amplifier effects

ohpoonet
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Thu Apr 22, 2010 5:03 am

Hi people,

I want to play the Doors (Love me twice) and I want my guitar to sound like the authentic one in the song.

I have a few setting on my amp: contour, gain, treble, bass, and a couple digital effects that I doubt they used.

Any ideas how to get that Doors sound?

Much Appreciates,
Essam


wiley
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Thu Apr 22, 2010 8:29 am

First off, nobody has done so as of yet. So, why worry?

Secondly, Robby Krieger (the guitar player with The Doors) played 'fingerstyle' on the electric, he had especially long fingernails. He also played mainly Gibson SGs, one with a rare 'pearl tail' vibrato. Both the Gibson SGs he played back then were stolen in the early 70's.

Third, seems your amp ain't gonna cut it dude. You probably have an 'electronic' amp, they weren't around back then. You'll need to start with a 'tube' amp.

From a Robby interview;

"With the Doors we’d use mainly Fender Twins for the first two albums. The sound wasn't really so much about the amps as the mics anyway. For the first two albums we were using old tube mics through a tube board; we’d hardly ever do any overdubs because there weren't enough tracks, except for Jim Morrison’s vocals. If you listen to most Doors records they’re all very simple" *NOTE: Early on, the Doors cut a deal with Vox (popularized by the Beatles) yet Robby supposedly hated the sound, so he used...

Live, the Doors used what looked like Acoustic amps. "They were actually homemade amps that had about five times the power! They were really just mini PAs with horns. They sounded real bad but they were loud!"

Effects: "I used one fuzz pedal and an Echoplex for repeats – real simple. In the studio, it wasn’t much different; we just added a little reverb off the plate to wet it up." Krieger was very minimal in his use of effects – even the wah-wah sound in Peace Frog from Morrison Hotel (1971) was simply gained by twiddling his tone knobs, the effect exaggerated by having one of his pickups reversed, Peter Green style.

Also, Robby started off learning Flamenco, at the age of 18, after playing a borrowed Ramirez (Mexico built) his Dad bought him a Ramirez from Spain. He took Flamenco lessons for around a year and also studied Sitar.

His most famous quote towards this, "Gibson SG standard, and a lot of LSD".


BigBear
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Thu Apr 22, 2010 9:27 am

Essam- Wiley has provided some wonderful information. But the short answer, or perhaps short question is, how serious do you want to get trying to re-create a sound from a 60's group?

You can literally spend thousands of dollars chasing an elusive sound with tube amps and mics, effects pedals etc. Or you can invest in a good digital modelling amp, or effects pedal, either of which will give you a variety of sounds and sound pretty good but won't be very close to the "real" sound.

It's simply economics. How close do you want to get to get to the original sound and how much are you willing to spend to get it?

Good luck! :cheer:


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Music Junkie
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Thu Apr 22, 2010 10:50 am

Ditto to what Bear said. On a side, Sweet info Wiley!!!

If you have some disposable cash, you could certainly look into some of the boutique style tube amps. There are some out there that will give you a damn close rendition of what you are looking for. There are just soooooo many factors that go into getting a specific tone. Lots of well established players will tell you they still have not found the exact tone they are looking for. Tube style, box style, tube age, speaker size and configuration, temperature of the room in which you are playing in, playing indoors vs. outdoors, guitar body and pick-ups, on and on and on....

Sorry to be a buzz kill, but it can be like finding a needle in a half-stack..... ;)

J


ohpoonet
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Fri Apr 23, 2010 4:08 am

Thanks for the thorough information!

I will look around the music shops here in Abu Dhabi.

In response to some questions I read above, I want to play "Love me Two Times"

I am planning to use a drummer, a singer, and two guitars (any opinions on this?)

The gig is for a fundraiser at my old school (i graduated in 08)

Oh and i use a marshall amp.

Essam


dennisg
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Fri Apr 23, 2010 8:48 am

My suggestion is to replace one of the guitars with a bass. "Love me two times" is a simple song that doesn't need two guitars.


BigBear
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Fri Apr 23, 2010 12:07 pm

dennisg wrote:
My suggestion is to replace one of the guitars with a bass. "Love me two times" is a simple song that doesn't need two guitars.

YES! And see if you can find a good keyboardist, too! :cheer:


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