WISHBONE ASH
http://www.mikepiera.com/ash.htm
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JAKE E. LEE
"Jake's Equipment
The equipment Jake was using on Retraced was a bit different from his older recordings.
"I used an assortment of loaner guitars, along with the ESP Ultra-Tone I brought to Vegas with me. There was a stock, Mexican-made, Stratocaster w/rosewood fingerboard, a Fender "Nocaster", an early seventies Les Paul Custom, and the guitar I, by far, used the most, a single pickup mid sixties Melodymaker with Seymour Duncan JB jr pick-ups. The amp was a Soldano SLO 100, but two of the power tubes were pulled to bring it down to 50 watts. It was run through a Variac to bring the incoming voltage down a little, and came out a one by twelve Marshall cab, all to keep the volume down since it was recorded in the hallway of Michael Lardy's home. Among the pedals used were a Cat's Eye Mista' Fuzz, a G. S. Wyllie Moonrock, a Shin-ei FuzzWah and a Tycobrahe Pedalflanger," Jake explains.
I've seen discussions on various message boards regarding what pick-ups Jake is using and asked him to straighten the matter out.
"The single coils have always been DiMarzio SDS1's, the only great sounding pickup I think they ever made. The humbucker was at one time a Duncan Holdsworth prototype, but mostly it's been a Duncan Jeff Beck. Presently I'm trying out different pickups. Don't know exactly what I'm looking for, but hopefully I'll know when I hear it. I've always loved the sound of P-90's and Lipsticks, but they can be so noisy it ultimately becomes grating, same as my old Uni-Vibe. I loved the glassy, liquid sound I got from it, but it was so noisy I'd avoid using it. I ended up selling it because of that, even though I've yet to hear anyone else's version of it come close to sounding as good," he says.
Another thing I've noticed is Jake is never using a whammy bar. How come?
"Back in '75 my only guitar was a Gibson SG standard and I wanted to add a Strat, so I worked at a local music store in exchange for any Strat in the store. I thought they all came with wiggle-sticks, but when I went through all the guitars, about 20, to find the one I liked the best, there was one without the bar that sounded way better than any of the others. That's the one that became my favorite. Later it was repainted by my roommate who worked in the Charvel paint shop. Ever since, I've felt that any tremolo (vibrato, really) system on a guitar takes away from the tone, at least the tone I'm looking for.""
