What is 'that vintage sound'?

Mike Davidson · Post by **Mike Davidson** » 24 Nov 2010 9:13 am

I consistently see folks say 'if you want that vintage sound' when advertising their older pedal steels for sale. So what is 'that vintage sound' regarding pedal steel guitars? How is my sound going to differ if I bought an old Sho-bud Pro I vs. a modern S10 like a Stage One.

Kevin Hatton · Post by **Kevin Hatton** » 24 Nov 2010 10:32 am

It doesn't matter as a beginner. The Stage One is the better choice right now. Older guitars have their share of idiosyncricies. You can get a great sound out of a Stage One and it is a very reliable guitar. Excellent for a beginner or pro.

Jim Park · Post by **Jim Park** » 24 Nov 2010 10:42 am

I guess to sort of answer your question..........you will need to peruse the old recordings of various players and determine for yourself what the "vintage sound" really is........... for me, its early Buddy Emmons, pre push pull and early push pull era sound, for others it would be late 60's Lloyd Green........or perhaps mid 60's Brumley with Buck...........or Mooney with Waylon. All these recordings can be found on youtube. I guess it boils down to different guitars, different players, different styles of music even.........Have fun.........with some of the new preamps and amp modeling effects units you can find the different tones to experiment with. and I agree with Kevin 100%

Jim

Larry Bell · Post by **Larry Bell** » 24 Nov 2010 11:18 am

It really is more the style of the player, the amps that were/are available, and the fashion of the time than it is the guitar. Vintage is whatever you want to make it. As suggested, listen to the music from the 'vintage' era. Turn the treble up, the bass down, listen to a lot of Mooney, Day, Drake, and Green. That's the sound you are shooting for. Do it on a ShoBud? Why not? They did.

The Buddy Emmons Black Album sound is very different from the ShoBud sound. The Emmons vintage sound is clean and clear. What is it Buddy said 'blisters a beagle's ear at 100 yards'.

These days listen to Dicky Overbey -- he's about as close as you can get to that 60s Emmons classic sound.

Vintage is also a mindset. You have to think like they did then to sound like they did.

Will an old ShoBud single 10 sound different from a ZumSteel Stage I? You bet it will. It will feel different and play different too. Will you like that difference? I have no clue. Generally, if I want to impart a vintage feel, I'll pick closer to the bridge, play Mooney licks, turn down the bass on the amp. I only do that as an homage or a cool cliche from time to time. I wouldn't choose the vintage ShoBud sound (as I think about it) as my main sound for what I do today but it's cool to be able to pull that out of the bag of trix from time to time.

Realize this is just my li'l ole opinion and I am an Emmons guy, not a ShoBud guy. On top of that, trying to summarize what a particular musical instrument sounds like in words is a monumental challenge.

Just learn to play whichever guitar you choose. The other stuff won't be really important for some time, as Kevin pointed out. I would choose the StageI as well.

Chris Lucker · Post by **Chris Lucker** » 24 Nov 2010 1:42 pm

Larry Bell wrote:
The Buddy Emmons Black Album sound is very different from the ShoBud sound. The Emmons vintage sound is clean and clear. What is it Buddy said 'blisters a beagle's ear at 100 yards'.
.

Larry

I don't think Buddy Emmons was referring to the rosewood The Blade guitar when he referred to blistering a beagle's ear. I believe he was referring to his Wraparound Blade guitar -- #1264019 if I recall.

Anyway, to my ears the buddy Emmons "old sound" was before he started spelling his name with a "y" which means Sho-Bud Permanent and 1964 Emmons Wraparound. I cannot recall to mind his sound on a Bigsby or Fender.

Add to the Permanent or Wraparound a Standel Hybrid, Gibson outboard reverb and an Echoplex.

Larry Hamilton · Post by **Larry Hamilton** » 24 Nov 2010 3:08 pm

It's Jim Loessberg for me. Try his "Sawed Off Shotgun" CD, one of Dugg Collins and at least one of Curtis Potter's CDs.

Chris Lucker · Post by **Chris Lucker** » 24 Nov 2010 3:26 pm

Here are some Buddy Emmons quotes from Ask Buddy:

The original Night Life was recorded with a Sho~Bud and Standel combo which as you know, was bright compared to the Nelson/Price version. In the Price days, the six words steel players heard most from engineers was "can you give me more highs."

