The Steel Guitar Forum

When Ralph is playing the first little run he does in big city is he using any effects?
To me it sounds like he almost has a little bit of a overdrive with it and possibly some delay, if anyone has an idea please let me know. I’d like to try and replicate his tone for this song. I think it’s the perfect tone in my opinion.

Maybe I don`t understand the question, but on the original recording I think Norm Hamlet played the steel. Not sure on the effects. Hope this helped.

I thought it was Norm Hamlet too

Mitch

Might just be my mistake but I thought Ralph played this one. But I just really like the tone for the first lick after the fiddles. I’d love to be able to replicate it.

I do it using strings 3,5,6

Carl, I agree with you assessment - a little delay and overdrive. The overdrive could be simply the front end of a tube amp. That first stage, jack 1, is unattenuated with high gain, a combo that can lead to some distortion especially for pedal steel with it's heavily wound pickup (at least twice the wire of a standard electric guitar pickup).

I’m hearing :
low resistance pickup,
Forceful picking
Amp pushed into slight distortion
Studio chamber reverb

Pretty much all classic steel tone is not clean and sounds way better than the 80’s clean with tons of headroom sound that became common.

Jim Pitman wrote:Carl, I agree with you assessment - a little delay and overdrive. The overdrive could be simply the front end of a tube amp. That first stage, jack 1, is unattenuated with high gain, a combo that can lead to some distortion especially for pedal steel with it's heavily wound pickup (at least twice the wire of a standard electric guitar pickup).

Jim, I’m not sure about that. The sound of a heavy pickup overdriving the input creates very audible difference tones. Those low ghost tones move around when you play bends.

Bob Hoffnar wrote: Pretty much all classic steel tone is not clean and sounds way better than the 80’s clean with tons of headroom sound that became common.

Agreed.

Pretty much all classic steel tone is not clean and sounds way better than the 80’s clean with tons of headroom sound that became common.

Yes the difference between "Tube Amp" and "Solid State Amp"...and that solid state sound really came about that 80's era...> and yuk yuk yuk.(except for Lloyd Green studio sound and Tom Brumley and a small few others),,,
Yes that is Norm H on Steel and Dobro on that whole Album.
Ricky

Not sure of which era of Moon's playing you are talking about because it was a long career, probably 4 decades... Here is the secret to the sound of his early recordings... However, it won't fit into your pack seat or gig bag... bob