Van halen 1 sounding overdrive-distortion pedal

Ripdivot · November 19, 2009, 11:08:57 PM

I think I get pretty close with my Crunch Box, some EQ and some reverb. I think Eddy could have played through anything in this tonal ball park and made it sound great.

caspercody · November 19, 2009, 11:13:23 PM

Forgot to mention Metropoulos amps. Check out plexireplicas.com, and look at 12000 series. Curious to know what they sound like, or to see a schematic.?

fpaul · November 20, 2009, 08:10:09 AM

Got my 50w Plexi working last night, Ceriatone board with Magnetic Component transformers, fuse holders/pots from Apexjr. I guess my next stop is attenuator/ variac. Also been checking out the power scaling boards, kind of like a variac but keeps the heaters at 6.3v. Ever played a cranked plexi, cut the power off, and kept playing? It's magic for about 5 seconds. I remember thinking I wish I could get it to stay like this. I think maybe Eddie figured it out. I guess if you slave, the amp is a stompbox so ok to talk about on this forum? Maybe need a channel switcher to actually stomp though.

I know the studio adds a lot to the sound. Even the Rockstah clips I was talking about have a little reverb added with protools. But you have to start the tone quest somewhere. I heard VH live with SH, not the record but still sounded pretty good to me.

giantsteps · November 20, 2009, 08:36:18 AM

Try the metal simplex. I changed the diode to a zener and the input cap to a 2.2 and it has that loose, edgy plexi thing going...

DougH · November 20, 2009, 09:19:21 AM

Quote from: spaceace76 on November 19, 2009, 08:48:43 PM
The end product on the album was a result of good production and a fantastic guitar player. It's not the type of thing you can slap together in your spare time, or hope to get from a stompbox.

I agree with this 100%. People tend to get caught up with copping the sound they hear on a record. But first they need to understand and separate what part of the sound is raw guitar tone and what part of it is production. As others have mentioned, the reverb and mic-ing are a big part of that sound. With slaving, as spaceace76 mentioned, you can put your time-delay fx behind the distorting amp. With that setup if you run that into a stereo wet-dry or wet-wet pair of amps, you can start to mimic some of the production aspects of the sound. Once you start experimenting with this stuff, you start realizing that the exact distortion sound or technique is much less significant than you first thought it was.

The same goes for Page and those early LZ records. The ambient mic-ing and production is a big part of what makes the guitar sound huge. And for the huge tone Iommi got on the early Black Sabbath records, try doubling the guitar with a delay and running in stereo (after tuning to C# or course). A lot of those guitar tracks were double-tracked.

morcey2 · November 20, 2009, 09:39:56 AM

I suck on guitar, so even if I had his exact setup, I couldn't sound like him. That said, I did have a rig that came extremely close to it when played by someone who could play. (basically, anyone other than me.

) It was a Plexi6V6 that I built through a 2x12 sealed cab w/ well broken-in greenbacks in a mostly concrete big-a$$ box of a room. The room added the reverb part.

At the amp show, one of the locals here who can probably play every van halen song exactly as intended fired it up with my Agile AL-3000 (Les Paul copy. But a really good one. Couldn't do any whammy-bar dive-bombs though). All of us were floored. I've got the recordings here somewhere and I'll link to them when I find them.

I've played the same setup in the same place, but it just sounded like some dork trying to play the guitar.

I built a Thor that comes pretty close, but it was too dark for me.

Matt.

Johan · November 20, 2009, 04:03:33 PM

dont forget the pickup. Eddie used an old Gibson PAF. most of the time these came with non matched coils, since they just "wound until full". the missmatch in numer of turns often gives a little extra edge to the high end that has bite but doesnt screech, if you know what I meen...I personally love the PAF replicas Gibson make these days. especially the Burstbucker #2( I love the way these clean up when turning down the volume knob)...but unfortuanatly, they are not waxed, so you need to do that yourself before installing...and also they cost A LOT ( but stay away from Classic 57...dull, tired and boring sounding in comparison)...and using a single 4x12 loaded with 25watters when running a 100watter on full gives you speaker saturation too...
j

Fender3D · November 20, 2009, 08:59:08 PM

Quote from: DougH on November 20, 2009, 09:19:21 AM
Quote from: spaceace76 on November 19, 2009, 08:48:43 PM
The end product on the album was a result of good production and a fantastic guitar player. It's not the type of thing you can slap together in your spare time, or hope to get from a stompbox.

