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Randy's solo spot light Axe

Posted: Fri Apr 18, 2014 9:54 pm
by devorerd
So I'm brand new to the site..so quickly I offer this: I come from the guitar side, took lessons from many years from Paul Chapman (who was on the DOAM tour) and personally knew Randy. I've read hours and hours of posts on this site..Impressive..I thought I was about a 9 out of 10 expert on Randy....I'll give myself a 6 compared to most here! Anyway on to the topic

So on tour with Ozzy, Randy of course used the Sandoval Harpoon V for his solo spot light..What I have always wondered is why? His favorite axe was the Les Paul....It's been well documented that the Sandoval V had trouble staying in tune....so why use it for your solo? We all know Randy could pull of tremolo sounds by bending the Les Paul..so that is out...

Let the madness begin..

Thanks for letting me in the circle..

RD

Re: Randy's solo spot light Axe

Posted: Fri Apr 18, 2014 10:03 pm
by Tito
You can only do a certain amount of bending the neck on the lp.on his solo he would use the pdv tremolo to the point where it was impossible to do on the lp.how can you bend a harmonic in rapid succession on an lp?the white charvel was tuned to eb..just my opinion on that.

Re: Randy's solo spot light Axe

Posted: Fri Apr 18, 2014 10:21 pm
by devorerd
yeah thought of that..but as we know..he did "No bone movies" live without the slide action...SoI I agree he really stuck to the signature solos on songs that warranted that....i.e. Flying, Crowley, Crazy, IDK, Revelation, Over the mountain....etc..a lot of the others including SS, Steal Away had a lot more improvisation..But it's your solo..Wouldn't you want to use your favorite axe?

Re: Randy's solo spot light Axe

Posted: Sat Apr 19, 2014 3:19 pm
by Shockwave
Randy used it for the spotlight because he used it for suicide solution. He obviously ain't goi g to switch guitars really quick just to do the solo. Plus he played his solos all his previous years on the LP so maybe it was just a fresh change for him. I think he as getting very board with the solo later on With the diary tour as he was he was using it all over the place.

Plus the PDV just looks much cooler for a spotlight solo and that guitar was Randy's trademark before the Jackson's went into production.

Re: Randy's solo spot light Axe

Posted: Sat Apr 19, 2014 4:18 pm
by devorerd
Interesting point of view, the PDV did look totally cool... but for the Diary tour he incorporated portions of the familiar solo spot into the "Band Jam", which was really unique, very scale driven which required he and Airey to be in lockstep and I think that he and Airey would have been musical partners down the line.., they were pretty tight during the band jam as the tour progressed and shared a passion for classically driven melodies.

Re: Randy's solo spot light Axe

Posted: Fri Jun 06, 2014 5:45 pm
by devorerd
Having listened to the Albuquerque, New Mexico show, there is no doubt that Randy switched to the Les Paul during the drum solo..different tonality and they go into Good Bye to Romance very quickly after Airey's keyboard part which concludes the band jam.

Re: Randy's solo spot light Axe

Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2014 4:45 am
by TAB
poofters

Re: Randy's solo spot light Axe

Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2014 12:04 pm
by devorerd
Yep, those pull offs can be seen on the Quiet Riot shows as well..I've read that Randy said it hard to do a "solo" per se when your told you only have five minutes

Re: Randy's solo spot light Axe

Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2014 1:45 pm
by Stiltzkin
devorerd wrote:So on tour with Ozzy, Randy of course used the Sandoval Harpoon V for his solo spot light..What I have always wondered is why? His favorite axe was the Les Paul....It's been well documented that the Sandoval V had trouble staying in tune....so why use it for your solo? We all know Randy could pull of tremolo sounds by bending the Les Paul..so that is out...
Who knows really? :oops:
Apparently he recorded Crazy Train with the PDV but used the LP live for the very same song...

Re: Randy's solo spot light Axe

Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2014 2:15 pm
by devorerd
Never heard that he used the PDV for Crazy train in the studio, hmmm?

