Help! Albert Lee or Silhouette Special?

[georg]

Hi guys,

at the moment i do not own any music man guitar, but i'm very close to buy one. i'm from austria and i do not have many chances to play ebmm guitars in a guitar store to test them. maybe i will do a trip to germany in summer. but maybe i will buy one online without testing it. let's see...
i do a lot of research on the net and i think that i prefer the albert lee sss model (maybe in vintage sunburst and white pearloid pickguard, natural headstock, no trem, no piezo).
but i'm not sure about the performance of the guitar when putting on higher gain. mostly i play in the style of eric clapton, gov't mule, pink floyd, beatles...
but sometimes i need to play black sabbath, iron maiden or a few punk tunes in my cover band, and i do not find any reviews or demos of the albert lee played at higher gain. i will not play high gain metal or shredding or something else. i think black sabbath is the upper gain limit ;-)
i know about the silent circuit, but how is the tone of the guitar?

i think about buying the silhouette special instead. it's a very beautiful guitar, too, and the playability is great, too, i think and there is a humbucker in the bridge position, that i can use for the higher gain sounds.

i'm not sure...so maybe some of you can give me some inputs about the sound (differences) of the to guitars at higher gain (and maybe clean, too).
i have to mention that i 'm searching for only one guitar for all of my music. at the moment i have a cort g-custom and i will sell it as soon as i get my ebmm. i don't want to have 2 or 3 guitars at home. so the guitar should sound great (what all ebmm do), but should be versatile so that i can play all i need on only one model.
i'm playing through a crate vintage club 50w without any pedals at the moment. just using the clean and gain channel with the gain control for different songs and the reverb control
rarely i use my digitech rp 255.

thanks,
georg

 

[threeminutesboy]

Hi Georg and welcome.

I will play the little devil here and say that AL with MM90 could fit the bill nicely. That being said the Silo Spec HSS is a very good choice also and if you go that route you can also consider the Luke III but there is a trem

good luck with your new purchase, you won't regret it

 

[Spudmurphy]

... and I'd say Al SSS hee hee
... the HH is a good 'un too!

 

[georg]

@threeminutesboy:
thanks for your suggestions. the albert lee mm90 sounds interesting. how does is performe in the clean sounds? can you hear the typical quak or twang like you do with the single coils or are they much more "warm" or "fat"?

@spudmurphy:
i see you have 3 wonderful albert lees, i envy you!
maybe you can tell me a little bit about the performance of the single coils at "higher" gain, maybe you can even give me some examples...i would be very pleased about

 

[beej]

They're both excellent guitars and cover a lot of similar ground- you can't go wrong with either. I prefer the AL for aesthetics and feel, but that's personal preference. They sound a bit different, with the AL having more of a vintage flavour (and twang with the bridge pickup).

In your shoes, I'd think the Silhouette Special in SSH configuration would be ideal. If you go with the SS or AL in an SSS config, I'd look to replace the bridge single with something higher output and humbucking. (I have a Bill Lawrence L298 in one of my ALs for this- easily handles higher gain stuff.) Then you'll have it all covered.

 

[Jack FFR1846]

Personally, I'd recommend a silo spec HSS. I have a sub 1 modified with silo spec HSS and silent circuit and an Al SSS and an Axis Supersport MM90.

The hum of the silo spec is the only one I would consider for any thing Ozzy or anything close to metal. The MM90 is what I consider an "everything" pickup, but I do find it isn't heavy enough. The Al is my favorite guitar and for the kind of music you're thinking of, an Al HH would be a better match, I think.

You'll like any of them, and I think you'll be happy whatever you choose.

 

[lock-ny]

I have 2 silo specials HSS and they are the most versatile in the MM lineup IMO, I know guys are gonna disagree, Id love an AL HH soon but for your needs you get a bucker in the bridge and all sorts of single coil tones plus you can split the bucker, its a no brainer to me, good luck in your decision...

 

[Klon Solo]

I just did a demo the other day with the al sss using a megalith delta high gain pedal.

It was fun. It s pretty muddy on the low end. Check out cbone magnifico on YouTube. That's me. It's my latest video.

I'm not even 25% as good as the guys on this website, but at least you'll get an idea.

 

[billy carr]

What about a hss Albert Lee? That would be pretty sweet. Go from twang to screamin harmonics! Sounds fun.

 

[GWDavis28]

What about a hss Albert Lee? That would be pretty sweet. Go from twang to screamin harmonics! Sounds fun.

So billy, you asked, there was one made, it use to be owned by Pete, here, I think Keith owns it though it was for sale recently. In original Blue Dawn no less!!!!

