Simulating an existing guitar tone

[Ronniejm]

Hello All, looking to pick some brains,

My pal, a huge Johnny Cash fan, wants us to record some of his fav songs, first two on his list are "Give my love to Rose" and "I walk the line".

First thoughts were, no problem Ive listened to these songs loads, and they sound fairly straight forward to play.

But...........he wants me to try and recreate the original guitar sound for each, I'm assuming played by either Luther Perkins or Bob Wooton. his theory being that the right sound must be hiding somewhere in my "magic wee box of tricks" ie my BR800.

He may well be right but if it is I cant find it and indeed dont really know how to set about looking for it, I never really use any of the effects options in the BR800.

So my questions would be,
Is it possible to achieve what he wants?
If so any pointers on a starting point?

The equipment I have to hand is
Accoustic/Electric guitar-Fishman electrics
Jim Dean "Les Paul" Guitar
Line Six variax Guitar
BR800
oh and an iPad (just in case theres some app I could get for that)

Of course this might be all down to the particular guitar or amp they used, and I,m whistling in the wind here, but as mum used to say if you dont ask you'll bever know.

Cheers
Ronnie

[Oldrottenhead]

I have an irighd2 with which I can turn my iPad into a stomp box. There is a free app I use called Tonebridge , where you can search for the tones and effects for particular songs. I had a search and the presets for " I walk the line"  is there but unfortunately not the other song.

[64Guitars]

There are several versions of those songs on various Johnny Cash albums and they each have different tones. If you're trying to achieve a specific tone, then it depends which recorded version you're trying to emulate.

To my ear, acoustic guitar tones aren't that distinctive, so you probably won't have much trouble with that part. For the electric guitar tracks, the original recordings probably used a Fender Telecaster. So a good starting point would be to use your Line 6 Variax guitar with one of its Telecaster settings. For an amp model on the BR-800, you'll probably want something clean. Try using the CLEAN TWIN amp setting which models a Fender Twin Reverb. I'm not sure which of the BR-800 preset patches use that amp model but you can change it in any of the presets from 1 through 50. So just select any of those patches, then go into its settings and change the amp model to CLEAN TWIN. Set GAIN SW to LOW or MIDDLE and turn down the GAIN setting so you don't get any distortion. And adjust the other settings (BASS, MIDDLE, TREBLE, PRESENCE, LEVEL and BRIGHT) as you would on a real amp. You might want to change the speaker simulator setting too (SP TYPE). You'll probably want it set to ORIGINAL, but try some of the other settings to see if it sounds any closer to what you're trying to emulate. Turn off all the other effects (MODULATION, DELAY, COMPRESSOR/LIMITER, WAH, and DISTORTION so you're just getting the amp sound without any additional effects. You might want to add some reverb and perhaps adjust the EQUALIZER controls.

I hope that helps. It's just a starting point, of course. You'll have to spend some time tweaking the settings and comparing the resulting tone to the tone of the guitar on the original recording. Then tweak some more till you're satisfied that you've got the sound as close to the original as you're able to.

[AndyR]

I reckon 64's spot on.

I can add that Luther Perkins's sound was:

A Fender Esquire not a Telecaster.
This has a single "vintage" tele bridge pickup (those were actually quite hot and fat sounding).
An Esquire has fancy switching - #1 is vol only, no tone control; #2 is vol and tone (same as telecaster #1 wiring); #3 is vol only + a fixed treble roll-off (a fixed resistor + capacitor across the switch position), it was designed to give a "bass" option to a guitarist - exactly what Luther's parts are doing.

I've watched a few old tv clips - he seems to have usually used the "bass" switch position most for that boom-chicka part, so a Telecaster on the bridge pickup with the tone rolled off isn't a bad approximation. A telecaster won't twang quite as much, though, because of the neck pickup's extra magnetic pull. (Btw, Steve Cropper's earlier stuff is the same - eg Green Onions, etc)

A warm sounding clean Fender amp (Tweed).
I'm guessing the treble needs to be turned way up to compensate for the dark jazzy tone coming from the geetar. The "secret" to this sort of sound is "dial the treble on the amp turn it down on the geetar". I'm not sure how the older fender guys (strat, tele users) found this out, but I learnt it off Rory Gallagher in the 70s - turn the bass down, treble up, gain up... control it all from the guitar.

Effects-wise:
A very short single delay - a "slap-back echo" thing - "analogue" sounding would be better.
A small amount of spring reverb. Not too much - the big reverb is on the vocals, the guitar is quite dry in comparison.

Like 64 says, you should be able to impersonate most of this with the Variax and the BR-800.

Use the T-type model on the Variax, bridge pickup only, turn the tone down on the guitar.
Use a clean amp model.
If your reverb controls have "early reflections" or a similar setting (might be called Pre-Delay or something), this has the same effect as using a delay for slap-back echo - you won't need the delay as well.

