Bill Steer's Pickups??

Re: Bill Steer's Pickups??

Lucy: Carcass article in the new Guitar World in which Steer says that his LPC is a '77. I doubt that helps on your Quest for the Holy Grind Tone, but it's something.

The Peavey 6505 is the same amp as the 5150. I own one and at low/medium volume with low gain, it's pretty quiet. BTW, I modded mine by adding a bias trim pot therefore making the bias adjustable
and using a quad of JJ Electronic KT88/6L6 power tubes. Holy poop, it sounds great!

I've never owned a 5150/6505, but I can't believe there is even a debate about 5150's not being the same amp as 6505's. I've even seen people debate the guy from FJA mods who could probably mod a 5150 with all the lights in his workshop turned off, still insisting the 6505 isn't the same amp.

2x6L6's and 2xKT88's? Are you trying to kill people?
 
Re: Bill Steer's Pickups??

Thank you P4. We've talked about the 77. It is a beautiful guitar.

I haven't seen anyone debate the 5150 vs. the 6505 but I was on lunch so who knows.

Yes the 6505 is the 5150 minus Eddie Van Halens logo, name and blessing. It is the same amp. The 6505+ is the 5151 II.

Thank you for letting me know that Bill Steer is in the New Guitar World!!! :headbang:

I'm gonna go pick it up after work. :)
 
Re: Bill Steer's Pickups??

I recall a very old Guitar World article talking about Heartwork's tone.

Granted, most of this has been covered in the thread, but on Heartwork a combination of the 5150, a Marshall JCM 900 SLX, and a Marshall 6100 was used. They also threw a little Marshall practice amp into the mix for some "high end fry". A Marshall Gov'nor pedal was used as a front end boost.

The pictures from back then were mostly showing Ibanez RG guitars. I don't recall mention of pickups, but they looked to be either stock Ibanez or Dimarzio due to the pole pieces. The guitars were also tuned to BEADF#B.

This is speculation on my part, but would not doubt the use of Duncan JB or Custom pickups, or the Dimarzio Super 3. I think any of those could get close, but with the combination of amps and overdrive, it is really hard to pick out the specific frequency signatures by ear.

A friend of mine picked up Surgical Steel and it sounds great. I just wish it had been released much sooner. I was still listening to Carcass through Swansong and Wake Up and Smell the Carcass, so it is kinda hard to accept that they're back after already going through a .. mourning period(?) of one of my favorite bands ceasing.
 
Re: Bill Steer's Pickups??

What's up G!!! Good morning all.

Yeah man...don't worry about repeating stuff. I'm glad you joined us.

I'm spinning FIREBIRD right now and Bill Steer is taking my @$$ to school this morning! :headbang:


I love how on their facebook page before Surgical Steel was released Carcass was like [and I'm paraphrasing] "We didn't do this for the money or the reunion, we did it because no one is doing it right so we have to show them how it is done."

And then they full on DID IT. They took every band to the back of the wood shed and whooped them with one release.
 
Re: Bill Steer's Pickups??

Aaaah yes. The 7string thread was one of the better ones I checked out before I started this whole shabang.

I should have posted all the links on the first page. :sad:

duh.

Thanks for posting it bro.

~LD
 
Re: Bill Steer's Pickups??

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1IXdvX0deo

Was still under the assumption he was using Peavey 5150s but he's using a EVH 5150 III in this concert (great audio/visual btw). As somebody else said, probably changes depending on what country they're playing in/rental gear and whatnot.

Also, not sure you heard them, but the Heartwork and Necroticism Full Dynamic Range reissues (IE barely compressed/mastered) are for free streaming/paid purchase on Earache's Bandcamp page.
http://earache.bandcamp.com/album/necroticism-descanting-the-insalubrious-full-dynamic-range-edition
http://earache.bandcamp.com/album/heartwork-full-dynamic-range-edition
 
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Re: Bill Steer's Pickups??

Just FYI...

Bill Steer is on the NEWER Gentleman's Pistols album....not the first one.

It's still pretty good...it just doesn't have our boy on it.

I bought a whole bunch of his GP and FIREBIRD stuff a couple of weeks ago and I was a little bummed that he wasn't on the album but it's still okay. :sad:
 
Re: Bill Steer's Pickups??

Here is a cool link to some brothers talking about our boy Mr. Bill Steer.

http://forum.gibson.com/index.php?/topic/72814-identify-this-les-paul/

I wish we could all get together and have a Bill Steer assembly and get a giant bronze statue made of this guy.


Zakk Wylde the last guitar hero??? I THINK NOT.

