Owen Vickers

My Tone Quest

2 November 2009

Wow, so long since I updated here   So, what’s been going on with this “tone” of mine.  Not much progress, but plenty of things to try…

I have taken the EMG’s out of the N2, I’ve decided that I’m going back to passives for that guitar.  The EMG’s were really nice, but the sound isn’t quite what I’m going for.

I got a Lovepedal Pickle Vibe finally!  What a great pedal.  I’m trying to decide if I should replace my EVH Phase 90 with it, or run them both on the pedalboard.

Also I’ve sold the PRS Tremonti SE, it just wasn’t working for me, I’m really a Strat guy not  a Les Paul guy.  OK, I know that the Tremonti isn’t a Les Paul, but I generally put guitars into one of three categories:

• Strats – Anything Strat-shaped or vaguely Strat-shaped e.g. Fender Strats and clones, Ibanez RG, JS and other slightly Strat shaped guitars
• Les Pauls – Gibson LP’s and all the variants like Jr’s, SG’s etc. (flame on ), most PRS’s
• Other – B.C. Rich’s, Explorers etc.

Right, that should alienate enough people   In case you are wondering, yes I do understand that those categories are sacrilegious and I should be burned for saying all that, but it’s how things work in my head!

Anyway, some interesting (for me) tone testing was done at the NZGuitars.com gearfest in Auckland recently.

I played the Realtone/Ibanez Strat through my pedalboard, into the JSX head (with 6L6 tubes), which was running into the Laney 2×12 cab with Celestion Seventy80 speakers.  The clean was really good, and the drive channel sounded great, but only when the master volume was on about 5.  This is a 120 Watt tube amp, so 5 is really, really loud!

The big problem was that I noticed that all my drive pedals (Cusack Screamer, G2D Custom Overdrive and AMT Fatal Tube) sounded awful through this setup.  A bit fizzy would be the best I could describe it.  All the pedals sound great through my little 5 Watt Valve Junior though.

I’ve long assumed that the speakers in my Laney cab were the issue, but I plugged the head into two Bogner 2×12 cabs, running a Celestion Greenback and a Vintage 30 in each one, and it still sounded as bad, possibly worse on some settings…

After talking to a friend of mine he suggested that the problem is probably in the cheap cables I’m using on my pedalboard, or something like that.  Makes sense to me!

Things to try now are:

• Isolate each pedal – Test each pedal with just: guitar>one pedal>JSX>cab.  If this sounds good, then the problem must be in the cabling between all the pedals.  If the pedals still sound bad in this configuration, then I’ll try them again with the EL34 tubes back in there, perhaps the pedals I have don’t play nice with 6L6′s?
• Try running the JSX at 60 Watts to tame the volume – This will mean pulling either the two inside or two outside power tubes and halving the impedence from the head (cab set to 16 Ohms and amp head set to 8 Ohms).

Oh, I’m also trying to sell the Jackson Dinky.  I really, really like this guitar, but playing in a covers band at the moment, I don’t think it’s quite what’s required for April Sun

21 April 2010

Time for another update?  Sure thing!  The Jackson Dinky is gone, and an Ibanez JS1200 has been added to the fold.  My guitar collection has now been cut down to this:

• Ibanez JS1200
• Fender Malmsteen Stratocaster
• Ibanez/Realtone Strat
• Ibanez RT450 (with DiMarzio Evo pickups)
• Washburn N2 (now with a DiMarzio Evo in the bridge and a DiMarzio PAF Pro in the neck)
• Ibanez JS100
• An in-progress Frankenstrat, formally known as my 90′s Japanese Fender Strat

A very different line up to what a had a few years ago.  At a guess, I’d say it’s dropped in number by eight guitars in the last two years!  Scary…

Amp wise, I’ve now got a Mesa Recto 2×12 cabinet with Celestion Vintage 30 speakers in it.  This cab sounds amazing!  A lot more low end than the Laney cab, and better for distorted sounds (although the Laney might have a better clean sound).

I’m running the JSX on two power tubes to drop it down to ~60 Watts.  I’ve swapped out the JJ 6L6 tubes I was running for the original JJ EL34′s I had in there.  I prefer the sound of the EL34′s I think.  I managed to pick up a set of Winged =C= EL34′s recently for a very nice price, and I put them in the JSX last week.  It’s like a night and day change to the sound   I’ve never really bought into the NOS, cork-sniffing, tube thing, but maybe it’s time to take it a bit more seriously…  The Winged =C=’s sound incredible, maybe a little lower gain than the JJ’s, but a smoother top end and plenty of lows still.

Pedalboard has been through some changes; last week it was: Guitar > TC Electronic Polytune  > TC Electronic Nova Drive > Cusack Screamer > G2D Custom Overdrive > MXR EVH Phase 90 > Lovepedal Pickle Vibe > Vox Time Machine > Amp.

Today is it: TC Electronic Polytune  > AMT Fatal Tube > Cusack Screamer > G2D Custom Overdrive > Amp
Then in the effects loop: Artec CHR3 Chorus > MXR EVH Phase 90 > Vox Time Machine.

The reason for the pedal changes is that I am going to start using the JSX at band practice (instead of my Crate V30/Marshal 1×12), and the modulation effects going into the front of the JSX don’t sound so great to me, so I need to put them in the effects loop.  I’ve also found that I’m not using the Vibe for any of the songs we are doing, and I decided to give the chorus pedal a try.  I’m also missing the Fatal Tube for 80′s hair metal lead goodness, so the Nova Drive is in the cupboard for a little bit.  It will most likely come back, as the distortion side of it sounds killer for lead work.

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