Getting that Billy Gibbons sound

EricTheWeary

jimmyguitar said:

I’ve always thought he had a pretty terrible sound but happy to be educated as he’s obviously admired. All the ZZ Top i’ve heard sounds very poorly recorded with a drum machine and buzzy guitars!

It’s a long career. A lot of the early albums had ‘ modern’ remixes on the back of the success of Eliminator and they tend to be what’s used for the reissues and are just awful. The early albums with the original mixes tend to be what people see as his hallmark tones. Brown Sugar is believed to be Pearly Gates through a Fender Deluxe and one of the definitive vintage Les Paul tones but sounds like shit on the remix. 
And some of it was buzzy but he did buzzy very well. ZZ Top were quite radical in some ways for a little ol boogie band from Texas. 

Simon_M

Wow! Thanks for the huge response. Clearly there’s a lot more to his sound than I thought. I suppose tone wise I’m talking about the earlier albums - what I consider the ‘real’ ZZ Top. I’ve been trying a few songs in open E and I think it’s more authentic. Definitely going to try dialling up the gain and play with the eq more.

EricTheWeary

thegummy said:

EricTheWeary said:

IIRC his graphic EQs are supposedly set to get different guitars to sound roughly like Pearly Gates ( vintage Les Paul) although that might equally be bollocks.

I've seen that and wondered how much it really works - I pretty much doubt that totally different guitars can be made to sound that close to each other no matter how much EQing is done. I've also seen people who seem to see it as proof that the difference in guitars is just down to EQ too. Would be interesting to actually hear them compared; I'm sure it reduces any extreme differences in the tone of very different guitars but can't imagine they sound all that similar after the EQ.

Yeh, it would be interesting to see how close someone with good ears and a big graphic eq could get with a bunch of guitars. I guess in reality it just evens out the levels but everything about Billy seem to have to mention Pearly Gates or pesos or turning up to patent pending or something similar. 

Voxman

Obviously I'm not in his league but I think I can get reasonably close to Billy's live sound - 

DulcetJones

Simon_M said:

Wow! Thanks for the huge response. Clearly there’s a lot more to his sound than I thought. I suppose tone wise I’m talking about the earlier albums - what I consider the ‘real’ ZZ Top. I’ve been trying a few songs in open E and I think it’s more authentic. Definitely going to try dialling up the gain and play with the eq more.

My favorites are the older albums with songs like "Heard it on the X", "La Grange", "Jesus Just Left Chicago" etc.  I would bet money he's playing through a tube amp, and I'm pretty sure it was all Les Pauls in those days.

mr-mac

If you want a cheap amp to get his earlish and when he returned to a similar tone in 90's try a crate v50 its amp he used when he returned to the early tone

mr-mac

Marshall jmp-1 rack was another fave.... One for sale with a power amp on here at moment iirc and think live he played the jmp1 into two v50 crate amps when he had them.

Lodious

jimmyguitar said:

I’ve always thought he had a pretty terrible sound but happy to be educated as he’s obviously admired. All the ZZ Top i’ve heard sounds very poorly recorded with a drum machine and buzzy guitars!

@jimmyguitar ; Deguello and Tres Hombres are my favourite albums. If you don't like those then you are unlikely to like Billy Gibbons. Both have stunning guitar tones, some very tasty playing and are beautifully produced.

Make sure you avoid the 6 pack, which tried to make the good sounding albums sound like the shit sounding albums. Probably the biggest remastering disaster in modern music. 

ChuckManual

Lodious said:

Make sure you avoid the 6 pack, which tried to make the good sounding albums sound like the shit sounding albums.

Probably the biggest remastering disaster in modern music. 

Wis award for this statement alone.

It simply CANNOT be repeated enough.

bigjon

DulcetJones said:

My favorites are the older albums with songs like "Heard it on the X", "La Grange", "Jesus Just Left Chicago" etc.  I would bet money he's playing through a tube amp, and I'm pretty sure it was all Les Pauls in those days.

I read in an old guitar mag that La Grange was recorded on a Strat, back pickup - certainly sounds that way to my ears and the single coil make it easier to get the pinch harmonics in the outro solo.

EricTheWeary

bigjon said:

DulcetJones said:

My favorites are the older albums with songs like "Heard it on the X", "La Grange", "Jesus Just Left Chicago" etc.  I would bet money he's playing through a tube amp, and I'm pretty sure it was all Les Pauls in those days.

I read in an old guitar mag that La Grange was recorded on a Strat, back pickup - certainly sounds that way to my ears and the single coil make it easier to get the pinch harmonics in the outro solo.

According to a Guitar World article La Grange is two guitars - Pearly Gates and a strat but it's the strat on the solos ( including the pinch harmonics). The first album seems to have been Pearly Gates and a Marshall but after that all sorts of stuff and Billy had been a strat guy back in the Moving Sidewalks. 

poopot

I can get close to his early live sound... We did "Tush" at theFB Southern Jam a few weeks back... I used a strat so not quite there and my playing is not even close to being in the same league... Strat > Expandora > 5e3... Reverb added in post Octavia fuzz kicked on for the solo's



The Rev from the 80's "Jailhouse Rock and Tush"



Lovely fuzzy mess that it is!!!!!

Fretwired

If you check online Gibbons claimed he used a cranked Fender Champ on La Grange with the two mic trick. I have a Champ and as Les Paul and I can see that this might be the case.

DulcetJones

bigjon said:

DulcetJones said:

My favorites are the older albums with songs like "Heard it on the X", "La Grange", "Jesus Just Left Chicago" etc.  I would bet money he's playing through a tube amp, and I'm pretty sure it was all Les Pauls in those days.

I read in an old guitar mag that La Grange was recorded on a Strat, back pickup - certainly sounds that way to my ears and the single coil make it easier to get the pinch harmonics in the outro solo.

It wouldn't be the first time I was fooled that way.  After seeing picture after picture of Jimmy Page playing  a Les Paul I bought one.  Then I found out he had recorded most of Led Zeppelin I and II with a Tele.

thegummy

Which one is the back pickup?

Never understood that term, seems to be used a lot referring to Jazz basses.

None of the pickups seem to be located in the back or front to me lol

olafgarten

thegummy said:

Which one is the back pickup?

Never understood that term, seems to be used a lot referring to Jazz basses.

None of the pickups seem to be located in the back or front to me lol

It's the bridge pickup, confusing terminology because the higher frets are sometimes referred to as the top frets. 

Moltisanti

i saw them live a few years ago and i was surprised at how much gain he uses, very light touch though as stated earlier.
the best thing about his playing is all the killer little double stops and chord stuff he uses in his leads, he is my favourite bluesy player

Fortheloveofguitar

Grab yourself an old 80’s Marshall Lead 12. You can get great ZZ tones from it 

clarkefan

ChuckManual said:

Lodious said:

Make sure you avoid the 6 pack, which tried to make the good sounding albums sound like the shit sounding albums.

Probably the biggest remastering disaster in modern music. 

Wis award for this statement alone.

It simply CANNOT be repeated enough.

Find a copy of this greatest hits package from 1977, none of the crap remastering, bloody great album  It can be found for way less by the way...

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Best-Zz-Top/dp/B00069YEF2

Samgb

ChuckManual said:

Lodious said:

Make sure you avoid the 6 pack, which tried to make the good sounding albums sound like the shit sounding albums.

Probably the biggest remastering disaster in modern music. 

Wis award for this statement alone.

It simply CANNOT be repeated enough.

Wouldnt worry - its been out of print for 20 years. The modern reissues sound great.