Without a doubt, the best combination for tone I like best was with a 64 push pull and Standel transistor amp with an open back and 15" Lansing speaker. I should think the pickups on the guitar were around 16k at the time

A few examples of the Sho~Bud sound would be any Ernest Tubb album or the song, "Half a Mind," or the Duane Eddy album, "Twang a Country Song," or my first two albums or with Ray Price, including the song "Night Life." The Sho~Buds I used for those recordings were the original permanent models with changer fingers that rested against tuners in the end of neck and no roller nuts to absorb the sound. Those features along with a 12k pickup and a 25" scale gave the Sho~Bud permanent model a clarity and warmth no present day guitars can duplicate.

Peter Freiberger · Post by **Peter Freiberger** » 24 Nov 2010 3:47 pm

My wife and I just drove to Las Vegas to hear Ray Price (he said "Happy Anniversary" to my wife and I thought she would swoon!), since he didn't play Bakersfield this year. Jim Loessberg was playing his wraparound through a Standel amp. What a sound! I'd bet that's what he used on the latest record, "Bebop, Etc.", a record well worth having for tone as well as content.

Mike Davidson · Post by **Mike Davidson** » 24 Nov 2010 5:51 pm

I have a 74' MSA D12 and I want a simple S10. As goofy as it may sound I love the narrow foot pedals of the Pro I and the Stage One. In my 6 string world, outside of collectors value, sometimes 'vintage' can also mean thin, nasal, buzz or unreliable which translates to pain in the keester. I have some state of the art amplification carrying over from my 6 string world so that's not a prob. I am just wondering if I would be better served with a tried & true Sho-bud or opting for the modern technology. Where I am located I really can't go PSG shopping. I most definitely don't want a beginner S10.

Ian Sutton · Post by **Ian Sutton** » 25 Nov 2010 8:18 pm

in my own limited experience, i've found that i've achieved the vintage tone easier and easier as my right-hand technique has improved. With the help of the Jeff Newman Right Hand Alpha course, as well as countless hours of listening to the greats of yore, my tone and execution seems to all be in the right hand. But again, my experience is limited.

I'm playing a 76 MSA Classic S-10 as well, fwiw.

Larry Bell · Post by **Larry Bell** » 25 Nov 2010 9:36 pm

Mike
Doesn't Frenchy Messier have a shop in Belen?

I've ordered strings and supplies from him but am not sure if he has a store.

At the top of this page click on LINKS then VENDORS and scroll down to Frenchy's.

He could be a great contact for you.

Bob Carlucci · Post by **Bob Carlucci** » 26 Nov 2010 4:36 pm

Listen to this solo... Thats the vintage sound..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5GPVS8v_zhg

Mike Davidson · Post by **Mike Davidson** » 26 Nov 2010 5:07 pm

Larry I've heard of Frenchy's however that's still an 8 hour round trip. I'm actually closer to Amarillo or Lubbock, TX, at 5 hours round trip, if I can find a dealer in that neck of the woods.

Bill Lowe · Post by **Bill Lowe** » 26 Nov 2010 5:58 pm

When I think of vintage guitar sound this is what comes to mind.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJf2GWDWeGg

and this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rr8cynrrJH0

Bob Carlucci · Post by **Bob Carlucci** » 26 Nov 2010 7:26 pm

Bill great tones for sure... Not what I would call vintage personally,, but certainly "classic"...

The old Fender cable steels were a vintage sound.. but hey everyone hears things differently... To me THIS is "vintage"..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=liX6eVZs ... re=related

admin · Post by **b0b** » 26 Nov 2010 10:03 pm

You can't hear vintage sounds from stereo computer speakers! Once something's been digitized and MP3'd all bets are off. I gotta laugh when someone says "listen to that vintage tone" on a YouTube video. Sorry, but it just ain't there no more. It's been algorithmically compromised out of existence.

You want vintage sound? Get rid of your effects pedals. Just use a pot volume pedal and a tube amp. Steel guitar pickups haven't changed much over the years, but everything downstream from it is way different. Hilton pedal? Digital delay? Stereo chorus? Solid state amps? Each of those things takes you one step further from "that vintage sound". But compressing it into a lossy little computer file format is the nail in the coffin. You'll never get that vintage sound back again.

Just my opinion...

Peter den Hartogh · Post by **Peter den Hartogh** » 26 Nov 2010 10:54 pm

Interesting, b0b.

