Mids with Ronnie Le Tekro & Oz Fox/Michael Sweet?

[Cornfordcrunch]

Ive been really lucky to have the opportunity in the past few years to hang with Oz and Michael a bunch of times in social situatuons (Oz sat in on vocals with my band ...and sang Journey...with no monitors and killed it...its on youtube.)It seems that Mike is the "chaser" and Oz just kind of goes with it. I cant understand why those two get continually overlooked when dual guitar bands are discussed....the note choices in their harmony leads were fricking stellar and the way their vibratos match is just awesome...but then again, good stuff typically does get overlooked.

I asked them about the tour with TNT and Loudness. Mike said Ronni's guitars have the action set so high they were nearly unplayable by mere mortals...

AWESOME!! Stryper is one of my favorite 80's bands and I don't have any qualms saying that lol It seems to me the more melodic a band is the more they get panned. Id love to see the video!!!

I also got the impression that Mike was the Gear Chaser. His information was more detailed then Oz's but it was great getting the information from both of them!!

As far as Ronnies guitar action, Curt has said the same thing and you can actually see it in videos!! It looks like you could shoot an arrow off of his guitar neck LMAO

If my dumb ass can figure out how to post the youtube link I'll put up the vid

 

[Cornfordcrunch]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1r7kH_QeR2c

 

[Scott Peterson]

Killer thread. Icon was one of my fave's; you can't imagine what a trip it is to read all the information on this thread... I thought I was the only one left that remembered Icon... kudos.

 

[Chubtone]

Killer thread. Icon was one of my fave's; you can't imagine what a trip it is to read all the information on this thread... I thought I was the only one left that remembered Icon... kudos.

I was in three different bands that all WORSHIPPED Icon. When new guys would get in our band or I'd join a new band I'd say have you heard this and give out a tape or two and it never failed, it was always a from them.

Stephen Clifford was probably my favorite heavy rock vocalist in that era. He just had it. Either Clifford or Shortino.

 

[Zachman]

ahhhhhh 3 of my 80's faves mentioned in this thread!!


Just to clear up some things that Ive read....
I spoke to Oz Fox and Michael Sweet via e-mail and in person and here is what the told me and Ganiac at the Stryper expo in 2000 when we met them. When they used the Boogie Mark series amps and not preamps they used Boogie MKII's not the MKIII's or IIC+'s. Oz said that his amp might have been close to the MKIII because he got his amp right about when the MKIII's were just comming out and he said that his amp just sounded mean as hell and it had the Import transformer.
Both Michael an OZ slammed the Front end of their amps with the Furman Pq3 bumping up the midrange at a narrow bandwidth , cutting the lows and the level on the PQ3 was set at 8 to max which increases the gain by +26db. Both mark series amps had graphic Eq's and they were set to the scoop setup. When you have the Boogie graphic scoop combined with the PQ3 in the front of the amp you get that tone. Ive nailed that tone on any of the Marks series amps with an EQ and PQ3. Its really the parametric EQ that is needed for that tone.
The Marks series amps and PQ3 combo was used on Soldiers and THWTD.
In God we trust they swapped out the MKII's for a Quad preamp Strategy 400 Poweramp and PQ3 and on against the Law they went back to straight MKII's without the PQ3 slamming the front end.

OZ told me that they used Boogie Halfback Cabs loaded with 4 EV speakers. He said that some speakers could not handle that sound but the EV's were great for it.

They also used Noise gates because you will find out that slamming the front end and boosting mids will add a shitload of noise lol!!

As far as effects were concerned OZ told me that they used Digitech stuff and the only thing he used was a chorus with 26ms of delay between cabs and he used Delay Live on the THWTD tour. Other then that everytime Ive seen him Live he just used Chorus.

I hope this helps!!


As far Letekro is concerned he did pretty much the same thing that stryper did by hitting teh front end of the amp but its the Flanger that acts like the EQ in order to get that Midrange Hump. How he figured that out is beyond me and it Was Curt(Chubtone) Who hipped me to the Flanger !!

Icon use the same thing as Stryper but they used Valley Arts Parametric EQ. Wexler set his midrange Bump to 800hz and the other guitarist had his at 400. They recorder them together and that's what gave them the sound. They also used Musicman solid state amps which would not have the bottom end Stryper had and it would be a bit tighter.
If you Listen to Reason for the season by Stryper that was more in the 800hz Freeqency ala ICON!

Hope this helps!

~R~

Holy crap Ralph--- THAT is a LOT of very detailed info. No wonder you're the man. You RAWK!!!!

Love ya Brother Zach,,,,,,But ya da man!!

~R~

 

[Gainzilla]

Oh and I agree that Both Curt and Kage do a mean LeTekro!!!

LOL, I remember when we recorded our solos for Alex Flouros's massive 22 player wankfest. I figured that Id take my 20 seconds and dedicate it to Ronni. When I went into machine gun mode, you were laughing so hard that there was a vein popping out of your head!!!

On another note, Ronni is a great player who never really got his due IMO. Its not like he had alot of licks, you pretty much heard the same 3 in every damn solo but he had a great ear for melody, solid hooks, great tone and some of the tightest harmonies that I have ever heard. Mofo smoked an ASSLOAD of weed though, I got to hang out with him a bunch of times back in the day and he was perpetually stoned LOL!! Cool, down to earth cat...

Kage

 

[thiswaythatway]

Slamming the front of a Fortin mod with a PQ-3? You guys are lunatics. The Fortin has at least double the gain of the amps we used to slam the front of with Furmans. If you found a guy that could mod the Fortins to have twice as much gain as they have you guys would probably slam the front of that too. And so on, and so on, and so on.

