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What do you use to create your unique Sound..


mihcmac

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I"m starting to think personal sound has as much to do with the people you're playing with and how does each other's sound compliment each other.  Playing alone, it's never a consideration for me - but I bet as soon as you start throwing in other guitars / instruments etc...  you start to tailor your sound to get a distinction between the two, make sure you're not washing each other out. 

Just thinking out loud.

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1 hour ago, uncle fester said:

I"m starting to think personal sound has as much to do with the people you're playing with and how does each other's sound compliment each other.  Playing alone, it's never a consideration for me - but I bet as soon as you start throwing in other guitars / instruments etc...  you start to tailor your sound to get a distinction between the two, make sure you're not washing each other out. 

Just thinking out loud.

 

A lot of times you do sound the same, occupy the same area of the megahurtzes and stuff.  That's where playing comes together.  You have to move away from the other guitar player.  If he's playing cowboy chords I'm somewhere up the neck, and vice versa.  We let the guy singing pick his spot, other guy goes off somewhere else on the neck.  Helps with depth and width.

rct

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18 minutes ago, rct said:

 

A lot of times you do sound the same, occupy the same area of the megahurtzes and stuff.  That's where playing comes together.  You have to move away from the other guitar player.  If he's playing cowboy chords I'm somewhere up the neck, and vice versa.  We let the guy singing pick his spot, other guy goes off somewhere else on the neck.  Helps with depth and width.

rct

It's taken me a while to figure that out.  It's so important.

I don't think I have a unique sound, other than I play clean mostly.

Edited by badbluesplayer
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3 hours ago, badbluesplayer said:

It's taken me a while to figure that out.  It's so important.

I don't think I have a unique sound, other than I play clean mostly.

 

You do, like most guitar players, play much cleaner than I do.  I admire that.  I do the super weedly clean now and again on some jazzy-er stuff and it's usually good for a robust chuckle.

I consider Tim singing and being the guitar guy for this song right now with just a couple harmony vocs for me to be a much deserved rest, so I wander all over, changing texture and timbre against whatever he is doing.  It's relaxing, because next one or one after will be all Ron, and I'll have to get back to work.

rct

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When I started to make the transition to P90's, I noticed when playing with other guitarists that, it seemed, I just owned the playing field. I was using my Epiphone Junior DC that had a P90 from a 59 Gibson LP in it. In most cases the other players were using much better guitars, but it cut through them like a knife though butter.

This evolved into a big part of my sound, maybe...

Edited by mihcmac
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7 hours ago, uncle fester said:

I"m starting to think personal sound has as much to do with the people you're playing with and how does each other's sound compliment each other.  Playing alone, it's never a consideration for me - but I bet as soon as you start throwing in other guitars / instruments etc...  you start to tailor your sound to get a distinction between the two, make sure you're not washing each other out. 

Just thinking out loud.

Yeah, I had to learn that lesson quite quickly  (I've only played in 2 bands) - I think of it like a stained glass window where each guitar, bass, vocals, cymbals and drums are a different coloured glass and the window is the sonic range...so long as they fill a different piece of the window it's pretty, but if they overlap it just doesn't  let light through.  

I saw an inexperienced local guy playing a gig we were also on and his band gave him a solo and there was nothing, the pain on his face was hard to watch, but I turned to our drummer and said 'I'll bet he's got his gain way too high' -another adjustment you must make between the bedroom and the stage.

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14 hours ago, 'Scales said:

Yeah, I had to learn that lesson quite quickly  (I've only played in 2 bands) - I think of it like a stained glass window where each guitar, bass, vocals, cymbals and drums are a different coloured glass and the window is the sonic range...so long as they fill a different piece of the window it's pretty, but if they overlap it just doesn't  let light through.  

 

 

I play in a 7 piece band, but I am the only guitarist. That helps a lot. In fact its been that way for most of the bands I worked with. I'm aware that I occupy the same range as the keys so I turn down extra low when he plays a solo.

