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When Eric Clapton picked up his guitar to record what would become the definitive electric blues guitar album in March of 1966 there was no such thing as 'Garageband'. \u00a0Instead, he plugged into a 30w Marshall 2x12 combo. \u00a0Before that time, he'd been using a half stack, a JTM 45 and matching 4x12 cab, the stuff that amp collectors' dreams are made of.<\/p>\n

The engineer struggled to record any usable sound at all from the 30w combo. \u00a0Eric played at full volume, throwing a 'hand-grenade' into blues-rock history and forcing the engineers to rewrite the rule books. \u00a0The sound levels must have literally been deafening, as anyone who has played through a non-master volume amp with this sort of power can imagine. \u00a0But the sound of the electric guitar would never be the same again, and countless guitarists have since sought to emulate that stinging, biting and bluesy, magnificent Beano tone.These days, there are many great amps that will get you in the ball park of that sound without breaking your hearing. \u00a0And you can even get a passable and usable approximation directly from your computer.<\/p>\n

For the cover version and lessons of 'Hideaway' I have uploaded to YouTube I played a 2010 RO Gibson Les Paul. \u00a0I used the bridge pickup with the volume on around 6 and the tone about 2. \u00a0I ran it via a curly lead into an iRig interface, straight into the computer and thence to Apple's great recording program, 'Garageband'. \u00a0The main setting in Garageband was 'Crunch Guitar' and the sub-setting, 'Heartbroken'. \u00a0I have attached here a screenshot of all the settings, so you can see what was on, and what was off, and where the dials were set.<\/p>\n

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The tone is a little more distorted than is ideal for emulating the Beano sound, but it's hard to get around that problem without compromising the power and sustain that we need in some of the parts, especially the bends in the high register. \u00a0In conclusion, it's not perfect, but it's workable. \u00a0I am a big fan of Garageband.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When Eric Clapton picked up his guitar to record what would become the definitive electric blues guitar album in March of 1966 there was no such thing as ‘Garageband’. \u00a0Instead, he plugged into a 30w Marshall 2×12 combo. \u00a0Before that time, he’d been using a half stack, a JTM 45 and matching 4×12 cab, the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false},"categories":[11,22,8,38,36,1],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n