Sustain?

maltingsaudio

Don't be afraid of using distortion for the kind of tones you want referencing those  songs. Neck pickup, loads of gain, good damping technique and clean picking are the key as well as the neck pickup on a strat.  Nb This way doesn't have to be as loud as trying to get that sustain from a clean tone

p90fool

The other common way with classic blues tones is to have your treble boosted (or bass cut) before the distortion, fooling the ear into thinking that the amp is much cleaner than it actually is. 

This can either be some kind of EQ, an amp bright switch, or simply the way the signal path in certain amps is designed. 

The songs you mentioned have plenty of distortion, in fact more gain than I ever use, but the clean note separation and lack of obvious grainy fuzz are mostly about which frequencies are boosted (or cut) before that happens. 

HAL9000

Voxman said:

When I was young & inexperienced, I was after the same thing and I thought a compressor would give me the 'sound in my head' because I got stuck on that word 'sustain'.  I got one but it didn't do what I wanted, because it 'squished' the tone and at higher settings/volumes added a bit of distortion (well, that's what your typical compressor does, in'it? ! lol)  - later, I discovered it was actually a delay FX I needed - of course the two together can be good too.  

I remember buying a compressor years ago after hearing that it would increase sustain. As I recall it just gave a 'squished' tone and very little, if any, sustain. I think, but stand to be corrected, that compression doesn't actually improve sustain but gives the impression due to the way it smooths out the higher volume at the start of the note.

As others have already pointed out, a good vibrato technique will definitely increase sustain since it puts energy into the string and keep it vibrating that bit longer.

A little gain or distortion (you don't need loads) will go a long way.

A Strat generally isn't the most sustain-y  of guitars. My experience is that Les Pauls, or even Teles, sustain more. Depending on which Strat you've got, you might be able to fit a heavier sustain block. I did this to mine and there is an improvement - it's fairly subtle but it definitely helps.

Gassage

Another thing- crank the amp, roll back vol on guitar.

Teetonetal

Compressor with a mix knob. That way you still get some attack but with some squish and extra sustain.

ESBlonde

Gassage and modus both have both got the right idea.  Also p90 suggests getting the tone hot too. This all helps with the amps ability to cook the tone and be dynamic. 

Voxman

HAL9000 said:

A Strat generally isn't the most sustain-y  of guitars. My experience is that Les Pauls, or even Teles, sustain more. Depending on which Strat you've got, you might be able to fit a heavier sustain block. I did this to mine and there is an improvement - it's fairly subtle but it definitely helps.

Like many folk here I have both Gibsons (LP, SG) and Fenders (Strats, Tele) and whilst LP's have this reputation for great sustain, due to fixed neck, woods/weight, p/ups etc, to some extent I think this is a bit 'over-played' as a decent Strat or Tele will usually have pretty good and even a comparative sustain. I have a 2010 USA Standard Strat with trem & RW board, a 69 hardtail Strat with maple cap board, and a 1988 USA Tele rw board - and they all have pretty good natural sustain.     

sweepy

You can also hunt for the sweet spot, angling the guitar in front of the cab/combo to keep the note singing 

richardhomer

AndyR said:

A good left-hand vibrato technique - keeps the note going without changing the pitch. I have NO IDEA how to do it or how I learnt it, but one day it was just there.

Really agree - you can 'coax' sustain with the right guitar - even played completely clean, without effects.

The right hand can make a diffference too - unless you have a very high action and heavy strings, a heavy attack seems to 'over-drive' the string and strangle the tone. The string is damped by buzz created from the initial attack and somehow stops it 'singing'.

Headphones

Ahh, the eighties are back!!!  This was the only thing of import in guitars/music journalism of the time.  Bee in a jam jar tone that buzzed forever.

"Still got the blues" isn't remotely clean!  At least the lead tone; that's a distortion pedal into a loud amp.  Wasn't he using a Marshall distortion pedal into a Marshall stack at the time?  A good distortion pedal into a valve amp will get you fairly close; the pedal gives the tone shaping, while the amp gives the compression and feedback like sustain. The set up hints above are important too, particularly at bedroom volumes.

There are a few smattering's of backing guitar (though it sounds to be mostly synth, bass and drums), clean guitar with chorus playing arpeggios.

robgilmo

Viagra, take enough and you will be sustaining all night long and well into the next day.

BRISTOL86

Headphones said:

"Still got the blues" isn't remotely clean!  At least the lead tone; that's a distortion pedal into a loud amp. 

