This tone, its perfect!!

First of all, I love that theres a worship guitarists section on this website. Its great to have a community that is like minded, AND knows what theyre talking about.
My question is in regards to the slide instrumental of this song, which starts at about 3:10. His tone is phenomenal!! We play this song at church regularly, and i do my best to emulate this tone, but im not quite there. Man, it sounds so perfect, id love to use this tone more often!!
Obviously hes playing a nice gretch hollowbody it looks like, and im playing a tele, so theres going to be some differences there, but how do you think hes getting such tone? I get the obvious, some ambient delay and light overdrive, neck pickup, but what else do i need to dial in for this in your opinions?
anything, what type of amp, EQ settings, pedals, heck, even what type of slide. (i usually use my brass slide as opposed to my glass one...should i change that??) any ideas?


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFeGgyHp4Yw

Thanks guys!
-j

It's kind of the standard U2-ish tone that's popular right now. If I had to guess, I'd say the guitarist here is using a Vox amp, an OD of some type, and delay. You can approximate this tone fairly closely with a Tele on the bridge p/u but roll off the tone some to take the bite off. Add OD (set with low drive, high output)and delay to taste and you'll be in the ballpark, assuming you have a fairly decent amp. There's probably more to this guy's rig, but my suggestion will probably get you most of the way there.

To my ears, there is no attack to the notes but they do have a lot of sustain. Try to mimic that tone with OD, a compressor and a delay pedal.

I've seen sights and you tube videos that breakdown hill songs rig... And the stuff about attack and compressors will be a part of it... But I feel like IMHO, the biggest component is the amp and the guitar. The clarity, etc says cranked tube amp and high end pickups and pots.

Droff is playing a semihollow Duesenberg Starplayer. He used to play through a pair of AC15s for the earlier albums, but believe that he using a different amp set-up now (got this from the Hillsong site referenced above). The Starplayer has a P90 in the neck position and HB in the bridge. Good luck with your tone quest.

The key to basically all Hillsong tone is a Vox amp, a fairly transparent creamy overdrive, and lots of delay. A nice hollow body guitar will complete the set up. And as far as Droffs setup goes he is now using Jackson Ampworks.

Well, obviously, there are a lot of things to consider in this instance. First, though i couldn't find the link, I know that the guitar he's playing is a Dusenberg, which sound amazing anyway. also, i know he will often play on a 15 watt Matchless amp, which give some great tone as well. Here would be my suggestion:
- Use a 15 watt tube amp if you can...you can really push the tubes in these and get some natural breakup without using a pedal (if you want, i usually use OD pedals)....try the Laney CubR 15...you can get one relatively cheap for like 400 and sounds great.
- Obviously, OD...if you are looking for a good one, check out the xotic AC Booster...awesome pedal for worship.
- compressor would be good and like one guy said, you may want to turn the sustain up just a bit to let those notes ring out.
- buffer pedals can't be overlooked if you're using a few pedals in your chain. check out the JHS little black buffer. It will changed your tone for the better.
- Put some ambient delay on there and you'll be set!

What order do you have your pedals lined up in?

Well, obviously, there are a lot of things to consider in this instance. First, though i couldn't find the link, I know that the guitar he's playing is a Dusenberg, which sound amazing anyway. also, i know he will often play on a 15 watt Matchless amp, which give some great tone as well. Here would be my suggestion:
- Use a 15 watt tube amp if you can...you can really push the tubes in these and get some natural breakup without using a pedal (if you want, i usually use OD pedals)....try the Laney CubR 15...you can get one relatively cheap for like 400 and sounds great.
- Obviously, OD...if you are looking for a good one, check out the xotic AC Booster...awesome pedal for worshirp.
- compressor would be good and like one guy said, you may want to turn the sustain up just a bit to let those notes ring out.
- buffer pedals can't be overlooked if you're using a few pedals in your chain. check out the JHS little black buffer. It will changed your tone for the better.
- Put some ambient delay on there and you'll be set!

What order do you have your pedals lined up in?

Right now I'm playing a tele, into a chain: compressor, OD, boss tuner, passive volume pedal,digital delay, and analog delay, in that order, into a vox ac15. So all the parts are there I think, minus the guitar! Do you think the boss tuner is a good enough buffer?

Right now I'm playing a tele, into a chain: compressor, OD, boss tuner, passive volume pedal,digital delay, and analog delay, in that order, into a vox ac15. So all the parts are there I think, minus the guitar! Do you think the boss tuner is a good enough buffer?

Every pedal that you have (even if it says it's true bypass) will color your tone a bit and with the addition of more cabling introduced between pedals, you'll lose some of your signal. The buffer boosts this quite well. Go to jhspedals.com and they have a video where you'll hear the difference. When I got my little black buffer I did the exact same test and recorded it and it was completely true.

I would put the boss tuner coming off of your volume pedal (which are notorious tone suckers) if you have an Ernie ball VP jr., then have your compressor, OD, and then modulation pedals going into your amp.

What OD pedal do you have and what delay pedals?

Every pedal that you have (even if it says it's true bypass) will color your tone a bit and with the addition of more cabling introduced between pedals, you'll lose some of your signal. The buffer boosts this quite well. Go to jhspedals.com and they have a video where you'll hear the difference. When I got my little black buffer I did the exact same test and recorded it and it was completely true.

I would put the boss tuner coming off of your volume pedal (which are notorious tone suckers) if you have an Ernie ball VP jr., then have your compressor, OD, and then modulation pedals going into your amp.

What OD pedal do you have and what delay pedals?

For delay im using an OCD (not ideal for this kinda low-medium stuff, but its what ive got. Ordering a timmy soon), and delay is boss dd-7 (with tap tempo set to dotted 8ths) and MXR carbon copy.
I would put the volume pedal closer to the front, but i really love how volume pedals sound AFTER overdrives.

True bypass is slightly overrated. The longer your signal chain is the more you'll need some kind of buffer, which is why I'm ok with my ts9 not being true bypass... My volume pedal has a tuner out so I took the TU-2 out into that but only to shorten the signal chain, I didn't really notice a huge tone difference