Anyway, I was just wondering what it is that makes a particular guitarist immediately identifiable, regardless of the song.
For instance you can identify Brian May’s work as soon as you hear it. I know him when I hear him, but what exactly is the unique quality that I recognize but can’t seem to name?? The kind of instrument he uses? His personal technique? Does it have more to do with the way the songs are produced / engineered? Probably an uber stupid question to anyone who knows the mechanics of music, but I just can’t put my finger on it, and I’m starting to fret.
So, axemen and women, what gives a guitar player “their sound”?
It’s in the fingers. I frequently hear stories about some notable guitarist playing another guy’s instrument, completely different from his preferred model, and still sounding exactly like himself.
It can be any of the things you mention, WOOKINPANUB, but in particular I’d pin it on two things: tone and phrasing.
The instrument and equipment are part of a player’s tone - even if you don’t know what a Strat, Marshall, Octavia or wah-wah is, they’re integral parts of Jimi Hendrix’s sound. But when you give a good guitarist a different instrument and different equipment, certain parts of his tone will still come through because it’s partly determined by the way he frets notes and the way he attacks the strings. Like Biffy says, that’s in the fingers. The really great guitar players, and heck, some of the less-great ones, have instantly recognizable tone. If you know what they sound like, you can often hear a second of their playing and say “Hey, that’s !” I don’t even like Led Zeppelin very much, but I’d say I can identify them on the radio in about .2 seconds.
And phrasing is the way the guitarists play what they’re playing, and that usually isn’t affected which guitar he or she is using. It’s a fun way to identify people because once you’re familiar with a guy’s phrasing, you can tell who is borrowing from him/ripping him off.
Brian May is an interesting example because I think he literally built the guitar that he played. So right there, it’s not going to sound like someone else’s instrument.
I agree with all of the aforementioned statements, and would add that effects are a large part of a guitarists’ sound. U2’s The Edge is identifiable by the echo and delay effects he typically plays with. I wouldn’t consider myself much of a guitarist but it’s lots of fun playing into Apple’s GarageBand and playing with the echo and delay so I sound like a poor man’s Dave Evans.
Was this also a pun or did you just write this and not realize it?
Brian May used a coin for a pick, as well as layering multiple tracks to play his own harmony part, sometimes as many as three different tones at once. His style is therefore extremely distinctive.
As other wise folks above have said, the distinctiveness of a player comes from all the tools used. One of my favorite electric guitar players, Mark Knopfler, is an example. His original signature sound, as best illustrated on “Sultans of Swing” by Dire Straits, was a combination of the guitar and amp he used, his right hand technique, left hand technique, and note choice. On that song and many others, he used a vintage Fender Stratocaster and a Marshall tube amp. He never, as far as I know, uses a pick, so his right hand technique is a constant: he does most things that other lead players would do with a flat pick by using his thumb and index finger, augmenting those by occasionally picking with his middle and ring fingers. This allows him to pluck the strings when he wants to in a very distinctive ways, as well as allowing a very subtle string attack when he wants. With his left hand, he’s a fairly standard player, except that he sometimes employs left-hand vibrato on double stops and triads, meaning he’ll play a chord and the add vibrato to it by moving his left hand. Knopfler is most distinctive in terms of note choice in minor keys, which he seems to prefer. “Sultans of Swing” and “Money For Nothing” are minor key examples of his playing. When he strays from his signature Stratocaster to use a distorted Les Paul on “Money For Nothing”, he still sounds distinctive because of his hand techniques and his minor-key note choice.
If I may offer an analogy, it is the case that not only pianists performing on various (and variable) acoustic pianos, and electric pianos (Rhodes keyboards amplified direct to house or board, let’s say) can sound quite different, but Hammond organists, for example, manage to achieve quite identifiable personalities on a stock Hammond. An organ has no touch sensitivity (velocity at which a note is struck has no effect upon the volume – or very little, in the case of the Hammond).
In most of the above cases, touch, note choice, phrasing, chord voicings, use of the sustain pedal/expression pedal, etc. account for the unique stamp of one’s personality.
