How To: The Early VH Brown Sound

Re: How To: The Early VH Brown Sound

PFDarkside said:
Is the Red too hot for the EVH tone?
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The Bogner red channel or red pedal is more similar to Ed's modern tone on A Different Kind of Truth. The XTC can be best described as Green/Pete Townsend's Hiwatt, Blue/old and new Van Halen, Red/Jerry Cantrell.
 
Re: How To: The Early VH Brown Sound

Do any of you know whether it is possible to approach this sort of tone using a Boogie MKV with EL34s and the power switch set to the Variac mode which drops the power supply down to around 95 volts?
 
Re: How To: The Early VH Brown Sound

I'm not familiar with the Mark V preamp, but on my Road King I can configure it to a British preamp, EL-34, tube rectifier, spongy setting with tubes in Triode or Pentode and...it sounds pretty much nothing like Ed. ;) Great tube amp tone, but not his. Actually my Splawn (basically a hot rod marshall) gets much closer, but more like 1984/5150 era. The original VHI/VHII Brown Sound is the Grail. ;)
 
Re: How To: The Early VH Brown Sound

J E C said:
Do any of you know whether it is possible to approach this sort of tone using a Boogie MKV with EL34s and the power switch set to the Variac mode which drops the power supply down to around 95 volts?
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No.. not at all... Much more to the sound than just the power tube type and volts in the power tubes... the circuits arent even vaugely alike, This is like saying will my 68 Mustang perform the same as my 2013 Dodge Challenger if i give them the same michellen tires and E85 fuel?
 
Re: How To: The Early VH Brown Sound

That's what I thought being different circuits. Couldn't hurt to ask though.
 
Re: How To: The Early VH Brown Sound

J E C said:
That's what I thought being different circuits. Couldn't hurt to ask though.
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Yeah but... didn't you technically ask if you could approach the sound instead of asking if you could perfectly nail it?

I'd say the answer to if you could approach the sound would be yes. With the right guitar+pickup+pedals, you could get in the ballpark and that's all you were asking right?
 
Re: How To: The Early VH Brown Sound

Correct a mundo Zen. Just thinking of various different things I can do with the beast and how it mite sound. Still learning it.... I am actually going to read the ENTIRE manual and try to get a better grasp of how to adjust it and how the adjustments affect the other adjustments and sound.
 
Re: How To: The Early VH Brown Sound

zenmindbeginner said:
Yeah but... didn't you technically ask if you could approach the sound instead of asking if you could perfectly nail it?

I'd say the answer to if you could approach the sound would be yes. With the right guitar+pickup+pedals, you could get in the ballpark and that's all you were asking right?
Click to expand...
Yes...of course you can.
EVH is not the easiest player to emulate. Most if it will be playing the licks the way he played them. LOTS of time invested in that...but you are probably just wanting to get close to what he got.?
Probably:
1.The Variac
2.Pre Rola Greenbacks (something similar)
3. Super distortion pickup
4. Knobs turned pretty far to the right
5. and YOUR amp. .....It is not a 1200 series Marshall.....so just accept that.

He also used a 20 Ohm dummy and re-amped into a SS Power amp. But again, you do not want this to turn into your lifes work.
Watch Pete Thorns Video(s). If he can do anything (and he can do A LOT) it is really master that EVH thing.
good luck
 
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Re: How To: The Early VH Brown Sound

A much cheaper (but less accurate) approach to this would be to use the Wampler Pinnacle (I have the Deluxe) into a clean tube amp. It does a really good emulation and even gets the variac'd thing somewhat.
 
Re: How To: The Early VH Brown Sound

Or, just tap whatever preset VH is on an RP250, 350, whatever….


Interesting science experiment though.
 
Re: How To: The Early VH Brown Sound

There was a interview with Eddie in recent issue of Guitar World. It's the one with Beck and Gibbons on the cover. In it he describes his setttings for his phaser and flanger in the early days.
 
Re: How To: The Early VH Brown Sound

DankStar said:
Did anyone hear that dude's VH tone on here with just a bugera 1960 dimed? That was pretty sick.
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That would be me, thanks. :) It does rather well for a $399 amp!
My winter project this year will be building a nice plexi replica with specs as close as I can get to EVH's "magic" Marshall, that will be interesting....
 
Re: How To: The Early VH Brown Sound

Blix said:
That would be me, thanks. :) It does rather well for a $399 amp!
My winter project this year will be building a nice plexi replica with specs as close as I can get to EVH's "magic" Marshall, that will be interesting....
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And this man's thread over on TGP is what convinced me to get my Bugera. Our setups are a bit different (Blix has an EVH 2x12 cab to my Peavey 412MS cab and he's using a big resistor as a dummy load while I've got a Jet City Jettenuator) but the end game is similar. Bypass the effects loop and the PPIMV and you have a clone of the Marshall 1959 circuit. A couple values may be different than EVH's (I don't think there's the 2700ohm resistor on V1b's cathode but rather the usual 820ohm) but it's pretty damn close.
 
Re: How To: The Early VH Brown Sound

GilmourD said:
And this man's thread over on TGP is what convinced me to get my Bugera. Our setups are a bit different (Blix has an EVH 2x12 cab to my Peavey 412MS cab and he's using a big resistor as a dummy load while I've got a Jet City Jettenuator) but the end game is similar. Bypass the effects loop and the PPIMV and you have a clone of the Marshall 1959 circuit. A couple values may be different than EVH's (I don't think there's the 2700ohm resistor on V1b's cathode but rather the usual 820ohm) but it's pretty damn close.
Click to expand...
I will look for myself...but do you happen to know if there is a schem available for your Bugera...which one is it BTW.?
I realize Bugera Does/Did get a lot of bad press...but a lot of times, that kind of thing is just "The Internet".....people repeating stuff they have read, just to fit in and sound Cool/Knowledgeable.
But back on topic.....EVH is an old story. Like with all popular players, he could plug in to a Fender HRDlx backline, and you would never doubt who was playing. As always, it is 80% about the player.
Is it the 1960.....the Bugera.?
 
Re: How To: The Early VH Brown Sound

zzmoore said:
I will look for myself...but do you happen to know if there is a schem available for your Bugera...which one is it BTW.?
I realize Bugera Does/Did get a lot of bad press...but a lot of times, that kind of thing is just "The Internet".....people repeating stuff they have read, just to fit in and sound Cool/Knowledgeable.
But back on topic.....EVH is an old story. Like with all popular players, he could plug in to a Fender HRDlx backline, and you would never doubt who was playing. As always, it is 80% about the player.
Is it the 1960.....the Bugera.?
Click to expand...

I've looked but I couldn't find a schematic.

It's the 1960 Infinium. I seem to see more about the original 1960 as far as mods and values, but I imagine things haven't changed much past the addition of the cascaded channels on the bottom inputs and the PPIMV.

Sent from my VK810 4G using Tapatalk
 
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