I agree with this 100%. People tend to get caught up with copping the sound they hear on a record. But first they need to understand and separate what part of the sound is raw guitar tone and what part of it is production. As others have mentioned, the reverb and mic-ing are a big part of that sound. With slaving, as spaceace76 mentioned, you can put your time-delay fx behind the distorting amp. With that setup if you run that into a stereo wet-dry or wet-wet pair of amps, you can start to mimic some of the production aspects of the sound. Once you start experimenting with this stuff, you start realizing that the exact distortion sound or technique is much less significant than you first thought it was.

The same goes for Page and those early LZ records. The ambient mic-ing and production is a big part of what makes the guitar sound huge. And for the huge tone Iommi got on the early Black Sabbath records, try doubling the guitar with a delay and running in stereo (after tuning to C# or course). A lot of those guitar tracks were double-tracked.

I got the best studio quality sounds, when I got a multi amp system.
I used plugging my guitar into my phase 90 / Dist+ / flanger then splitted into my 100W Super Lead / 4x12 and into Intellifex and a stereo 200+200W FBT (A cheap transistors PA amp) / 4x12
Echo, reverb and chorus won't "disturb" the punching Marshall sound

Phaser before distortion (both from Dist+ and Marshall) really helped.
Another phase trick:
split the guitar cable, one into Dist+ / Marshall1
and the other into phase / Marshall2

Paul Marossy · November 20, 2009, 11:23:57 PM

Quote from: caspercody on November 19, 2009, 10:59:04 PM
Look at Wamplers Pinnacle pedal. This is a pedal you can buy

I have one of those. Great pedal.

halen · November 21, 2009, 03:28:39 PM

All the replys listed on this i have tried and also know about as far as rocksta's clips on metro amp(which i have visited that site many times)they dont sound like van halen 1(first album),he has a nice tone but there is some over-the-top crunch needed,i think some people who are after Eds first album tone are believeing the BS Ed would say in early interviews and are excepting his BS,like Ed said that he never used a overdrive-distortion unit for van halen 1(recorded in 1978)which to me and many others know its BS,so that missing link(which overdrive-distortion,maybe homemade unit by Ed,hard to say) which unit is a mystery.

the_stig · November 22, 2009, 01:20:35 AM

jessej · November 22, 2009, 07:42:17 AM

I have a huge pile of Guitar Player and World magazines dating back from 1979 and I have read every page of them back in the day .. Based on memory, I am pretty sure that Mike Soldano said Eddies amp was a '67 Marshall Super Lead amp on the first album(s?), and that they used a variac to drop the voltage a bit and a dummy load to crank all juice from the EL34 power tubes (making the Super Lead act as his "stompbox"). Also the EQ probably acted as a booster in front.. Studio post processing, like heard above, is a major part of that sound.

For what it's worth, I really like the Wampler Pedals Pinnacle demos I've heard. I had a hard time choosing between ordering the Pinnacle or the Super Plextortion.
I chose the Super Plextortion for versatility and I hope to get it in the mail next week.. but for EVH tones the Pinnacle would have been nicer.

halen · November 22, 2009, 08:54:27 AM

All the post processing listed above i have seen-heard, the van halen 1 songs listed above on the process list dont sound like a 100 watt marshall it sounds more like a 50 watt or smaller amp or something in front of the amp like a overdrive-distortion unit.Eds marshall was a 67-68 marshall 100 watt,12000 series serial # (supposenlly used to record the first album,van halen 1)Ed also used 50 watt marshalls.Ed didnt use EL 34 tubes he used sylvania big bottle 6ca7 tubes which is the American version EL34,as for the photo above thats van halen in the studio recording van halen II,there are no photos of the band when they recorded van halen 1(i wish there was),as for mike soldano, he wasnt around back then(mid to late 70s),the person who took care of Eds marshalls was jose arrendondo(no longer with us,passed away).Some people should read my original post,i have tried and know about some of the things the people have already said after my original post

.I have also read all the mid 70s interviews from different guitar magazines and take them with a grain of salt.(mis-leading and some BS)

GtrmanMoe · November 22, 2009, 01:43:54 PM

There's no doubt that studio processing took place. EVERY album ever recorded has some of post processing going on. That's what "mastering" is all about. Don't be misled into thinking "mixing" and "mastering: are the same thing." They are distinctly different. In listening to the clips linked above, the CORE of the sound is there, pre-processing. As a matter of fact, I don't hear much post processing going on in those clips. I've heard bootlegs of early live recordings, and the tone is there, as well. The assertion that studio processing is the root of the classic "brown sound" is not wholly true.

