What did Edward Van Halen really say about his early tone? Did he really mean it? What can we read into it? Following is the remainder of the tone-related excerpts from the November 1978 Guitar Player interview (part 1 is here). Commentary by yours truly.

(In case you missed it, here’s the first part of this review.)
Next I set the Output at 1 o’clock and maxed the Sensitivity, while zeroing out the Attack and setting the Trim at 2 o’clock – “Chime Bloom,” per the instructions. The noise increased, but not to a level you’d likely notice on a stage. [...]

I’ve always had a soft spot for MXR pedals. A Distortion+ mated to a Boss GE-7 were the key ingredients in making my silverface Twin sound like a Marshall, back in 1986! But over the years I’ve become, well, a snob. A “boo-teek” snob. I thought, Surely some huge company with a team of talented [...]

Here’s part 2 of highlights from the legendary April 1980 Guitar Player cover interview of Edward Van Halen.
Do you do anything special to your pickups?
I usually use old Gibson PAFs, and I always pot them. I submerge the whole thing in paraffin wax, and this cuts out the high obnoxious feedback. [...]

Compressors 101
by John Drenning
A particular tone obsession of mine started with David Gilmour. In fact, I’m pretty certain that at least 80% of tonal tail-chasing among Men Of A Certain Age involves British rock bands of ‘65-’75, a period more or less bracketing the Blues Breakers’ Beano album on one end, and “Dark Side [...]

Here’s a tip for web-minded musicians: Do a blog about your recording process. A good one. Detailed, daily, with lots of photos.
That’s what Bruce Kulick did for the recording of his BK3 CD, and if you’re at all a gear head – and what musician isn’t – after reading Bruce’s blog you’ll want to heard [...]

…in PremierGuitar.com Articles
Lots has been written about KISS’s Sonic Boom album, but all of the interviews thus far have left info gaps. PremierGuitar.com recently posted a couple of new interviews – a little late to the party, but the info is good. A few gear details are still missing, but not many!
One PG interview is [...]

I’ve been a Randy Rhoads fan ever since I heard the Blizzard of Ozz album. Many people can say the same thing.
I’ve read all the guitar magazine interviews (Guitar Player only?) with Randy, and while I can’t quote from them verbatim, I know the gist of his gear details. It also seems to me that [...]

It’s tough to pin down the Aerosmith guys as far as what guitars were used when because they definitely didn’t stick with any one instrument too long, even during any given concert. But amp-wise, after Toys they switched over to the new-at-the-time Music Man amps which had 6L6 power tubes (like Fenders) but solid-state preamps.

There’s been a lot of stuff written about, said about and speculated about regarding Edward Van Halen’s mind-blowing, world-altering Van Halen I setup. Was he running “slaved” amps (one amp into another), was he using some sort of boost and/or distortion pedal, etc.
If you read hard and don’t fall prey to speculation (which is tough!), [...]

One Man’s Recollections, Anyway…
And: Why Ed Used a Variac and Greenbacks?
[A quick request: Please do not copy and paste this entire post somewhere else. Thanks!]
Not too long ago I had the pleasure of connecting with a guy who grew up with Eddie Van Halen. Ed went to the same high school, they both played guitar [...]

No One Touches Sykes’ Les Paul!

I happened upon a cool, recent interview on PremierGuitar.com of Scott Gorham. Good stuff there, but not a lot on his Thin Lizzy-era gear, maybe because it was Les Pauls and Marshalls and that’s it. But I had to find out, which led me to a Performing Musician interview with [...]

Diehard Eric Johnson fans may have seen this one, but then again maybe not. My buddy Sean (thanks man!) unearthed this gem deep on the Music123.com site – a vid of Eric going through his pedalboard, guitars and amps in the studio, and playing some stupidly amazing stuff.