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Matt Pike is much like his guitar playing—powerful, blunt, slightly pissed off, and occasionally out of tune. And he’s been playing guitar almost as long as he’s been talking. “My uncle and grandpa used to always play guitar and I just remember loving those times,” says Pike. “Ever since I could handle a guitar, I’ve been playing one.”
Pike’s headbanging lineage started in the ’90s with stoner-metal icons Sleep, and after that band’s initial burnout, continued with the ferocious High on Fire. Decades of playing have honed Pike’s perspective about his instrument and music: “Riffs are the conversation starter—that’s what brings people in, but you better have more to offer than just that,” he says. “I create with the guitar and the riff is my illustrative force.” For fans of Pike’s raging riffage, it should be no shock that the frontman/guitarist had enough to say by way of his guitar (and High on Fire lyrics) to populate two new albums: Electric Messiah from High on Fire and Sleep’s The Sciences.
Since the release of those two critically acclaimed albums in 2018, Pike’s vision has been validated by way of a Grammy for Best Metal Performance (Electric Messiah) and dozens of sold-out Sleep shows that have continued to send the doom trio around the world. While the tour that brought Pike, bassist/vocalist Al Cisneros, and drummer Jason Roeder to town was delayed because Pike had one of his toes partially amputated due to diabetes, the pioneering guitarist couldn’t be sidelined for long. “The guitar is a spiritual instrument—it goes from heart, to head, to hands, out the speaker cabs, and into the universe. That directly impacts the people who listen to you—they know if you’re full of shit or not. I’ve always known I was meant to express myself through this 6-string tool. The only constant through addiction, hard times, juvenile delinquency, heartache, and life has been the guitar.”
Before the band’s show at Nashville’s Marathon Music Works, the bare-chested shredder threw on a shirt, strapped on a Les Paul Artisan, and explained to PG’s Chris Kies how Sleep’s aural expeditions are full of patient, spontaneous moments built on a bed of sustain and swirl.
In recent years, Sleep’s 6-string overlord Matt Pike has intensified and beefed up his sound by way of triple-humbucker guitars. His main choice for this run of shows is a Gibson Les Paul Artisan. During the tour, he made some pickup swaps, and this particular model has a pair of new Lollar dB Humbuckers (bridge and neck) surrounding his signature Lace Dragonaut. In addition, he’s rewired the Artisan so it has a volume knob for each pickup and a master tone control.
In a 2018 interview with PG, Pike explained the appeal of having three humbuckers: “Onstage I’ve really been using three-pickup Les Pauls a lot—I need them for Sleep, and I’ve started preferring them for High on Fire. I really enjoy the tonal diversity, power, and sustain I can get with three-pickup guitars.” All of his guitars take Dunlop .012–.056 strings, and he hammers away with Dunlop Tortex .73 mm picks.
Pike updated this Les Paul Custom with two Lollar dB humbuckers in the bridge and middle positions. For now, the guitar’s neck pickup remains stock.
Tuned to an oddball variation of open B, this ’70s Ibanez 2680 Bob Weir model is Pike’s only guitar without three ’buckers.
With his fortress of tube amps, Pike has clearly borrowed a page from Angus Young’s AC/DC playbook. As Pike explained in our 2018 chat, not only do High On Fire and Sleep require different setups, but each style of Orange head provides a specific tonal layer to his cake of doom. “They really are two different animals,” he says. “The commonality between both bands is my desire for a thick, pointed midrange, and from there I tailor things. High on Fire uses a little less sustain and a little more gain, where Sleep, which may seem more overdriven, is more of a massive wall of volume and sound that’s better suited for a compressed, sustaining sizzle. The sheer volume allows me to get fuzzy, loose, and roaring.
“For High on Fire, I use my old Soldanos with Orange Dual Darks because those are more modern-sounding and aggressive amps. The Soldanos have a balance and midrange that just works for High on Fire, man. The Soldano is crisp, faster, tighter, and more modern, where the Orange is beefier, sustains more, and lives in a more classic- or stoner-rock world.
“Onstage with Sleep, I go with six Orange half stacks—I’ll have four Thunderverbs that surround the Dual Dark stacks. The Dual Darks are on channel B, 3/4 distortion, 1/2 volume, and the Thunderverbs are in Channel A for a loud, crisp, projecting midrange. Three pertinent things to my Sleep tone: chug, punch, and sustain. I took a cue from AC/DC and how they set their amps for pure loudness, but they got all that gain and filth from the amp just working so hard and punishing the speakers. I like being in total control of my fire-breathing dragon—that’s the it factor now.”
Set to channel A, the Orange Thunderverbs are dialed in to provide burly midrange.
Typically, Pike runs a pair of Dual Darks—he feels they’re the British company’s most modern-sounding heads—to deliver the aggression and distortion he requires for Sleep, but on the Nashville date an Orange Rockerverb 100 MkIII substituted for a dying head. All the cabs are loaded with Celestions and all are firing.
Board 1 has Pike’s must-haves on it. Everything is anchored around his EarthQuaker Warden Optical Compressor that’s always on and helps squish the notes into a sustaining wall of sound. (You’d think with the buzzing in the video, he’d use a noise gate, but as you’ll see, there’s none on his board.) Other key stomps are the Revival Electric Metric 3-Band EQ, Black Arts Rabid Mammal (Pike’s signature pedal), KHDK Paranormal (Slayer/Exodus Gary Holt’s signature pedal), Lone Wolf Audio Twin Snake, Daredevil Pedals Atomic Cock V2, MXR Phase 90, MXR Carbon Copy, Keeley 30ms, EQD Spatial Delivery, MXR Carbon Copy Deluxe, and Third Man + Mantic Flex. A Peterson Stomp Classic StroboStomp keeps everything in tune.
Board 2 houses Pike’s amp controls (a pair of Radial Engineering Switchbone V2s) and various experimental sound generators. For this gig, that meant an EQD Data Corruptor and an original Daredevil Atomic Cock.
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Chris Kies has degrees in Journalism and History from the University of Iowa and has been with PG dating back to his days as an intern in 2007. He's now the multimedia manager maintaining the website and social media accounts, coordinating Rig Rundown shoots (also hosting and/or filming them) and product demos, and occasionally writing an artist feature, all while still shooting/editing video for NAMM-show coverage. Other than that, he spends time with his pitbull and enjoys non-guitar-related hobbies.
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