Songs/Bands with Guitar Tones You Love

Cafe Society
1

Sometimes the way a guitar sounds can effect the enjoyment of a song as much as the notes it’s playing, so I thought it would be interesting to see specific examples.
Some of mine are:

Going Out West by Tom Waits- the part that begins right after the 15 second mark. I don’t know how he got that sound, but I’ve never heard another song with a guitar that sounded quite like that. It’s just the right amount of fuzz.

Hoist That Rag, also by Tom Waits. It sounds like he pulled the guitar and amp out of a junkyard, and that is a good thing.

She Bangs The Drums by The Stone Roses is made up of several great sounding guitar parts. I especially like the guitar chords that sound starting at 2:01.

The Jesus and Mary Chain, especially Just Like Honey.

All Day and All of the Night by The Kinks.

More if I think of them.

2

Oh, gosh, guitar tone – this is a worthy topic, and I think there’s lots of comparisons to be made. I completely agree that guitar tone can either suck you in or eject you at high velocity from a song. I’ve heard songs that I goddamn hate, but the guitar vibe just makes you listen because it sounds so cool. Sadly, its it’s 11:30pm here and I’m headed to the beddin’. More deep tone thoughts later if I can. I hope others will chime in.

FYI, your “hoist that rag” link it busted, video deleted. I’m also puzzled why you like guitar played through a coffee can into a pillow, but that’s just me. :slight_smile:

3

I really like Thurston Moore’s sound with Sonic Youth (grew up listening to them, but it’s been a while since I listened to the band properly). I’m not a musician, but screeching feedback / making a discordant fucking racket doesn’t seem like too difficult a thing to do. Moore’s guitar, though, sounds different to everyone else who lays out a generic punk rock noise. Their masterpiece *Daydream Nation *is often described as ‘orchestral’, or ‘symphonic’. It’s amazing how such a feedback-driven, scratchy sound can power such a big and complex sound.

Another guy with great sound is Josh Homme from QotSA. I was listening to Songs for the Deaf recently in the car and Josh Homme is laying down some monster riff and my wife says ‘It’s like you can’t hear the fingers!’ Meaning that when you hear some metaller shredding the guitar I often get a mental image of fingers moving furiously up and down a fretboard. With QotSA, though, it all seems so effortless. I’ve never heard a band produce such a fast, powerful sound whilst remaining so poised.

4

The Beatles - “You Never Give Me Your Money”. Quite a few tones throughout. I especially like the part that comes in with the lyric *“But oh that magic feeling…” * So unique sounding…it’s that and Paul’s vocals that make the song for me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JaegkMtZPh0

5

Television - Days.

One of my favorite bands. It’s more about the technical skill in the guitar playing than the actual tone as such, though the sound of the chords in the opening minute of this song gives me shivers.

6

I always thought The Smiths had a delicious tone to their songs. I’d love to talk to Johnny Marr and get his perspective.

7

The trick to playing Johnny Marr’s parts is figuring out which fret to put the capo on. He uses a lot of open chords but usually played several frets up - that’s how to get all that nice ringing/chimey stuff.

September Gurls by Big Star has a fantastic guitar sound (unfortunatly it’s not actually played on a guitar :))

Jimmy Page has done plenty but the guitar sound in When the Levee Breaks is particularly out of this world. IIRC it’s a 12 string in an open tuning recorded at a highed speed than the playback speed (if that makes sense).

8

Good lord, what a topic. So many places to go.

I started a related-but-opposite thread here- Great songs with awful guitar tones…

I love so many of the choices already offered. Big Star, Television, Stone Roses (I love the instrumental outro on Waterfall, when he kicks in the wah), and all of the classics mentioned.

Guitar tone is such an evolutionary thing - access to evermore…un-acoustic kinda tones has driven so much innovation in rock music. What is “generally considered” the first rock n’ roll record - Rocket 88by Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats (featuring Ike Turner) - is considered the first rock record *because *of the guitar tone - it’s really the big difference in this song vs. boogie and jump blues. In that case, legend has it that Ike Turner’s amp was dropped on the way to the studio, knocking out a tube, which distorted the tone (by the way, if you can’t make out the guitar in the link, it’s because it really sounds like a farty baritone sax following the boogie riff - when the real sax kicks in you can hear the difference - but it is that distorted, thick tone that sets the song in a new direction).

From there, most guitar heroes have been defined by their tone as much as their riffs - Eric Clapton and his Woman Tone from the Mayall / Cream era, Eddie Van Halen with the infamous Brown Sound, Stevie Ray Vaughn and his signature Strat tone (see post #21 in this threadfor an earlier take I had on that.) - heck, Steve Jones and the Sex Pistols Les Paul thru a screaming (and stolen) Fender Twin is a signature tone, along with Johnny Ramones Mosrite. When you live in online guitar-geek land, like I do, whole websites are devoted to achieving the tone of one song. Gibson’s weekly eNewsletter devotes a column to how to digitally dial up the tone of a given song. I have no idea how good that could sound, but have my skepticism.

