Beatles Guitar Tones

  • Thread starter Thread starter Len Rabinowitz
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Len Rabinowitz

Len Rabinowitz

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Listening to the re-mastered White Album- sounds great in my opinion!

Any idea how to get those distorted guitar tones out of a Tourmaster?

What were they using anyway? I'm guessing it is some kind of fuzz, not an overloaded amp.

Were they still using Voxes at that time? Maybe some Fenders?

Some of the pictures show Epiphone guitars. Maybe still Gretsch and Rickenbacher? I'm not sure these are Gibson and Fender sounds.

Thanks!

:confused: :rock:
 
Good question. I think you have the basic elements down, but the mystery part to is the pedals. I have no idea, but yea, I think some fuzz was in use. How do you liek the re-masters ... good?
 
I only have the White Album now, but so far it sounds fabulous to me- really clear.

There's one picture in it that looks to me like it is the rock version of Revolution. John has the Epiphone, George a Les Paul that looks like the finish was removed, there are clearly Fender amps, but I can't see which ones, and I can't see any footpedals.

I'm listening to Savoy Truffle right now- Great guitar stuff; the parts are odder than I would have thought. A really snarly, snappy tone. I think channel 3 can get something like this. 4 would be too brown sounding.

Fun!

:D
 
Thanks! I was watching the Anthology piece on the White Album. They look like Fender Twin Reverbs. George's LP isn't sanded down (although a lot of people did that in those days) it looks almost oxblood- very unique. John has something in front of his amp. Not a mike, maybe a direct box. I remember reading something about the guitar at the beginning of the rock Revolution was plugged righht into the tube board and overloaded that like crazy.

A friend of mine reminded me that they just didn't have so much guitar stuff in those days, and to look more towards the studio- Abbey Road- and George Martin, Geoff Emerick, and things like mike pre's and mike placement. I suspect he is probably right. Still, they are really unique tones.

Just playing along with it- It's not all to pitch! That freaks me. I wonder if that is on purpose.

:D
 
I still use the Beatles guitar stuff as a reference for tones all the time .... I do not try and copy as much as I did at one time. Bull Dog and Taxman that era stuff just sounds so cool. Savoy Truffle is one of my favorites. The energy is amazing.

Just play it in the room and ball park it ..... you well be on your way before long. even if you have the same gear as them it only gets close. Most of it is all about driving the power amp.

This thread belongs on the main forum .... this forum is much slower..... maybe I well start one over there. Feel free to do so yourself.
 
Best I can figure out now, Harrison was using a lot of Les Paul and SG. Maybe still his Gretsch, but I don't hear anything that sounds like it. I don't hear anything that sounds like a Strat to me, but he was a Tele player, and some of this might be a Tele. Lennon seems to be using his Epiphone everywhere- I don't hear anything that sounds like a Rickenbacher.

Looking at the amps is an eye-opening experience. So primitive compared to what we know. Some of the earlier things were transistor amps. Does any pro guitar player use a transistor amp anymore, other than the JC 120?

I was using my 335 last night. 3rd channel will get something like it, but it just has such snap and sizzle.

Interesting parts, too- Unique changes and riffs. A good deal of the playing is McCartney.

Maybe there is a "George Martin producer in Abbey Road studios" pedal?

They are not all to pitch. Thanks to tuners that doesn't happen anymore. That may be as much loss as gain.

:D :rock:
 
It's McCartney on Taxman- That riff is impossible for me to play! Sounds like a Tele through a Vox to me, but maybe some kind of fuzz. I think also you have to pay attention to how it was recorded. Revolver was one of the most innovatively recorded albums of all time. If I remember Geoff Emerick's book right, the first close miked kick drum was done for that record. Not to mention tape loops.

:thumbsup:
 
I know that some of the fuzz tones - for example, the incredibly hi-fi overdriven sound on "Revolution" - were achieved by running guitars direct into the board and cranking the console pre-amps beyond the boundaries of sanity. Lennon in particular got a kick out of demanding that EMI's white-coated engineers do things that made them cringe. :D
 
Gravity Jim":fyl5zhvt said:
I know that some of the fuzz tones - for example, the incredibly hi-fi overdriven sound on "Revolution" - were achieved by running guitars direct into the board and cranking the console pre-amps beyond the boundaries of sanity. Lennon in particular got a kick out of demanding that EMI's white-coated engineers do things that made them cringe. :D
Click to expand...

Yeah....I know a lot of the distorted tones were doing this 2-3 times...Run a track through the board, cranking hte gain...and stacking 2-3 preamps on the board together to get that distortion. That's the orignal form of gain stacking!! :)
 
A lot of the stuff being out of tune was not because of tuners .... they did have oscilloscopes in the studio. It was done by manual flange / chorus on the tape machines. They did a lot of that. Speeding up or slowing down tape well change the sound a lot even when not doing flange.

Len Rabinowitz":314qcd8x said:
It's McCartney on Taxman- That riff is impossible for me to play! Sounds like a Tele through a Vox to me, but maybe some kind of fuzz. I think also you have to pay attention to how it was recorded. Revolver was one of the most innovatively recorded albums of all time. If I remember Geoff Emerick's book right, the first close miked kick drum was done for that record. Not to mention tape loops.

:thumbsup:
Click to expand...

Geoff Emerick's book is great.
 
Yeah, I know they fiddled with the tape machines a lot. I think they also used a leslie speaker a lot. I think the vocal on Tomorrow Never Knows is through a Leslie, and I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of the guitar tones are as well. I'm pretty sure the solo on Let It Be is, and I always thought that was a nice tone.

So, with the Tourmaster, maybe a pretty snappy channel 3 tone with the Eventide Modfactor's Leslie simulation might get some of it...

:confused: :D
 
I guess my question boils down to this- What were the fuzz boxes that were available in 1968? It seems to me that is what is causing the tones on something like Birthday- Very snappy, compared the the rock Revolution, which is a little darker and sounds more direct into the board. The re-mastering is really clear sounding to my ears- I could hear a lot more detail.

With tuning, I would if they might be tuning to the keyboards in the studio, although I would assume the Abbey Road would keep their keys tuned to pitch. I have known some singers that will adjust tuning to make a song easier to sing. It wasn't so unusual in those days to have a song "in the cracks" pitch-wise. I think it added a subtle, unique tonality.

:D
 
Len, try a Tele through ch 2...turn the treble control up, mids kinda down, bass at noon or less...also a Rat pedal would help...espiecally a Keely modded one....FWIW...The Super V module sounds exactly like that...it's a vox AC30
 
There was not many pedals at all..... most of the time I would guess it was all power amp distortion.
It is harder to get in the ball park of small amps cranked. I would use one of the clean channels with the master turned up.
I would also try using the low watt thing on the back.
it is hard to tell what you well find ..... believe it or not my Mesa Tremoverb DR does a very good Vox AC 30 on the blues channel. I know I was surprised. Not as good as my THD Bivalve but pretty close.

I agree the lead sound on Let It Be is very cool. The way he uses the melody is very cool.

http://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/101977
 
You know it's funny- The tones struck me as sounding like a Rat, although that didn't come around for years!

They did have fuzz boxes. They were used on Satisfaction in 1965, and Paul had that fuzz bass on Think For Yourself on Rubber Soul. I just don't know what it was.

:confused:
 
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