jay bennett's pedalboard

[pmancini100]

okay, so ive been searching for what kind of gear jay actually used for a while, and noone seems to know what kind of effects. the closest glimpse anyone has had is in IATTBYH in the "two guitars obsolete" scene.

 

the closest thing ive seen in the form of a gear interview is this:

 

http://www.guitarplayer.com/article/wilco-builds-modern/jan-00/6640

 

has some cool stuff about jays guitars, and that he used 11 gauge strings. still no pedalboard description though. i know he has an ernie ball volume pedal, and he has to have some kind of compressor.

 

lets try and compile all our knowledge for future jay bennett gear-seekers. (i hope im not the only one)

[pmancini100]

http://www.youtube.com/user/JHamm10137#play/uploads/10/w7nHI34J-Fw

 

see? like, this stuff is awesome. his sound is so clear

[Groo]

I as well love Jay Bennett's tone/playing. However, judging from the article (and my own eyes and ears from the videos I've watched), it doesn't seem that Jay Bennett is defined by his pedals (at least, not to the level that someone like Nels Cline uses pedals). His tone is fantastic, especially in that video that you linked to. However, all it takes to get the kind of sound like you see in the video is a nice clean Fender amp and a Telecaster (or other similar, chimey bright guitar). I think most of Jay Bennett's skill was in his fingers, and amp/guitar choice (which explains why I like him so much). Toss your favorite compressor and overdrive pedal in front of a nice Fender amp, and you'll probably be able to get pretty close to Bennett's tone (as long as you can cop some of his licks).

[pmancini100]

agreed. jay was a beast. id love to know just how he used things though. i mean, i dont think digitech will be coming out with a "pieholden jay bennett pedal" anytime soon. you know, like those dumb eric clapton pedals people actually buy.

[ginandcigarettes]

okay, so ive been searching for what kind of gear jay actually used for a while, and noone seems to know what kind of effects. the closest glimpse anyone has had is in IATTBYH in the "two guitars obsolete" scene.

 

the closest thing ive seen in the form of a gear interview is this:

 

http://www.guitarplayer.com/article/wilco-builds-modern/jan-00/6640

 

has some cool stuff about jays guitars, and that he used 11 gauge strings. still no pedalboard description though. i know he has an ernie ball volume pedal, and he has to have some kind of compressor.

 

lets try and compile all our knowledge for future jay bennett gear-seekers. (i hope im not the only one)

 

I caught him at a small club in 2007 and snagged this pick of his pedals:

 

 

That's:

 

Boss Chromatic Tuner

MXR Micro Amp (clean boost)

MXR Blue Box (fuzz with octave)

 

I'm pretty sure that when I saw him a few years before that, he had the same pedals minus the Blue Box. Of course, this was during his solo years; I have no idea what he used in Wilco.

[pmancini100]

..holy shit!

 

imagine, all that awesome sound he can make with just those pedals. i ordered my steve pride and the blood kin album a few days ago. i cant wait till it gets here

 

thanks dude!

[pmancini100]

jay also had good taste in rugs

[ginandcigarettes]

jay also had good taste in rugs

 

Hee hee. That is, in point of fact, the house rug at the Silverlake Lounge. That is to say, that rug is just the rug that has always been on the stage there.

 

It is, however, a good rug. I have played at the Silverlake Lounge on several occasions (typically the 8:00 or midnight time slots -- you know, where they stick bands that no one wants to see) and always enjoyed the rug. I have even gone so far as to have a lie down on the rug in the middle of a set when I got SMASHINGLY drunk during a show a few days after a particularly bad breakup.

 

The other times I got drunk during the set and had to lie down I have no excuse for.

[pmancini100]

dont know if this has been posted anywhere yet, so here:

 

http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&searchlink=JAY|BENNETT&sql=11:acfixqr5ldfe~T4

 

pretty fucking nuts. i wanna check out the tommy keene stuff and that blues traveler thing he produced

[Ghost of Electricity]

it doesn't seem that Jay Bennett is defined by his pedals (at least, not to the level that someone like Nels Cline uses pedals).

it seems to me that Jeff's tome is more defined by the pedals than Nels' tone. "Hell is Chrome" solo could be nothing but the Prunes n' Custard, for example. With Nels' it's more about his hands: the flourish of notes and the (excessive?) use use of the ole' whammy bar.

[Groo]

it seems to me that Jeff's tome is more defined by the pedals than Nels' tone. "Hell is Chrome" solo could be nothing but the Prunes n' Custard, for example. With Nels' it's more about his hands: the flourish of notes and the (excessive?) use use of the ole' whammy bar.

 

While I agree with you about Nels' hands being the center of his tone, what I was meaning is that there's a lot of talk about the pedals that Nels, Jeff, etc. use (and Nels contributes to that sort of talk: http://www.nelscline.com/tech.html). A lot of the stuff Nels does on stage is "enhanced" by pedals and other tools he likes to use, and a lot of the sounds he gets are very specific to the pedals he uses, and he likes to use very specific, boutique pedals. With Jay, all you really need is a cranked tube amp and a few standard pedals to imitate his tone. A Tube Screamer, Tremolo Pedal, a nice axe, and a cranked Fender amp are pretty much all you need.

[Ghost of Electricity]

While I agree with you about Nels' hands being the center of his tone, what I was meaning is that there's a lot of talk about the pedals that Nels, Jeff, etc. use (and Nels contributes to that sort of talk: http://www.nelscline.com/tech.html). A lot of the stuff Nels does on stage is "enhanced" by pedals and other tools he likes to use, and a lot of the sounds he gets are very specific to the pedals he uses, and he likes to use very specific, boutique pedals. With Jay, all you really need is a cranked tube amp and a few standard pedals to imitate his tone. A Tube Screamer, Tremolo Pedal, a nice axe, and a cranked Fender amp are pretty much all you need.

I hear you. And this is kind of surprising, given Jay's penchant for experimenting with sound in terms of engineering techniques and finding new keyboards, etc. i wonder why he didn't mess around with pedals more.

[ginandcigarettes]

I hear you. And this is kind of surprising, given Jay's penchant for experimenting with sound in terms of engineering techniques and finding new keyboards, etc. i wonder why he didn't mess around with pedals more.

 

Well, we should probably distinguish between his live rig and what he did on record (even though I tend to think that he favored using an odd instrument on record than trying to make a normal instrument odd).

 

I think we're also comparing really early Jay when he was in a country band to really late jay when he was a solo artist and ignoring a good chuck of Jay history. Yeah, in the early and late periods, Jay didn't use many pedals. But he (over)used a wah-wah on the Being There tour and at least had some kind of phaser or flanger to get a Leslie-like effect on Outtamind Outtasite (check out the recording of Jay's last Wilco show).

 

Certainly he cranked Fender amps on solo shows (he had a tweed Bandmaster the first time I saw him and a Hot Rod Deluxe the second time), but you can hear the unmistakable sound of a Vox AC30 on a lot of Wilco live tracks (and I think spy one on their

).

[Ghost of Electricity]

I think perhaps at the height of his experimentation (ST, YHF) he also was (for whatever "2 guitars are obsolete" reason) playing more keys than guitar.