Ed's 1978 touring rig.

[Good Guest]

I highly doubt nor believe the VH1 tone is all about pickup magnets and negative feedback values..and EVH has said many times his volume lowering tricks are in his amp. tricks as in plural.. the boss ge 10's were probably used to control feedback at huge venues like Japan...that those units are used in conjunction with the echoplex's and have a mid boost to them is counter to the feedback issue tho....that would probably increase feedback problems...the line level boost w/ eq theory makes more sense.

Still lots of secrets out there and I think one of the reasons there isn't a ton of marshall clips are things like R stash walking away with info, forming a company ...companies sponging the info and making products ..the community probably has come to the conclusion that what they play amounts to unrewarded R&D work that can be used against them whilst fattening up tone thieves bank accounts...kinda like the 1% of the EVH community

Then you have the obvious amps like the Bray or Atomica which are game changers ..enders? As far as core tone goes they can't be beat unless tons of rack gear is used or if you like gigging in a closet. The stock plexi theory is fine if and only if you know all the boxs used and there are too many for most to entertain...get into slaving which is a big step for most guitarists to take for going on a goose chase.

For some the search is over ....once you know the magic box(s) ..that's it any old plexi will do...no need for a modded amp. That's why the lack of clips..some have found out the secret..some are still hunting ..some think they have found it and some don't care...some have already committed themselves to becoming sales man for the evh spinoff enterprises...amps, pickups, boosts, speakers...must be the economic times

I would love to hear more clips in a "take that 1% " kind of attitude where more secrets are played but not revealed.
Like marshall maniacs clips that say slaving!!! But yeah just like EVH when you discover it ..you move on..

[Tone Slinger]

Good insight there Fella's, I can get at some of that.

[Marshall SL12301]

Dave friedman said "Ed did not ever slave his amp until 5150 tour" and this was confirmed by one of his techs.
I guess he just put up with the volume....

Not drinkin that koolaid! If that were true how did he manage to get his plexi to OD like this then in 84?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmtzqa5X1FQ" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
I think GG and nitro are right, he used some sort of OD/fuzz box, he had to have used one just to get that gain at the level he played on that letterman gig!

[T.L.]

Dave friedman said "Ed did not ever slave his amp until 5150 tour" and this was confirmed by one of his techs.
I guess he just put up with the volume....

Not drinkin that koolaid! If that were true how did he manage to get his plexi to OD like this then in 84?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmtzqa5X1FQ" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
I think GG and nitro are right, he used some sort of OD/fuzz box, he had to have used one just to get that gain at the level he played on that letterman gig!

Yeah, I really doubt the Letterman production would have (or could have) tolerated a dimed plexi on the set...

[Good Guest]

I really doubt the Letterman production would have (or could have) tolerated a dimed plexi on the set...

There is absolutely no way a dimed plexi was on that set...a dimed plexi would deafen the entire audience ....everyone on the set would be lost....even with a single 4X12 cab...you can get away diming them tho in say an outdoor event...that's where they actually shine and sound the best IMO

EVH said he liked to feel the air move ..well live outdoors he can get away with that..and he did play lots outdoors in his early years and no doubt he had plenty of noise violations...he wouldn't have to trick it out to make his bones rattle ..he looked like a pretty skinny as a rail fella back them... on 6 would do it...anything over that he would fall over.

[Tone Slinger]

I got a mag from '84 and it has Rudy going over Ed's set up. He was 'slaving' in '84. H&H power amps, etc. As I recall he even mentioned something about cranking the bias on the (he called them el-34's) Sylvanias. 6ca7 tubes often had el-34 on them too and vice versa.

You can 'hear' Ed's tone was reamped in those '84 shows. By the 5150 tour, Ed got a bit TOO much involved with chorus/delay etc, but the letterman stuff was just like the '84 tour tone imo.The Letterman shows volume was controlled via slaving. You can hear it. It gives just that 'touch' of 'MODERN' to the tone, like how a 'good' modded super lead does, like a Mod5, Friedman BE-100 or Bray, etc.

Definately NOT a dimed or attenuated plexi by that point.

[Marshall SL12301]

I got a mag from '84 and it has Rudy going over Ed's set up. He was 'slaving' in '84. H&H power amps, etc. As I recall he even mentioned something about cranking the bias on the (he called them el-34's) Sylvanias. 6ca7 tubes often had el-34 on them too and vice versa.

