Spaghetti Western FUZZ

[markm]

Can one of you kind gentlemen suggest a good Fuzz circuit for the Spaghetti Western tone?
I'm looking to build one that will provide the same sound as "The Good, The Bad and The Ugly" guitar tone.
I prefer something that uses Silicon trannies as that's what I have or perhaps germanium.
Thanks very much,
   MarkM

[RDV]

That's what the Orange Sunshine reminded me of. Or just mis-bias a Fuzz Face. Sustain is your enemy.

RDV

[Processaurus]

Yes!  Hands down thats one of my favorite guitar sounds.  My personal recipe for copping the Ennio Morricone tone, with what was around, was with a Jaguar (I actually got the guitar after obsessing over the spaghetti sound for weeks) and using the sansamp gt2 built into my amp, set to the tweed sound with the gain up a good amount, with tons of the amps spring reverb.  If I used the neck pickup and picked back by the bridge (for the extra twang), it was a decent western sound. 

I'm definitely interested to hear about what anyone else has tried though, I imagine a hollowbody would be good, as would old lunch box sized tube amps from the fifties.  I've actually been listening to a CD of Morricone's western music (something like "the legendary Italian westerns") for weeks now, its totally brilliant, but some of that singing is whacked though!  Once Upon a Time in the West has an a more fuzzed out guitar that could be a pedal possibly (though it may have been before pedals in general?), the good the bad and the ugly seems more like a dirty little amp...  its a thin horse kinda sound.

Yes, sustain isn't welcome.

Edit: Ennio Morricone

[RDV]

I should've mentioned twang being the main component of that sound.

RDV

[Quackzed]

treble boosters always give me that plunky twang... try a treble booster...

[Sir H C]

I've been told that Portishead, who get that sound, use a Roland 555 echo overdriven.  I would think the Rosac Nu-Fuzz or Mosrite Fuzzrite can get there, possibly the Shin-ei FY-2 with a bit of the guitar backed down.

[NoFi]

The version of the good the bad and the ugly recorded by the atlantics is quite surfy, does wonders when i have guests lol. 

I would have thought it was all slight tube saturation on Moricone's recording + the imperfections of the recording equipment.

[vanessa]

Ennio Morricone

For some reason I've always heard an Ampeg Reverbrocket (or the like) for the tone of the clean amp but that's a long shot. I've read that Ampeg combos were "standard equipment" for studio musicians (guitarists and bass players alike) for years back in the 50's, 60's.

[Joe Viau]

I don't want to hijack this thread, but let's not forget another virtuoso of the fuzz-tone TV themes of the 60's :

http://www.vicmizzy.com/home.html

Vic did the theme to "Green Acres," "The Ghost and Mr. Chicken" and a host of others.  He always had the orchestra in the background playing andante while the good ol' fuzz--I think that they used a Tele--dominated the melody line.

[lastresort]

wall of voodoo did a bunch of stuff in this vein, and from some searching it looks like the guitarist, the late marc moreland, used the following to get the sound:

Gibson Flying V.
Fender Twin (Reverb cranked)
Blue Box"  foot pedel by MXR.

from : http://www.wallofvoodoo.com/wallposts/archives/97posts.htm

[petemoore]

  Don't let the words "I don't think I've seen a 'definitive answer' on this questions deter from any experimentation.
  Those tones To me Are just legendary and I really hold 'em up there with anything I've ever heard that can put a chill down my spine...that equates exactly to powerful tone in my book.
  The suggestions are what I've tried for this, and they come close, but I believe there is a little something extra going on, room or hall accoustics for one thing.
  The coolest thing I discovered about TGTBATUgly is...call and response...the caller calls, the responder waits until the echoes have subsided to respond...very indicitave of 'historic communications'...wait until the message passes through the 'slow air' and is completely recieved before responding...this alludes to 'DISTANCE' spacing...super coool.

[markm]

Geeez,
I thought I was the ONLY one who was really into the sound of the Spaghetti Western.
Looks like there are quite a few cowboys here huh??!
Ya know, I have the materials to try out a couple suggestions here and I think I will.
I'm also leaning toward the Vox Tonebender from Fuzz Central as it has a bit of extra treble.
I had a re-issue of it in the early '90s and don't remember it as sounding that good however,
for this type of tone, it may fit well.

