Qotsa - I think I lost my headache guitar sound

Spaceaceuk

Tapping to the hive mind wealth of knowledge on here . Queens of the Stone Age have a song called I think I lost my headache . At 2:04 the guitar comes in with the most wonderful tone . Do you think this is purely amp overdrive or is there some pedals involved in this one . Someone on a Reddit mentioned a JHS twin twelve could get you close but I’m not so sure. Any thoughts? 

roberty

Wow yeah that is a cool sound

No idea how it's made but it sounds to me like there's a pedal and an overdriven amp involved, and some clever EQ

Moe_Zambeek

Possibly one example of the alleged peavey decade sound? Which is available in pedal form via a few companies, notably the Acorn Amps Solid state preamp pedal.

Cirrus

It's two takes, sounds like they're hard panned. I'm at work just now so I can't mute a speaker to hear each one in isolation. but they both sound like small amps, and the magic is in the contrast between the two tones and how they interact. The left one is quite dark and woofy in the low mids, quite a vowely tone. The right one is brighter and tighter more standard.

Just listening without being familiar with the gear they'd use (I know they've used loads of different stuff over the years), It's hard to work out what the signal chains might have been. Plus mic choice and position has so much influence on the frequency balance too.

roberty

I've been using a 1x10 IR on my Captor X quite a lot. It's a really good trick for contrast

TeleMaster

Great track! You have good taste.

dangriffiths

Afaik Peavey's came on the next album Songs for the Deaf so was more likely Ampeg V4/VT40 but he has always tried to keep some secrecy about his sound (as he says its taken him years to work out). Cocked wah and EQ pedals for sure used at points too. Not sure there was a lot of pedals until later and all boards are about with images online.  Fulltone Ultimate Octave for later stuff is great. The Catalinbread SFT I liked too

Good info for Songs for the Deaf era in this video (which was originally deleted from the guys channel but then reposted):

Winny_Pooh

There was a long video by Eric Valentine. From what I recall multiple amps, multi miked, Ampeg combos and eq pedals heavily mid boosted.

theatreanchor

Sounds like an Octave Fuzz is on there. Also, the correct tuning will help. There's a reddit thread discussing the same song here: https://www.reddit.com/r/qotsa/comments/aq9nsv/advice_for_an_i_think_i_lost_my_headache_guitar/

Reverend

The video is interesting. The peavey Decade was the key o the bass sound.
On the guitar he went back to the Tubeworks that was the main amp in the 90s. Blended with the peavey head he strangely says are weird/crappy but are exactly the heads youd associate with that drumming. 

Fiddlesticks_

Homme is also known for using drop C standard tuning and pretty heavy strings. If he's done so on this track then that will contribute to the sound a little bit.

theatreanchor

Fiddlesticks_ said:

Homme is also known for using drop C standard tuning and pretty heavy strings. If he's done so on this track then that will contribute to the sound a little bit.

It really is mostly down to the tuning (and his predilection for cheap, solid state gear).

StuartMac290

I know they record his guitar through a pair of cabs facing each other with a figure 8 mic. They move the mic back and forward along the axis between the amps to adjust the phase relationship and change tone pretty dramatically. I think that's where the cocked wah thing comes from, amongst other things.

Kurtis

Someone actually made an album called songs for the deaf?! 

Reverend

StuartMac290 said:

I know they record his guitar through a pair of cabs facing each other with a figure 8 mic. They move the mic back and forward along the axis between the amps to adjust the phase relationship and change tone pretty dramatically. I think that's where the cocked wah thing comes from, amongst other things.

they were doing that live a lot as well.  when homme and Olivera played in Master of Reality they were using Sunn Model Ts set up like that. 

I 

Reverend

theatreanchor said:

Fiddlesticks_ said:

Homme is also known for using drop C standard tuning and pretty heavy strings. If he's done so on this track then that will contribute to the sound a little bit.

It really is mostly down to the tuning (and his predilection for cheap, solid state gear).

I don';t think its thing for cheap gear for him. It's very much the gear his hero's used. late 70s peavey mark 4a crop up in photos and live videos of the likes of Black Flag ( the album is defined by black flag drum fills) Minor Threat, Bad Brains at so on.

EricTheWeary

Kurtis said:

Someone actually made an album called songs for the deaf?! 

Although I prefer Dan Baird’s Love Songs for the Hearing Impaired which is more both more fun and more politically correct. 

The Homme in a box pedal is the Stone Deaf PDF or PDF 2. Josh used one although I’m not sure how much. 

https://youtu.be/KF39ayBHIlM?si=FVtc_yzcNdLOr1Xm

guitargeek62

EricTheWeary said:

Kurtis said:

Someone actually made an album called songs for the deaf?! 

Although I prefer Dan Baird’s Love Songs for the Hearing Impaired which is more both more fun and more politically correct. 

The Homme in a box pedal is the Stone Deaf PDF or PDF 2. Josh used one although I’m not sure how much. 

https://youtu.be/KF39ayBHIlM?si=FVtc_yzcNdLOr1Xm

So did Troy.


The Skeleton Key is a pretty good pedal for their tones too, but almost has to be running into an on-the-edge-of-breakup amp for best results.

Travisthedog

Stone deaf FX PDF1 or 2 and muff will get you pretty close to most JHs sound for the first few albums at least especially that tone you speak of in ITILMH - that’s the PDF1 for sure 

Reverend

Sd1 is worth a go. Think he used them back then

guitargeek62

Travisthedog said:

Stone deaf FX PDF1 or 2 and muff will get you pretty close to most JHs sound for the first few albums at least especially that tone you speak of in ITILMH - that’s the PDF1 for sure 

Doesn't this album pre-date the PDF1 though?? The album came out in 2000, and I remember the PDF launching - I didn't start playing until 2006, so it must have been after that.