What's that tone you "hear in your head?"

[diggum12]

I know that's a totally subjective topic.  But really, do any of us ever achieve "that tone" permanently?

When I read comments in articles or magazine endorsements where people say "My search for my ultimate tone has ended" I usually don't give that any credit honestly.  To me, tone chasing is what makes the game so fun.  I like it to always get better and better.

It's kinda like saying, "Well I've practiced all I can practice and now I only need to play.  I don't need to get any better now."

The reason I say all this is because I play everything in the chain:  The guitar (and ultimately the hands) is only the beginning.  I also PLAY the pedals (the OD's, the Distortions, the delays...) and then I PLAY the amp.  They're all parts to be played, you follow me?

I play guitar using my ears.  I play the pedals using my hands.  I play the amp using my pedals. 

I hope I'll never be satisfied with my tone, and right now I LOVE my tone more and more everyday.  It's like a good marriage really:  If there's no chance of it getting better every day, why bother walking down the aisle? 





BTW, I'm happily married with 4 kids...

In fact, today is my 9th anniversary. 

Sorry for rambling.

[gravity84]

To be honest.  I hate tweaking, but I am a tweaker (not drugs, tone, which I guess counts as drugs).  I would love to settle on a tone and say I love this tone and this is "my" tone, and to be honest, even when I get new gear I still dial it up to "my" tone.  I guess IMO tweaking really cuts into playing time, and I picked up the guitar to play.  That's why I'm a fan of Brian's pedals, because they are so easy to use to get "my" sound. 

Edit:

I guess what I'm saying is, your playing is the words, sentences, paragraphs you use to express yourself.  Pedals, amps, guitars they're just your vocal chords.  You can say whatever you want to say through any vocal chords.

[partsocaster]

It's journey, to be sure. When I was starting out, I cared nothing about tone, it just had to be loud. Then I played a while, found that I liked a certain "type" of sound but in those days I was a little more into the technique of playing rather than the sound of playing. Once I was in a real band, my sound started to solidify because it was atypical of the music my band was playing so there was consistency at the bare minimum.

Over the last ten years though, I have been listening, not only to my tone but also to the tones that made me want to be a guitar player and emulating them. I think about it like hearing and not hearing, like saying yes to something when you only heard part of the question or answering from knowledge instead of out of my a**. Now I know what I want to get out of my signal chain, I can hear it in my head, as your subject states, and have learned how to get remarkably close.

The beauty of experimenting is that I might find that the tone I heard in my head is not the one I was REALLY looking for.

I also have to say, and I've made mention of this before, the gear choices have vastly improved, not only in number but also of build quality and tone. Early distortion boxes were not toneful as the amps they were played through, fuzz. Pedals now really sound like tubes, amps really, and that changed my perspective on tone because the possibilities just exploded. Listening to music outside my comfort zone does that as well, I never would have found out about Brent Mason without Wampler Pedals and I totally dig Brents stuff, a truly incredible guitar player.

I say tweak until we become dust, you'll never know what you'll find if you don't look.

Happy Anniversary, btw, I am approaching the 10th this July but only 1 kid who's going to be 5 tomorrow. Good topic.

[diggum12]

I say tweak until we become dust, you'll never know what you'll find if you don't look.

I'm with you partsocaster!  When my hands are too old to solder and tweak, that's when I'll welcome the grim reaper. 

[thejoe]

I've never been satisified with one tone. Isn't that why we're here? Why we mod? I play in several different bands varying several different styles. There is no way to settle on one set tone. Its highly subjective... I'm a HUGE Brian May fan. "Tie your mother down" is generally the lick I'll play as I'm warming up. But my tone most of the time is very far from his. And he is certainly a tone guru. I think its actually my favorite of all the tones I've heard. I just know its not going to work for me all the time.
I get bored. I mod things, I tweak things. Its why I don't have a practice amp. When I'm home I want it to sound as close to what it'll sound like live. I"ll spend hours playing at home so I don't have to spend hours tweaking at sound checks (if you even get a sound check).
I (much like most of us, i'm sure) am a collector. But I don't let age or price of instruments get in my way. Last week I routed my 1975 SG-I to put a full size humbucker in it. I'm sure it'll get lots of stones thrown my way, but now it sounds how I want it to. Why own anything you won't use?

*for anyone concerned it was a seymour duncan '59 neck pickup that installed. its in the bridge position.

[Eric_Idle]

Well, the clean sound I hear is dependent on context. Whether it's stylistic or in response to the type of song (ballad, up tempo, rocker etc) but genrally speaking, as someone who primarily playes a tele I'm after a warm, fat (but not bass heavy) smooth tone that has some punch, but not too much attack. Sounds contadictory. After years of searching, I've quit trying. I now am willing to go with a clean sound that sounds nice and musical, but am willing to compromise the details as long as my clean tone isn't harsh.

I've managed to nail down most of my overdriven tones except one. I've never been able to get that sound that has sustain without all the grit and harmonics that sream "this is distortion!" Allan Holdsworth, Larry Carlton and Eric Johnson all have it in their own way, I'm thinking I'll have to let that one go as well. I came closer than ever for a while. I had a modified TS clone that was just killer. Then I had to take it for the builder for repair, and it's never been the same.

Oh well.

[diggum12]

Eric, have you tried the dual distortion thing?  Y'know like a Tube Screamer combined w/ a DS-1?  I use the Blues Driver into the DS-1 all the time.  It gives me that howl that's very Johnson-esque.  (I've modified them all, of course.)

Y'know one thing about EJ is how ridiculously simple his setup typically is.  I've seen him live, and while a lot of it has to do with his amps and fingers, it seems the emphasis on his playing a "magical" fuzz face or Tube Driver is really overhyped, and not by him.  I mean heck, I have an interview with him at home that says he loves a stock DS-1 because it has a nice creamy sounding distortion.  Okay if that doesn't throw people off, nothing will.

I think he can still get most of his tones by his choice of guitars and amps, and of course his hands.  When I saw him, he played an SG all night.  Cliffs of Dover still sounded like Cliffs of Dover, Trademark sounded like Trademark... you get the picture.   He does a lot of amp switching too, sometimes combining two amps on one channel! 

I tried and tried for a few years to get his tone.  Then when people started saying, "Hey, you're starting to sound like Eric Johnson" I almost took it as an insult because all that meant was, I was starting to be a good copycat. 

[Eric_Idle]

Funny you should ask, because I do to a certain extent. I use a modified BD-2 with my Relic Drive for a hopped up SRV type of tone.

But like yourself, I wouldn't want Eric Johnson's tone. That's sort of why I included Holdsworth and Carlton. It's a type of distortion as opposed to one guys tone. But even that I'm starting to give up on. I've been listening to Jimmy Herring's solo disc "Lifeboat" and am thinking that a gritty harmonic laden tone is pretty cool after all.

I think the beginning of the end for me were the DS-1 "vintage" and "18"

[godiniac1]

I think if I found "The Tone" life would be boring for evermore......then I'd have to do something different like turkey farming....

Basically, it's not the tone, but the knowledge of how to get it, and to tweak the most out of whatever you have at the moment that is the real prize...
I reach places where I have a tone I'm satified with, but then I get into a different project, and it starts all over again....

godiniac

[ice house]

I hear Warren Haynes. I am delusional!