Two Rigs for Two mentalities (lengthy observation)

[Dantesstudio]

I am 18, just a kid. I have been playing guitar for 7 years, nearly half my life. One thing I have always been obsessed with is the creation of ideal tone. I have played in rock clubs, in jazz big bands, jazz competitions in Central Park, metal venues, blue grass dances, and i have even dabbled in alittle gypsy jazz. The point of this is that I have played every genera at some point or another so I have used a lot of different equipment and I require a lot of different tones. I have three sets of guitar heros (i hate that game). Rock- Vai, Johnson, Petrucci, and Satrani. Jazz- Montgomery, Benson, Metheny, and Reinhardt. Classical-Boccherini, Bream, Williams, and Segovia. All have very different tones.

For years people on forms and shops told me " its tube or nothing" when it comes to guitar. I have found this only partialy true. My metal rig is powered by non other than a mesa stiletto and I really dont think a solid state amp can achieve the tone I have now with out sacraficing volume. The amp power type doesnt matter to me though for classical or jazz. Granted I always play clean in these generas(obviously). My jazz and classical rig is powered by a Henriksen 12inch combo. Not a very expensive amp and solid state and I havent found anything that comes close to its tone. I find tube amps to be to "touchy" for my clean tone and not worth the trouble.

Another interesting thing is the importance of the pick. Yes the actual pick and how you hold it. I dont think a lot of people know that on the forum. For metal I play with a fender heavy celluloid. Pretty standard. A lot of attack and quick releases. It doesnt really matter what pick I use for metal though. Its all about the huge pedal board and tube amp. Jazz is incredibly different. My teacher a professor at UT made the observation that by turning the pick over and playing with the "non pointy part" you get a much rounder and warmer tone. Benson does this and his tone is excellent. Montgomery uses his round thumb (similar to a round pick). Point being, dont take purchasing a pick for granted like i always did.

My final observation is all about money. For metal or anything distorted for that matter I use a relitivel cheap Ibanez and a bunch of expensive electronics. So i have maybe a 1000 invested in my guitar and 5000 in my rig. My jazz rig is flipped however. I spent right at 1000 on my ss Henriksen jazz amp and 4500 on my 1960 Gibson ES350T from George Gruhn. So I have gone from your typical teen angst filled rocker to a simplistic classical/jazz guy.

Thank you for reading please comment I am really curious to see if anyone else has found the same conclusions. I am young and trying to learn quick. Suggestions

References: jazz amp www.jazz amp.com George Gruhn www.Gruhn.com

[LonePhantom]

Interesting. Oh by the way it's genre.

[Dantesstudio]

Ya, your right. I never could spell.

[jb4674]

$1000 on a SS amp is excessive IMO. I'd like to know how much mommy and daddy contributed to the ES350.

Jimmy

[Dantesstudio]

Ya it is sorta expensive for a good SS but the point is its not expensive for a good jazz/classical amp. Actually my family doesnt make a lot because of some banking issues that have messed up my dads job (thanks bush!). Actually the guitar was much cheaper than it should be. A 1960 ES 350t should be around 9 0r 10 thousand but this one was 4200 becuase one of the pups wasnt origional. LOL i though that was stupid to cut the price in half for that but to a collector evidently it really matters. To be honest I paid for about half of the guitar, I teach guitar lessons and I make a good chunk of money playing. The rest came from my step grandfather. He is a pretty accomplished mandolin player.

[GilkyBear]

Yeah, I have been hunting my tone for quite some time now. I started as a big hair 80s metal guy, so it was all about the Ibanez's, the Marshall stack (1/2), and I went with a digitech processor (currently for sale in the classifieds). I guess what brought me to the quest really was I played a PRS hollowbody through a Fender 59 Bassman reissue in a music store fairly recently (2 years ago). Don't get me wrong, I know that isn't exactly a 'magical' combination, they are nothing spectacular, nice, but not spectacular. But what really got me was the touch sensitivity. I was blown away by how responsive the combination was .

So, I decided to get away from digital and start looking for my own sound. I hope I don't get too flamed for this, but the Ibanez tone without the digital effects processors isn't really what I am looking for. Don't get me wrong, it has it's place, and no other guitar feels so perfect to me, but it isn't the tone I'm looking for.

So, I just got my amp (Marshall Silver Jubilee) retubed and biased, I got a PRS Modern Eagle, a PRS Hollow-Body with piezos, and a Fender Rory Strat. One of them new Hand-Wired Ibanez Tube Screamers (TS-808 HW), and brand new Vovox cables (haven't arrived yet) and I'm going to see what that does for me. I guess I have decided that analog is the way to go after all, and I'm going to see if I can get those nice woody, natural, airy tones I have been looking for. I am going for a Hendrix (wind cries mary/little wing), SRV (Life without you/pride and joy), and Zeppelin and Floyd type of tones so I should be getting very close. I am pretty sure I'll need a different amp for the cleans as well. You should have bought a Roland Jazz Chorus, they can be had quite cheap these days and the cleans are unreal.

Great thread.

[Dantesstudio]

Thats rad, those are some serious guitars. I have only played one Gallager strat an it blew me away. But ya I started iwth the same idea as you I think. I was the 12 year old who was gonna be Vai haha. But then I started listening to people who had a real natural and warm tone and I got a teacher who actually has a career and is accomplished and that lead me to the realization that i need to go back to guitar-cable-amp.