guitar sound etc.

[ormfdmrush]

which effects should i use (and how) to get the Sisters' 1982-1985 sound?
i mean both guitar and bass
any Smurphs members here?

PS if you give the reference on Bauhaus, The Cure and others, it would be great, too

[CellThree]

Cheap ones I think would cover it. If it plugged in and had a volume switch I think that pretty much covered it for the early days.

It depends if you're thinking of recording or playing live. Recording wise you could use readily available EQ plugins to adjust the sound. Livewise It pretty much seemed a plug in and go type of affair. Get an old distortion pedal or an amp that has built in distortion as a start.

Marian needs a E-Bow if you're gonna play the Marx line. They're not that cheap actually, but quite good fun.

Oh, you'll need a nice Electric 12 String to play any of Wayne's stuff properly.

There are some threads if you search that talk about the different equipment that the original line up used.

[ormfdmrush]

thank you, but i meant chorus/flanger/delay/presets/etc.
i've found only one topic, containing the close reference - http://www.myheartland.co.uk/viewtopic.php?p=203990
can anybody add something to this?
i also need some tabs
yeah, i know about
http://www.poisondoor.com/thesistersofmercy/tab.php
http://gvelay.free.fr/gta/index.html?sisters/index.html
http://ultimate-guitar.com/tabs/sisters ... y_tabs.htm (update)
but i'd prefer Guitar Pro ones
does anyone have any?
i've downloaded few from mysongbook.com a long time ago, but those tabs are crap

[eotunun]

These should do for starters, but some of them are plainly wrong. When I still had Windows&Guitar Pro, I listened to that Alice-interpretation. Not even ten seconds passed before it hit the bin. A superbly nice site about anything for/with/about guitars!

[ormfdmrush]

thanks, but those gp's are not alright
they are exactly those i've got a long time ago
i will probably correct some of them
is anybody on the forum in good relations with Smurphs or Ben/Robo?
they could spend a bit of their time, making tabs for thursty HLers
or even chairman

[eotunun]

That´s what I call wishfull thinking!
That won´t happen even in your dreams, mate.
If you can be bothered to do the transcribing work yourself, the txt-type Alice Tabs at Ultimate guitar are quite correct. (I looked them up last night after posting the link) The notes are the same on both of them for the second riff, only one version is a lot more dufficult to play. That´s the one with the open e string instead of fret 5 of the B string for the e.. You´ll have to get the B string quiet while playing the e. Anyway-If I am not mistaken I saw Adam play it with the open e at Düsseldorf in 2003. No guarantee for that, though.
I prefer Powertab to Guitar Pro.

[CellThree]

You could of course just tune your guitar and sit down with the records and learn how to play them.

They're all either in the key of A or D, except The Damage Done which is in C. I think More is in B (well, at least I play it in B).

The only difficult ones are Waynes guitar part in Marian (still can't work out the 2nd section of it) and the Floodland stuff (mainly because it's all on Synth).

I recommend watching Wake a couple of times as this definately helps on some of the songs.

And Eotunun, Alice is dead easy. It is played on the B and E strings. Just hook your little finger on your picking hand on the E string to mute it when you play the B string. The Ultimate Guitar tab isn't quite right.

The last two notes on Riff 1 should be 1 0, not 2 0. Also, that Riff 4 bit is not right either.

[ormfdmrush]

any comments on pedals presets?
i need also that fat sound for my bassist

[aims]

or even chairman

I somehow doubt that.

Guitar Pro isn't available for Gentoo

[AngryWorm]

any comments on pedals presets?
i need also that fat sound for my bassist

Just set a 2/3 bass and full treble on bass-amp and that's it,trust me.

I dont like to use bass pedals,but in Fix and some other songs bass player can use a phaser.

[Quiff Boy]

i asked choque hosein (musician, producer and long time associate of eldritch & marx) about this and his reply might not tell you everything you want to know, but will certainly tell you everything you need to know:

I think what yer forumites are not grasping is that whatever was available that dole money would allow was "the sound" that week. I would advise just "borrowing" stuff like they did!

It wasn't until old fussy Hussey joined that any of them had even caught site of a "Pedal Board", he usually used Boss pedals: compression, chorus, delay and a bit of flangetarius.

I remember doing some demos with Benn Gunn a week or so after his sacking and all he had was a duff old DOD chorus pedal......which reminds me - I got a phone call while they were recording asking me if I had a guitar with a whammy bar!

That's how ill equipped they were.

Suffice to say, as the band got richer (i.e. after Floodland), that's when the guitars all went generic (and some might argue boring!!).

A Roland RE201 tape delay was in the arsenal too, and when the first album was done you can guarantee that AMS and Eventides delays, Yamaha SPX reverbs, and whatever was high-tech in de eighties were used (Eventides were the dogs bollocks when it came to chorus/delays, and still are).

so there you go. the rule of thumb seems to be beg, borrow or steal. and if it was cheap in the 80s its probably used on a sisters record.

[eotunun]

i asked choque hosein (musician, producer and long time associate of eldritch & marx) about this and his reply might not tell you everything you want to know, but will certainly tell you everything you need to know:

I think what yer forumites are not grasping is that whatever was available that dole money would allow was "the sound" that week. I would advise just "borrowing" stuff like they did!

It wasn't until old fussy Hussey joined that any of them had even caught site of a "Pedal Board", he usually used Boss pedals: compression, chorus, delay and a bit of flangetarius.