I am from Europe and in the early days all we could listen to is vinyl and AM radio.

I tried to attend the Buck Owens concerts in Amsterdam, but the first time he had no steel player (Tom just left) and the second time we saw Buck Owens with Jaydee Maness live on Dutch TV, but when I went to the live concert 4 days later, Jaydee was not there anymore.

So, I personally never heard any live steel guitar until I started playing myself.
I grew up listening to heavily processed sounds. Does that mean my concept of vintage sound is flawed?

Brint Hannay · Post by **Brint Hannay** » 26 Nov 2010 11:20 pm

Interesting point about the computer speakers, b0b. On the other hand, the vintage sounds were intentionally tailored for how they would sound on car radio and home radio (as opposed to "hi-fi" or "stereo") speakers, weren't they?

Jim Park · Post by **Jim Park** » 26 Nov 2010 11:41 pm

Well............I can hear the difference in Buddy's tone compared to the others, and I think the modern computer speakers are considerably better quality than my Sony 9 transistor radio, or my Mom's 66 VW speakers which was where I first heard the sounds of a Pedal Steel. I'm sure that an hour or two perusing youtube will expose the listener to the entire spectrum of pedal steel Tones, Styles and Guitars

Bob Hoffnar · Post by **Bob Hoffnar** » 27 Nov 2010 1:37 am

Mike:

I am just wondering if I would be better served with a tried & true Sho-bud or opting for the modern technology.

In my experience there is no such thing as a tried and true Sho-Bud tone. There are different models and many of them were made very poorly out of cheap, unreliable parts. Many of them don't work well and don't sound good. A few years back while I was on tour I had a guy tell me my Franklin didn't have "that vintage" Sho-Bud sound only to find he had a contact paper maverick with 7 year old rusty strings as his tone reference. In my perception the phrase "vintage tone" when used on the forum tends to be so varied that it means almost nothing.

Just get a guitar that works and start practicing.

Bill Lowe · Post by **Bill Lowe** » 27 Nov 2010 6:36 am

I think everybody has their own idea 0f what a vintage guitar sound is. Everybody who posted is right. There is no right or wrong. To me it is the early emmons p/p that does it.

Mike Davidson · Post by **Mike Davidson** » 27 Nov 2010 6:47 am

The things everyone is saying 'all' make perfect sense even though some disagree with each other. That is the nature of discussing vintage or even tube vs digital. Since I have a MSA D12 I'm thinking this guitar has no choice but having a vintage sound being it's 36 years old.

Guess what I'm trying to extract is I'm going to get a S10 of some type at around 1500 (+or-). The D12 is going to wind up being my studio guitar and what I work 'up' to. I want 10 strings and a single neck to learn on and to grab and go to jam with friends instead of using a forklift.

The sound I like the most is the gigantic, cathedral type church organ whine and with that haunting moan and swell that I hear some players achieve. I know it has a great deal to do with style, amps, the players brain but when it comes to the guitar I am wondering if I would be better to get a Sho-bud Pro I or a brand new Stage One. Old character vs. new technology. I love the way the Sho-buds look and I like the way my friends played, even with dust and dirt all over it. But most likely I only have one shot. See looking back I feel I made a mistake getting a D12 to learn on. I will turn it into not a mistake and I got an awesome deal so it was not a mistake in that regard but it is overwhelming for a beginner. At the same time I don't want a 'beginner model'.

One shot what would you buy?

Bobby Snell · Post by **Bobby Snell** » 27 Nov 2010 7:00 am

To learn on? Modern, accurate mechanism. Technique and neck knowledge will be easier to acquire, and good tone will come with time. Then if you have to have a vintage guitar, you'll be able to handle any little "quirks" that come with it.

Tommy Gibbons · Post by **Tommy Gibbons** » 27 Nov 2010 7:44 am

There is a difference in tone, style, and technique. Putting them together is what counts!!!
MHO

TommyG in Tennessee

John Billings · Post by **John Billings** » 27 Nov 2010 11:48 am

"One shot what would you buy?"

'73 Shobud. Barrels behind two hole pullers. Not quirky, reliable, and easy to work on.
A tube amp. I like my Twin with a 15" JBL. The old "vintage" sounds are not as clean as today's preferences for a 200 watt solid state amp and complete clarity. If you listen to Lloyd's "Darlin'" stuff, you can hear the tube "hair" that made it such a pleasant sound.

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