For me, no suprise given my posting history and my love of straight-up rhythm guitar, I gotta go with the tones of **Malcolm Young **of AC/DC (signature tone songs include Problem Child, If You Want Blood, Sin City, What’s Next to the Moon - a bunch), **Keith Richards **in the Sticky Fingers era (the opening lick of **Can’t You Hear Me Knockin’ **is pretty much the best sounding, coolest opening riff ever recorded, IMHO - I know, YMMV) and I suppose Live at Leeds, era Townshend/Who. In all cases - okay, except for Pete at Leeds :wink: - the actual gain on the amp is surprisingly low - I have hit this a few times in earlier threads - the actual amount of distortion is low, but it comes from pushed tubes and how the player is bangin’ on the strings to drive everything. Malcolm Young plays with heavy-gauge strings and just spanks the crap out of his strings.

**Knopfler’s tone on Money for Nothing **is legendary - his '58 (?) Gibson Les Paul Sunburst - picked and plucked in the classic Knopfler style - but through an overdriven amp, and it sounds like the bridge pickup with the tone rolled off (so not quite Clapton’s Woman Tone, because Clapton used the neck pickup with the tone rolled off for that…)…

Have to leave with a plug for Jeff Beck’s Les Paul tone on **Let Me Love You **off of Truth…

9

'The Package by A Perfect Circle.

People of the Sun by Rage Against the Machine

10

Yeah, How Soon is Now is one of the best Guitar tracks of all time.

11

Most of my picks have already been mentioned - Smiths, JAMC, Stone Roses, Sonic Youth.

I’m a sucker for post-Smiths/JAMC jangle-noise pop, and I like The Sundays and the House of Love especially for that.

Pixies managed to make that surf-rock tone sound so much less dated than anyone else.

12

Yes - and Down Rodeo off the same Rage CD, too…

…and mswas - there is a story online somewhere about how Marr got that tone - apparently it was, like, a roomful of various amps that had built-in vibrato and he sync’d 'em all up to pulse at the same rate - what a joyous noise. And the slide work on top of that is just amazing.

Marr is tough because he plays with a thumbpick which leaves his fingers free for picking - but he comes at it with no set pattern like a Travis picker. It gets a great tone because you can vary dynamics and attack so individually.

Okay - obvious one: **Derek Trucks **- Down in the Flood (link to thread on that song with link to song…)

13

Don’t throw stuff at me, please, but I really like Neal Schon’s tone on Journey’s Infinity album. Classic warm Les Paul sound.

14

**Tom Scholz of Boston **made a mint packaging his Rockman mini-preamp, designed to replicate the Les Paul-through-a-Marshall-in-a-stadium tone. It didn’t hurt that his tone was a huge feature of his songs - the crunchy rhythm riff off More Than a Feeling or the final electric guitar break in Long Time. Not my favorite music, but solid classic rock that wears its guitar tone like a brand.

15

I love that Boston sound.
Another band that wore it’s “guitar tone like a brand” was Big Country. Bagpipe guitar it was, and wonderful to hear.

16

Jeff Buckley’s solo stuff has this lush, very clean bell-like Fender + reverb tone that I’ve been trying to replicate my entire life. I second Thurston Moore’s sound, it’s amazing to me that for a band that tries for a discordant noise style, they’re actually less overwhelming than most metal/punk sounds. Less is more, I guess.

17

I’ve always been partial to the echo-ey (heh) guitar sound of Echo & the Bunnymen’s Will Sergeant-perfectly fits the tone and mood of the music & lyrics.

18

I love the guitar tone David Gilmour produced throughout “Shine on You Crazy Diamond” on Pink Floyd’s *Wish You Were Here *album. That perfect bend as the guitar’s intro to the song always gives me a bit of a chill. He has a smooth almost jazz-guitar sound at the start with just a hint of fuzz to it. Then the 4-note sequence that’s the main musical theme of the song has a little bit of twang and a thick reverby waver in it (from Leslie rotating speaker cabs, I think I’ve read). Then it’s topped off with the abrupt shift to a harder and more biting tone at about the 6:04 mark. I’ve always loved the guitar work Gilmour does, and this is some of his best playing in my opinion. I know I’ve spent a fair amount of time trying to nail that tone . . .

Also, the tone from “A Great Day for Freedom” is great. I don’t know anything about what Gilmour was playing on that song, but the tone is very distinctive to me. Say what you will about Pink Floyd after Roger Waters left, but there is still some fantastic guitar work on The Division Bell.

19

I can’t believe no one has mentioned Eric Johnson yet. Apparently Johnson can be quite anal about his tone and it has caused him to delay releases.

Slee

20

Gilmour’s playing drips with great tone. Everyone knows about “Another Brick In The Wall”. But after listening to that, go listen to Gilmour’s solos on Paul McCartney’s “No More Lonely Nights”. Then go to Youtube and find the clip of Gilmour accompanying Kate Bush live on “Running Up That Hill.”

An Arky, nothing wrong with touting Neal Schon. Go check out the improvised (!) coda to “Stone in Love”, and thank me later.

Other favorite tones:

– Martin Barre on Jethro Tull’s “Teacher”
– Dick Dale on tons or recordings. Start with “Miserlou”
– The Edge on U2’s “Pride (In the Name of Love”
– Most of Brian May’s Queen output. Start with “Killer Queen” and “Crazy Little Thing Called Love”.
– Mike Campbell on Tom Petty’s “Don’t Come Around Here No More”