Distorted Guitar Sounds in Jazz

[HighSpeedSpoon]

... I thought it might be a good idea to start a thread where you can share your favourite examples of crunch or distortion in jazz.

I would start with Mary Halvorson. You hear the sound I'm referring to from 16:30 mins. onward.

Thanks very much. I enjoyed the piece, and her use of distortion worked for me in the context of this piece. Discussion overdrive or distortion without context doesn't mean much to me.

[neatomic]

james blood ulmer, larry coryell, sonny sharrock, pete cosey, marc ribot, arto lindsey, robert quine..pioneers of the whole downtown knitting factory scene


cheers

[aleksandar]

Possibly, Stern is more obviously blues rock. But I would regard Stern as much more of a traditional bop improviser who sticks some blues rock licks and a bunch on chorus on so he could get gigs in the '70s :-)

But I still hear Kurt as prog rock player - perhaps not a guitar player though - maybe a synth player haha. Not many bends going on... I think it was when I put Heartcore on for my flatmate an excellent jazz pianist, and he said with some derision 'this isn't jazz - it's prog rock!!!' and I realised then he was right (flatmate in question is more into Sonny Clarke and the Smiths.)

The thing is I infinitely prefer Bernstein's very straight sound in this clip, but that's a matter of taste, I think.

(The thing is I still have a huge soft spot for Steve Hackett and all that lot..... Not sure if I should admit that early Genesis was the first band I got into ... oh well I just did)

But anyway, yes Kurt and that lot are pretty amazing and the early days fusion players don't tend to interest me (I like Jonny Mac better when he had no picking chops... )

I think that unless you play a big fat archtop with strings like bridge supports (or a Maccaferri) and take into account anything done in guitar since Wes you will inevitably sound like prog rock. It's just the way it is. Popular music is all about simple things being played on the guitar....

Why not wear the cape? :-)

Hm, I don't know why you would call him a synth player...He does use a synth from time to time, but hey, what is it with some guitar players using that thing, anyway...I mean, Abercrombie, Metheny...

Anyway, Rosenwinkel uses 12 gauge strings on a semi-hollow guitar. He does use some effects, but in a more tastier way than Stern, in my opinion. Stern's sound is all....wet!!! And there is no just "Heartcore" Rosenwinkel, he also has a standards album, then "Our secret world", album with big band, that sounds like a modernized soundtrack for some black and white movie to me and so on. As a matter of fact, while I was working, I just finished my work and stopped by to see what's new, I was watching this:

As for the distortion sound, I like the fact that, along with the compression and delay pedals, he use it in a jazzy way, I think, not that much in a rock or blues way, with lots of dynamics, screaming distortion. It just sounds like the same instrument with a different timbre, and not like "you step on the distortion and you make it to another level" thing

[christianm77]

4

Hm, I don't know why you would call him a synth player...He does use a synth from time to time, but hey, what is it with some guitar players using that thing, anyway...I mean, Abercrombie, Metheny...

Anyway, Rosenwinkel uses 12 gauge strings on a semi-hollow guitar. He does use some effects, but in a more tastier way than Stern, in my opinion. Stern's sound is all....wet!!! And there is no just "Heartcore" Rosenwinkel, he also has a standards album, then "Our secret world", album with big band, that sounds like a modernized soundtrack for some black and white movie to me and so on. As a matter of fact, while I was working, I just finished my work and stopped by to see what's new, I was watching this:

As for the distortion sound, I like the fact that, along with the compression and delay pedals, he use it in a jazzy way, I think, not that much in a rock or blues way, with lots of dynamics, screaming distortion. It just sounds like the same instrument with a different timbre, and not like "you step on the distortion and you make it to another level" thing

Sure I know Kurt's other work.

When I say Kurt is a synth player I don't mean this literally (as in he plays a guitar synth) I mean he sounds like a synth. Particularly on record, although live his sound seems to be going even more this way. One aspect that probably contributes that is the use of his voice mixed into the guitar sound....

I like Heartcore best actually, perhaps it doesn't really sound like a jazz record. I really like the production. Go figure. The more acoustic rhythm section stuff I'm not into so much.

The Next Step sounded like a step back, to me.

Also gauge 12 = weak sauce and sem-hollow = not a proper jazz guitar :-P

(I'm kidding of course, you wouldn't find many rockers playing 12's & and have .11's on my tele)

If you listen to Kurt's first two albums he is playing with a much more traditional jazz sound, too. In a way I like it less when Kurt is doing the straightahead thing because I don't think he is playing to his strengths so much, although I have to say he is very good at it (i.e. much better than me :-))...

Maybe it's all part of the inevitable Kurt backlash. I listened to him a lot over 10 years or so....

Not a big fan of Stern's sound (it's a bit indistinct somehow) but playing wise he's fantastic of course.

[nick1994]

to me, Rosenwinkal's sound is really even, to the point where slurs and picks almost become blurred (though there's still a distinction) and his attack becomes less obvious. It's a legato sound that's not like scofield, pat or holdsworth.

[aleksandar]

It is even because he is using a compressor pedal. I have read in some interview with him, where he said that he tries as hard as he can to eliminate the transient from the pick and to make it sound more a legato thing,while not losing the dynamics of the guitar. But I don't think his guitar is overprocessed, especially compared to the guys that are using stuff like delay and chorus with some detuned settings (like some Sco's stuff, for example).