I played a beer festival once and a band came on before us and they had 3 guitarists (not including bass) and a rack of guitars as well. Two of them were playing cowboy chords with gain. One of them should have been playing clean. The 3rd played barre chords. It was ok but they hadn't thought it through.

 

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1 hour ago, merciful-evans said:

 

I play in a 7 piece band, but I am the only guitarist. That helps a lot. In fact its been that way for most of the bands I worked with. I'm aware that I occupy the same range as the keys so I turn down extra low when he plays a solo.

I played a beer festival once and a band came on before us and they had 3 guitarists (not including bass) and a rack of guitars as well. Two of them were playing cowboy chords with gain. One of them should have been playing clean. The 3rd played barre chords. It was ok but they hadn't thought it through.

 

I once went to see a band that at times had three bass players..  yes, all playing at once..  and no.. it didn't work.. not at all...

 

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8 minutes ago, kidblast said:

I once went to see a band that at times had three bass players..  yes, all playing at once..  and no.. it didn't work.. not at all...

 

[lol] yeah man...here's a bit from our one and only show with 2 bass players - it's great in theory!

 

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yea.  a bit heavy on the bottom, so to speak.  And just imagine having ONE more in there.  I felt bad for the other guys trying to keep up with the madness of it all

at the end of the set, one of the guitarist asked "So what do you think"  

"I think you have 2 too many bass players"  

"Tell me about it...."

Edited by kidblast
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I think its good to experiment, if your group is doing covers occasionally injecting some improv can be beneficial and the reverse. Most of my bands have been very progressive almost slipping into fusion, but had to step back occasionally and do some rhythmic headbanger tunes.

Anyway this was just a though, not really on or off topic, but if you are trying to sound like someone else or yourself it takes experimenting.

Everything changes when you get out of the bedroom to the living room to the garage to a public place, being able to actually hear what you sound like a few feet away from the source.

Edited by mihcmac
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I don't play in a band anymore, but in my last band used an Eleven Rack.  It was a cover band, so I wasn't really going for a unique sound, but trying to sound like the original recording.  Eleven rack was great for that as it offered a whole bunch of different amps and every effect you could think of.

Between mid 70s and about 1990 I played my LP through a Twin Reverb with no effects.  Just used a little reverb from the amp.  That amp was from about 1974, it had the blue trim, and it had a master volume that was a push/pull.  I pulled it out for a little dirt, but not too much.  In those days people were always coming up to me and saying what a unique tone I had.  The reverb was always on, but not too much, just enough to give the guitar some depth.  Not like slap back delay or echo chamber.  The other thing I always did was use the volume and tone controls.  So many guitar players in those days always had volume and tones at 10 thinking that gave them the fullest range of their pickups.  I was almost never at 10 on any of them.  I played a lot cleaner than most others.

If I had a second guitar in the band I liked it if he played a Strat or a Tele so we had different sounds coming from our pickups.  The contrast between the humbuckers and single coils blended well.  

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On 8/23/2020 at 3:33 AM, uncle fester said:

I"m starting to think personal sound has as much to do with the people you're playing with and how does each other's sound compliment each other.  Playing alone, it's never a consideration for me - but I bet as soon as you start throwing in other guitars / instruments etc...  you start to tailor your sound to get a distinction between the two, make sure you're not washing each other out. 

Just thinking out loud.

 

On 8/23/2020 at 5:04 AM, rct said:

 

A lot of times you do sound the same, occupy the same area of the megahurtzes and stuff.  That's where playing comes together.  You have to move away from the other guitar player.  If he's playing cowboy chords I'm somewhere up the neck, and vice versa.  We let the guy singing pick his spot, other guy goes off somewhere else on the neck.  Helps with depth and width.

rct

Totally.....

In my experience, there is no substitute for playing with other people, specially for accelerated skill development and learning where the sounds you're making will embellish or enhance whats being played.

Edited by mihcmac
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