Hey Lucy... I see you found the Gibson forum thread where we were discussing the '77 White Custom that Bill plays. I've since been in contact with Bill (I own his domain) and asked him some specific questions about that particular guitar. Here was his response (I'll post the entire message, rather than just the guitar info):

Hello Brian,

Nice to hear from you! It has been a while.

Thanks for your good wishes regarding the Carcass album. We finally get to finish the mix over the coming days. Long story but Colin was asked by another band to do an emergency salvage job on their recording, so our mix ended up being pushed back by a few weeks.

Needless to say, we're impatient to get this thing finished! Between you and I, one thing that didn't help was waking up one day to discover that Blabbermouth had decided to announce the completion of the album. We'd had no intention of making any kind of statement until the whole thing was mixed and mastered, with a label deal agreed upon. But it seems that someone at BM had a grievance with Jeff and opted to "leak" some information out of spite. Probably the strangest part was reading the name of some German guy they claimed was our new drummer. That's someone we'd never even heard of before, let alone met!

Rant over... Onto the Les Paul Custom! As you might have guessed, it's a 1977. Obviously these guitars were white originally, and gradually aged to this slightly yellow-y look. I call it the "nicotine" finish. The only thing that's been changed since I've owned it is the bridge pick-up. The original one was a lost cause - you know how it is with older pick-ups, some will last for decades, others give out and reach a stage where even a repair is a bit pointless. So a friend replaced it with a Seymour Duncan '59. I'm not really a pick-up aficionado, this was done out of necessity!

Regarding the States, well, at present Maryland is the only thing we have in the diary. But I wouldn't mind betting there will be a few more US dates lined up once we have a release date for this record...

Enough of all that. What have you been up to lately? Drop me a line some time with your news!

Cheers,

Bill
 
Re: Bill Steer's Pickups??

HOLY CR@P!!!!

How did I not see this post!?!?!?

@SWAMPROCK


Thank you sooooo much man!!!!

I can't believe you actually heard from him!!!

Too cool too cool.

Sorry I didn't see this sooner.

Much respect man thank you.

~LD
 
Re: Bill Steer's Pickups??

HOLY CR@P!!!!

How did I not see this post!?!?!?

@SWAMPROCK


Thank you sooooo much man!!!!

I can't believe you actually heard from him!!!

Too cool too cool.

Sorry I didn't see this sooner.

Much respect man thank you.

~LD

My pleasure. Bill really is a nice bloke.

Bill has since picked up a Wine Red '79 Custom with stock pickups. I think he bought it off Andy Sneap (or might be just using it; not sure. I know he had some onstage problems with the '77), and had used it for some of the recording of Surgical Steel, as well as his '77. He actually used his '57 Junior on the album as well! Everything was put through a Kemper profiler amp...
 
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Re: Bill Steer's Pickups??

Yeah man, I never realized until I saw Carcass live.

This kat's tone is C R A Z Y.

And to think that tone came from a Duncan 59. Goes to show, you don't need a super high output pickup to achieve such a savage tone.
 
Re: Bill Steer's Pickups??

Yeah man, I never realized until I saw Carcass live.

This kat's tone is C R A Z Y.

Yup. He's come a long way since his Napalm Death days in the 80's :). Here he is with a slightly rawer tone.


With the right boost, od, dist, fuzz there's really no need for high output pickups.
 
Re: Bill Steer's Pickups??

Yup. He's come a long way since his Napalm Death days in the 80's :). Here he is with a slightly rawer tone.


With the right boost, od, dist, fuzz there's really no need for high output pickups.


Yeah man. Still thick and saucy :fing2: I've seen all his youtube stuff.

Did you ever see that guy who picks apart a guitar players career and shows you songs note for note and how their style changes and/ or evolves over time? He does a Bill Steer episode and he's phenomenal. I can't link to youtube here at work but you should check it out.

By the way, your avatar is hysterical. :)
 
Re: Bill Steer's Pickups??

Yeah man. Still thick and saucy :fing2: I've seen all his youtube stuff.

Did you ever see that guy who picks apart a guitar players career and shows you songs note for note and how their style changes and/ or evolves over time? He does a Bill Steer episode and he's phenomenal. I can't link to youtube here at work but you should check it out.

By the way, your avatar is hysterical. :)

Thanks man. Didn't know about that youtube video. Thanks for the tip!
Always interesting to see bands and musician develop. I always thought Amorphis did a similar great job.
 
Re: Bill Steer's Pickups??

Just saw Carcass last night, Holy Moly that was one hell of a show, and I was eyeballing Bill's Wine Red Les Paul. MAN that thing is beautiful! And of course, the tone was top notch. I also noticed the pickups and the neck had a gold cover but the bridge was just a plain 'ol black pickup, assuming that it was a Duncan.
 
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