Glenn |B)

 

[Tollywood]

What about a hss Albert Lee? That would be pretty sweet. Go from twang to screamin harmonics! Sounds fun.

It is fun! Here's my modified Albert Lee BFR.

 

[billy carr]

I'm jealous, I would really like somthing like that...maybe I will get lucky some day!

 

[paranoid70]

I would say the Silhouette Special (duh). I use it for hard rock and metal all the time.

(To be honest I typically use a SG for the Sabbath songs tuned to C# - Into the Void, Snowblind, Lord of this World....)

 

[banjoplayer]

Hi Georg,
welcome to the forum. Where are you in Austria? I´m in Ulm/Germany. Feel free to try my AL SSS whenever you are near. The AL SSS has vintage/50s-style pickups. Changing them is possible but not necessarily. The AL covers a lot of styles similar to a Strat or a Tele. It is very versatile. Black Sabbath/Maiden may need a bit adjustment but with the right pedals you can eventually try it with the stock pickups.
For me my Steve Morse and my Albert covers all that is needed. Of course I have others for fun, but I could live with those two.

Here are two videos of me with my band playing Pearl Jam - Alive (Solo at 3:40) and Rage Against The Machine - Bombtrack (Solo at 2:58). Both played with my AL. It´s not high gain, but maybe you get the idea

 

[banjoplayer]

(AL is on the left)

 

[georg]

Hi guys and thanks for all your inputs!


@klon solo: thanks, but i can't find your channel. can you post a link here?


@gwdavis28: very nice, this one would be very cool. albert lee hss, wow this one was produced by music man in this way? why is it no serial model?

@tollie: wow, this one is crazy looking very cool...how's the sound? what pickups do you have in there?


@paranoid70: do you always use the bridge humbucker or how do the single coils work at the gain level?


@banjoplayer: very cool, thank you. the vids are great and your playing, too! nice solo @ alive!! and the guitar looks and sounds really nice. very nice distorted tone in both songs. i will definitely not use much more distortion that you did in both songs. are you using many pedals there?
i live in vienna, but i will do a trip to pro music tools in munich on the 1st of august, because they have a lot of ebmm guitars there. how far is ulm to munich?

 

[GWDavis28]

@gwdavis28: very nice, this one would be very cool. albert lee hss, wow this one was produced by music man in this way? why is it no serial model?

Georg, story is that it was built by an employee (for himself), he had it and then years later decided to sell it. It has quite the coolness factor as because it's Blue Dawn and that EBMM doesn't make/sell an AL SSH.

Glenn |B)

 

[banjoplayer]

@banjoplayer: very cool, thank you. the vids are great and your playing, too! nice solo @ alive!! and the guitar looks and sounds really nice. very nice distorted tone in both songs. i will definitely not use much more distortion that you did in both songs. are you using many pedals there?
i live in vienna, but i will do a trip to pro music tools in munich on the 1st of august, because they have a lot of ebmm guitars there. how far is ulm to munich?

gern geschehen
On Alive I used my Crate Vintage Club 30 combo, on Bombtrack my Laney LH50R Head. Cant remember about pedals as both was a few years ago. But possibly a Tube Screamer or BK Butler Tube Driver (both usually with high Volume and Low Gain as a booster). Nothing extreme here, normal Classic Rock Equipment and settings.

Ulm is between Munich and Stuttgart. About 140km from Munich. I´m here early August if you want to make the distance. But pro music tools should have all you want. I see their guitars on ebay. I find them a bit pricey for used EBMMS but there are only a few around on ebay from private sellers. Maybe you will find something here on the forum. Every now and then some German or European forumite is selling something...

 

[georg]

@glenn: very cool story to a great guitar

@banjoplayer: danke!
Crate Vintage Club sounds great, i have a 50watt combo...i love it. nice to hear that other guys are using it, too. especially in combination with such a wonderful guitar.


i start think about the albert hh model. does anyone of you play one of these wonderful guitars? i've seen a vintage burst model with all rosewood neck and fretboard und an walnut model, too. they look brilliant.
the only thing is the twang: how is the clean sound of the two humbuckers? is it any kind of teleish or stratish?

 

[mtrejo]

I'd highly recommend the AL MM90 as well. I have two and I love them both! Yes, they indeed clean up very well, get that quack you are looking for and sound mean as hell overdriven.

A little technique I discovered recently. Mine are piezo, so on a clean tone, I roll off all the treble and set the magnetic pickups to about 95%. Mix in about 80% piezo to add back the sparkle and man, it sounds very rich. Spent about an hour noodling with this config yesterday. Not to mention I just strung up a set of M-Steels. All I needed was a few beers and I'd be all set.