The Extreme guitarist shares his pedal philosophy—including how a visit from EVH inspired him to use a phaser on the new record—and talks about ripping with Rihanna at the Super Bowl and more.
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Nuno Bettencourt on Pedals
I have a love-hate relationship with pedals. That's why I don't use anything, because I've always felt they get in the way of what you're trying to say if you use them wrong, especially with choruses and things like that. When Edward switched from being straight in your face, and then started splitting things left and right and chorusing and doing that, which was amazing and creative and beautiful, I lost a lot of him. I heard less of him and I heard more of what it was going through as the voice.
And I really prefer any guitar player, whether it's Brian May or Jimmy Page especially, anybody, the good, the bad, and the ugly. Meaning, sometimes it's not the greatest tone in the world and sometimes it's not the prettiest to listen to, but there's an emotion there, and I think pedals and what you do processing-wise gets in the way. The notes are there, but they get in the way of expression and emotion because there's a physicality that you have in your fingers that, to me, it's like I always try to find that straight shot from here to there, to that speaker, to that microphone, to the record.
And it's funny because recently, let me drop a name, Steve Vai. Recently, when I was at Steve Vai's house, he wanted to hear the album before it came out. So I drove to his house. He has an amazing studio, and he's like, "Let's play it from top to bottom." He's like, "We're not going to stop. I want to listen to this damn tone." And he stopped after every song, he's like, "All right, now wait a second." I'm like, "Steve, we're supposed to listen to this like an album." He goes, "Yeah, yeah, but the guitar's right there. How did you get it to be right there?" I just said, "Because there's nothing there. There's no magic, no hocus-pocus.”
It's always been a 57 and a 421, and I don't do anything to equalize, and I let it be on the outside of the center of the speaker, outside the cone, and I let it go. And yeah, I'll use a little delay. Delay is different for me or so revere because it enhances what you've done already. What I need is the type of processing that becomes the body of what you're doing, it becomes part of that note, if you know what I mean. That's like more of... And I always feel like, as a guitar player, the real you tends to never never come out when you do chorusing or flanging or something. Unless you want it for an effect. It's like an effect or even to make it pretty. Sometimes we do chorus with chorusing stuff or you want it to... By the way, you want it to have that sound and that just a big body of just beauty, then you're doing it right.
I don't think there's a right or wrong, don't get me wrong. I'm not being a pedal snob or anything. But for me, I love my heroes and the guitar players I heard when there's not much in the way of their hands, and they find the right amp to just be that extra voice for them to interpret what they're doing with their hands. And that's always been my goal. And amps have changed every album, but I think wherever your headspace is at, that becomes the tone.
Nuno Bettencourt on Why He Doesn't Use Pedals | Wong Notes Podcast
Learn all about the Queen guitarist’s signature techniques.
Chops: Intermediate
Theory: Intermediate
Lesson Overview:
• Explore guitar orchestration and layered harmony parts.
• Understand how to move between chord inversions.
• Emulate the feel and phrasing of one of rock’s greatest guitarists.
Click here to download a printable PDF of this lesson's notation.
In this installment of Electric Études, we take a look at the unique guitar style of Dr. Brian May, from the legendary rock band Queen. May has been crafting distinctive guitar parts for more than 40 years, and Queen’s popularity continues to grow with legions of loyal fans young and old. The band has inspired countless artists from Foo Fighters to Lady Gaga, and Queen’s catalog includes some of the most popular classic rock tracks of all time.
Following the tragic and untimely death of the irreplaceable and enigmatic Freddie Mercury, the Queen legacy continues with May and drummer Roger Taylor flying the Queen flag at sold-out performances all over the world with singer Adam Lambert. They even have a live musical stage show We Will Rock You, which has enjoyed a nonstop run in London’s West End for 12 years.
May has a unique style and favors some unorthodox techniques, such as attacking the strings with an old sixpence coin instead of a standard flatpick. He also uses his right-hand fingers a lot, either gently brushing across the strings or pulling his index finger off the strings as they rub against it. At first glance, you might think he’s tapping.
For this feature, I’ve tried to incorporate as many different rhythm and lead techniques as possible, and when composing this short piece I turned to a number of classic Queen songs for inspiration.
The first 10 measures are inspired by “Now I’m Here,” from Sheer Heart Attack. This section features a slightly cleaner sound with the guitar volume backed off and some chorus to produce a wide-sounding effect. I work through a series of major triads while palm-muting the open 4th string. You can hear how the drums accent the chord stabs. I turn the volume up slightly for the conclusion of this section and work around an A5, D/A, and A7sus4 figure.
In the next section, I kept our verse riff and added some chordal ideas similar to what May played in “One Vision” off A Kind of Magic. These chords employ a very common characteristic of Brian’s rhythm style, where the root note of a power chord simply drops down by a half-step to change the chord. I’m also putting in a bit of the D blues scale (D-F-G-Ab-A-C) as well. Pay attention to the chord stabs, and be sure to keep them tight and clean.