I don't want to hijack this thread, but let's not forget another virtuoso of the fuzz-tone TV themes of the 60's :

http://www.vicmizzy.com/home.html

Vic did the theme to "Green Acres," "The Ghost and Mr. Chicken" and a host of others.  He always had the orchestra in the background playing andante while the good ol' fuzz--I think that they used a Tele--dominated the melody line.

I think I read somewhere that the fuzz on Green Acres was a Mosrite.
Another famous '60s tone that is Killer is the James Bond guitar tone...that's cool!

[Sir H C]

Thought I read somewhere that the Green Acres theme was a Maestro, it was 1965 so that would make some sense, not sure when the Mosrite came out (mine I think is 1966).

[goodrevdoc]

    IIRC, the good the bad and the ugly guitar tone sounds the way it does because it was played on a baritone. Danelectro makes a decent model these days, and when plated through my standel combo sounds very "Morricone"
-justin

[$uperpuma]

there better be a Western/Spaghetti theme to the enclosure when you DO decide

[markm]

Thought I read somewhere that the Green Acres theme was a Maestro, it was 1965 so that would make some sense, not sure when the Mosrite came out (mine I think is 1966).

That's right....OOPS!
Yeah, now that I think about it it was the Maestro.
See what happens, once you get into your forties, thing start to turn to sh*t!

there better be a Western/Spaghetti theme to the enclosure when you DO decide

How'd you know what I had up my sleeve for this
I have some of the Clint DVD's and was eyeing the covers for ideas......
Mayyybeeee I should build the circuit first huh??!

[yeeshkul]

JUst found this thread looking for Morricone-type fuzz. I am another big fan and collector of the Maestro (here i mean Morricone ). By the way he mentioned this “At the time it was common to use Fender instruments, but I do not know if Alessandroni played a Fender. However, I would like to take this occasion to say that the guitar in my western films is not that of Alessandroni, but is that of Bruno Battisti D'Amario, an eminent Italian concert player.”

To ask him about stompboxes most likely equals commiting suicide ... Mr. Morricone has got very grumpy and wild reputation among journalists and directors .. and generaly people who ask him about TGTBATU and OUATITW.

[petemoore]

  'Now You Dig.'
  There's something wierd about every sound on that movies tracks.
like there's a phase shift between the ears, surfacing about 1/2 the time.
  I think maybe a reel to reel with 'special' qualities may have been used to get some of that, also sounds like someone kept bumping the reel..sound moves up and back in time, like a phase shift between the ears.
  Guitar sound, like the lower half of the string Freq's was dropped, early on, like treble booster, guitar volume rolled back..., lol...allowing the Occarina to handle the bass freq's .
  Don't know how, never heard anything like it before or since.
It is a 'nasty' guitar tone, has no 'full warmth', sounds soaking wet, cold, thin, weathered.
  In fact I think it may have passed by us here, but because it was so cold, lifeless, brittle, coarse and harsh, 5x treble than bass, it was decided as useless circuit by those who tried to work with it.
  But I think it was an amalgum of state of the art '60's technologies, steel strings and a magnetic pickup wire, probably some kind of transistor, perhaps a transistor radio modded and mic'd and run through a ReverbRocket.
  Stone room with trebly amp in it, doors moved around or just closed to induce echo and phase changes...that kind of stuff is creative and a little bit of trouble to set up [if you happen to have large stone room or hallway, try a cave], even harder to mimic electronically.
  ...no digital emu's of that? seems like prime suspect for digital Emu, 'Bad 'n Ugly' patch...if there is one perhaps some third party, second hand info could be gleaned as to 'what is it?'

[petemoore]

  Now I'm hearing 'standing waves' of that bell near the end of the cool guitar tracks.
  A-rough, A-rough, A-Rough, Ruff Ruff.
  Tik a tik...tik a tik....tik a tik. [Three legged horse Emulations...like 'Back in the Saddle'] ]

[Rodgre]

Don't forget the FLATWOUND guitar strings!

Roger