Ultimate Rhoads

Hello, So I have the Marshall 1959RR amp head and the MXR Distortion plus footpedal. That is what Randy had used, but it sounds nothing like him. What kind of pedal can give this amp a more distortion sound?

try an equalizer and a chorus pedal also a wah pedal.theres a thread on here somewhere that should help you out..

Have you tried turning it up? Use the regular unmodded "Bright" channel. That's the one Randy used, not the cascaded channels.

Blizzard0fOzz wrote:Hello, So I have the Marshall 1959RR amp head and the MXR Distortion plus footpedal. That is what Randy had used, but it sounds nothing like him. What kind of pedal can give this amp a more distortion sound?

Volume is a key contributor to his sound, you have to remember the head is a hundred watt head with no master volume control so unless you are driving it hard the valves are doing nothing, randy would have used the distortion + to add a little colour to his sound, the distortion you hear on the recordings come from hard driven valves. The only way to drive the valves at sensible level is to buy an amp attenuator like the thd hotplate, this will reduce the volume but still drive the valves.
Also remember that its all in the hands that give the sound as well, you could put randy through a shitty amp and he would still sound like awesome and sound like randy.]

Try exchanging fingers with him. imo tone is in the fingers.

Blizzard0fOzz wrote:Hello, So I have the Marshall 1959RR amp head and the MXR Distortion plus footpedal. That is what Randy had used, but it sounds nothing like him. What kind of pedal can give this amp a more distortion sound?

You have to crank that sucka up!

So....
Tone Tips And Tricks For The Marshall Super Lead

And some more vital information:
The Boosting Mystery: Understanding and Taking advantage of Boosts

Thank you for pointing out that site Dutchman

I would say that the 10-band eq is the most important piece of "hardware" in the equation. No amp or pedal is set to the exact frequency that randy had. I remember tryin out randy's sound years ago, i got very close to it using an MXR EQ, and.. a shit trany amp. You can't simply remove a pedal that had such a significant impact and expect to get in the same ballpark IMO

I'll even go so far as to say that the dist+ and exact model of amp is superfluous.

Rob

I think another thing that plays a big role in this sound are those altec 417-8H speakers. These speakers had a lot weight: 6,22 kg. (average celestion speakers are about 3,5 kg)

I never heard altecs but I can say when comparing some EVM12L (8,6 kg each!) speakers with typical 3,5 kg celestion speakers the difference isn't subtle. Instantly waaaay more meat and balls with the EV speakers! You can hear those 8,6 kg's going back and forth resulting in a big heavy sound. It will be very hard to dial that 'difference' with your amp when not using those heavy weight speakers.......

I definitely agree with adding an EQ, I have an old MXR like Randy's and I love it after any Fuzz/Distortion pedal,yes a cranked Marshall sounds best and also with a THD Hotplate if you can't have it loud.The thing about valve amps like Marshall's is that they compress the signal.I've seen many who will turn their distortion pedal's volume and fuzz controls all the way up thinking hey if I drive the amp's input them I'll get more of that heavy metal sound etc,which is in many ways doing it backwards,I think it's better to let the amp do the driving from the output tubes and have the distortion pedals volume and fuzz controls at a lower level. It seems Randy liked using his Distortion + more as a booster than for more distortion. Notice how many player's like Jimi Hendrix,Jimmy Page and Eddie Van Halen and Randy too while having their own tones,the simularity is that they all had a very clean sound and not really over the top distortion but rather sustain. and some of the most famous tones were actually very trebly in tone,think of Zep's first too albums,Brian May and yes Randy,and while some may squack oh Randy's tone sounds too thin,actually it cuts thru! Now try this,turn you distortion pedal's volume and fuzz controls almost to max and turn the amp's volume down and play. Now turn down the distortions volume and fuzz control and turn up the amps volume and you may be surprised,try recording both ways too. Another thing is to try different distortion pedals thru an amp on clean (or clean channel)and if it sounds killer thru a clean amp then it should sound awesome compressed thru a plexi Marshall,also the speakers can make a huge different in the overall tone.And for those who don't have a Marshall yet but a different cleaner sounding amp,try runnning you distortion pedal(volume and fuzz controls lower) into a preamp or booster or overdrive for just a touch more of bite or sustain if you will.Yes everyone will each have their own ideal of which guitar-effects-amp -speaker combinations works best for them.Regards Kevin

The Flying Dutchman wrote:I think another thing that plays a big role in this sound are those altec 417-8H speakers. These speakers had a lot weight: 6,22 kg. (average celestion speakers are about 3,5 kg)

I never heard altecs but I can say when comparing some EVM12L (8,6 kg each!) speakers with typical 3,5 kg celestion speakers the difference isn't subtle. Instantly waaaay more meat and balls with the EV speakers! You can hear those 8,6 kg's going back and forth resulting in a big heavy sound. It will be very hard to dial that 'difference' with your amp when not using those heavy weight speakers.......

I think the speakers are probably the most important piece of hardware. I had a pair of the 417s that I traded into YEARS ago.. I planned to hang on the to them until I could locate 2 more. I finally got tired of waiting and put them in a combo amp.. MY GOD THEY WERE BRIGHT!!! And LOUD! Great speakers, but werent as versitile as others. But for getting a Randy tone they would be a must in my opinion, especially after owning them and hearing them..


Matt