So here I am… not having updated my blog in awhile, and playing more than I was before. I’m currently working a pretty long/tiring clinical rotation and have not had a lot of energy past going home and sleeping. 9 more months before I wrap this school thing up!

Without further to do: wow… my tone sounded awesome this past month! Now I try to figure out what I did…..

• Change your strings often. Wow, a so-so lead from practice Wed night sounds squealing- full of harmonics- with new strings. You will not believe the sustain, the depth of tone, and smooth sound you get from new strings.
• It strikes me as odd the people who spend BUCKS on “transparent” overdrives, modulation etc…. (everything the Buzz is about these days) yet don’t change their strings. Seriously, I bought 3 sets for $12.99- and that overdrive was $250? Junked-up strings don’t transmit the best sound when your gear transmits the pure, transparent tone of rust! If your tone starts in strings, then do the easy think to take care of your tone!
• Get your amp EQed before each performance. Just put it on stage, step as far as possible and face it (as close to being a member of the audience as possible) and adjust accordingly. Then once its mic’d, then get the soundguy to give you any other tips.
• Each guitar I have likes a differing amp EQ: Tele likes a little more bass in the amp, less treble. Les Paul likes less bass, and a bit more treble.
• Each guitar likes a different Overdrive type: my Tele has a natural flatter EQ, so it likes pedals with midrange: Zendrive, Fulltone OCD, Tubescreamer type pedals- or perfectly transparent pedals like the TIM. My Les Paul tends to be a bit more heavy in the mids, so I roll off the mids on the Zendrive, use the Barber Small Fry, and natural tube compression.
• The Hermida NuValve has two itty-bitty tubes in it. They sound real good.
• Little tubes are NOT transparent.
• However, they are a heck of a lot of fun to play.
• When just “screwing around” with the little tubes on low gain at church, I discovered that at minimal volume the back of the room could hear what I was doing. I have never had anything cut through the mix so well.
• I like the before said “itty tubes”.
• Don’t be afraid to shred a little during a solo at church (tastefully of course!). For some reason some of us are worried of overplaying! I have been playing lead for a few years at this church and always play very deliberate, uncongested, melodic things. Then a couple of Sunday’s ago we were playing a Hillsong song,  I felt a quirk in my hand when I started playing the normal slow, cliche’ church “Hillsong” lead. At the climax of the solo, I ripped about 5 fast declining notes with quick high bend then went back into the  slow resolution. I literally saw the crowd smile as the solo was different than what I usually play, and it really peaked the song well.
• Have the humility to not play when needed, and the combination of humility/courage to let loose when you need to. Feel the flow of worship- and listen to the spirit and make sure your talents point towards He who gave them to you.
• Dotted 8th sounds good… on almost everything. Definitely solos. Yup.
• Karl likes delay. Click HERE
• To copy Karl: Delay is as perfect as it gets— God made it before the guitar, then gave it the guitar to make delay sound better.
• Tap Temp is a necessity.
• I can’t believe how I neeeeded a good tremolo a year ago and as of present I haven’t switched it on in 6 weeks.
• I can’t believe how little I used a Wah a year ago, but now I keep asking myself why I haven’t put it back on the board.
• I fully believe in a dual overdrive setup. The NuValve going into the Zendrive sounds phenomenal- smooth, and sustaining. The Barber Small Fry going into the Zendrive is riddled with harmonics and squeals… played lightly sounds like Santana, played aggressively, it sounds like RAWK!
• Always mic your amp. Always. I let a soundguy plug into my “line out” once. Moral of the story: Mic it! ALWAYS.
• When you mike your amp, your new pedal that cuts through the mix cuts through the mix- versus sounding like being played through a tape recorder.
• For the love of the listener- do not turn your treble all the way up. Do not be the  ice-pick to the ear as I have been. Treble cuts through well, yes- but your audience is now deaf.

Remember, tone is subjective! However, I have found that there are a couple of things that you should always consider: how “soft” your notes feel, even at high gain levels (ever hear a lead that cut through so well, but didn’t sound HEAVY?), and how well those notes cut through the mix with little effort does please your audience.

Also, gear is nothing without the practice behind it- or the fresh strings. Don’t forget that!

-L

Our worship team is going through some transitional phases as we have a new leader. She is an incredible, exciting vocalist… but knows nothing about music. Therefore we as the band are having to work with finding the correct keys and modeling into her style. Its tiring, exciting, and a complete dichotomy of feelings. We have had several really great services and we have had several not so great practices/performances.

So what do we do then?

I for one get some musical inspiration to help inspire my tone, my practice, and to renew my tired mind. I use this relaxing to push myself to keep my talent at its highest so I can offer excellence on Sunday mornings.

Albeit, more often than not, I just need to relax and clear my mind. I hope these videos inspire you, and let you relax in their toneful feel….(and apologies to those who frequent the blogs: I reused a couple of these!)

The guys out of Nashville… with a raw, raw tone….

The old guys… who still make me a fanboy….

MMMMmmmm… just listen to the solo at the end…

Now, I’m not into the whole “John Mayer is the pinnacle of tone!” world as some are.  But, he nailed this song:

Yeah. I’m an 80’s kid. Sue me….

A song that was a power statement, is now a ballad? Only one guy can pull that off. Just listen to the guitar’s tone… mmmm.

Deeper stuff to come. I need it light this week!

