moody blues guitar tone?

[jm52]

moody blues guitar tone?

Any ideas?

 

I used to have a nice tube amp that did this...  and then real life intervened....

So, looking for an in the box sound.

[Colin Nicholls]

 I have no idea what the Moody Blues guitar tone is, unless you're just looking for a "moody" blues guitar.

Might I recommend SwankyAmp? It's very nice.

Edited June 7, 2021 by Colin Nicholls

[jerrydf]

There's a mini-series of three videos on YouTube with Justin Hayward where he talks about his amps, his guitar(s) and his guitar rack.

I knew he mainly played the 355, and there's also videos of the band playing Ride My See Saw where he plays the Telecaster.  There's nice little stories on here about those guitars. For the amps, his on-stage set-up seems rather complex, with a stereo Fender/Mesa Boogie set-up plus a Marshall for sustain. So good luck rigging that up in Amplitube or TH-U or whatever.  Unfortunately he doesn't really discuss the actual settings here, but this is a start.

It's a long time since I saw them at Leicester De Montfort Hall, just afer Question of Balance came out!

jdf

 

[rsinger]

In the first video above Justin says his tone is from the processor that looks like a boss gt-3 and since it's an amp modeler it's hard to say.

[Starship Krupa]

Need to know which of Justin's tones you're looking for. Post or mention a song and I'll try to help. Big Moody Blues fan here.

[jm52]

Thank you all for your replies.

In the beginning Justin used the same fuzz as Hendrix:   Supa-Fuzz... (not the pedal version) Marshall did a couple of knock offs.... And others as well.

I have the schematics and most of the components to build one.

Thought maybe i could use some plug ins to get there from here.  Hence the post

Prolly gonna build it, in my spare time.

And still try to emulate in the box.

 

Edited June 13, 2021 by jm52

[Starship Krupa]

So his lead tone. Yes, I'd say that an emulation of a transistor fuzz like a Fuzz Face and tune it as necessary with EQ.

Go ahead and build one! It's fun.

[jerrydf]

Yes, I've had some fun over the years building distortion and fuzz units, as well as tremolos, compressors, amps, etc. 

I was just looking at the Supa Fuzz.  The authentic version uses the old germanium Mullard OC75s (and no feedback diodes) - I haven't seen those for a few decades (although I may actually have some in one of my old stock boxes somewhere).  So I checked around and you can get some on ebay for £10 or 10Eur. I did see one advert trying to sell them for 240Eur or so.  So - you can try for original authentic OC75s, or I suppose there's perfectly servicable equivalents these days. 

Good luck.  Let us know if you take the hardware route, and how it goes.

 

[Starship Krupa]

This has inspired me to try to cop Justin's tone myself. A couple of favorites: "The Story in Your Eyes" and "Ride My Seesaw."

Gives me a good excuse to dive into Trash 2.

[Terry Kelley]

I got the opportunity to hang out with Mike Pinder several times trying to help him solve a digital recording issue. We got to talking about the recording techniques of the Moody Blue, mixes, etc. On this topic he did say was that Hayward's guitar was often recorded at extreme volume levels to the point that being in the room with the amps was painful. But the sound was great!

 

Edited June 19, 2021 by Terry Kelley