Sounds pretty heavy, no? See, this is where I could go on and on and on about the pseudo-mystical processes that lead to the creation of a new song, and the almost religious experience that comes with the act of tying little noises together into something coherent. But you know what? The vast majority of the music I have come up with or created has happened by accident.
That's right. It happens accidentally. Comically, sometimes.
More often than not, I'll just be sitting down noodling on one of my guitars, not even paying attention, and I'll find myself playing something that sounds almost riff-like, if you close one ear while listening and use a LOT of imagination.
But somehow, that little something grabs my attention, and if I ignore it, it picks at me. Seriously, it's like one of those kids that follows you around pulling on your pant leg going "hey mister, hey mister, hey mister". It's irritating as hell.
So I find myself having to pay attention to it, and show it some love, and start figuring out where it belongs, and what other little sounds go with it, until it has found itself with a family of like-minded sounds, and that family starts to reproduce and create other little sounds to go with it, until now it's a freaking TRIBE of little sounds, all sharing some indigenous system of beliefs and faiths. Maybe some inbred relatives, too. But by God, they're all related, and they're gonna make a sound.
And I'm the poor fool they've chosen to record this whole mess.
Makes things interesting, no?
Sunday, April 28, 2013
Sunday, April 14, 2013
Tone Part 2 - Phalanges?
So what do I think and believe about tone? It's pretty simple, really:
Tone is in your fingers.
It's an old cliche, sure, but one that I happen to believe very strongly. In all the years I've been playing and listening to guitarists, I've found that the players that I consider to be the "best", or at least the ones that influence and inspire me the most, all share the same ability to sound great on whatever gear they're playing on.
Sure, you can make the argument that guys like Satch, Vai, Ford, Metheney, etc, all get to tour with their own equipment, set up by their own highly trained guitar techs. And there's some truth to that. But there have been too many instances where I've gotten to hear some of these players on gear that is not only NOT their own, but is frequently stuff considered to be sub-standard, and they've sounded great.
As an example, about 5 years ago, I had the pleasure of seeing Robben Ford play at Jazzbones here in Tacoma, WA. It's a small club. Not much of a sound system. And Ford is not a rich man. His tours are not usually large affairs with trucks of equipment travelling around with him. So for this gig, he was playing a VERY nice guitar (a '60-ish Les Paul with P90's loaned to him by Larry Carlton) through one of the most beat up looking Fender Twin Reverbs I've ever seen. He was going though his Zen Drive pedal for most of the night.
He sounded amazing.
Despite the fact that he didn't have his Dumbles with him (which he uses in the studio almost exclusively), he sounded exactly like Robben Ford.
Another example? Click on the following link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9v5e1TTwts
Satch is playing on a Pignose guitar, through a cheap Peavey amp, and a DigiTech RP200. Not exactly the high-end gear he's used to using, no? But damned if he doesn't sound almost exactly like the album.
So what does all this go to prove?
Probably nothing. But IMO, it goes a long way to help me believe that with the great players, gear is almost irrelevant. I honestly think that if Stevie Ray, or EVH, or Jimi, or anyone picked up any guitar out there, and plugged it into just about any amp on the planet, they'd find a way to make it sound great. And this makes sense if you think about it. Most of these guys didn't exactly get to start playing guitar on great gear. I mean, have you SEEN EVH's striped guitar? It was a cheap homebrew that he mostly built himself. He plugged it into the recording studio's stock Marshall amp and added a Variac switch to it. The result? Eddie's famous "brown sound".
There are times when I think that many guitar players are willing to believe that somehow, some magical combination of ingredients will create the "perfect" tone because they don't want to believe that practice is what will ultimately do it for them. After all, why put in the 10,000 hours if you can plug your 1 piece extra light quartersawn cryogenically frozen guitar into your boutique point-to-point wired amp and sound as amazing as you've ever dreamed, right?
And maybe that's what bugs me about the tone obsession. It almost seems like an excuse for laziness. Sort of an "I don't HAVE to practice because my gear will make me sound great" mentality. Of course, the catch is that the players that have that mindset never stand out from the crowd, because they've never learned their instrument.
Again, my primary issue is with the people that will try and tell YOU that that's the way it is, and has to be. If they want to, I don't know, short change themselves that way, more power to them. But when they go on to tell everyone that will listen that THEY should also short change themselves, well, that's when the crankiness revs up for me. Go figger.