The driving figure that comes up next should sound familiar to anyone who has heard “Keep Yourself Alive” from Queen’s debut album. I kicked on a phaser for this section and conclude with some bluesy licks in G minor pentatonic (G-Bb-C-D-F). The next bit borrows elements from “Bohemian Rhapsody” and “Bicycle” with a quarter-note triplet before heading into a harmonized trill. The harmony idea continues with a descending line based around D Mixolydian (D-E-F#-G-A-B-C), leading us to the solo section.
The solo section moves to a half-time feel and the chord progression emulates Queen’s majestic approach to ballads. May has an uncanny feel for melody and well-placed chord tones. The solo is based around F major and its diatonic modes, and the F major pentatonic (F-G-A-C-D) scale. Over the C/E chord, we touch on F#, which isn’t diatonic to the key, but adds to the majestic sound. This section also features a fair amount of positions shifts, so take care with accuracy.
I then move into some of May’s signature scalar runs, starting off with triplets and then moving to sixteenth-notes. To give the backing track the correct feel, I’ve included some guitar harmony ideas, trying to emulate the sound of May’s orchestrated lines. On the track there is some overlapping of lines. In the second measure of this section, you will notice that the guitar parts overlap a bit. I’ll leave it up to you to choose which note to play.
The phrase over the Bb-Gm change includes a short melodic figure that works great performed with the first finger to give a smooth feel. The next bit is a common bluesy phrase that’s based in the C major pentatonic (C-D-E-G-A) with some passing tones. This lick works great over the C major to Bb/C chords, resulting in a dominant tonality. The final section includes an idea that May is famous for, and can be heard in the classic “Brighton Rock.” Check out the ascending C Mixolydian (C-D-E-F-G-A-Bb) lines that use two different delay settings to produce a harmony. I set one delay to a half-note and another to a quarter-note, and both are synced to the track’s tempo. As you climb up the scale, a harmony is produced as each delay enters.
May’s main influences in his formative years included Hank Marvin and Rory Gallagher. Both these guitarists had a profound effect on May’s approach to tone. He has always favored Vox AC30 amps and started off with a Marvin-inspired clean tone. But he loved how Gallagher pushed his amp into a smooth overdrive using a treble booster to generate searing sustain. May has used this approach for many years, favoring the sound of the treble booster as it pushes the tubes harder. This produces saturation and sustain, but also cleans up the bottom end. May leaves his treble booster on all the time, and to produce clean tones he backs off his guitar’s volume and plays lighter.
Live, May uses three modified Vox AC30s, with the middle amp completely dry and the left and right amps dedicated to effects. The treble booster is in a small housing attached to his guitar strap and is routed before his wireless unit.
All these elements, plus the unique switching and tonal capabilities of May’s “Red Special” go towards producing his signature tone. He also uses 6- and 12-string versions produced by Guyton guitars in the U.K., which are stunning instruments. I had the pleasure of using Brian’s own Green Guyton when I toured with him. Burns made some affordable replicas, but later Brian took over production with his own brand, Brian May Guitars.
For the recording I used my own green Brian May production guitar, which has had a few modifications to it. This ran into a Brian May signature Fryer Treble Booster and then into a Wampler Thirty Something to emulate the front ends of the Vox. The amp I used was a Cornford Carrera, an 8-watt combo. The phaser was an MXR EVH90, while the chorus, flanger, and delay were added in mixdown, courtesy of Line 6 Mod Pro and Echo Pro units. I used the guitar’s volume to produce different amounts of gain or to make the tone clean, and the treble booster was on all the time. This track will obviously work with any guitar, but having the unique switching available on the Brian May guitar really helps, as in some places I would knock one pickup out of phase to produce that squawky tone and also help sonically separate the layered harmony lines.
The exhibition will offer the opportunity to experience the environment and surroundings in which the band created so many classic tracks.
Burbank, CA (November 15, 2013) -- Much has been written over the years about rock legends Queen’s mastery as musicians, songwriters and live performers. Less has been learned of the inside workings behind the shaping of the music which yielded four decades of pop hits, rock classics, and inspired countless young musicians to find their own place in music history.
Coming in the year which has marked the 40th anniversary of the release of their first single and album, a new Queen exhibition, ‘Queen: The Studio Experience Montreux’, is to offer a rare insight into one of the most significant periods of their recording years. The exhibition will open December 2, to mark World AIDS Day.
The Mountain Studios sessions saw Queen at their most demanding – both of themselves and those who worked around them. Freddie’s proclamation, “I want it to sound like a herd of Wildebeest stampeding from left to right,” was one such typical moment recalled by David Richards, then studio engineer, and later their producer. “Queen had no interest in what might have been done before. They were always looking for something new. So you would have to invent a way.”
Covering Queen’s sessions in Swiss based Montreux Mountain Studios where they regularly recorded between 1978 – 1995 and where they created the bulk of tracks for six of their most popular albums, the exhibition will offer the opportunity to experience the environment and surroundings in which the band created so many classic tracks.
