We might perhaps finally know Van Halen's humbuckers magnet type

[jeremy]

everyone needs to drop the bs, the conversation about evh is fine, but the back and forth is non-sense. if ya dont care about the snooty pursuit of a certain tone or deep dive into gear, thats fine. let those that are interested do their thing

 

[Securb]

EVH tone is preset #37 in a Digitech RP200A. It really is that easy these days.

There are a ton of EVH presets in the Eventide H9, Ain't Talking Bout Love, Panama, Drop Dead Legs, and others. While exploring the H90 recently, I found a preset called "Balance Era" that was spot on. Not something I think I would use, but fun to play with and get nostalgic about.

 

[El Dunco]

When you trace it back further it is very cool. Eric Clapton inspired by Freddie King buys a Les Paul with humbuckers instead of P90s and creates his own tone, including the Woman tone. Clapton then moves on to an ES335 to further develop his own tone. In Pasadena young EVH is inspired by Clapton and buys an ES335. When the ES335 is not just right for his direction EVH buys a guitar inspired by his other hero Jeff Beck and gets a Stratocaster. When he finds the Strat is not as full as the ES335 he takes the pickup from the Gibson and puts it in the Strat. If Eddie was content sounding like Eric Clapton or Jeff Beck, Frankenstein would never have been created.

I guess we have Freddie King to thank for all of this.

I love that it’s a skip and a hop from Freddie King to Fear Factory. Isn’t history cool?

 

[Chistopher]

Anyways, I very much enjoyed the blog because I like reading about deep dives and research in general, and greatly appreciate how the author still kept it real here (as seen in one of their blogs regarding the amp

Are you implying you think you could reverse engineer the mods that were done to Eddie's amps? I like to think I'm good at what I do, and you could hand me a pedal (which is peanuts to an amp) that I've modded, and I'd be hard pressed to reverse engineer, barring that I wouldn't be allowed to just look at component values.

I doubt Eddie mentioned tech specs in any of his interviews, and I doubt José Arredondo was interviewed regarding the subject. And it's not like you can reverse engineer an amp with black box methods, especially if the box in question isn't even in front of you.

How would you suggest he further his research?

 

[Archer250]

Are you implying you think you could reverse engineer the mods that were done to Eddie's amps? I like to think I'm good at what I do, and you could hand me a pedal (which is peanuts to an amp) that I've modded, and I'd be hard pressed to reverse engineer, barring that I wouldn't be allowed to just look at component values.

I doubt Eddie mentioned tech specs in any of his interviews, and I doubt José Arredondo was interviewed regarding the subject. And it's not like you can reverse engineer an amp with black box methods, especially if the box in question isn't even in front of you.

How would you suggest he further his research?

What? No.

I'm just saying that it's great of him to remind people there's a shitton of ways to get within the ballpark and that you're gonna get more out of practiing.

 

[Chistopher]

What? No.

I'm just saying that it's great of him to remind people there's a ****ton of ways to get within the ballpark and that you're gonna get more out of practiing.

Ah, I thought that was sarcasm. Carry on then

 

[Securb]

I love that it’s a skip and a hop from Freddie King to Fear Factory. Isn’t history cool?

Someone should map the licks. I am sure some pentatonic licks went from Freddie>Clapton>EVH>Fear Factory/Dimebag

 

[Masta' C]

I heard EVH swapped the 3-prong power cable on his variac to a 4-prong style and that the added capacitance, coupled with the increased efficiency to ground, resulted in a unique voltage curve through the transformer of his amp, which in turn gave his resulting "brown" sound the extra edge and clarity that came to define the VH sound on the first record.

That and cocaine.

 

[El Dunco]

Someone should map the licks. I am sure some pentatonic licks went from Freddie>Clapton>EVH>Fear Factory/Dimebag

Great idea. It would demonstrate that great new sounds don’t occur in a vacuum without recombining prior influences. Like a guitar-based “Everything is a remix” series.