You can 'hear' Ed's tone was reamped in those '84 shows. By the 5150 tour, Ed got a bit TOO much involved with chorus/delay etc, but the letterman stuff was just like the '84 tour tone imo.The Letterman shows volume was controlled via slaving. You can hear it. It gives just that 'touch' of 'MODERN' to the tone, like how a 'good' modded super lead does, like a Mod5, Friedman BE-100 or Bray, etc.

Definately NOT a dimed or attenuated plexi by that point.

so dave was mistaken or the poster of that reply was wrong then. I knew ed did not have his 100 watt top dimed with the leterman band! thats in itself is piss yer pants funny, paul schaffers toupee would have flew off!

[jape88]

Definately NOT a dimed or attenuated plexi by that point.

Help me here, why couldn't Ed use a load of some description to keep his amp dimed on the Letterman clip?

[rgorke]

Definately NOT a dimed or attenuated plexi by that point.

Help me here, why couldn't Ed use a load of some description to keep his amp dimed on the Letterman clip?

that would be my guess. A load and then into the board or whatever Shafer uses. The cabinet may have been used or just a prop.

Also, there is a difference to saying Ed slaved "on 1984" versus "in 1984". For the tour, that could be a good guess. On the album, probably the same set up as Dave mentioned for the previous albums.

[Tone Slinger]

Exactly. Ed, imo, sounded MUCH better on that '84 tour (same tone as Letterman and '85 NAMM show) than on the 1984 album. Really, this tone '84 tour up to that but before 5150, was his best tone except for the '77 to '78 stuff.

I meant dimed or attenuated as a 'stand alone' scenario. Dimed into a load then into a poweramp is sonically much different, for better or worse. The tone is changed a bit. Plus, Rudy mentioned a couple boxes being used that arent mentioned much (if at all) concerning that tone. I'll pull out that mag again.

[Marshall SL12301]

Exactly. Ed, imo, sounded MUCH better on that '84 tour (same tone as Letterman and '85 NAMM show) than on the 1984 album. Really, this tone '84 tour up to that but before 5150, was his best tone except for the '77 to '78 stuff.

I meant dimed or attenuated as a 'stand alone' scenario. Dimed into a load then into a poweramp is sonically much different, for better or worse. The tone is changed a bit. Plus, Rudy mentioned a couple boxes being used that arent mentioned much (if at all) concerning that tone. I'll pull out that mag again.

Even with the eventide and extra goodies ed used i LOVE his 84 tone! and i also really enjoy his LWAN tone big time! it sounds really "brown" "warm" in my opinion

[Tone Slinger]

Seems Ed never used 'stand alone' amps from '84 tour on up to around '98. The H&H poweramps were used, via loadbox and 'one' dimed top (Ed had a nice 'plexi' Super Lead for this on tour, obviously not the #1).

The '1984' TOUR tone was AMAZING, had that 'refined' quality, but still had that EDGE. IMO, LWAN was maybe TOO smooth and refined, due to possibly too much digital mess ?

Anyway's, Ed got an AMAZING tone in thayt '89 footage at Sammy's Cabo Wabo party thing. Lots of star musicians were there, and you could see a SOLDANO behind Ed. Seems Ed dimed it as well into a load then into the H&H power amps. It had that SAME tone. I'm sure Ed had the preamp gain on the Soldano down just a hair though.

When you think about it, this set up that Ed used (Dimed head/load/power amp, etc) is akin to using a 2203 with a ppimv. See a solid state poweramp doesnt distort. On a ppimv the FULL preamp voltage hits the output tubes but a LESSER signal is returned, in other words preamp gain of a dimed plexi at lower volumes (output tubes ARENT distorting). Kinda like the Blasting head to load to solid state poweramp thing. Listen to a Mod5 played well, then listen to the David Letterman stuff. I hear 'similarities'.

[garbeaj]

Just to clarify...I like Phil X. I like his personality, the guy can sing, and he does have really good chops. I absolutely realize that he is just playing riffs that pop into his head...and sometimes these takes on riffs are way off. But I am exactly the same way...unless I practice something a bit, I rarely play anything right!

I'm not slagging Phil X as a player. I also never slagged Doug Steele as a player. The fact is Doug and Phil often make "what the fuck" clips that are not meant to be their attempt to sound exactly like the record. Even Doug's instructional videos are often just played to demo the licks...but he doesn't ALWAYS get it exactly right and he doesn't keep trying until he gets it exactly right. He already puts ALOT of time and effort into making the videos and dissecting the riffs. I don't really blame him for doing a take that is "close enough" for him to get his point across in the interest of not doing hundreds of takes. He sometimes nails it...sometimes he doesn't-but he gets close enough to get the idea across to people learning his interpretations of the licks from his videos. Some people choose to believe that Doug plays everything perfectly all the time and that anyone (me for instance) that calls him out when he doesn't is an asshole. Whatever. No one is perfect. Myself and yes, even Doug Steele included.