I remember doing some demos with Benn Gunn a week or so after his sacking and all he had was a duff old DOD chorus pedal......which reminds me - I got a phone call while they were recording asking me if I had a guitar with a whammy bar!

That's how ill equipped they were.

Suffice to say, as the band got richer (i.e. after Floodland), that's when the guitars all went generic (and some might argue boring!!).

A Roland RE201 tape delay was in the arsenal too, and when the first album was done you can guarantee that AMS and Eventides delays, Yamaha SPX reverbs, and whatever was high-tech in de eighties were used (Eventides were the dogs bollocks when it came to chorus/delays, and still are).

so there you go. the rule of thumb seems to be beg, borrow or steal. and if it was cheap in the 80s its probably used on a sisters record.

If it was cheap then, it´s in the vintage section of Ebay today and gets allmost as expensive than new stuff. At least at german Ebay. Too many fools have too much money..
Edit: An important point I forgot (an indicator for my missing manners):
Thanks fo the info, Herr Administrator!

[theroyalconsort]

I've been looking in to this as well.

By the time we hit Wake the sound is with out doubt a Roland JC-120

No other amp has that monumental chorusing sound.

I have also heard that That Guitarist was using an Aria 12 string at the time but I have never been able to read the headstok on any footage I have seen.

On the wake concert there is definately a Phaser in use on the opening of First and last and Always... Along with a compressor and a delay.

The Chorus comes from the amp.

Thats all I've got so far other than I once tried an amp called a Peavey Classic with a built in Phaser that sounded suspiciously like alot of the reptile house / Anaconda recordings.

Someone somewhere must know somthing!!!

[nodubmanshouts]

You could do worse than check with Ramone... not that he would necessarily know about the Sisters, but Rosetta used to rip off the sound pretty well! (Yeah, I think Porl had a JC120)

[ashville]

When I saw them play in 1983 Craig was playing a cheap bass (maybe an Aria) through a Boss distortion pedal (the standard orange one) into a Vox AC30 guitar amp (not a bass amp).

It sounded unbelievably awesome.

Which is why I had a look when they came off stage, and which is why I remember.

The bass never sounded as good when they bought "better" equipment and instruments.

[Rosalie]

I find it hard to find what gear they used for a lot of stuff.

A Vox AC30 is pretty impressive, I wouldn't have thought they'd have had that level of gear at that time. What a weird choice for Bass though. I guess without the top boost AC30s are kind of dark voiced, so it probably worked. A lot of non TB Vox amps are voiced a little like bass amps, at least my AC4 kind of is. A lot of bassists like to use guitar amps to make them stand out in the mix.

I think Bauhaus also used a DS-1 on Bass, and a DOD Chorus.

The main amp Daniel Ash used was a HH ICS100 combo. He used that on pretty much everything.

It's nearly impossible to get his sound out of other gear. He's even managed to get his sound with guitars other than a Tele, I think his best tone was probably from "Gotham". I think he may have switched to using bright voiced Humbuckers on his guitar. I'm not sure though.

The closest you can get to Danny's tone is probably using a a Tele with an amp modeler and cranking the Fender Twin model. That will give that clangy kind of quality. You cannot do this with a real Fender Twin, you will be evicted.

Next best bet is a Vox amp that does have Top boost(or use an EQ). The HH amp seemed to be in between Fender and Vox tonally, or at least sounded like a Fender with a more Brit kind of vibe.

[sultan2075]

You cannot do this with a real Fender Twin, you will be evicted.

Ain't that the truth! Vox's *are* dark sounding, and when I've been in bands and playing through them, I've always found it difficult to cut through the mix. Playing with a Vox inevitably meant that even when I turned the trebles all the way up and the bass all the way down, still no one could hear me. I eventually ditched the Vox for an American made Fender Hot Rod Deville, which a) cuts through the mix quite nicely, and can get some very nice highs and b) is still louder than fuck but not quite as loud as the Twin.

[Franki]

Hi, to continue this topic ...

I'm a bassplayer, but for less than 2 year, so i'm not very good to find the corect notes bymyself

is there some correct tabs on sisters songs available somewhere ?

or does a better bassist here made the transcription ?


Have a nice day,
franki

[Being645]

Don't know whether what you may find here is correct, It's all we currently know of.

http://sisterswiki.org/Tablatures

[Rosalie]

You cannot do this with a real Fender Twin, you will be evicted.

Ain't that the truth! Vox's *are* dark sounding, and when I've been in bands and playing through them, I've always found it difficult to cut through the mix. Playing with a Vox inevitably meant that even when I turned the trebles all the way up and the bass all the way down, still no one could hear me. I eventually ditched the Vox for an American made Fender Hot Rod Deville, which a) cuts through the mix quite nicely, and can get some very nice highs and b) is still louder than fuck but not quite as loud as the Twin.

Mids are generally more where you cut than Treble actually. It seems odd that a Fender would cut better but I've been in a room with a Hot Rod and it's obnoxiously loud so it wouldn't surprise me.

What Vox amp did you have anyway?

[sultan2075]

I had a borrowed "something" with 2 12's in it, and later, an AD100VT 212 combo, which sounded really nice to my ears--as long is it was the only amp being used. The moment we brought in the other guitar and the bass, it just vanished. In fact, after I got the HRD, the other guitar player spent a few weeks on the AD, and we had the same problem--he was completely inaudible unless the rest of us were silent.