loves my tube amps but would love to use the sounds in songs to help me choose my next amp, or at least go find said amp to try out. For instance, If I wanted my amp to sound like the one used on "Black Dog", which amp would I choose? A couple other song examples could be: "Funk 49", "Sunshine of your Love", "Sick of Myself". Obviously, effects shape sound so adding pedals etc. are fine too. I can edit this post to create a list for everyone. Feel free to throw in your favorite songs, this could be helpful for beginners and vets alike.

[Eric]

That's a really neat approach. I like it a lot. Unfortunately, I suck at identifying this stuff, but I think there are lots here who will know enough to help.

[Tone2TheBone]

This thread has the potential for some interesting replies. Good topic. I'll start by guessing that most of Van Halen's stuff came from an old Marshall Plexi head. Don't remember the age of the head. I do know that they were recorded with old bottom cabinets loaded with 25 watt Celestion Greenback speakers. Some sort of Variac was also used as was some kind of graphic EQ pedal along with a script MXR Phase 90 phase shifter pedal. I personally think he hit the amp with the EQ maxed out and up for added gain without the variac but this is only my opinion. ;)

I've heard that a lot of George Lynch's tone on the later albums came from a purple Marshall head belonging to God knows who. I read that he offered to buy it from the owner but was denied.

[markb]

Black Dog probably an old Supro practice amp with 6v6s.

Sunshine of your Love most likely a Marshall Plexi, the live version for sure. Maybe with a fuzz face on the solo.

Anything more recent probably relies a lot more on pedals than stuff recorded in the 60s/70s. Just didn't have the pedals, see? Effects in those days tended to be obvious, fuzz, wah, univibe, that sort of thing.

[Bilsdragon]

Yeah, most of the 60's and 70's distortion was volume induced real tube distortion. No wonder most of us are a little hard of hearing now. LOL

Great replies so far. :applause

[ZMAN]

Most of the songs you are mentioning were played through Marshall Plexis. The Sunshine of your love was played through a wall of them. Joe Walsh used them as well. You have to realize that there weren't a lot of amp producers that could make amps that would belt out the songs to major arena venues. There wasn't a lot of sound systems to pump through back then just Big loud amps.

[sumitomo]

I looked at this yesterday and said Hum I'll wait and come back and see.I was gunna say a Marshall JTM 45 would do the trick.Sumi:D

[marnold]

I've heard that a lot of George Lynch's tone on the later albums came from a purple Marshall head belonging to God knows who. I read that he offered to buy it from the owner but was denied.
I don't know about "later" albums, but I've heard this story too. I thought that was more around the "Under Lock and Key" timeframe. Lynch is really hard to nail down because he changes amps and effects so frequently. The only constant is really his bengal striped guitar. Otherwise he has used Randall, Soldano, Marshall, back to Randall again. He's used various overdrives, modded DS-1s, and so on. Add to that the tendency to record different parts with different amps and you get a tone that is impossible to reproduce outside the studio. Yet it always sounds like George . . .

Edit: Apparently my memory serves me well. Here's some info from http://www.gearslutz.com/board/high-end/77436-george-lynch-tone.html even including comments from Michael Wagener!


The setup for George's guitar tone on "Under Lock And Key" was as follows:
We had two Marshall heads and two Laney heads, not sure which models, but one of them was a Plexi. We had cabs in three different rooms: two cabs were placed in the big room at Amigo, one connected to a Marshall, the other connected to the Laney. The Marshall was responsible for the high end part of the sound and the Laney was set to take care of the low end. There were 14 (fourteen) mics set up in that room in various psoitions around the cabinet and some further away to get some room tone. The second Laney was sent into a very dead room and had a Boss chorus pedal in front of it, set to very slight chorus. The second Marshall was sent into a small, tiled bathroom, to add a different room tone. Those 16 mics came in on the MCI 500 console mic pres. They were bussed to one bus and that bus had a UREI 530 EQ on it (best guitar EQ ever). George mentioned that he always gets a great tone with his Fostex 4track recorder when it's in total overdrive, so I asked him to bring it in. So after the 530 everything was sent to the Fostex 4track, which lived under a packing blanket under the console, so nobody would see it. The Fostex was on stunn, completely overdriven and was sent on to the 3M 32 track dig machine from there.

No, I am NOT kidding!!!

