Hey everyone, first of all I'm new to this forum so if I'm in the wrong area for this post, please let me know

Also, I'm sure you're all sick of answering questions regarding John Mayer's tone on the Where the Light Is live CD. If you're willing to help, I really appreciate it!

What I'm looking for:
- Belief tone, that nasally, screaming sound he plays in the intro and often he solos with it
- Tones similar to that one ^. He uses this sound a lot in his leads, people have told me to scoop my mids but I can't get there on just that.

What I'm workin with:
- Egnater Rebel 30 1x12 (6v6 and/or EL84 tube combination)
- Clean or Dirty Egnater channel?
- Fender Hotrod Deville 212 (this is back home, so I can't use it most of the time so please stick to Egnater advice!)
- American Deluxe Strat (pretty sure, I'm not in front of it at the moment but it has the "fat switch" on the volume knob)
- I lowered my pickups a bit, for a more compressed sound because I tend to pick hard
- Keeley Katana
- Tube Screamer TS9DX
- Reverb/Delay, etc.

Let me know if I can provide any more information. Thanks so much!

-Tyler

Ok so I just watched it on You-ey Tube ....
Like what I hear, but so glad I'm no longer in my 20's....

As far as his tone, it's just clean Strat tone's thru a small tube amp, Mayer's tone should be one of the easiest to replicate, as it is basically a study of SRV, Clapton, Hendrix, Rory Gallagher and many other's, such as Buddy Guy.....

His tone is clean, meaning I don't hear extraneous noises so I'm suspecting Mayer uses some type of noise gate system, Pup wise I would say Texas Specials would get you close or high output Fender 60's. Modulation is really where it's at... But 50% of this tone is going to be your amp, many forget that the amp is 50% of the sound equation where an electric guitar is concerned.

Now as far as what you are using .... A 212 Deville ... Isn't that a bit of overkill unless you are playing venues of 500+ to cut thru.... If I'm not mistaken this is a 60 Watt Amp Correct I used to have a Hot Rod Deluxe, loved it but unless it was in a club, there was no way I could crank it to the level of where the response I wanted happened. So I use mostly a vintage Magnatone 15 watter. Yes in a practice / rehearsal situation it is more than enough.
The reason behind a small wattage amp is to keep the levels manageable so that I'm working on the sound I want not forever fighting a Gorilla in the room...
A small amp will teach you how to create that palette of sound, the more wattage only works if you are in a big venue where you need that power to cut through or to just be heard ...

Look at what Mayer uses on Stage at Crossroads or for that matter what all those guys / gals are using. relatively modest sized amps, (40 to 60 watts) the monitors are what bring that sound to the fore.

As far as your Egnater, never have used one so I cannot comment .....
But if it is indeed a small wattage tube amp 15 to 30 max then it may be feasible....
However bear in mind that some of these small amps do not have preamp tubes, they are just direct main tubes from 1 to 10, that in itself is a true small amp gain distortion.....

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"C'est parti mon Kiki "

Riddle me this: if tone is 50% guitar and 50% amp, what % is in the fingers?

@53magnatone

Thank you so much for your detailed response! The Egnater is a smaller, lower wattage amp so it seems to be the way to go for this sound. Also, to the other guy, Mayer's technique is HUGE in his sound. Not to toot my own horn, but I've been trying to compare myself to him for a long time so I think I've started to pick up some of his technique... but I'm not there quite yet. It's unbeatable! I'd say it's 20% guitar, 60% amp, 20% "Mayer-Fingers"

I wasn't dismissing the hands, although Django Reinhardt only had the use of Two fingers on his fretting hand...
What and more importantly how one strikes a string is part of the equation , but for the question at hand ( no pun ) I was not going to get into pedagogy as that is a complete and extensively complex subject . We were just discussing tone and equipment, however if you wish to get into the digits..... Then we shall ...

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"C'est parti mon Kiki "

The other 100%.

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Bill

RIG RUNDOWN. This may interest you.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6POSqjjrIA

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"Where would rock and roll be without feedback?"

Posts like that undo all the good work done by marketing departments

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my stuff on soundcloud

+1,000 You won't get the tone with just equipment.

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Life...... It's sexually transmitted and always fatal