Old School playing

[JOEY B.]

I have been watching videos of some of the '60s and '70s guitar heros, as well as the SRV video "Live from Austin Texas". Anyone who ******* about the MkIII and its shared gain and tone controls should watch the masters in action. They use the volume and tone controls on the guitar to get their optimum sound, rather than stomp a button. And they are fast at doing it. 8)

 

[GD_NC]

Yep. We're spoiled! Technique is worth 100 x any amp.

 

[bryan_kilco]

I was watching G3 - Live In Denver the other day, and noticed that these guys dont seem to be using any sort of noise gates, but are using their guitars volume controls to silence the guitar. just seems like too much to worry about, in my opinion. GREAT tones though!!

 

[Facelift]

well, while they may be real good at it, wouldnt it be so much easier to just step on a button and go from heavy distortion to shimmering clean without having to tap dance, roll knobs backs, switch pups, ect. to make it work? Seriously, those who "bitch" have valid points that Mesa should have made the Mark III do what its supposed to. Bad part is, they mention in the manual that it does this so they knew they screwed up. IMO, regardless of the eq sharing channels, they should have been designed to switch over and be good to go. The thing that REALLY sucks about it is there is no known mod to fix it. That is great playing though. Ill never be that good.

 

[JOEY B.]

All the years that I played my Mark I Boogie, the only noise gate that I used was a fast hand on the pickup selector switch of my Les Paul (with the neck pickup volume rolled off) :lol: . The technology will make this kind of volume and tone manipulation a lost art in a few years. I learned to do it out of necessity, and it is just second nature to me. I do it without even thinking about it. Check out this video, and watch him sneak a feel on the knobs and switches. :twisted:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4O_YMLDvvnw

 

[dodger916]

Before footswitchable two channel amps, it was always crank the amp for the lead tone and back off the guitar for rhythm. Of course, when we would do a maximum volume level check, I'd always back off guitar a bit before striking the E chord. Gotta keep something in reserve! As Joey says, the right hand was integral to keep the volume in check as well.

 

[Don]

That's how my 5E3 clone works. It has one sound- dirty. It cleans up completely by turning the guitar's volume down

BTW, it's a 2 channel amp- "Microphone" and "Instrument". They each have a volume control but share a common tone control and there's no switching.

Watch footage of Hendrix and Page. They would often leave their fuzz pedal on for a whole song and turn back the guitar's volume to clean it up.

 

[lesterpaul]

amen//W HAynes is also a master of this manipulation...it is another realm of "mastery of the instrument"...pardon the pun, but the hands on approach rules-there is NOTHING like seeing/hearing someone who truly has spent thousands of hours mastering their art-knowledge/mastery of the implements of expression ..hellyeah...(If I say master one more time in this post,i guess that makes me a masturbater)
seriously, it makes tonal flexibility easier to me-more mileage out of the amp
MASTER!

 

[MrMarkIII]

Sadly, the guitar "volume" and "tone" controls seem to going the way of the vermiform appendix and wisdom teeth.
It's so much easier to spend a hundred bucks on a pedal than, say, use that "knob" that's, oh, an inch away from my finger-tip.
Hey! You hooligans get off my lawn!

 

[hgus]

I've been playing like this, "old school" for the last 8 years, single channel amp, treble booster (that usually stays on), set the amp a little bit too hot, and lately a little bit too bright too (to be tamed with the tone knob - a great gain control!). It's great. And I think understated amps look cool too. "How the * does he get all of those sounds out of that minimalist amp?"

Actually, it works perfectly with my new mk iv as well, even on the lead channel. If YOU haven't tried it, DO!

 

[CoG]

well, while they may be real good at it, wouldnt it be so much easier to just step on a button and go from heavy distortion to shimmering clean without having to tap dance, roll knobs backs, switch pups, ect. to make it work? Seriously, those who "bitch" have valid points that Mesa should have made the Mark III do what its supposed to. Bad part is, they mention in the manual that it does this so they knew they screwed up. IMO, regardless of the eq sharing channels, they should have been designed to switch over and be good to go. The thing that REALLY sucks about it is there is no known mod to fix it. That is great playing though. Ill never be that good.