I actually admire Doug and Phil X greatly...I would LOVE to have Phil X in my band. I agree 100% with Ralle.

NOW-If you look at my original post, you will see that I said in that particular clip I had trouble discerning the tone from that clip because of the off the cuff way Phil played the licks. In other words, it was hard to hear the highs on the high strings and the lows and muted notes on the low strings because he wasn't really articulating the riffs as clearly and correctly as say Mark or Ralle or Strat78 or any of the other good players on this board (and other boards) might who know the tunes and riffs better than Phil does...There are many other clips where Phil is right on in his off the cuff style. This clip just didn't happen to be one of them. So what. That doesn't mean I said "Phil X sucks". It just means I thought he was just noodling in that clip and it made it more difficult for me to judge the tone.The end.

[Tone Slinger]

Now THATS what I'm talking about. There is NO disrespect here, just GREAT analysis on the part of a gang of dudes who CARE.
I look forward to clips everyday and listen intently to them as they appear. I got a good sound and want to share info's and specs. It all starts with clips though. To quote Klaus Meine, "I Cant Get Enough" !

[leadguy]

I got a mag from '84 and it has Rudy going over Ed's set up. He was 'slaving' in '84. H&H power amps, etc. As I recall he even mentioned something about cranking the bias on the (he called them el-34's) Sylvanias. 6ca7 tubes often had el-34 on them too and vice versa.

You can 'hear' Ed's tone was reamped in those '84 shows. By the 5150 tour, Ed got a bit TOO much involved with chorus/delay etc, but the letterman stuff was just like the '84 tour tone imo.The Letterman shows volume was controlled via slaving. You can hear it. It gives just that 'touch' of 'MODERN' to the tone, like how a 'good' modded super lead does, like a Mod5, Friedman BE-100 or Bray, etc.

Definately NOT a dimed or attenuated plexi by that point.

so dave was mistaken or the poster of that reply was wrong then. I knew ed did not have his 100 watt top dimed with the leterman band! thats in itself is piss yer pants funny, paul schaffers toupee would have flew off!

Rudy has said this to Dave.

Look there was no slaving of any amps until 1984 tour everything was in front of the amps and yes hiss Rudy Leiren told me that. Its not all that hard his signal chain into a stock Marshall with 6ca7s biased hot droped with a variac. In these pics he is using telefunken tubes that he use to buy at the tv repair store[ this was told to me by him] Dave

Very simple. Rudy leiren told me personally. Flange phase echoplex into a marshall with variac to 90 into only one cab. The univox echo or whatever was only patched into the chain for eruption he also used a eq for eruption. Eq was also occasionally used for tone shaping with amps that did not sound as good. This was the core setup. As more vol was needed more amps were added and more cabs but sill only one per amp. There really is nothing more to it. Lots of sustain and feedback from the sheer vol of it all. Now ed was always experimenting and still does to this day so there might have been some mishaps along the way like tubes melting etc. No lying just things not explained the right way out of a lack of technical knowledge.

Well here is what i was told by Rudy Leiren his long time tech. This was just last week. His setup was flanger phaser echoplex amp. His main 100 watt was used on everything. The bias was turned all the way up and the variac was set to 91v. into only 1 cab. There is a pic of the early days with a 50 watt and a vox. He told me the 50 was a back up to the 100 and the vox was a last ditch back up. He often borrowed amps for his back ups. In fact he told me a story that at a party they were playing ed blew a fuse in his main amp and did not have a backup and had to rum home to get a fuse while the band was playing. After this he always made sure he had a backup. Now Rudy said the eq pedal was used only for certain guitars or sometimes when he used rental gear that sounded bad. Also the univox echo was patched in by hand for eruption only and then was taken out of the chain after. Later there was another cab on Mike side that was driven from another amp they used a splitter to do this. As time went on more cabs where used and so where more amps. The amps would only drive one cab though. Now he did say ed was always trying shit but would always come back to this set up. This info follows everything ed has ever said to me personally. Also when 84 hit he changed his set up to H&H power amps and some different effects etc. He still used a cab off the head though no load resister. The Load resister came for the 5150 tour.