Boss GE10 - Brown Sound

[iplayLouD]

I've been chasing the brown sound ever since I heard VH1 when I was 16. While I wasn't going for it straight on since I've had other influences too, gradually, over the years, I've been able to acquire various bits of Eddie gear.

I have a 1959HW Plexi, an old cab with vintage pulsonic greenbacks, a 5150 Kramer replica with a Duncan JB, a 1978 flanger, a Phase 90 (EVH edition), and a couple of very nice delay pedals to stand in for the Echoplex.

Yesterday a 1977 Boss GE10 EQ popped up for sale locally. I believe that this is probably the least well-known part of EVHs signal chain, but, as it turns out, it's the most effective.

My mind is blown. Variac my ass, it's the damn EQ that's responsible for most of that juicy "brown sound".

In short, I'm very happy with it and if you're chasing that sound too, consider buying an EQ pedal before anything else. It makes a world of difference in front of a Plexi.

[Dinosaur David B]

EQ generally makes more difference to ANY sound than any other pedal. You can really sculpt tone with them.

[bourbonsamurai]

eq pedals are great, but the only way to get that plexi to FEEL right is to run it at 88-90v.  changing the mid pot to a 50k wont hurt, either.

[iplayLouD]

It's almost "unfair" somehow.

People stress over specific pedals, pickups, strings, tonewood, etc. But a good EQ pedal is just off-the-charts powerful for getting the sound you have in your head.

And yet, most players I know don't have one.

Is it because it's more fun to look for "sexier" gear, aka overdrives, distortions, boutique amps, etc?

[bourbonsamurai]

It's almost "unfair" somehow.

People stress over specific pedals, pickups, strings, tonewood, etc. But a good EQ pedal is just off-the-charts powerful for getting the sound you have in your head.

And yet, most players I know don't have one.

Is it because it's more fun to look for "sexier" gear, aka overdrives, distortions, boutique amps, etc?

 

my take on this, is that most players hear with their eyes, their ears being comparatively useless appendages.  one of the best rigs youll hear being gigged consistently in my neighborhood is a two rock amp, with a board full of jro, analogman, strymon, etc, and it sounds like a loud trashcan, cuz dude cannot be bothered to eq this moneypit according to whichever room hes playing.  if ones ears are so wooden as to be unaffected by playing a full gig with the screechiest, clicky, concrete garage floor treble imaginable, and i mean its *bad*, i think its a fantasy to think our hero is capable of grasping the effective practicality of a graphic eq.  this typa shit is waay too common

[Dinosaur David B]

It's almost "unfair" somehow.

People stress over specific pedals, pickups, strings, tonewood, etc. But a good EQ pedal is just off-the-charts powerful for getting the sound you have in your head.

And yet, most players I know don't have one.

 

I keep an EQ pedal in the studio, but to be honest, I've never really needed it Live. And in the studio, I usually add the EQ after tracking, because I have so many different ones to choose from, and when it's part of a channel strip, you get that strip's mojo along with the EQ. For creative EQ, I mostly use Helios for guitar and bass -- the sound of Olympic studios and the Rolling Stones mobile studio. You can crank the shit out of the mids and it sounds great. I like Trident on keys. It's brighter. Think the piano sound of Elton and Freddie.  I've got SSL, API, Neve, all modeled after those desks. Pultec is a classic. It does all the right things, but I want to say a little more transparently. And then, of course there are all the corrective EQs that are much more transparent. You use those to fix things like a pinging snare drum, or when instruments are masking each other. The best for those is ProQ. 
 

[cvansickle]

I've discovered recently that now all EQ pedals are created equal, and not all frequency bands are useful for guitar amps.

For example, I have a J.Rockett Audio Rockaway Archer, which has a six-band EQ and Gain controls. These are the frequencies:

Band 1 – 100 Hz Far Left
Band 2 – 200 Hz
Band 3 – 400 Hz
Band 4 – 800 Hz
Band 5 – 1.6K Hz
Band 6 – 3.2K Hz Far Right

These bands seem to be very effective in the effects loop of my Fender Super-Sonic, making it emulate Marshall sounds easily.

I also tried a cheap EX 7-Band EQ pedal; it has a level control and different frequency bands:

Band 1 – 63 Hz Far Left
Band 2 – 125 Hz
Band 3 – 250 Hz
Band 4 - 500 Hz
Band 5 – 1.0K Hz
Band 6 – 2.2K Hz
Band 7 – 5.0K Hz Far Right

Now, I don't know anything about sound science, I just know what I think sounds good to my ears and brain. The six bands in the Rockaway Archer allowed for getting the sound I wanted with very little effort. The seven bands in the EX weren't getting me close enough. Apparently it's not enough to have EQ - you have to have the right EQ.
 

[Dinosaur David B]

All you really need to know about EQ as far as guitar tones are concerned is that for his live rig, Billy Gibbons ran Pearly Gates through an EQ that would capture the frequencies of whatever you ran through it. Once he had Pearly's frequency captured in that EQ, no matter what pointy or furry guitar he ran through that rig, it came out sounding like Pearly Gates -- which stayed home, safely out of harms way. 

But tone is in the hands. 
 

[Stitsel]

Old thread, but here's my .02c ........ 

I know next to nothing about studio EQs and the various makes/models etc. , but I do know for playing guitar , my faves are Graphic EQ ( 6 band or 10 band ) & Parametric EQ..... I don't have much experience w/parametric EQ pedals ( does anyone make one ? ) , but playing with plugins is fun. You can really sculpt the tone with a parametric EQ, if you have the patience. I like it when you have a visual representation as you're dialing in the tones in real time..... you can make a Marshall sound like a tinny transistor amp, or a full blown raging Rectifier style amp, just with the EQ. It's really remarkable what EQ can do.