And again:

"In late 1985, during rehearsals following the November 1985 release of Dokken’s “Under Lock And Key” album, George Lynch rented a modified Marshall head from S.I.R. (Studio Instrument Rentals in Los Angeles). The amp was a 100W Marshall Super Tremolo (Model 1959T) - a hand-wired, pre-master volume model of the “Metal Panel” (post-“Plexi”) variety (manufactured sometime between mid-’69 and mid-’73). George was so “blown away” by this “perfect amp” (George’s words - not mine) - known to S.I.R. as “Stock #39 - that he desperately tried to convince S.I.R. to sell it to him. After S.I.R. refused to sell #39 or even reveal the name of the person who had modified the amp, George paid approximately $2,000 just to rent the amp for the first leg of Dokken’s tour in early 1986.

Upon returning #39 to S.I.R. following his rental of the amp, George finally learned the name of the mystery modifier who had performed the modification to #39: Tim Caswell (Tim had worked in S.I.R.’s tech/service department for several years until 1985, when he left S.I.R. just prior to George’s rental of #39). Subsequently, George contacted Tim in order to have a handful of his own Marshalls similarly modified.

In short, Tim’s modification to #39 consisted of utilizing the amp’s then-unused tremolo circuit (with its additional pre-amp tube) to hot-rod the Marshall by adding an extra pre-amp gain stage. A master volume control was also part of the modification to #39, since the amp was a pre-master volume model."

[Eric]

For instance, If I wanted my amp to sound like the one used on "Black Dog", which amp would I choose? A couple other song examples could be: "Funk 49", "Sunshine of your Love", "Sick of Myself".
To clarify, are you talking about the Matthew Sweet tune "Sick of Myself"?

[Tone2TheBone]

I don't know about "later" albums, but I've heard this story too. I thought that was more around the "Under Lock and Key" timeframe. Lynch is really hard to nail down because he changes amps and effects so frequently. The only constant is really his bengal striped guitar. Otherwise he has used Randall, Soldano, Marshall, back to Randall again. He's used various overdrives, modded DS-1s, and so on. Add to that the tendency to record different parts with different amps and you get a tone that is impossible to reproduce outside the studio. Yet it always sounds like George . . .

You're right about the later albums I needed to clarify that George made that comment in one of the Guitar mags right after the "Back for the Attack" album was released. I keep forgetting this is 2010 and that was 1987. :thwap I act like it was just yesterday. Are we that old already?

[ZMAN]

MY favourite right now Joe Bonamassa is quite open about his rig. The tone on the songs on his lastest DVD can be duplicated pretty easy if you follow his set up. The DSL has several modes that emulate vintage Marshall amps, and the pedals and delays are not expensive.

[Bilsdragon]

To clarify, are you talking about the Matthew Sweet tune "Sick of Myself"?

That's the one.
Stone Attic's band covers this song and since I play with the guitarist at lunch I get to learn the set list too.


These are just for instance songs, I like a wide range of music. I would just like a list matching to the amp and or effects.

[marnold]

As far as "Sunshine of Your Love" goes, I found this:
From http://www.last.fm/music/Cream/_/Sunshine+Of+Your+Love/+wiki


Clapton’s guitar tone on the song is created using his 1964 Gibson SG guitar and a Marshall amplifier. It is also believed that a Vox Clyde McCoy Picture Wah is placed fully in the bass position for the solo section. The song is renowned among guitarists as perhaps the best example of his legendary late-’60s “woman tone”, a thick yet articulate sound that many have tried to emulate. For the solo Clapton quoted the opening lines from the pop standard “Blue Moon,” creating a contrast between the sun and the moon.

I remember reading recently something about "Black Dog" too. IIRC, Page used the Les Paul he got from Joe Walsh and it was recorded direct. Sounds crazy, but that's what I remember reading. I'm desperately trying to find the source for that.

[Eric]

That's the one.
Stone Attic's band covers this song and since I play with the guitarist at lunch I get to learn the set list too.


These are just for instance songs, I like a wide range of music. I would just like a list matching to the amp and or effects.
I used to love that song. Still do, just haven't listened to it in a long time. Again, no idea what he's using. The popular answer seems to be Marshall Plexi for everything else, which I guess would include anything from JTM to JMP series, right?

[Eric]

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How about the rhythm guitar at the beginning of this song? It seems like there's a lot of delay in this song, but I'm not sure if the rhythm guitar has any on it. Not that it would matter if I could identify delay, since I have no clue what amp/guitar they're using. Just curious.