How To Get The Jimi Hendrix Clean Tone
- Thread starter Mike B
- Start date
Twelve8
Strat-O-Master
Sounds real nice, good work
stratman in va
Most Honored Senior Member
WOW! Aldous Snow is a heckuva Strat player!!
Chont
Dr. Stratster
That was great. Thanks.
I think that is a decent (and cost effective) way to approximate the tone but it sounds way too "Fenderey" (technical term) to me. The best way is using an older style non-master volume Marshall or clone - that will nail it too a much greater degree because - at least for the earlier stuff and absolutely for the live stuff (Monterrey pop) that's what it was. You don't need a fuzz pedal - those old amps are basically a British-made Fender bassman. That is actually my favorite clean sound and what I use as my primary clean sound. I have a Ceriatone JTM 45/100 that I gig with.
rafasounds
Senior Stratmaster
In the studio Jimi used many different amps, especially small Fender combos for the cleaner sounds, at least in the two first albums. Jimi's live "clean" sound was never clean. First, he used Marshall amps with an already quite overdriven tone as a primary tone. On top of that he would add the Fuzz Face, Univibe, and Wah. Sometimes the Octavia, but not often. When switching from louder parts to quieter parts, he would just roll down the volume knob, sometimes with the Fuzz on, sometimes not. He had a good "cleanup", probably because of Roger Mayer tweaking his guitars and pedals.
What is the source for the small combos on the first two albums? When we say clean I think it is all relative anyway. His playing on live at Olympia theater in Paris is quite clean for songs that were supposed to be - it's not a very big venue and there's no way he had it past four anyway on full stacks - which is where one would be at basically it's proper rated RMS and still be relatively clean. I think by and large what you say is accurate but words like "never" are a bit strong.
rafasounds
Senior Stratmaster
The source is years of listening to every recording there is available of the Man and reading extensively about anything related to the Man. Do the same things and eventually you will get to the same conclusions. Yes, Jimi's live tone was NEVER clean, in the very literal meaning of the word clean. It always had some overdrive.
So the typical internet source. Have you ever played through a vintage marshall stack?
Davesband
Senior Stratmaster
Great sound..!
For some reason I never became friends with a fuzz pedal. I really don't know why.
But I get a super Hendrix clean sound with a Wampler Plexi drive.
Gain set about 9 o'clock totally hits the spot for me
For some reason I never became friends with a fuzz pedal. I really don't know why.
But I get a super Hendrix clean sound with a Wampler Plexi drive.
Gain set about 9 o'clock totally hits the spot for me
El Gobernador
fezz parka
Hendrix used Fender amps all the time. Twins, Bassmans, Deluxe Reverbs, Super Reverbs, Showmans etc. Sometimes they were house amps at studios like The Record Plant, sometimes he bought them himself:
Then there was the time he put a flux capacitor in his corvette, got up to 88 mph going down Nichols Cyn Rd. and came to the future and picked up this:
Then there was the time he put a flux capacitor in his corvette, got up to 88 mph going down Nichols Cyn Rd. and came to the future and picked up this:
Last edited:
rafasounds
Senior Stratmaster
No, but it doesn't mean I don't know anything. The best source you can have is yourself, your own experience. Your own ears. You see, some people may have played vintage marshalls, but they can't seem to recognize a non-clean sound on record.
http://www.thegearpage.net/board/in...songs-where-he-uses-fender-amplifiers.975069/
here is some internet speculation for you.
But if you want to get out of the speculation territory, as I surely would like to, listen very carefully to the Winterland 1968 recordings. It's a very famous Experience live album which has has numerous compilations. You can find it in LP or CD, or even online. Why this album? Because it is a very good picture of what Jimi was onstage in his best form. 1968 was a good year for the Experience, they had been performing for two years and were really tight. For these Winterland concerts Jimi was really focused on the music, and, after knowing pretty much every live recording there is, both of the Experience and later rcordings, in my opinion this is the best there is of Jimi playing live.
Listen to the whole album and try to find one place where you can hear a clean guitar sound. By clean, I take again the literal meaning of clean. There are parts where you might think its a clean sound, but listen carefully. There is always a degree of dirt.
"Cleaner" is not clean.
Personally, I think you're pedantic. Listen to people's experiences, improve your own, do your research, before you can be pedantic.
Fendereedo
Most Honored Senior Member
I've seen that Line 6 PIC before, never fails to make me chuckle!
rafasounds
Senior Stratmaster
Just to add. When I said "years of listening to every recording there is of the man", this is not internet source. I am not an internet baby. I still have physical music. LP's and the such. Nothing to do with internet.
rafasounds
Senior Stratmaster
If we consider that one night when Jimi, stoned and drunk, went upstage for an after hour jam and plugged into a very clean vox super beetle, then he might have played "clean" onstage. Otherwise, considering his LIVE work with his bands, Ive never heard he play clean.
I guess you're implication that you have the greatest ear of all time and so much "experience" - pun intended makes me pedantic? How do you have any idea what I know relative to you or the amount of time spent on knowledge? That's speculation buddy. I have Hendrix albums and a vintage Marshall stack (good for me I know) and the Wind Cries Mary - which I think is the quintessential early Hendrix clean tone - sounds exactly like that - not like a "small combo" - so that is what i base my speculation on.
rafasounds
Senior Stratmaster
I'm not the one saying I have better things than the others, you see.
Since this is all speculation, regarding the use of fender amps in studio, I stay with the gratest common sense, based both on fact and on people's experiences, that in the early records many fender amps were used.
Regarding the use of clean sounds onstage, I leave that to what's already very evident.
Since this is all speculation, regarding the use of fender amps in studio, I stay with the gratest common sense, based both on fact and on people's experiences, that in the early records many fender amps were used.
Regarding the use of clean sounds onstage, I leave that to what's already very evident.
El Gobernador
fezz parka
No, arguing over minute details makes you pedantic.
Hendrix used all sorts of amps. It's documented up the wazoo. He didn't start using Marshalls until he went to London in '66. I met Eddie Kramer about ten years ago and asked him about amps and he said this: "He used whatever was in the studio. Twins, Showmans, Marshalls."
So yeah. He used Marshalls. And Fenders. And whatever else he thought would get him the sound he wanted. Just like the rest of us.
