Steve Albini - HowTF?!

RevJToad

New member
Listening to a Big Black boot right now, which has me wondering - how the hell did Steve Albini make that godly racket of his?
 
Re: Steve Albini - HowTF?!

A lot of that tone is a Harmonic Percolator and a metal pick.
 
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Re: Steve Albini - HowTF?!

This is his Guitar Geek rig for Shellac, but I'm not sure it is 100% accurate. TGWIF can prolly tell you exactly what is inside the casing for his amp head. He's seen it.
 
Re: Steve Albini - HowTF?!

big_black said:
A lot of that tone is a Harmonic Percolator and a metal pick.
The Harmonic Percolator...

"every time you step on it, it's a new adventure in distortion"

John Kucera
Alligator Gun
 
Re: Steve Albini - HowTF?!

The Travis Bean didn't show up until the Shellac Days. I have always heard that Steve played a Veleno in Shallac but everytime I see a picture from that time period he's playing Strats and Tele's! The Harmonic Percolator has a lot to do with the massive fuzzy part, the metal pick helps but on top of all that Steve has always run tweeters in his guitar cabs to bring out the massive top end. The rig listed on guitar Geek is pretty close nto Steve's current rig with Shellac but during the Big Black days Steve used whatever he cold get and still got that tone. I have even seen a video from 1995 with Shellac and Steve is playing through a Marshall head and a Roland Jazz Chorus and still gets that same tone!
 
Re: Steve Albini - HowTF?!

Theres some sort of interview somewhere where he discusses this. Obviously I cant find it now it might eb of interest...
First off, speakers - he was saying how he uses extra tweeters and p.a cabs to bring out all those weird harmonics.
He used all sorts of guitars in big black, which were all custom made for him, or tweaked with. In the final tour diary he mentions they'll be pissed that he smashed up the guitar again.
Then theres the preamp, the pedal, the metal picks (which are cut as so the string is struck twice)... not forgetting the originality and talent etc..
 
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