78 model and The Importance of pedals in van halen's sound

[Pat_rocks_and_rolls]

As you may know van halen used a lot of pedals but one in particulary has retain my attention the MXR 6 band EQ from the 70's-80's.

If you want to chase that tone you better get the dry raw signal right.

So what's in front of the main amp ?

The MXR 6 band EQ is certainly the pedal in front of the main signal amp. My hypothesis is that he added a vox tone bender to the main signal. However vox tone bender are really expensive particulary those from the 70's-80's. I'm not really sure about that however he used a heavily modified tone bender removing the knobs and adding connections. What was its purpose ? we will never know. However i think it was used to add some punch and attack to his sound.

What is sure is that the mxr 6 band EQ is an imperative if you want to reach that sound.

Here is an example using bias FX and the mxr 6 band eq from the 70's-80's :

https://soundcloud.com/user-753183638/eq-1

It gets pretty close without variac.

if anyone has a vintage mxr 6 band eq and a vox tone bender and a good plexi it would be interesting if he could make some trys with them and show us the results

here is what van halen pedal board used to look like :







Don't forget you'll need a duncan 59 or a 78 model if you want to get the tone.

Steeledge guitars confirmed me that the pickup inside the EVH frankenstein is not the fender evh frankenstein pickup but the EVH custom shop from duncan. You cannot buy this pickup however it is very close to the 78 EVH model (the magnet differs).

you'll need to have the pickup very close to the strings too :



Eddies pickup bobbins are always eaten on the bass side.

 

[ntotoro]

Re: 78 model and The Importance of pedals in van halen's sound

I've always wondered how many red herrings EVH has thrown into his rig over the years, particularly in pictures of it.

Pete Thorn made a video recently about setting up your tone with non-M/V Marshalls and he pretty showed in that video that running straight into a Suhr SL68 (Plexi-type circuit) or even a MarkII, he got VH tones with everything dimed and only the treble and bass backed off a hair, if at all. There's nothing fancy going on. Looked like he was playing a home-made Superstrat at the end of the video and I don't know what pickups he had, but the sound is in that amp.

The Variac may help get that sound at lower volumes, but the sound is still there. I'm guessing that's why he'd run his amps dimed, then use a dummy load or something into a MOSFET power amp for his overall volume.

Nick

 

[Chistopher]

Re: 78 model and The Importance of pedals in van halen's sound

Steeledge guitars confirmed me that the pickup inside the EVH frankenstein is not the fender evh frankenstein pickup but the EVH custom shop from duncan. You cannot buy this pickup however it is very close to the 78 EVH model (the magnet differs).

I'm willing to bet that the only difference is either the A2 in the "magic" is probably roughcast and/or degaussed. I thought the pickup in the $25k Frankenstrat was a degaussed Custom Custom? Then SD released the IM1, which was a copy of that pickup.

 

[AJK1]

Re: 78 model and The Importance of pedals in van halen's sound

Van Halen and it's sounds has been done to death, it's all old news now

 

[GilmourD]

Re: 78 model and The Importance of pedals in van halen's sound

Van Halen and it's sounds has been done to death, it's all old news now

So is complaining about it.

Almost nobody brings up the two EQs in EVH's chain along with the Echoplex preamp. I think that a lot of the secret sauce is in the EP preamp.

 

[AZ Picker]

Re: 78 model and The Importance of pedals in van halen's sound

Once I saw folks getting pretty close with everything from a SuperD in a Les Paul or SuperStrat to a Custom or CustomCustom in a strat (or 59 or 78 model) I realized the pickup can vary quite a bit as long as the amp and it's EQ are in the ballpark. I wish I had Eds quick, light touch but alas I have to muscle out those riffs, which probably does more to make it NOT sound like EVH than my pickup selection.

 

[Joey Voltage]

Re: 78 model and The Importance of pedals in van halen's sound

40 years later, and the one person who is NOT trying to get that sound is EVH.

 

[Mincer]

Re: 78 model and The Importance of pedals in van halen's sound

What is EVH doing these days, anyway?

 

[Reaper of Doom]

Re: 78 model and The Importance of pedals in van halen's sound

What is EVH doing these days, anyway?

Selling a **** load of EVH gear to people who are obsessed with getting his tone[emoji23][emoji23][emoji23]

Sent from my F3111 using Tapatalk

 

[CaptainWhizz]

Re: 78 model and The Importance of pedals in van halen's sound

Selling a **** load of EVH gear to people who are obsessed with getting his tone[emoji23][emoji23][emoji23]

Sent from my F3111 using Tapatalk

I don’t know, it seems like people who are after Eddie’s tone are generally after earlier tones, which makes more money for pickup makers and Marshall cloners than it does for EVH/ Fender.

 

[beaubrummels]

Re: 78 model and The Importance of pedals in van halen's sound

I once made perfect Van Halen sounds. But the only thing I could play with it was Van Halen songs. Then I couldn't find anyone to play with me.

 

[CaptainWhizz]

Re: 78 model and The Importance of pedals in van halen's sound

I’m watching a video with the guys from Cradle of Filth talking about using 5150s, it makes me wonder how it would sound if Eddie jammed with them.

When I saw Zebrahead live last year, both of the guitarists were playing Striped Series guitars and 5150 heads, they sounded good, but I wouldn’t have said it sounded like a Van Halen tone.

I remember reading posts on here about someone who was trying to nail the VH1 sound, throwing loads of money at it, but when someone asked him what he was going to once he had it, I don’t think he had an answer.

 

[Sirion]

Re: 78 model and The Importance of pedals in van halen's sound

I will never own any of the EVH gear, because I think his legacy overshadows so many other great rock guitarists that I'd rather support, but it should be said that a lot of the reason why his stuff is selling isn't because it emulates his old tone, but because it gets things fundamentally right. All the people I know who own EVH amps – none of them are fanatical devotees of him – have been very happy with them, and the guitars not only seem to be of good quality, but have added logical modern conveniences such as the truss rod wheel.

At the same time, getting hold of the string set that Eddie used on the early records, the Fender 150XLs, which incidentally is my favourite set, has pretty much become impossible by now. Go figure.

 

[beaubrummels]

Re: 78 model and The Importance of pedals in van halen's sound

I think he challenge with chasing VH tone is similar to chasing the Beatles tone or The Who or any tone chasing artists. VH used different equipment all the time. He would wear gear out, fix it or replace and it sounded different but he still got his identity out of it. (Likewise, the Beatles used different guitars and amps on almost every album. The Who was the same way - Pete T used different guitars and amps all the time, and different again when playing live.). It's kind of like PAF tone - yeah? which of the hundreds of different ones are we talking about?