For You Orange Amp Owners:

[adkguy07]

How do you dial your Les Paul into your Orange head(s) and cab(s)? It seems like an elemental query; doesn't it.

This week, I've concentrated on getting an acceptable tone from my (totally different) Orange Dark Terror....know for its high gain cabilities, plus the PPC112 V30 loaded closed back cab. Yup, after amp and guitar tweaking for a half hour, I have my “acceptable” gritty tone and the ability to clean it up a touch with my Lester's controls, but still able to use pick pressure to get notes to crunch a bit to make my tone interesting and un-predictable.

I only use a reverb pedal and no boosts overdrives come into play. Did you who've been through this exercise find that you had a lot of pickups to amp fiddling to get your own tone? I've only had to adjust pickup heights and luckily did not have to tweak any pole screws on my Burstbuckers.



adkguy07

[bclaire]

Hmm... good question.

I only set up my LP when I replaced the pickups with 57 Classics to sound good but I swap between Fenders, Gibson, and Duesenbergs without really changing settings on my amp.

The only exception is if I decide to bring a Strat, I use an EP Boost for that.

[adkguy07]

Hmm... good question.

I only set up my LP when I replaced the pickups with 57 Classics to sound good but I swap between Fenders, Gibson, and Duesenbergs without really changing settings on my amp.

The only exception is if I decide to bring a Strat, I use an EP Boost for that.

Thanks, Billy. Of the two amps I have (the other a Fender) I had set Les Paul's pickups for the Fender. I use the Dark Terror for my gain tones and the guitar was not really sounding like it was taking advantage of the Orange's ample gain. I found the combo of Les Paul and Dark Terror sounded the way I wanted, by re-tweaking it pickups; which cut down drastically time taken to dial the amp itseIf. I think I'd better leave them dialed in to the Dark Terror and not re-adjust for the Fender.


adkguy07

[Les Paul Lover]

To be honest, the main change between my guitars is where is set the gain and volume.

With my Vigier Expert, volume and gain slightly up. G&L ASAT Special Tribute and Gibson SG 70s Tribute a touch lower on the gain/volume perhaps.

For my LP (Burstbucker Pro pick ups), I'll get the gain down a touch. All settings differs slightly depending on amp, mood, song....

I've recently read the the pole piece you didn't adjust where only included in the pick ups when Seth Lover designed the humbuckers to satisfy Gibson salesmen.

Seth argued they aren't needed at all, but the salesmen, needed or not, wanted a sales point to help with the humbucker uptake when they came out in the 50s.

[Wired]

surprisingly my Les Paul Traditional is brighter than my American Pro Telecaster. To the point where the LP bridge pickup is almost ice picky. I turned the bridge pickup around (poles facing the neck) and that smoothed it out enough, but still pretty dang bright.

With my RV50 MK1 I have my EQ set: T 11:30 / M 1:00 / B 12:30, gain around 11:00. Even my clean channel is pretty neutral in the EQ settings. This is how I currently have it setup for my Telecaster and my ES-335.

For my old band where I was using my Les Paul and my PRS CU24 as my main guitars the settings were: T 12:00 / M 10:00 / B 1:30. Gain was around noon.

[Ronnie Robinson]

How do you dial your Les Paul into your Orange head(s) and cab(s)? It seems like an elemental query; doesn't it.

This week, I've concentrated on getting an acceptable tone from my (totally different) Orange Dark Terror....know for its high gain cabilities, plus the PPC112 V30 loaded closed back cab. Yup, after amp and guitar tweaking for a half hour, I have my “acceptable” gritty tone and the ability to clean it up a touch with my Lester's controls, but still able to use pick pressure to get notes to crunch a bit to make my tone interesting and un-predictable.

I only use a reverb pedal and no boosts overdrives come into play. Did you who've been through this exercise find that you had a lot of pickups to amp fiddling to get your own tone? I've only had to adjust pickup heights and luckily did not have to tweak any pole screws on my Burstbuckers.



adkguy07

Does an acceptable tone mean one that is OK but to your ears not great? Because you want to get some cleaner tones?

It's simply not easy out of a single channel amplifier made for higher gain and any variation will be a compromise.

Firstly I'd dial my eq to noon, turn gain to nil, then turn volume to 12 o'clock now dial in the gain, until u have a rhythm tone your really happy with with hard picking that will cover most the stuff u do.

Adjust eq to suit.

Next switch to your neck pickup turn the volume down to say 8 and pick softly, use this for cleaner parts.

I would also buy a good quality boost or OD pedal set with gain low and volume high for lead passages. I use a Providence stampede and it works really well like this.

I also use masking tape to mark my settings on the map so it's easily set up at gigs.

[adkguy07]

Ronnie, “acceptable” should be replaced with a “tone I'm reasonably pleased with”; considering that the Dark Terror is high gain and to get my idea of good tone does require some compromise between a decent gain sound and a decent “clean” tone.

This morning I spent time getting my Les Paul's neck pickup adjusted so that my clean tone from it will be clean with lighter picking and by applying more pick pressure, it will,start to just breakup when I play doublestop notes and triads. I moved on to the bridge pickup and adjusted it to be just slightly less in volume than my neck pickup; the reason being I look for a middle position tone that's full on the lower 3 strings and brighter on the top e,g, and b strings. To me, this gets my preferred type of middle position tone. I call it a”chirp” when I get it set just right.....a really fuzzy clean.The bridge tone I'd describe as AC/DC on the lower three strings and a “Page” thinness on the top three strings.

It's taken me awhile to get to this point considering the Dark Terror's concept is uncomplicated. Then again, it may also be one of the reasons it took me awhile to figure out how to achieve my idea of what my preferred tone should sound like and at the same time allow me to play several types of music using one guitar and one single channel amp....with no OD or distortion pedals in the mix. This is my home setup and I don't think about how I'd have to alter this for playing in a band situation because all my playing these days is home or studio based.


adkguy07

[Wendigo]

I've always found that orange amps have a slightly compressed tone profile compared to some other amps like Marshall or Fender. High gain pickups therefore seem to make them too compressed sounding, so the amp seems to benefit from a relatively clean and articulate pickup, like the '57 or similar. You'll get a much nicer, even clean tone when you roll off the volume as opposed to the "sudden" volume drop associated with a compressed tone.

[adkguy07]

I've always found that orange amps have a slightly compressed tone profile compared to some other amps like Marshall or Fender. High gain pickups therefore seem to make them too compressed sounding, so the amp seems to benefit from a relatively clean and articulate pickup, like the '57 or similar. You'll get a much nicer, even clean tone when you roll off the volume as opposed to the "sudden" volume drop associated with a compressed tone.

This is one big reason I went down into lower wind pickups from what I had in mynLes Pauls.

I put in a Seth Lover set three years back nd they do just what you describe. I can get a cleaner “clean” and still enough in my bridge Seth to drive my Dark Terror into higher gain, when I need it.


adkguy07