halen · November 22, 2009, 04:11:23 PM

listening to the clips above i do hear something in front of Eds amp(overdrive-distortion unit of somekind)pushing the front end,i dont hear a stock marshall plexi,marshall plexis are clean sounding to begin with especially a cranked marshall plexi,they get very loud but clean, they dont produce the crunch-over the-top distortion Ed achieved on van halen 1. No stock-cranked-variaced- down marshall plexi,it just doesnt happen and alot of people believe that,i tried this many times its not going to happen,the missing link is what Ed used in front,overdrive-distortion unit,there is no dought.

alanlan · November 22, 2009, 04:35:29 PM

I had a '73 Les Paul Deluxe and a 100W JCM800 8X12 stack (bought new in 1981) in my younger days. The only 3 stompboxes I used were a Microamp, MXR Chorus and Crybaby. With a %^&*ed wah and Microamp pushed up to max, the result wasn't too far from that sound. Perhaps you need to experiment with tone control as much as overdrive. A good parametric EQ with Q control may be a good place to start.

Paul Marossy · November 22, 2009, 05:04:00 PM

Quote from: jessej on November 22, 2009, 07:42:17 AM
I have a huge pile of Guitar Player and World magazines dating back from 1979 and I have read every page of them back in the day .. Based on memory, I am pretty sure that Mike Soldano said Eddies amp was a '67 Marshall Super Lead amp on the first album(s?), and that they used a variac to drop the voltage a bit and a dummy load to crank all juice from the EL34 power tubes (making the Super Lead act as his "stompbox"). Also the EQ probably acted as a booster in front.. Studio post processing, like heard above, is a major part of that sound.

I rest my case (about the use of a Variac). I don't think EVH ever used any distortion pedals until later in his career. I'm pretty sure not on the early recordings anyway.

Allan Holdsworth is another guy who likes to eke power tube distortion out of his amps by using a dummy load of sorts that he designed himself. He has some of the best guitar tones if you ask me. That's one reason I really dislike these amp distortions that create it all in the preamp. I think that sounds terrible in comparison with power amp distortion. I much prefer power tube distortion in conjunction with some from the OT with something that's pushing the front end of the amp a little bit.

Ice-9 · November 22, 2009, 06:36:50 PM

In a lot of the early interviews with EVH i have to agree that that the Variac was mentioned a lot about how eddy got his tone, but i do have to say one of the important things not mentioned here is getting the correct reverb/echo setting.
In the mix on Van Halen 1 Ed's guitar is panned left (not new info) and the reverb/echo tails are on both sides, ok that doesn't mean anything when your playing through your amp (left/right) but a good reverb setting with a little echo/delay will make all the difference. I also don't think his sound is hugely overdriven as opposed to driving the amp hard. You just have to listen to some of the tunes where he backs the guitar volume off just a little and it cleans up nicely but still biting. I think Ed also has some nice high end in there , probabaly presence.

GtrmanMoe · November 22, 2009, 06:43:31 PM

Ed's always been upfront about his experimentation with the Variac. I've even seen some pics of his setup from way back when that showed the Variac. If I'm not mistaken, he'd feed the amp about 40V from the Variac, causing the amp to break up at a much lower volume setting. Is it not unreasonable to assume that because the amp was driven into distortion sooner, the amount of saturation available increased over the sweep of the volume knob, to some degree enabling the distinctive crunch? There's also no denying that there were effects in front of the amp - notably an Echoplex unit and the MXR Phase 90. If Ed truly used some mystery stompbox to aid his distortion, is it much of a stretch to think that we'd now have the EVH Distortion to accompany the EVH Phase 90 and Dunlop's EVH Wah? Imagine the killing the distortion unit's manufacturer would make if all that was need to sound like Ed Van Halen was a stompbox! I've also heard Ed play through rigs that weren't his own, and the resulting sound is unmistakably Edward, indicating that much of the brown sound is in his fingers, as well.

Getting back to the OT, I've found the BSIAB2 to be a reasonable facsimile of the classic VH tone. I get thisclose to the tone with my BSIAB and diy Phase 90. Now, if there were a talent stompbox, I'd certainly have it made!!

halen · November 22, 2009, 09:25:47 PM

Im wasting my time here.......................

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Van halen 1 sounding overdrive-distortion pedal