That'll all get you close.

But for the last 20% you would need the following:

Heavy flat-wound strings (very heavy by today's standards)
Thick celluloid picks
Palm muting like Luther's

If you already have these three, even Luther would have been able to get his sound out of a Les Paul, tube screamer and Marshall stack

But without those three, none of us can get that close - so don't get too sucked into fiddling with the technology once you've found a decent approximation, you'll be wasting your time without changing the strings (replacing the nut, getting a set-up and learning how to play again!!).

Get yourself a reasonable approximation, listen to the original, then just start twanging - get into it and enjoy it. Most folks will be going "wow! how did you get that sound?"


On the acoustic guitar, I agree, tones aren't that distinctive, but the playing is. It took me years to recognise how good a guitarist Johnny Cash was. The original band used Johnny's guitar, Luther's boom-chicka, and Marshall's stand-up bass to produce this brand new sound - a kind of rhythmical train rolling over the tracks thing - without drums. Drums got added quite quickly, but what a sound they got.

What I'm trying to say is, more important than getting identical tones is getting the interplay between acoustic, electric, and bass. I've tried several times - I can't do it on my own. It can be done, though - listen to some of Fenderbender's stuff on here (hi Tommy! Hope you're doing OK )

[Ronniejm]

Thanks guys. Lots of great info here, can't wait to try it out.

I keep telling myself I need to do some homework and try and learn about guitar effects, different amp sounds etc, but I never seem to get round to it. Maybe playing with this will give me the push I need.........

Thanks again for allowing me to cheat on my homework.

Cheers
Ronnie

[bruno]

I saw an interview with Nuno Bettencourt (Extreme guitarist) who spent forever trying to sound like Eddie Van Halen. He got to play Eddie's guitar through Eddie's rig, and his comment was "damn, I still sounded like myself" and "I guess the tone is really in the fingers then" :-) It made me laugh. 
B

[alfstone]

Ronnie...what about playing YOUR OWN sound, instead?

Why copy? At best, it will be an imitation...never as good as the original...

My two Euros....

 

Alfredo

[Ronniejm]

Hi Alfstone, Bruno,

Your absolutely right getting a spot on version of an existing tone, probably depends on a lot more than hardware and settings,

I should have been clearer, I was not looking to achieve that exactly, more an approximation of a particular sound.

It's a one off thing for me to try, based on my friends request to get a bit closer to the sound that he hears when he plays the originals, more of a fun exercise than anything else.

I hardly ever play with any of the effects and settings on my BR800, truth be told I'm quite happy with the natural sound of my accoustic guitars, and for me anyway, it tends to fit the kind of songs I find myself playing, the downside of that is I have no idea of a starting point on the effects and settings when a request like this comes along, so the info from others was invaluable to me in finding that starting point.

Thanks for your comments, I am always learning from those friends who have more of insight to this than myself.

Cheers
Ronnie

[alfstone]

Ronnie, what I think is...

for acoustic guitar: the BEST sound you may obtain when recording your acoustic guitar is the most close to the REAL sound of it, I mean what YOU hear when you play it unplugged.
During the years I've had several acoustic guitar processors, filled with tons of effects, even really good effects, but the older I get   I'm more and more convinced that the "right" sound is as cleanest as possible. For this reason I've sold ALL the multieffects for acoustic, and the only thing I use is the Aura Spectrum DI, that is NOT a multi-effect device, but that has the ability to get as close as possible to the sound of your acoustic instrument.

After recording, there's an important post-production work in a DAW (I use some specific Waves plug-ins for acoustic guitar), since it's very important using both the right equalization and the right compression. I think that this is the point where you may obtain the specific sound you're looking for for that specific song.

...and to finish, ALL the tracks in a sub-mix channel for some reverb.  

Ciao!
Alfredo

[bruno]

I should have been clearer, I was not looking to achieve that exactly, more an approximation of a particular sound.

It's a one off thing for me to try, based on my friends request to get a bit closer to the sound that he hears when he plays the originals, more of a fun exercise than anything else.

Okay - this can be fun, but requires some research. One thing the Kemper has taught me is that amps really do sound different, and how they are recorded (miked) radically changes the way they sound. With any emulation of a guitarist sound, understanding the gear is essential - which guitar is used, which effect and which amp - then use your ears I'm afraid. Some of this is well documented on Google/internet - and some people spend time getting patches for certain songs or artists. As always, its a question of how far do you want to go :-) I was at a Eric Johnson gig a few years back, and there were lots of people taking pictures of the pedal board - not only to find out which pedals were being used, but how the pots were set!!! However, with broadly the right guitar, pickup selection, effects and amp/speaker emulation - and a bit of tweaking, you can normally get close. Have fun :-)

B