trey anastasio tone

stingraysteve7

New member
Does anybody have any ideas on what kind of pickups i should put on my strat to try and emulate the warn sustain of trey anastsio's guitar. im thinking about putting humbuckers on, and ive heard that he uses Schaller golden 50s. does anyone have any sugesstions?
 
Re: trey anastasio tone

i think his guitar(s) is a custom made hollowbody.so nailing his tone with a strat even with humbuckers is hard if not impossible. you can get close but not the same. also note that tone is not only on the guitar but also on the amp ,maybe more on the amp.
 
Re: trey anastasio tone

Treys rig is very complicated.....plus he is using a hollowbody....... but i would imagine getting a set of Schaller Golden 50s (yes he does use these) in your strat would get you much closer
 
Re: trey anastasio tone

Trey uses custom guitars that are hollow...NOT semi hollow, but fully hollow, but still about the same as a 335, If your gonna use a strat use some good PAF voiced buckers, His amps are BF Deluxes...a good Fender amp will do...Champ, Princeton, Deluxe, Pro, Twin, Super...these amps all have lots of the same sound, he also uses a tubescreamer quite a bit as well...that is just a start...his rig is quite complex...if budget permitted you could check into a new guitar, and it would help...as long as it was a hollowbody...maybe a 135 or something similar...as foe the pups...I too have heard about the Schaller pups, and have also heard he used Duncans too (a Jazz in the neck and a 59 in the bridge with Schaller covers), there was a real good interview with Trey, aobut a year ago in GW where they spent 4 or 5 pages talking about his gear...good luck
 
Re: trey anastasio tone

Trey's tone has as much to do with his approach as with his actual equipment.

Trey goes for a warm "vocal" tone.

He starts with a very warm, humbucking guitar (full hollow body). Nothing shrill or shriek-y about it. Look how far towards the neck his bridge pickup is.

He uses two Analog Man modified TS-9 Tube Screamers into an Analog Man BiCompRosser (which replaced his old Ross Compressor). He runs the distortions INTO the compressor allowing him to clean up the sound with his volume knob while the compressor keeps the output level constant. I've been using that trick for years. It works great.

He then goes into a couple of Fender Deluxe Reverbs which are 22 watt, all tube amps. the lower wattqage allows him to crank em up a bit and still not be "too" loud.

And there you have it. There are other effects in there, but that is the basic tone, equipment wise.

His tone also comes from amazing technique, a great understanding (and taste) of note choice, excellent vibrato, and good ears: he listens and places the guitar where it belongs in the mix of the band, both tone-wise and playing wise. And he has dynamics. He plays quietly as well as totally balls out rocking.

Good to see his name on this board. He is conspicuously overlooked by much of the guitar playing community.

Peace! :D
 
Re: trey anastasio tone

stingraysteve7 said:
Does anybody have any ideas on what kind of pickups i should put on my strat to try and emulate the warn sustain of trey anastsio's guitar. im thinking about putting humbuckers on, and ive heard that he uses Schaller golden 50s. does anyone have any sugesstions?
..I've read that a lot of his sound/tone come from his compressor or a delay unit. ..You might want to look into it.
 
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Re: trey anastasio tone

it a lot of things that give him that sound like mac said. any set of warm vintagey pups will do fine with the right setup and fingers :)
 
Re: trey anastasio tone

as the resident trey expert...lol

he uses a set of duncan 59s. they are wired so he can split the coils for single coil tones and also run the neck and bridge in parallel via two mini toggle switches. he used to use schaller golden 50s.

he has a huge board and bunch of rack mount gear so forget trying to nail his tone completely. the key aspects of though consist of two tube screamers (analogman 808 silver modded) and an analogman bicomp which he only uses on the ross side. he used to run the comp on pretty much all the time but on the recent tour he hasnt been. he runs both the screamers before the compressor. one is set for a very, very mild crunch and the other for more of a lead tone. the endless sustain on divided sky comes from running both the screamers on at the same time into the compressor.

his guitar is a custom thinline hollowbody with no block behind the bridge. Its built like an acoustic with side bracing. http://www.languedocguitars.com The hollowbody is a very big part of his tone. the full thinline hollow with no bridge block and the compressor is how he gets so much feedback, even when playing pretty clean...the tricky part is controlling it, lol.

I had a clone built because i couldnt afford the 10k for the languedoc. Mine was built by david at equator instruments. Talk to him if you have some cash and want one built, its a very very good price. Less than a new gibson LP standard. Its also a phenomenally good guitar.

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Re: trey anastasio tone

I had a clone built because i couldnt afford the 10k for the languedoc. Mine was built by david at equator instruments. Talk to him if you have some cash and want one built, its a very very good price. Less than a new gibson LP standard.

Grant, remind me what you loaded your Equatorial with.

- Keith
 
Re: trey anastasio tone

One very important part of Trey´s tone has to do with his pick. He uses a 2mm graphite pick, hitting the strings with the rounded part...not the pointed part. He also utilizes a very percussive picking style. By the sounds of his guitar, too...it would seem that he is not one to have the action set particularly low, er say...as low as you can go.

I posted a clip of a nice carved cedar top....

http://equatorinstruments.com/clips.html
 
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