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Robin Trower Hot Licks


gardo

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It is gobsmacking how a videomaker working in the sound critical music industry can make such a hash of a soundtrack. Sounds like they haven't even mic'd him up, just used the camera mic with the auto gain sounding like a steam leak between noises. Trying to reconcile a marshal and normal speech with a camera mic 10 feet away is folly

As someone who used to manage a video studio it is almost unbearable to watch

 

Thanks for posting though, the info is still good :)

 

An anecdote from Robin's wiki

"During a tour with Jethro Tull, Robin arrived early for a sound check and found Martin Barre’s Stratocaster (which Barre used for slide playing) propped up against an amplifier. Trower picked up the guitar, plugged it in, and with a shout which resounded around the auditorium yelled, "This is it!" "I then switched to Strat" he says. "Up to then I had been playing Les Pauls."

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Thanks for posting. Trower's been one of my favorites for years. I love his tone but I can't imagine using that gear in my condo - the neighbors already dislike my Fender cyber-twin. A Marshall as a pre-amp?!?!?!?!

 

"Bridge of Sighs" is one of my all time favourites and a big influence on my own guitar sound. As a result of trying to emulate Trower I ran a strat through an Ibanez AD-220 delay/flanger, that had input and output level controls, as a preamp then into a master volume Twin Reverb. The lower input impedance of the AD-220 gave the strat a nice rounded slightly mellow tone while the output level control gave the guitar enough boot to overdrive the amp nicely.

 

"Bridge of Sighs" was recorded by Geoff Emerick who recorded a lot of the Beatles stuff from Revolver on.

 

 

Cybertwin is a cool amp. I did some work on one for a friend and he left it with me for a while. I really got into the MIDI thing with a Yamaha MFC10 (programable MIDI foot controller) and found it to a really versatile and great sounding amp. Easy to carry for a "Fender Twin."

 

I like the concept of having a couple of tubes and being able to "rewire" the circuit to give the amp different characteristics.

 

To keep the volume manageable I plugged a phone plug into the headphone jack (to turn off the speakers) and ran the balanced line outs into my studio mixer.

 

I tried to talk my friend into letting me buy it (he wasn't really into the cyber part of the amp) but he wouldn't part with it.

 

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It is gobsmacking how a videomaker working in the sound critical music industry can make such a hash of a soundtrack. Sounds like they haven't even mic'd him up, just used the camera mic with the auto gain sounding like a steam leak between noises. Trying to reconcile a marshal and normal speech with a camera mic 10 feet away is folly

As someone who used to manage a video studio it is almost unbearable to watch

[/i]

 

This is onviously an old video and was likely copied from a video cassette.which may explain the poor quality.

Trower has always been one of my favorites. I saw him back in the late 70's at the old Pittsburgh Civic Arena.with Black Oak Arkansas.

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I think I own this but no longer own a VCR. It's got to be one of the worse instruction video ever. Yes I like his playing and songs but do you really have to spend 40+ minute on how he bends strings???

True enough, but because it's Trower I watched every second trying to grab any bit possible.

Among my pedals the least used has been chorus but after hearing the way he used it ,it's time to dig that one out again..

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When he says the action is very high he means it. How high do you recon that is?

What would you call " very high" ?

I couldn't guess. I also wondered what much heavier strings means. How heavy?

How does this "very high" action affect the trem ? Does this compensate for the intonation problems caused by a too high actin?

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This interview says he plays 11s at least starting 11 at high e.

Its a good read.

http://www.effectrode.com/tube-vibe/british-rock-guitar-veteran-guitar-player-magazine-1980/

I'll check it out. As for action I'll bet it's about 3 times what mine is. I keep mine at 1/16" at the 17th freet ,his must be up to 3/16". (sorry I dont know metric ,probably somewhere close to 5mm )

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I'll check it out. As for action I'll bet it's about 3 times what mine is. I keep mine at 1/16" at the 17th freet ,his must be up to 3/16". (sorry I dont know metric ,probably somewhere close to 5mm )

4.76mm. I'm impressed considering you "don't know metric". Yours is 1.59mm so yeah, just about 3 X. I measure mine at the 12th fret so apples vs. oranges but it's about 1.77mm for the high E, 2.28mm for the low E. In this interview, he just says "I like the action set pretty high." http://www.vintageguitar.com/2836/robin-trower/. He also says he uses a set with a 48 low E tuned down one step with the high E and B replaced with a 12 and a 15 respectively.

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4.76mm. I'm impressed considering you "don't know metric". Yours is 1.59mm so yeah, just about 3 X. I measure mine at the 12th fret so apples vs. oranges but it's about 1.77mm for the high E, 2.28mm for the low E. In this interview, he just says "I like the action set pretty high." http://www.vintageguitar.com/2836/robin-trower/. He also says he uses a set with a 48 low E tuned down one step with the high E and B replaced with a 12 and a 15 respectively.

 

I don't know metriric but I do know that a 10mm wrench is slightly larger than a 3/8" wrench . Half of 3/8 is 3/16 so the metric would be a little less half of 10l or a little less than 5mm

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I've probably said it here before, but if you get a chance to see Robin live (as he seems to still tour quite a bit) my advice is to go. I've seen him here in Houston twice in the past 5 years and his "feel" is better than he ever was ... and it was always damned good (I've seen him twice before in the 80s and 90s respectively). He's just hypnotically brilliant on those melodic arpeggiated jams like "In This Place" and "Hannah".

 

His latter day vocalist, Davey Pattinson, isn't the late great James Dewars (the soulful singer and bassist on all Robin's classic tunes), but he's still really damned good.

 

[video=youtube;xos5c4GQyHA]

 

 

 

 

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. He's just hypnotically brilliant on those melodic arpeggiated jams

 

 

That's the best word to desribe his concerts. When I saw him in the late 70's in Pittsbugh it was unlike any other concert I had seen".In City Dreams" was just coming out so we heard a lot of that music . Peeople just stood there spellbound listening to him play, they weren't dancing or jumping or waving their hands or anything . He had the audience under his spell and it was magical..

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I've probably said it here before, but if you get a chance to see Robin live (as he seems to still tour quite a bit) my advice is to go. I've seen him here in Houston twice in the past 5 years and his "feel" is better than he ever was ... and it was always damned good (I've seen him twice before in the 80s and 90s respectively). He's just hypnotically brilliant on those melodic arpeggiated jams like "In This Place" and "Hannah".

 

His latter day vocalist, Davey Pattinson, isn't the late great James Dewars (the soulful singer and bassist on all Robin's classic tunes), but he's still really damned good.

 

[video=youtube;xos5c4GQyHA]

 

 

 

 

Dewars was terrific.

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"And I want to stress to you how important the acoustic sound is in getting a good sound out of an electric instrument". Don't guess he'll be using that cinder block guitar anytime in the near future.

 

Love Trower and I agree he puts on one helluva show. Swear I smelled a little canibis coming through the computer when he was wanking away.

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Robin Trower is one of my all time favorite guitar players. "Bridge of Sighs" is my favorite of his albums. He also did some great work with Procol Harum. His "Guitar Faces" just tell me he's feeling what he's doing. A lot of my favorite guitarists, Stevie Vaughan, Gary Moore..Countless others, were emotive players.

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