A guitar? Now you’ve got fingers touching steel or nylon, plectrum styles, even slight variations in tuning preferences – a few more options for self-control inherent to the instrument.
Again, I would say that it is a combination of all of those things. I would say that strumming pattern and note pattern are a big part of it, but just as big if not bigger are the instrument/effect/amp combination. To demonstrate, I think Clapton’s style changed dramatically between Cream (Gibson ES-335/Les Paul/SG and Marshall stacks) and his later years where he used mainly Strats (Blackie is a composite IIRC, with neck and body from different instruments). In fact, if you had told me that they were two different guitarists, I wouldn’t have questioned it.
Brian May used homemade amps and guitars which have been replicated (there is Vox Brian May amp and numerous replicas of his Red Special guitar). Carlos Santana famously has mostly used PRS guitars and Mesa Boogie amplifiers. And of course Hendrix and his Strats, Marshall stacks, Octavia, Crybaby, and Fuzz Face.
Don’t forget bass players. Every experienced bass player will tell you that “your sound” is all in your hands. Geddy Lee still sounds like Geddy Lee, regardless of whether he’s playing his Rickenbacker, his Steinberger, his Wal, or his Fender Jazz, through a variety of different amps and cabs, or even straight into the PA system like he does these days. It’s not what he plays - it’s how he plays it.
Oh, and drummers, too. When a Van Halen song comes on the radio, it’s actually Alex’s distinctive drum sound (that high-hat!) that tells me it’s Van Halen before Eddie’s guitar sound registers on my ears.
That’s pretty much it. Change the guitar, the amp, the strings…it’s still Carlos. My hero. If you could define what it was, you might be able to do it yourself. Or maybe not.
What everyone else said about fingers but I think in some cases people have gone out of their way to be distinctive, deliberately or not.
Hendrix: Upside down Strat played very loud, often a semitone down. Lots of use of effects – even he couldn’t actually play guitar backwards in time – and whammy bar abuse.
**The Edge ** uses delay units a lot. A lot of other guitarists have used the same echo tricks but the Edge has used them so much it’s defined his sound.
Brian May. Stacked up harmonies and multiple parts (and that guitar).
David Gilmour. Tastefull, never plays fast. Even uses the whammy bar tastefully. Tastefull use of delay.
Joe Satriani. Sort of a faster David Gilmore
**Korn ** (or any similar band) guitars (often with the wrong number of strings) detuned a lot. More FX than you can shake a stick at, pitch shifters samplers. . .
Yngwie Malmsteen. Very fast harmonic minor scales, and arpeggios. Played fast.
Jeff Beck. Make noises that that don’t sound like they could be coming from a guitar.
If you use one of these techniques you’ll sound like you’re impersonating one of those guys. If you use them all, your name is probably Steve Vai.
If I spell his name both ways one has got to be right.
For people who don’t know, Joe Satriani isn’t really much like a speeded up Gilmour at all.
And Eddie Van Halen should have been in the list as kicking off right hand tapping and whammy dives*.
I know Hendrix did this but Eddie managed to keep his guitar in tune.
All good stuff - I don’t have much to add but as a guitarist felt somewhat obligated to post something to this thread.
Bottom line is that, unless you have some super-distinctive effect - e.g., May and his octaver-layering, Edge and his delay - it really comes from your hands. I have a very aggressive playing style - I brutalize my strings by strumming and picking hard - and my other guitarist has a much lighter style. On the rare occasions where we play each other’s instruments in our band setting, it is still 100% who is making which noises…so technique, attack and phrasing are basically analagous to someone’s language, dialect, word choice, etc.
Havings said that, as other posters indicate, tone is a big deal. People don’t spend HUGE money trying to replicate Stevie Ray Vaughn’s tone for nothing. Now, granted, his tone is defined by heavy gauge strings, tune down a half-step and floor it…and his Strat with what were apparently over-wound pickups didn’t hurt either…
I agree with the posters who say it’s in the hands. All players strive for tone, but that’s the icing on the cake. I could pick up Carlos Santana’s rig and play the same damn notes but nobody would confuse me for him. And Carlos could pick up a piece of shit acoustic guitar that’s out of tune and you would know blindfolded who it is immediately.