To be fair I'm probably misusing certain terms....I'm rather new to all this. Towards the back end of last year all I owned was an acoustic and now I'm head first in unfamiliar territory!

By clean I mean not kind of fuzzy/shreddy if that makes sense. Nice discernible individual notes rather than a buzzy/distorted sound like if you'd just cranked the gain right up. 

Thanks all for your tips and pointers, I'll give things a tweak over the weekend in the amp settings and mess around with the various ways of affecting the volume. It's confusing with gain, master, guitar output all on the amp as well as the volume control on the guitar to be able to affect the amount of noise I make!

BRISTOL86

Here is an example of the sort of tone I mean (pretty similar to the record to my untrained ear). Obviously he's working at a completely different level, amp wise, to my humble THR



Based on the comments he has the gain and master cranked right up although he's also using a tube screamer. Will experiment on the weekend

Neil

Put lumps of brass all over the guitar to increase sustain.

Well, that's what they did in the '70's.

p90fool

BRISTOL86 said:

Headphones said:

"Still got the blues" isn't remotely clean!  At least the lead tone; that's a distortion pedal into a loud amp. 

To be fair I'm probably misusing certain terms....I'm rather new to all this. Towards the back end of last year all I owned was an acoustic and now I'm head first in unfamiliar territory!

By clean I mean not kind of fuzzy/shreddy if that makes sense. Nice discernible individual notes rather than a buzzy/distorted sound like if you'd just cranked the gain right up. 

Thanks all for your tips and pointers, I'll give things a tweak over the weekend in the amp settings and mess around with the various ways of affecting the volume. It's confusing with gain, master, guitar output all on the amp as well as the volume control on the guitar to be able to affect the amount of noise I make!

It sounds like your seeking that elusive clarity with a fair bit of gain, rather than clean sustain then. 

My post above covers some of this, you could also set up your amp with less treble than usual, then run your Tubescreamer into it with the gain and volume on about halfway or less and the tone on full, to restore some of the treble you've taken off the amp. 

It needs a bit of juggling, but having your main source of treble (it's upper mids really) before the amp can give you that clarity and note separation you're missing with the amp alone. 

BRISTOL86

p90fool said:

BRISTOL86 said:

Headphones said:

"Still got the blues" isn't remotely clean!  At least the lead tone; that's a distortion pedal into a loud amp. 

To be fair I'm probably misusing certain terms....I'm rather new to all this. Towards the back end of last year all I owned was an acoustic and now I'm head first in unfamiliar territory!

By clean I mean not kind of fuzzy/shreddy if that makes sense. Nice discernible individual notes rather than a buzzy/distorted sound like if you'd just cranked the gain right up. 

Thanks all for your tips and pointers, I'll give things a tweak over the weekend in the amp settings and mess around with the various ways of affecting the volume. It's confusing with gain, master, guitar output all on the amp as well as the volume control on the guitar to be able to affect the amount of noise I make!

It sounds like your seeking that elusive clarity with a fair bit of gain, rather than clean sustain then. 

My post above covers some of this, you could also set up your amp with less treble than usual, then run your Tubescreamer into it with the gain and volume on about halfway or less and the tone on full, to restore some of the treble you've taken off the amp. 

It needs a bit of juggling, but having your main source of treble (it's upper mids really) before the amp can give you that clarity and note separation you're missing with the amp alone. 

Thanks for that @p90fool ;

I don't actually have a TS but wouldn't mind getting one if it's a vital component in the sound I'm after. 

Voxman

Yeah, re video that's not clean sustain, that's distortion and to get that 'rounder/smoother' tone, he's using the neck p/up and the front of the amp is being pushed with a TS-9 Ibanez tube-screamer.  Plus, (and as I referred to before) there's delay on there - essential to 'stretch' the sustain - not even Gary Moore could get sufficient smooth sustain for long legatto passages like this without using delay.  Beautiful tone & playing on that vid by the way - wish I could play like that!

BRISTOL86

Thanks @Voxman - perhaps I'll have to look into the tube screamer if I can't get close with tweaking the amp settings

Voxman

@BRISTOL86 good luck with finding your tone! 

BRISTOL86

Hey chaps

Made a quick recording and would value some feedback, please ignore the horrible playing. It's lost something in recording, definitely sounds a lot richer in person but I'm very new to trying to record anything!

Thanks!