Different guitar tones?

[bish1989]

Hopefully im in the right thread

Basically there are quite a few guitars players who i admire their playing and mainly their sound. Im not just trying to copy them as i want to work on my own style and tone.

Anyway, i have a good british valve amp (orange ad30htc), with normal pedals, overdrive, distortion, fuzz, chorus, delay etc Each one is to my liking.

To sound like the above players i like, am i better off keeping the effects i have and i can still sound like me using my own stuff. Then have a les paul with emg's for a zak wylde tone, a strat with hotrails for dave murray, a strat with a ssl-5 bridge for gilmour, a sg with humbuckers for ac/dc etc

or

am i better off just buying loads of different pedals?

May seem a weird question but i appreciate your thoughts.

Many thanks

 

[Heady Jam Fan]

Unless you are in a very specific cover band, I don't think it makes sense to buy gear for each cover you want to do (I would if I had enough money though I think, mostly for love of gear and not to cop tones as much).

I can get a pretty wide range with my rig, my style is much different than yours I think, but I can get close enough. Also consider that a lot of the bands you listen to play covers and use their normal gear.

 

[Lolaviola]

I believe that the guitar idea is a valid one, as the guitar you play will influence you morre than say a pedal will.
I have never been one for large boards with fifty distortions.
If I want to play like a particular artist, I am more likely to switch guitars.

 

[cookieshoes]

I actually don't think you really need multiple pedals or multiple guitars to sound like your favorite player. Because, it's always going to be an approximation anyway. When people want to reach an IDENTICAL sound of someone else, that's different. But, that would require separate individual rigs, using the exact same gear. Otherwise, again, it's going to be an approximation.

So, a single guitar, with a versatile amp, and a few versatile pedals should bring you in range of pretty much anyone. The distinction of single coil vs humbucker is solved by using a guitar with pickups that can approximate both, and which isn't skewed too heavily towards one or the other sounds. Lace Sensor pickups did a great job of letting a Strat owner get both passable single coil and humbucker tones. Whereas normal humbuckers can't get as close to the sound of single coils on their own, and normal single coils can't get as close to the sound of humbuckers on their own.

 

[bobbyatomic]

Go check out Guthrie Govan mimicing different players on youtube, he uses the one guitar and limited pedals (theres a video showing his pedalboard if you search for it) Its all in the playing, obviously if you're going to try and sound like someone playing a very particular sound, like say death metal, you're going to need distortion, but I don't think you're going to need the exact distortion.

heres some Govan

Larry Carlton style
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bUZK9dasP8s

Steve Vai Style
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sN5vUuqrSiI

Jeff Beck style
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdrweUGfuP0

Robben Ford style
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5GOs7iLKaTI

And the effects he uses
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H43qtMmgeVU

 

[Once Far Off]

Go check out Guthrie Govan mimicing different players on youtube, he uses the one guitar and limited pedals (theres a video showing his pedalboard if you search for it) Its all in the playing, obviously if you're going to try and sound like someone playing a very particular sound, like say death metal, you're going to need distortion, but I don't think you're going to need the exact distortion.

heres some Govan

Larry Carlton style
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bUZK9dasP8s

Steve Vai Style
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sN5vUuqrSiI

Jeff Beck style
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdrweUGfuP0

Robben Ford style
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5GOs7iLKaTI

And the effects he uses
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H43qtMmgeVU

Umm...that's some of the best playing I've ever heard. I can't believe I've never heard of this guy before!

 

[AXXA]

Maybe get just a couple guitars, each with different pickup configurations. You could even just have one guitar with multiple pickup options, via coil tapping/splitting, or a combination of single-coils and humbuckers.

Picking your pedals wisely may help you to cover a lot of ground, but you can cover lots of ground simply by knowing how to utilize your current setup to its full potential. If you were to add more pedals, I'd recommend looking into EQ's and multi-effects pedals. These can both be very versatile.