Okay, I’m back.

This last reprieve and time of “no posting” was not my fault– my computer died. I’m beginning work on my Doctorate Thesis so I definitely need a comp for that. Now I’m start polishing the 5 post I already have written and get them ready to publish here.

Thanks for chillin’ and waiting for me to pop back up!

-Larry

So I’ve been writing this blog awhile… and am getting a ton of hits on pedal board setup and questions how to do so. This question I received last was this one. I really liked the way it was asked and thought I would post it and my response.

hey! Great post… very informative, even though sadly, lots of it is over my head. I’m a worship leader at my church and I’m just slightly transitioning to my electric guitar as we’re doing more of the upbeat Lincoln Brewster type songs, and I’m using a Korg multi-effects processor pedal thing… and I just don’t see many people doing that, and am guessing I can tweak the sounds to my liking a little better using a train of pedals? Honestly I’m just trying to find that ‘appropriate’ church distortion/groove sound that is still hard core and sounds good, but isn’t the metal blasting away everyone kind of sound. I guess I’m asking what you think a good set of pedals (from scratch, including tuners/volume, etc.) would be to get crackin’ at finding a good mix of acousticy/strum sounds, with some good distortions and choruses as well?

Also, I know this sounds silly… but I don’t see how people transition so well between one song and the next, say you need to adjust your distortion… if you’re using say, the SD-1, then you’d have to bend down, turn the dial to crank down the distortion, and hope it’s right… that just doesn’t seem to be what people do, what is normal practice for getting different sounds throughout a set w/out literally tweaking the pedals between songs? Or do you just find a distortion that seems to fit them all?? Thanks in advance! —-

On the multiunits: yeah, I don’t like them. Did once, but they just don’t respond/breathe as well as actual analog effects do! The difference is astounding if you were to A/B them. That said, the newer “multi’s” that I would recommend is the Line 6 M13. This little guy can be tweaked quite well, and responds mostly the way an amp/analog effects do. I have been impressed with the tones I’ve heard from this thing. That said, my ear can tell some difference between a stomp box overdrive and the M13 overdrives, but the other effects (delay, modulations) are fantastic. Of course, as soon as I said I could tell the difference, a buddy of mine tweaked his to a point that sounded great and proved me wrong. So if you are on a budget, I would recommend the M13.

The best part of pedals is you have exactly what you want! You can add, remove etc…. and you get what you need! I’m assuming you are doing Lincoln-type music and maybe some Hillsong stuff. It helps to know your guitar, but we’ll just talk about the basics here and follow-up on the others. If I were leading worship with an electric guitar (as now I play lead and sing background) I would reduce my current board and probably use something like: compressor, 2 to 3 overdrives, tremolo, delay. Boom. That is all. Maybe a reverb. But thats pushing it– KISS method: Keep It Simple Sucka.

If I have to sing I don’t want to have to switch out so many effects, and I won’t be performing as much as I would be concentrating on Rhythm and staying on-key vocally! So for me, the actually pedals I would use would be: a smooth compressor (my fav: Barber Tone Press), high gain overdrive (my favs: Barber Small Fry, Fulltone OCD, Visual Sound Hyde, Hermida Audio Mosferatu) followed by 1 or 2 low gain drives (favs: Hermida Audio Zendrive, PaulC Tim, Barber LTD, Analogman Tubescreamer mod) then a tuner of your choice that mutes when you step on it, then a tremolo (preferably with tap-tempo) and a delay(with tap tempo, my favs: Line 6 Echo Park, and Boss DD20).

As for finding your “place” in the distortion/overdrive: Here is how I approach it. 1) I have 3 ODs on my board. Each is a different flavor. Each handles a different amount of gain. Boom, problem solved. I use this way sometimes. I also make sure the pedals (like the Zendrive) have a lot of headroom- where they aren’t too compressed and retain dynamics of playing. As in, hit a string soft, they are soft sounding, low gain. IF you hit the strings HARD, they ring back hard, medium gain. This also makes stacking drives (like my Small Fry INTO the Zen) sound incredibly good, smooth, and natural. 2) Lately I have been using the “classic method”. (which is what I would do if I were leading). The classic method comes from a time where no one used pedals, and only had amps for the drives. What they would do is set up their amp’s distortion with the volume on the guitar turned about halfway. Once they found that spot, their rhythm was set. Less volume would mean less drive, and a more clean sound. If they cranked the guitar’s volume, you had more gain/volume- thus a lead sound. I do this with the pedals with a lot of headroom (Zendrive, Analogman TS9 and SD1 among others…). Set to a nice rhythm with you guitar turned down. Nice light gain sounds. When I go into a heavy chorus/bridge, I only need to turn up to get harder/more gained sounds. If thats still not enough, I punch another “light” gain drive to boost it in volume and gain. Instant lead sound. I do the same thing with the high gain pedal: use it at 1/2 volume for the good crunchy stuff, more guitar volume for even heavier stuff or a lead sound, and if I need more, I boost with another low gain (this time the low gain is in the front, instead of pushing into the pedal).

But eventually you’ll find a pedal that fits almost everything. 80% of what I do (or have done) I used only an Analogman TS9 or the Zendrive (and now the Tim). The other 20% was clean (compressor usually) or heavy gained (which the TS9 and Zen couldn’t really do so well).

Good luck!

This has spurned some other thoughts from me… so look for them real soon!