Do you use the 'right' guitars for covers?

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  • vizviz Frets: 10647
    edited June 2021
    p90fool said:
    We have around 130 songs, I play them all on this, using one core amp tone and four pedals;



    Lovely guitar! For my GnR / Gary Moore stuff it’s the same here basically. Well I have more pedals on my board, but 90% is done on LP deluxe, through OD, wah, delay and phase 90, and into my amp’s dirty channel.
    Roland said: Scales are primarily a tool for categorising knowledge, not a rule for what can or cannot be played.
    Supportact said: [my style is] probably more an accumulation of limitations and bad habits than a 'style'.
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  • chromatunachromatuna Frets: 366
    edited June 2021
    No. I just settle in for the night in one instrument. A couple of pickups and that all important to me middle position and I am set. I don’t like coil taps but humbuckers don’t have to be set big, fat and middly they do great cleans too I find. Also love that guitar above, two P90s job done  
    This is the truth from hillbilly guitars!
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  • ESBlondeESBlonde Frets: 3576
    I'm going to be contrary - I know I'm surprised too!
    I used two guitars live from 1981 onwards, a strat and my Aria PE1000, partly for backup and to get those OOP straty tones, not much in the way of talent pedals back then. Since the kids grew up and finances allowed I've been taking 3 guitars on stage Strat, Tele and 335. I use 3 transmitters and one receiver so switching is very fast and almost seamless.
    I like to use something appropriate if I can but if we seque songs I can play anything on any guitar.
    Does anyone else hear a difference? Probably not, but then they cant tell the difference between a BOSS overdrive and some booteek stomp box either. In truth iI like gear and guitars are what it's all about so I'll continue to do this, no more than 3 though. Car space and setting up dictate that. In my country rock bands the strat gives way to an acoustic as third guitar but that's hard wired to the preamp/DI, again swap over is fast and slick just sling a strap over the head. Same pick for everything.
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  • mike257mike257 Frets: 374
    For a general working covers/function band, no. A main, a spare, and maybe an extra if there's an odd tuning floating about. I did used to change from a Tele to a LP type for a couple of rockier tunes that benefitted from the extra balls, but it was more "because I can" than "because I need to". 

    If you're in a tribute you want to look the part, but even then, you'd likely go for the guitars that have the strongest visual association with the artist rather than whatever they might have originally played the song on. 
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  • In recent years I have used a Musicman Albert Lee HH a lot for covers and just taken a spare, usually a Strat. The AL covers a hell of a lot of bases tone-wise and stylistically. I have found every switch position is useful, and used, on a gig. I have a first year Clapton Strat that is also a fantastic covers Guitar taking in a lot of musical styles
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  • I gigged solidly in a cover band for around 15 years and always took 1 guitar to a gig. It would be a choice from a selection of whatever I had around at home at the time. Nearly always it would be a guitar with a humbucker in the bridge that was tappable. HSS config would get me through a gig no probs. Using the volume control into a Marshally driven amp on a modeller plus a couple of boost pedals I could cover everything I needed to.

    I never took the approach of chasing tones that were on the records. I just concentrated an getting an appropriate sound gain wise and getting the parts nailed.

    Nowadays if I were to get back into gigging I would just take my tele. I could easily cover everything with that.
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  • JayGeeJayGee Frets: 1254
    The right guitar to play a song with is the one you’ve got to hand at the time. Which may or may not be the right guitar but is always the right guitar…
    Don't ask me, I just play the damned thing...
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  • CountryDaveCountryDave Frets: 842
    I’ve always taken 2 guitars to every gig, one as a backup for a potential string breaking.
    It always ends up being a tele +1, with the +1 being either another tele, a cabronita or a strat.
    Most of the time I’ll get through the gig on the main tele.
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  • TeleMasterTeleMaster Frets: 10103
    Nah. You'd need like 20 guitars.
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  • FarleyUKFarleyUK Frets: 2377
    I feel dirty when I play Whole Lotta Rosie on my Les Pauls, and Sweet Child O'Mine on my SG.
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  • fretmeisterfretmeister Frets: 23955
    No. I prefer to get through a show with only one guitar if I can.
    Cannot be arsed to deal with unnecessary guitar changes.
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  • stickyfiddlestickyfiddle Frets: 26753
    I do when I’m at home, though I don’t play a lot of specific covers. 

    Gigging covers, I’ve always just tried to choose an appropriate guitar for the material but not sweat about changing guitars for every other song. I mostly gigged an SG and Strat with switch for bridge&middle in series - you can get close enough for drunk punters with  those two
    The Assumptions - UAE party band for all your rock & soul desires
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  • PolarityManPolarityMan Frets: 7273
    I use one guitar for drop-c# / Eb standard and a second one for drop-C/D standard. 
    ဈǝᴉʇsɐoʇǝsǝǝɥɔဪቌ
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  • BezzerBezzer Frets: 581
    edited June 2021
    Right guitar?  I can't always use the right pickup as my gigger of choice only has one ha ha.

    I use to try and at least match humbucker or single coil, then realised people mostly didn't care.

    I have a second as a backup, usually for songs in a different tuning if needed although D-tuners have solved a lot of those issues too.
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  • KeefyKeefy Frets: 2272
    A few years ago I helped a local singer put together an album of folky covers. He sang and played acoustic guitar, I did nearly all the rest.

    For one song I came up with a guitar solo played with an amp-style tremolo effect. I tried various of my guitars but the one that sounded best in the mix was a Maverick Chaos, an inexpensive ‘metal’ guitar with locking tuners.

    Go figure, as they say.
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  • midlifecrisismidlifecrisis Frets: 2341
    for my covers band i take 2 guitars but only ever use one, the other is a spare. i have a les paul but for versatility of sounds i use an epiphone 339 with tappable humbuckers to get me a fender twang. I also sometimes use  a fender modern player tele which has a splitable humbucker and 2 single coils, sounds very stratty when required
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  • ICBMICBM Frets: 71960
    I think there are probably only three, or at a push four, electric guitar sounds most non-guitarists can distinguish...

    Strat in-between
    Bridge humbucker/hotter single coil (Tele, P90 etc)
    Some sort of clearer neck pickup (Strat, PAF-type humbucker)
    And possibly a two-pickup bridge/neck combination (Tele/Gibson middle position)

    "Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski

    "Just because I don't care, doesn't mean I don't understand." - Homer Simpson

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  • RolandRoland Frets: 8590
    Let’s add acoustic guitars to the discussion. 

    In our covers set 20% of the songs are driven by acoustic guitar. The last time I tried to play an acoustic guitar at a gig it was feedback mayhem. Nowadays I use an acoustic simulation.

    Who takes an acoustic to a gig because it’s the “right” guitar?
    Tree recycler, and guitarist with  https://www.undercoversband.com/.
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  • BGGBGG Frets: 688
    My last band was a funk,soul band, with a rather varied set of covers. 
    Always took two guitars, one as a back up, but because I kill strings so easily I’d play one set with each guitar. 
    This could be my DGT and strat, DGT and tele, strat and tele, Duesenberg and strat or tele or DGT lol. 
    I prefer just sounding like me. 

    #thebatesmotelband
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  • JalapenoJalapeno Frets: 6378
    Always take 2 as mentioned ^^^^^

    If I was in U2 and had Dallas handing them to me, maybe, but I'd feel a bit nerdy otherwise.
    Imagine something sharp and witty here ......

    Feedback
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