Rig Rundown: Covet's Yvette Young

Yvette Young’s electric guitar journey started on a SX Telecaster (it came to her by way of a trade for a drum machine because she wanted to plug in), but her connection with Ibanez can be pinpointed to her first one—a ’90s Talman with Bill Lawrence pickups. The finger-tapping phenom travels with a trifecta of eye-catching guitars, including a pair of sparkle-finished Ibanez Talmans that Yvette Young has named “Creamsicle” and “Flubber.”

At a recent NAMM show, she was loaned a Talman for demo work and immediately heard a difference in her tone definition and the interaction with her amp. She inquired with an Ibanez A&R rep what the pickups were in that model and she found out they were a set of Seymour Duncan SSL-5 Custom Staggered single-coils, so now both Talmans sing thanks to those pickups.

“Flubber” has typical 5-way switching, but you’ll find this showstopper in one of three spots: neck for most finger-tapping sections because of the ringing overtones, the fourth position for softer, delicate fingerpicked portions, or the bridge when she wants to get gritty and goose the amp. Both Talmans take D’Addario NYXL Extra Heavy (.012–.060) strings. While she changes tunings throughout the show, a mainstay for her is the Lydian-flavored F–A–C–G–B–E, which was inspired by the Japanese post-rock band, Toe.

“Creamsicle” is identical to “Flubber” in every way except for it having a rosewood fretboard. Like most guitarists, Yvette admits that while the guitars are similar in spec, they sound different enough that “Flubber” is currently her numero uno. (Also, if you watch the video around 6:30 she punks Chris by telling him that it’s made up of her dog’s ashes—it’s not, nor has she ever owned a dog.)

Yvette typically opens the set with two numbers “Sea Currents” and “Falkor” (yes, after the dog-like creature in The Neverending Story) that require this Strandberg Boden 7-string. Aiming to achieve both the antithesis of metal (Boden 7-strings are often found in the hands of rockers) and to visually match her transcendent onstage sounds, Yvette handpainted the model and uses it every night.

Here’s Yvette’s “Toyota” combo aka a Vox AC30.

And here are Yvette’s typical settings—notice she plugs into the high input of the top boost channel, still uses the amp’s reverb even though she has two reverb pedals on her board and dials out all the trem.

Yvette Young is the only guitarist in her three-piece band, so she has a lot of sonic space to fly and her board is the launch pad. It currently holds a pair of EarthQuaker pedals—Warden Compressor and Avalanche Run—a duo of Walrus Audio stomps—a Fathom Reverb and Julia Chorus/Vibrato—a trio of MXR boxes—Ten-Band EQ, Carbon Copy Deluxe, and a Bass Octave Deluxe. Other noisemakers include a newly acquired Caroline Guitar Company Somersault, Electronic Audio Experiments Longsword, Meris Mercury7, TC Electronic Ditto, and a Ground Control Amaterasu V2. And a TC Electronic PolyTune3 keeps everything in check.