Who plays Clean

[Nickblues1]

I'm not talking about when your gigging, but when your home just playing for yourself. When you just want to hear those clean notes ring out true.

 

I do, I know sometimes it's like trying to get those sounds to hit your soul. To just let yourself be engulfed in the pure magic of the music.

[thunderstruck507]

I just can't find a clean sound that I really enjoy that much to be honest. I do play around with it sometimes, the other day I was messing with clean stuff for over 20 minutes of my playing time which was more than most of the time. *shrugs*

[Schtang]

I play clean about 75% of the time, which is about the same amount I play live. I tend to solo with overdrive though, but occassionally I will play a solo clean on these beauties (there is one epiphone in there, a Sherraton II very nice guitar).

 

[thunderstruck507]

that iced tea standard is frickin sweet

[smokestack]

Playing with a clean dry sound is maybe something that all players ought to do occasionally, even if it's not appropriate for the music they normally knock out.

You learn a lot about both tone and technique. There's no hiding behind a clean sound.

[and leave that reverb and compression alone...that's cheating ;^) ]

[garyelcrrt1281733995]

Personally, my level of play (can't really call it skill, now can I) has only recently advanced to the point where I am sufficiently satisfied with my clean tone to get into experimenting with OD. I'm also finding its every bit as hard to find a pickup/guitar/amp setting for OD as it was for clean tones. And they aren't the same!

 

(You're right Smoke, about cheating, but sometimes its just so much fun to fool around with some blues while dialed into rotary chorus, compressor/susainer, reverb, slap-back delay and maybe a deep autowah - blended pickups, naturally, both volumes dimed, neck rolled off to zero and bridge tone at icepick)

[Schtang]

that iced tea standard is frickin sweet

 

Thanks - It was the nicest playing and sounding Gibson LP Standard that I came across when I bought it new in 2005. I was so so lucky that with all the goodness this guitar had' date=' it was graced with such a beautiful top, looks more AAA flamed maple top than a AA top.

 

Here is a closer look

[b']Gibson Les Paul Standard 2004 Ice-Tea[/b]

[glenn1281733995]

I tend to agree with Smoke. There was a time when I wouldn't even think about playing clean. I found myself stuck in a rut where I wasn't progressing to my liking. Someone suggested playing clean so that I could assess my own playing with a lot more accuracy. I discovered that I pretty much sucked clean. This prompted me to pay more attention to the basics and feel that I'm a better player for it. Now I only suck a tiny bit

[smokestack]

I never had the right kind of talent to get my head round and play the fancy stuff...so I had to learn how to play the simpe stuff effectively. Do I wish I could play the technical stuff as well ?

You bet I do...but a bit of tone and taste goes a long way.

[Notes_Norton]

Most of the time I play clean through a Zoom pedal with a Twin Reverb amp simulation both at home and on the gig.

 

But I play a lot of baby boomer music, and for the crowd I am playing, that is most appropriate.

 

Of course there are songs where some distortion and compression are needed and also a few that need acoustic simulation (the Zoom does a pretty good job at that). Oh and those 70s disco numbers let me have fun with the wah-wah pedal.

 

Notes

[Stray Dog]

I play clean practically all the time! Overdrive is over RATED more like... oh god that was bad.

 

Listen to my music here, www.soundclick.com/charliebetts to hear my clean sound. I hear so much overdrive it bores me. I love a nice sweet clean sound, you can some cool gritty rock sounds still through playing clean. The one distortion sound I do really love is a nice vintage fuzz, but I haven't ever been able to recreate that. I think the best fuzz tone ever is the riff in No Quarter. But apart from that, I really don't have any desire to distort...

[Prospero]

As a beginner, I play clean exclusively. It's so easy to fall into the trap that you're playing awesome when using distortion, when in reality you're doing everything wrong. It was good advice I got: the cleaner the better, when learning. You can't hide your mistakes.

 

That having been said, I prefer a deeper, bassier sound so I tend to keep the treble down and the tone knobs rolled back.

[ekyoquiero]

I know so many people who won't play unless their distortion is cranked up...cuz it's a cheat. Even if you miss a note, you can still hit it...if ya know what I mean. But I don't plan on taking shortcuts in my playing, so the majority of my home play is done clean to make sure that I hit the note correctly each time. Besides, some songs just sound better in a natural tone.

[rafaelh]

My sounds pretty much clean regardless where I am....maybe a bit more grit live and some delay, but it still falls under the clean category for sure.

 

When at home I use either a SS practice amp or sometimes my little princeton and they pretty much sound best left alone. When not using an electric at home I'll noodle with the acoustic so it's definitely clean.

 

BTW Schtang, nice collection there.....love that red Tele.

[dubstar]

like prospero, I usually play clean to work on developing my technique...

 

I'd say:

 

50% clean

45% deluxe memory man with a slight echo / reverb

5% add overdrive and distortion

 

most of the time I just pick up my acoustic because it's quicker

[volt1281734017]

I usually play without any distortion or overdrive, and I like to use all three pickup switch settings depending on the song or style of music I'm playing, and my mood. If I had to say which switch position I used the most I'd have to say the middle pickup switch position. Many leads sound better on the bridge pickup however.

[TWANG]

I try to practice everything twice.. first clean.. nothing but tube guitar and fingers..

then I replay with a bit of overdrive if called for.

but I avoid effects until at least the third run through.

 

It's ugly. It's hard. It's honest. It's unforgiving.

That's what I love about clean.

 

Your tone improves, your accuracy improves.. and when you fire it all up, you have more confidence than you even need, knowing that

you got better and the stuff will still hide any little thing that doesn't go perfectly.

 

that being said.. there's no excuse for not knowing how to use your effects well.. so practice clean and effected is called for.

 

TWANG

[jcwillow777]

I really don't play anything totally clean, but into one of by tube amps. I play probably about 10% with just reverb and probably about another 30% with Chorus and Delay. The rest with Overdrive, I love my TS9s.

[lostindesert]

At home it's clean with sometimes a chorus and a TS808 on my VOX AX15 with reverb.

 

Peter

[Dave]

I generally spend most of my time around the house playing unamplified because I keep a couple of guitars on stands and pick one up here and there and run through finger exercises for a few minutes. When I amplify, I want to be in the region where I'm clean when I pick normally and dirty when I dig in. That's the way I setup on stage, also.

 

Playing unamplified really highlights note articulation (or lack of it) in my technique. Nothing sounds more empty than a slurred note on an unamplified LP. Grin.

 

Smoke, Is that Keith Richards in your avatar? And I Like It, Like It, Yes, I do. (Line from Brown Sugar, I think)

[slagg]

without the clean there would be no feeling and no dig in the dig you dig.too many young lads hide behind a wall of disortion,but what do you do when the battery goes dead?

[pohatu771]

I play mostly clean... I have one of my own songs on overdrive, just slightly, and of course, when I cover Revolution.

[gothsloth]

Play clean to get things right, then wherever the music / feel takes me.

 

Smoke, Is that Keith Richards in your avatar? And I Like It, Like It, Yes, I do. (Line from Brown Sugar, I think)

 

Hey Dave, the line is from It's Only Rock n Roll (But I Like It)

[smokestack]

LOL, Yeah, It's Keith.

 

I think he might be a bit annoying though. Better if he kept still !

I might replace him with a cuddly little retriever puppy or something ;^)

[Dave]

Word has it that Keith had plastic surgery on his face. I saw the Stones on an Isle of Wight concert recently and he has a smooth face now...but he's still pug ugly (LOL).