The Fortin sure loves the purple trick for Tekro tones. And that's a Warehouse 65, i think Ronnie used H30's?

https://soundclick.com/share?songid=8280934

 

[Chubtone]

The Fortin sure loves the purple trick for Tekro tones. And that's a Warehouse 65, i think Ronnie used H30's?

https://soundclick.com/share?songid=8280934

That sounds killer on my lap top. I have to be sure and listen to it when I get home.

 

[mixohoytian]

I wish TNT had stuck w/ the 80s thing or gone back to it
the way ratt and dokken have etc...
LeTekro had a very special/unique thing in his style and arrangements and who cares if it sounds 80s

The late 80s bands all go the shaft and had to compete with offspring etc...which wasn't a big deal for all the bands that sucked, but LeTekro was a real loss to the hard rock world
I've heard his other stuff and it's just not the same as far as hard rock arrangements

anyways, I'm gonna try the purple trick into a fortin set to load then into a friedman modded splawn

 

[thiswaythatway]

I wish TNT had stuck w/ the 80s thing or gone back to it
the way ratt and dokken have etc...
LeTekro had a very special/unique thing in his style and arrangements and who cares if it sounds 80s

The late 80s bands all go the shaft and had to compete with offspring etc...which wasn't a big deal for all the bands that sucked, but LeTekro was a real loss to the hard rock world
I've heard his other stuff and it's just not the same as far as hard rock arrangements

anyways, I'm gonna try the purple trick into a fortin set to load then into a friedman modded splawn

I think TNT's real downfall was their songwriting. Intuition was way too commercial sounding and the album after that was pretty terrible IMHO. They were supposed to be a metal band and like soo many other bands they had more in common with Air Supply.

 

[mixohoytian]

I didn't say they were a great band
they were a band with a great guitar player
same goes for most mid - late 80s bands with cool metal guitarists

 

[Chubtone]

anyways, I'm gonna try the purple trick into a fortin set to load then into a friedman modded splawn

Too bad you don't still have that Triaxis because the exact combo you mentioned above into all 128 sounds of the Triaxis daisy-chained, simultaneously is the perfect tone. I played one chord into that rig and immediately turned everything off, wrapped it all lovingly into bubble wrap and placed it into a huge vault and sealed it. I will never play it again or play guitar again because I have found it all and now I have done it all. I have the perfect tone of all time.

Now I am going to give up my dreams of becoming the most famous guitar player in the world and go into something more realistic like trying to become a Formula 1 driver. If that doesn't work, I might just go pro in the NBA. This guitar thing is yesterdays news.

 

[mixohoytian]

dammit
now I need to go buy my triaxis back
or maybe I can simulate it with my pod going into the eleven rack then reamped through the axe fx?

 

[Chubtone]

You have to find a way to run the fortin/friedman/splawn rig into every single preset of the preamp at the same time. That's the key. The Triaxis has 128 sounds so that makes it way better than the POD.

 

[mixohoytian]

I'll never be able to do the Letekro spaz lick
and I'll never have the ultimate 128 gain stages tone
I give up
I'm switching to bass

 

[Gainfreak]

All kidding asside, I nearly crapped my pants from reading this thread and laughing so hard

 

[Cornfordcrunch]

I wish TNT had stuck w/ the 80s thing or gone back to it
the way ratt and dokken have etc...
LeTekro had a very special/unique thing in his style and arrangements and who cares if it sounds 80s

The late 80s bands all go the shaft and had to compete with offspring etc...which wasn't a big deal for all the bands that sucked, but LeTekro was a real loss to the hard rock world
I've heard his other stuff and it's just not the same as far as hard rock arrangements

anyways, I'm gonna try the purple trick into a fortin set to load then into a friedman modded splawn

I think TNT's real downfall was their songwriting. Intuition was way too commercial sounding and the album after that was pretty terrible IMHO. They were supposed to be a metal band and like soo many other bands they had more in common with Air Supply.

I always thought it was Harnells voice. I like it alot, but lots of people I tried to turn on to TNT didnt care for the vocals...I also remember reading that after the moderate MTV success with 10,000 lovers and Everyones a star the label started with the "we want radio friendly hits"...who knows...I probably wouldnt have been as interested as I continue to be about them if they'd blown up like a Bon Jovi.

 

[Digital Jams]

wtf

 

[Gainiac]

Slamming the front of a Fortin mod with a PQ-3? You guys are lunatics. The Fortin has at least double the gain of the amps we used to slam the front of with Furmans. If you found a guy that could mod the Fortins to have twice as much gain as they have you guys would probably slam the front of that too. And so on, and so on, and so on.

With that said......You do realize that Stryper slammed the Front end of the 4 gain stage boogie with the level maxed and the mids maxed right? Im just following thier lead

If you got the stryper tone, then re amped through the fortin...that would sound killer....
or you could just buy a metal zone pedal

Im one of the few that Like processed tones as well as a good cranked Plexi. I know the Stryper tone isn't for everyone but I dig it

+ 1 on the Stryper tone!! when I first met Ralph 320 years ago we were both totally inspired talking about BOTH these bands for the guitar tones and trying to chase that gear down... And the GAS chaos started from there.... This, of course was back before the internet and light bulbs and the wheel, so getting info from these guys on what they used was like pulling Teeth!!! nowadays everyone's got a parametric....

 

[Gainzilla]

I think TNT's real downfall was their songwriting. Intuition was way too commercial sounding and the album after that was pretty terrible IMHO. They were supposed to be a metal band and like soo many other bands they had more in common with Air Supply.

IMHO, I thought that Intuition was a friggin masterpiece; Great songs, playing ,tone etc... I guess it all depends on what youre looking for. the next album, Realized fantasies had some great stuff on it but was definitely a weak album overall. FWIW, I really dug My Religion, at least half of the tunes on that were pretty damn good