How does Andy Timmons get his sound ???

ChrisMusic

A spectacularly good gig by Andy Timmons.

As I am on my way up the learning curve with this, especially high gain stuff, can anyone here cast some light on the guitar sounds Andy creates.

I am particularly thinking about the thick, congested almost choking distortion, which would not be a "go to" sound for me if experimenting in isolation, but sounds fantastic in this context.   Any other insights into his "sound" would be appreciated too.

What a fantastic player he is, just amazing technique.

Thanks for your help  

duration 54 minutes

edited Dec 2016 with working link for YT video ~ enjoy...

Loobs

Is this gig just one long guitar solo? 

ChrisMusic

Well Loobs, if you mean is it instrumental, and by that guitar, then the answer is an unashamed yes  

xwolf5150

Boogie Lonestar was his fave for lead tones.

matt1973

I think Ibanez guitars tend to have a signature mid-range voice and there is some lovely subtle delay on that footage too. The Ibanez-ness seems the most apparent thing to me in this vid. Other than that, it's the usual answer; fingers, fingers, fingers.

There is quite a lot of good youtube vids on this guy playing isolated. If you've not seen them, have a look.

digitalscream

These might help...

Fortheloveofguitar

I can get a cracking Timmons lead tone from my Yammy THR5

Dave_Mc

(I didn't watch the whole vid- I'm going more on what I'm familiar with with Andy Timmons' more modern tone)

Darkish highish gain tube amp and/or darkish bridge humbucker should get you most of the way there, assuming you can play like him. A tubescreamer (or similar) od boost might help a bit with the smoothness, too.

Gassage

Dan at gigrig did a G2 for him. I know he likes the TC SCF and Phase 90. Also uses a timeline

SidNewton

There's not too many instrumental rock guitarists I can listen to. Steve Morse is one along with this guy.

monquixote

I don't think there is any big secret to his sound. 

He uses an HSS strat style Ibanez which in it's current form is alder bodied, but the one he is playing there is the older one with a mohog body (he still sounds like him regardless)

He uses Mesa amps so something high gainish will do and I think the only thing of interest is that he always has a couple of delays on (big box EHX Memory Man on the last rig rundown) set to a low level for ambience.

Other than that there is nothing, but his fingers involved.

Gassage

@monquixote

He used to have 2 DMM's, but I think the latest rig has a Timeline instead. Which does do DMM very well I have to say

monquixote

I suspect the fact that he's playing his old sig suggests it's probably pre Timeline in that vid, but I imagine any analogue type delay would do the job. 

littlegreenman

Same as Satch, 2 delays at times to thicken up the tone. Nice valve amp and a lot of commitment to note choice and execution.

And an octaver/ POG here and there.

Bellycaster

I love his Telecaster tone at the end of the vid in "Headed For the Ditch".

There's titbits in this interview worth reading.

http://www.guitar9.com/interview111.html

Edit: I remember seeing a Y.T interview with him saying that Brothers Johnson song "Strawberry Letter 23" Guitar solo inspired the hammer on riff in Headed for the Ditch".

matt1973

littlegreenman said:

Same as Satch, 2 delays at times to thicken up the tone. Nice valve amp and a lot of commitment to note choice and execution.

And an octaver/ POG here and there.

@littlegreenman got any more info on the two delay thing? Sounds interesting.

richardhomer

ChrisMusic;229025" said:

Well Loobs, if you mean is it instrumental, and by that guitar, then the answer is an unashamed yes  

Loobs is sort of the 'new' Bertie, isn't he? A true standard bearer for contumaciousness....

dindude

Timmons is classic Boogie sound to my ears, so no big secret. Great player but I find his lead sound a bit tireing after a while, too thick and bassy. Love his clean and edge of breakup tones though, leagues ahead of his "rock" instrumental counterparts for both style and sound in this area IMHO.

littlegreenman

matt1973 said:

littlegreenman said:

Same as Satch, 2 delays at times to thicken up the tone. Nice valve amp and a lot of commitment to note choice and execution.

And an octaver/ POG here and there.

@littlegreenman got any more info on the two delay thing? Sounds interesting.

@matt1973, go to 1:30 of this vid, you can see the tempo settings on the delays.



Short-400ms
Long-600-650ms
3-4 repeats
Gives a great cascading sound.

ChrisMusic

Thanks to everyone for your responses to my question.

I had a feeling that it might be a Boogie thing, and also the way it interacts with his "Valve Driver" too for some sounds.  I have never played a Boogie, so it is good to get some confirmation that this sound is part of their signature.  I also have to agree with @dindude about the quality of his cleans and verge-of-breakup tones, excellent.

Special thanks to @digitalscream for posting the videos, great insight shared there, and also to @monquixote & @matt1973 for the guitar insights.

Aspiration drives you forward, and whilst I appreciate a wide variety of playing styles and musicianship, this certainly falls into the category of aspiration for me.

Maybe Andy can lend me his fingers, along with his mind, musicality, experience and the creative vision to control them  

What an exceptional player and musician.

So another question now - what good pedals are out there to get this type of sound ?

How close do they get, and are they "amp specific" ?

An honorary mention to @richardhomer, I agree.  Contumaciousness is now a new addition to my vocabulary.  

Dave_Mc

It's worth pointing out that Mesa does lots of different amps and they don't all sound the same. I wouldn't buy a dual rec for timmons' tones, for example. but the lone star has those nice cleans combined with a warm/dark higher gain channel.

What's your current rig? As I said above, if you can play like him you should be able to get fairly close with fairly standard gear- superstrat, medium (or even medium high) output bridge humbucker (neck and middle single coils for the lighter tones, probably), reasonably high gain tube amp with a warmish distortion channel and decent fenderish clean channel, something tubescreamer-ish as a boost. That'll get you 90% of the way there, maybe 95%. Delays and stuff like that won't hurt, but the base tone can be got without them, I think.