The exhibition, which is under the auspices of the Mercury Phoenix Trust, will particularly highlight Freddie Mercury’s personal ties with Montreux and the studio where in his final months Freddie would spend as much time as his health would allow, recording his very last vocal tracks.
Dedicated to Freddie, the exhibition is being staged by the Mercury Phoenix Trust, the HIV AIDS charity set up in Freddie’s name to fight HIV AIDS worldwide. It will use the exhibition as a backdrop to furthering awareness of its programme of education and global funding in the worldwide fight against AIDS.
Its work in staging the exhibition is enabled through the sponsorship of the Fondation Casino Barrière Montreux, with the support of the Montreux Casino Barrière, the original home of Mountain Studios.
Michel Ferla, Fondation president, says: “The Fondation du Casino Barrière is proud to have been able to support the development and creation of ‘Queen: The Studio Experience Montreux’ at the Montreux Casino where it all started and to bring attention to how Queen contributed to the cultural musical heritage of the town.”
‘Queen: The Studio Experience Montreux’ will faithfully recreate within the Montreux Casino complex the rooms which originally housed Mountain Studios during the Queen recording years (the studio moved out in 2003 for renovation reasons). These revived spaces will be used to display extensive memorabilia from the original studio and from the band’s personal archives of the period: original Queen handwritten song lyrics, band members’ own instruments and costumes, studio tape boxes - many showing the original and subsequently changed titles of tracks, as well as combining specially created interactive audio and visual environments.
The ‘Queen: The Studio Experience Montreux’ is curated by Queen official archivist Greg Brooks and designed by Marmalade London whose previous assignment for Queen was the creation of the resoundingly successful ‘Stormtroopers in Stilettos’ exhibition, originally staged in London in February 2011 to mark the band’s 40th Anniversary. Says Marmalade London’s David Simpson:
“Following the success of the London project, which was attended by more than 22,000 visitors over a ten day period, it is a great privilege for us to now design a permanent exhibition as a celebration of the band's extraordinary achievements. The Swiss town was not only an invaluable retreat for the members of the band, but also a place where so many iconic tracks were conceived and recorded. The combination of footage, costumes, memorabilia, interactive displays and storytelling makes this a compelling exhibition, not only for existing devotees, but also as an introduction to nurture a new generation of fans.”
The exhibition centrepiece will be the original control room used by the band and where Freddie recorded his final vocals, complete with the actual microphone used in those sessions. Visitors are even given the opportunity to sit in the very studio chair Freddie used in those final days of recording, and to take control of legendary producer/engineer David Richards’ mixing desk to create custom mixes of Queen tracks. Initial tracks offered will come from the band’s final Montreux album, “Made in Heaven”. For anyone who has ever wanted to hear a favourite Queen song without guitars, drums or bass, pull up just the piano and backing vocals, or hear just Freddie’s voice in solo, this will present a truly unique opportunity to do so.
Queen first recorded at Mountain Studios in 1978, turning to the studio to complete their seventh studio album, “Jazz”, which they had begun recording in the South of France. A year later Queen took ownership of the studio, which they retained until early 1993.
Following their introduction to the studio with the “Jazz” sessions, five further albums were worked on there, as well as the studio being used by Roger Taylor and Brian May for solo work. Mercury chose Mountain to record a substantial part of his last solo work, his “Barcelona” album with Spanish operatic soprano, Montserrat Caballé.
Mercury was not at first enamoured with the idea of recording in a place with such a peaceful life as Montreux – when asked what to do with the studio once the band first took ownership, he quipped, “Throw it in the lake.” Freddie increasingly grew to love his new surroundings, eventually securing a lakeside apartment and taking up residence for the last period of his life, spending many of his remaining days in Mountain Studios storing vocal tracks for songs he knew would only ever be released once he was gone.
Mercury left Montreux for the last time on November 10, 1991, passing away in London exactly two weeks later, on the evening of Sunday November 24. His last work recorded there appeared on the band’s last album “Made in Heaven”, November 1995. It became one of Queen’s biggest selling albums, reaching sales of more than 20 million units across the world.
Says Brian May: "It's strange how life takes huge turns because of what seems at the time like a small decision. Our whole association with Montreux is the result of a momentary desire to take our recording work outside Britain so we would be more focussed (about 1978, I'm thinking). We decided to try Montreux and Munich as new places to find musical inspiration together as a band. Both turned out to be massive influences on our lives, and Montreux became a kind of second home. So much of our later development is tied into Mountain Studios, so it will be nice for Queen followers to be able to experience the studio first hand, and connect to possibly the most fertile period of all in the Queen story."
Adds Roger Taylor: "Mountain Studios, so many memories."
"Queen: The Studio Experience Montreux" will be opened by Brian May and Roger Taylor December 2, 2013. Thereafter open daily from 10:30 to 22:00. Entrance free although donations to the Mercury Phoenix Trust are encouraged.
For more information:
Queen Studio Experience