But, in the words of the once-great Dennis Miller, "that's just my opinon. I could be wrong."
Tone is in your fingers.
It's an old cliche, sure, but one that I happen to believe very strongly. In all the years I've been playing and listening to guitarists, I've found that the players that I consider to be the "best", or at least the ones that influence and inspire me the most, all share the same ability to sound great on whatever gear they're playing on.
Sure, you can make the argument that guys like Satch, Vai, Ford, Metheney, etc, all get to tour with their own equipment, set up by their own highly trained guitar techs. And there's some truth to that. But there have been too many instances where I've gotten to hear some of these players on gear that is not only NOT their own, but is frequently stuff considered to be sub-standard, and they've sounded great.
As an example, about 5 years ago, I had the pleasure of seeing Robben Ford play at Jazzbones here in Tacoma, WA. It's a small club. Not much of a sound system. And Ford is not a rich man. His tours are not usually large affairs with trucks of equipment travelling around with him. So for this gig, he was playing a VERY nice guitar (a '60-ish Les Paul with P90's loaned to him by Larry Carlton) through one of the most beat up looking Fender Twin Reverbs I've ever seen. He was going though his Zen Drive pedal for most of the night.
He sounded amazing.
Despite the fact that he didn't have his Dumbles with him (which he uses in the studio almost exclusively), he sounded exactly like Robben Ford.
Another example? Click on the following link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9v5e1TTwts
Satch is playing on a Pignose guitar, through a cheap Peavey amp, and a DigiTech RP200. Not exactly the high-end gear he's used to using, no? But damned if he doesn't sound almost exactly like the album.
So what does all this go to prove?
Probably nothing. But IMO, it goes a long way to help me believe that with the great players, gear is almost irrelevant. I honestly think that if Stevie Ray, or EVH, or Jimi, or anyone picked up any guitar out there, and plugged it into just about any amp on the planet, they'd find a way to make it sound great. And this makes sense if you think about it. Most of these guys didn't exactly get to start playing guitar on great gear. I mean, have you SEEN EVH's striped guitar? It was a cheap homebrew that he mostly built himself. He plugged it into the recording studio's stock Marshall amp and added a Variac switch to it. The result? Eddie's famous "brown sound".
There are times when I think that many guitar players are willing to believe that somehow, some magical combination of ingredients will create the "perfect" tone because they don't want to believe that practice is what will ultimately do it for them. After all, why put in the 10,000 hours if you can plug your 1 piece extra light quartersawn cryogenically frozen guitar into your boutique point-to-point wired amp and sound as amazing as you've ever dreamed, right?
And maybe that's what bugs me about the tone obsession. It almost seems like an excuse for laziness. Sort of an "I don't HAVE to practice because my gear will make me sound great" mentality. Of course, the catch is that the players that have that mindset never stand out from the crowd, because they've never learned their instrument.
Again, my primary issue is with the people that will try and tell YOU that that's the way it is, and has to be. If they want to, I don't know, short change themselves that way, more power to them. But when they go on to tell everyone that will listen that THEY should also short change themselves, well, that's when the crankiness revs up for me. Go figger.
But, in the words of the once-great Dennis Miller, "that's just my opinon. I could be wrong."
Monday, April 1, 2013
Tone Part 1 - The Journey Begins
Is there really any more personal and divisive part of the guitar playing experience than tone? From people who spend tens of thousands of dollars on the highest end boutique gear, to the guys that deliberately look for the cheapest pieces of crap they can find, tone is the subjective holy grail that all guitar players find themselves searching for. Since everyone and their mother have their opinions on this Topic of Epicness, I figured I'd throw my own two cents into the fray.
Once upon a time, during a discussion I was having with another guitarist, he opined that he couldn't understand why so many guitar players spent so much time and money looking for tone because "it's a science".
This left me feeling a bit on the stunned side.
Sound waves are a science. Frequency and response are sciences. The engineering of guitars, amps, pedals, speakers, etc, are sciences.
Tone? I've always felt tone is more of an art. Tone is about as subjective a thing as exists in the world. What one person strives for and finds to be the greatest sound in the world, another finds to be nothing more than ear-splitting noise. As an example, let's take Eric Johnson's tone on "Cliffs of Dover". Now, the vast majority of guitar players I know find that sound to be unspeakably beautiful - rich, full, bell-like, overdriven without being muddy, with a ring to it that send shivers up and down one's spine. However, one of my co-workers once expressed a burning desire to take the wet towel off of his speakers.