Dude, it's not like you bought it new. :lol: The Mark III was very advanced for its time-- remember this amp is from 1985! Channel switching on amps was a "wow" feature and three channels was completely new.

What most guys want for "heavy distortion" now was REALLY over-the-top then, right at the edge of what you'd probably want from the amp, and most people use much higher-output pickups now than they did then as well (which makes it harder to get your "shimmering clean".)

The Mark III was the end of an incremental process that went as far as it could-- it has a lot more in common, technically, with the Mark IIs than it does with the Mark IV's that followed, which do everything you're complaining about. That's why there WAS a Mark IV.

 

[phyrexia]

The Mark III was the end of an incremental process that went as far as it could-- it has a lot more in common, technically, with the Mark IIs than it does with the Mark IV's that followed, which do everything you're complaining about. That's why there WAS a Mark IV.

Now, this is an interesting point you bring up - I think I disagree. Having seen Mark II, III, and IV circuit boards, I think the IV is, at its core, a III with a ton more controls and a revised switching system, whereas a III is not just a II with upgrades. (In fact, I think the Mark V design is still based on this, because of the way the external switching on the V works, but now I'm really getting offtopic)

I'd have to look at the schematics a little to confirm, but I think the III and the IV are more similar in some ways than the II and the III.

Maybe JOEY can respond?

 

[CoG]

Hmmm, okay, that's fair. Maybe "technically" is a bad word-- I think I mean in terms of the technical concept, that it's a single EQ stack with switchable gain stages, where with the IV they decided to provide switchable EQ stacks as well?

 

[babow2]

Another thing the pros have, that I don't see mentioned, is a dedicated guitar tech off stage who often controls their effects. If you read interviews with many pros about their stage rig, many say their tech controls their effects for them from off stage. That same tech has the ability to kick in a noise gate or mute between songs.

 

[phyrexia]

Hmmm, okay, that's fair. Maybe "technically" is a bad word-- I think I mean in terms of the technical concept, that it's a single EQ stack with switchable gain stages, where with the IV they decided to provide switchable EQ stacks as well?

I see what you're saying.

 

[lockbody]

I have been watching videos of some of the '60s and '70s guitar heros, as well as the SRV video "Live from Austin Texas". Anyone who ******* about the MkIII and its shared gain and tone controls should watch the masters in action. They use the volume and tone controls on the guitar to get their optimum sound, rather than stomp a button. And they are fast at doing it. 8)

Jeff Beck is the master of this, IMO. Watch almost any video and he's constantly riding the volume control of his Strat.

 

[CoG]

On older Ibanez guitars the knobs had a rubber grippy thing to make manipulating the knobs easier. They may still be there on the new ones...

Just like pick attack turning those knobs is a very valuable technique. It becomes 2nd nature at some point in ones playing career.
I also think it's indicative of players who Listen to the Whole band when they play - They know it ain't "all about them". They (we) get to their volume and tone and blend it to mix with the band as appropriate.

One thing that manufacturers stopped doing is having tone knobs that actually do stuff. My main axe these days is an early-80s Matsumoku (Church of Magical Junk FTW) and one tone knob gives usable sounds all the way through the sweep and the other "tone" knob is actually a mid cut (don't know the center frequency), which is really useful for backing out of the mix w/o actually cutting volume, and gives you pretty interesting feedback control.

Tone knobs are interesting with my Mark IIIs because the Mark input stage seems to pretty much consider upper mids as boost. Rolling off the tone a little actually cleans up the amp as well as cutting treble; this is nice because the compromise for "all three 'channels' sound pretty good" is that cleans are a little too bright and not very clean. Roll back the tone a little and it cleans up and fills out.