Re: Randy's solo spot light Axe

Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2014 4:39 pm
by Shockwave
Actually another reason was probably the longer scale length ...easier to play faster stuff on compared to a les paul. There is no doubt Randy really loved the Les Paul he got, part of it was probably sentimental value also. But every other guitar he had and had part of the design process all had longer scale lengths.

Re: Randy's solo spot light Axe

Posted: Sun Jun 08, 2014 3:46 am
by Paul Wolfe
Shockwave wrote:Actually another reason was probably the longer scale length ...easier to play faster stuff on compared to a les paul. There is no doubt Randy really loved the Les Paul he got, part of it was probably sentimental value also. But every other guitar he had and had part of the design process all had longer scale lengths.

It's actually easier to do everything on a Les Paul's shorter scale length...

Re: Randy's solo spot light Axe

Posted: Sun Jun 08, 2014 9:09 am
by Stiltzkin
Paul Wolfe wrote:
Shockwave wrote:Actually another reason was probably the longer scale length ...easier to play faster stuff on compared to a les paul. There is no doubt Randy really loved the Les Paul he got, part of it was probably sentimental value also. But every other guitar he had and had part of the design process all had longer scale lengths.

It's actually easier to do everything on a Les Paul's shorter scale length...
Depends on who you ask :)
It's a matter of personal preference really :)

Re: Randy's solo spot light Axe

Posted: Sun Jun 08, 2014 7:12 pm
by Paul Wolfe
Stiltzkin wrote:Depends on who you ask :)
It's a matter of personal preference really :)
I don't know... shorter scale length means shorter stretches which means easier to play. I think the preference comes in based on what you learned on in the beginning. I prefer the Fender scale length because I started out on Fenders. When I play stuff on a Les Paul I struggle because I'm used to having to stretch a little further.

So, yeah, I guess your right, personal preference.

Re: Randy's solo spot light Axe

Posted: Sun Jun 08, 2014 8:31 pm
by The Flying Dutchman
devorerd wrote:Never heard that he used the PDV for Crazy train in the studio, hmmm?
It sounds at least for the rythym tracks he did:
How many tracks would you use for the rhythm guitar?

Max Norman: It depends. Some of those tracks have a lot of parts there. Let’s see: “You Can’t Kill Rock and Roll,” for instance. On that sort of slow-tempo thing, there’d be quite a few rhythm tracks there, apart from playing parts. There’d be a couple of power chord tracks, maybe one steel-string acoustic, and probably two or three other guitars playing parts. Very few D.I. [direct input] guitars on the tracks – mostly through the amp, turned down to get a clean sound. It was all done through a Marshall. He had a polka-dot Charvel that we used – pretty much all the guitar tracks were done with that guitar. Plus he had a creamy white Les Paul. We used that too. That was pretty good, pretty chunky.
Here it sounds he used the Charvel for the CT solo, but I don't think the Charvel (white) was already build when they recorded Blizzard? I guess Max probably confused the Charvel with the PDV? I remember reading somewhere that the PDV had pretty much high-end:
How was the “Crazy Train” solo recorded to get such a clear, piercing sound?

Max Norman: This is one of them that was triple tracked. If you listen to that track real close, you’ll hear there’s one main guitar around the center, as I remember, and there are two other guitars playing exactly the same thing, panned to the left and right, but back somewhat. And actually what happens is you don’t hear them – you just hear it as one guitar. He was the best guy at overdubbing solos and tracking them that I’ve ever seen. I mean, he used to blow me away. So on a lot of those things, when you hear a guitar that really comes out, that’s because there are three of them there. And it’s not like an ADT – he’s actually playing them three times, which means you get a very stable image. It really does sit there, rather than shift left or right, depending on where the delay is. That’s really the reason for that. Plus it’s a Charvel – they have an extraordinary top end.
See: http://jasobrecht.com/randy-rhoads-max- ... interview/