How about Eddie Van Halen's famous "brown" sound? Again, the majority of people I've known think that that is one of the greatest guitar tones ever captured. But I once met a guy who couldn't stop dissing on everything about it.
I've had the same kinds of conversations regarding Stevie Ray Vaughan, Joe Bonamassa, Joe Satriani, Steve Vai, Pat Metheny, and on and on and on. And that's a good thing, damn it. One of the great things about playing the guitar is the sense of self-expression you get from it. Whether you feel like shredding all out a la Yngwie Malmsteen or Rusty Cooley, or just want to kick back and play simple rhythm guitar, what ultimately comes out of you is YOU. As long as you like the sound you're coming up with, then no one else's opinion matters. Nor should it. If you put your playing out in the wide world, then you should expect to get feedback and criticism. But at the end of the day, none of that matters. Your sound, your tone, is you, distilled.
What drives ME nuts is people who feel the need to sell you on what makes the "ultimate tone". Whether they're shilling for quartersawn maple, nitocellulose lacquer, some uber-special sooper seekrit capacitors, titanium Floyd Rose bridges, nickel-plated tremolo screws (yes, I've heard that conversation before), cryogenically frozen pickups or bridges, or what have you, there are people (who have GREATLY proliferated since the spread of the intrawebs) who will absolutely INSIST that you can't possibly have good tone without this week's snake oil special. They will express their opinions in ways ranging from the "trying to be helpful" to out-and-out venomous trolling. They're very passionate in their arguments.
I have my own ideas about tone, but those will have to wait for my next blog post.
For now, I would like to ask any guitar players that may be reading this blog: What do YOU think makes for great tone? What have you found that works for you?
Once upon a time, during a discussion I was having with another guitarist, he opined that he couldn't understand why so many guitar players spent so much time and money looking for tone because "it's a science".
This left me feeling a bit on the stunned side.
Sound waves are a science. Frequency and response are sciences. The engineering of guitars, amps, pedals, speakers, etc, are sciences.
Tone? I've always felt tone is more of an art. Tone is about as subjective a thing as exists in the world. What one person strives for and finds to be the greatest sound in the world, another finds to be nothing more than ear-splitting noise. As an example, let's take Eric Johnson's tone on "Cliffs of Dover". Now, the vast majority of guitar players I know find that sound to be unspeakably beautiful - rich, full, bell-like, overdriven without being muddy, with a ring to it that send shivers up and down one's spine. However, one of my co-workers once expressed a burning desire to take the wet towel off of his speakers.
How about Eddie Van Halen's famous "brown" sound? Again, the majority of people I've known think that that is one of the greatest guitar tones ever captured. But I once met a guy who couldn't stop dissing on everything about it.
I've had the same kinds of conversations regarding Stevie Ray Vaughan, Joe Bonamassa, Joe Satriani, Steve Vai, Pat Metheny, and on and on and on. And that's a good thing, damn it. One of the great things about playing the guitar is the sense of self-expression you get from it. Whether you feel like shredding all out a la Yngwie Malmsteen or Rusty Cooley, or just want to kick back and play simple rhythm guitar, what ultimately comes out of you is YOU. As long as you like the sound you're coming up with, then no one else's opinion matters. Nor should it. If you put your playing out in the wide world, then you should expect to get feedback and criticism. But at the end of the day, none of that matters. Your sound, your tone, is you, distilled.
What drives ME nuts is people who feel the need to sell you on what makes the "ultimate tone". Whether they're shilling for quartersawn maple, nitocellulose lacquer, some uber-special sooper seekrit capacitors, titanium Floyd Rose bridges, nickel-plated tremolo screws (yes, I've heard that conversation before), cryogenically frozen pickups or bridges, or what have you, there are people (who have GREATLY proliferated since the spread of the intrawebs) who will absolutely INSIST that you can't possibly have good tone without this week's snake oil special. They will express their opinions in ways ranging from the "trying to be helpful" to out-and-out venomous trolling. They're very passionate in their arguments.
I have my own ideas about tone, but those will have to wait for my next blog post.
For now, I would like to ask any guitar players that may be reading this blog: What do YOU think makes for great tone? What have you found that works for you?
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