As for his singing while playing....Well now, I guess Keith Jarret's sound is uber-processed in that regard

And again about "rock reflexes", well compare, I don't know, Chromazone with Turns or Slow Change (one of my favorite songs of his) with Use of Light...Few months ago I played Rosenwinkel's View from Moscow to a girl who just got back from New York, and she said, wow this reminds me so much of New York. I think Kurt's sound is one of the most lyrical guitar sounds I've heard. I don't say that Mike is bad compared to Kurt, but I think Mike's sound, playing and overall feeling has that rockish thing to it from the 80's, while Kurt's sound is some dark, mellow sound that you would associate with a smokey bar.

[christianm77]

It is even because he is using a compressor pedal. I have read in some interview with him, where he said that he tries as hard as he can to eliminate the transient from the pick and to make it sound more a legato thing,while not losing the dynamics of the guitar. But I don't think his guitar is overprocessed, especially compared to the guys that are using stuff like delay and chorus with some detuned settings (like some Sco's stuff, for example).

Oh he said that did he?

Well there you go. It's an aesthetic common to many up and coming guys. It's interesting if you compare him to Ben Monder, who isn't nearly as legato even though superfically their sound (lots of ambience) is quite similar. In Monder's playing it feels like the reverb is padding out the length of the notes, which is not true of Kurt.

So the big thing ATM is lots of digital ambience. I think when people look back at jazz guitar in the 2010s they will feel the same way as we do about chorus in '80s stuff. But like chorus, it's a very good way of helping the guitar take up more sonic room in the band and 'fill it out' a bit.

I think the trend towards lots delay and reverb is a little troublesome, not least because I like playing with that sound myself. It's very comforting, but it can become a bit much sometimes... A bit of a crutch... A sound engineer once told me that while you want reverb, if you can actually hear it in the mix it's too much.

There is something quite artificial about it.

I think stereo amps, relatively dry, might be a better approach for helping the guitar take up more sonic 'space.'

PB is like the opposite. He must use round wounds, loads of squeaks and scrapes...

And again about "rock reflexes", well compare, I don't know, Chromazone with Turns or Slow Change (one of my favorite songs of his) with Use of Light...Few months ago I played Rosenwinkel's View from Moscow to a girl who just got back from New York, and she said, wow this reminds me so much of New York. I think Kurt's sound is one of the most lyrical guitar sounds I've heard. I don't say that Mike is bad compared to Kurt, but I think Mike's sound, playing and overall feeling has that rockish thing to it from the 80's, while Kurt's sound is some dark, mellow sound that you would associate with a smokey bar.

I like Mikes' solo album

I haven't listened to Kurt's stuff for a couple of years. I might come back to it. Use of Light is nice. Again I would say if Sterny is a full on blues rocker with bebop chops, Kurt is a prog rocker.

Incidentally I never used to see the fuss about Kurt on record, but the first thing of his I really got into was this - I love the intensity of his performance here:

Now that's a great tone, to me. I like they way it's crunchy but not full distorted, not smooth. Almost a punk/new wave sound. That arpeggio he finishes his solo with as well *shudder*

Actually I come across as down on Kurt, but when I went to hear him live in around 2008 I was completely unprepared for how great he was live. That gig was definitely up there with when I heard Pat Metheny (where the music was boring as fuck IMO, but when he actually played some jazz it was incredible). None of the contemporary guitarists I have heard come close. Peter Bernstein I loved as equally, but in a very different way.

Also I saw Kurt in a packed small jazz club, PB was at Ronnie Scott's. Although the sound can be very good, Ronnie's seems to suck the energy out of many players, so I can only imagine what the likes of Chris Potter Underground, Krantz and the Larry Goldings trio sound like in a proper NY sweaty club. They were pretty badass at Ronnie's...

[Nate Miller]

best way to take up more space is to play with a thick and heavy pick and use a high e string gauge of .14

gets you that fat round sound you need to go up against a sax player

[aleksandar]

Incidentally I never used to see the fuss about Kurt on record, but the first thing of his I really got into was this - I love the intensity of his performance here:

Now that's a great tone, to me. I like they way it's crunchy but not full distorted, not smooth. Almost a punk/new wave sound.

Yeah, it sounds like it's the RAT. That is such a great distortion pedal, that came out like that by accident actually. The designer got the wrong resistors in place because he was tired, I think that's how the story goes. Well, about the artificial thing, yeah, I agree, I don't like very much reverb and delay either, although the thing about Kurt's sound is that the effects are kind of subtle. Like he use them to sculpt the tone, not to enhance it, or to add up to it. I've read that he is using a splitter/mixer pedal of sort, so he can mix his wet and dry signal.

The first time I got to know about Kurt's music was by accident. Because my job mostly consist of sitting all day in front of the computer, I like to put my headphones and work with music on, kind of helps the process. Anyway, so I sit there, and the youtube was on autoplay, and then I heard this heavy piano intro, then the drums with this syncopated, heavy time, and then this almost oriental theme played by a guitar and sax, but like a counterpoint at times, and I was, now this is some heavy shit, what is it...?

And it was The Next Step from this video:

Also "View from Moscow", that song opened a whole new horizon about harmony for me. I mean, you play A, E, F and you call that A minor7?! And then you play something like a child's theme over some sort of Latin rhythm and you call that "View from Moscow" - but it is a great song.

Now, I don't if you can call that prog rock, to me that is jazz. It has the swing feel, syncopated rhythms, elaborated harmonies and melodies...Well, maybe you could call it prog jazz, I don't know...

But, no matter how you call it, it is a fact that actually Kurt has started a whole new style. Even John Abercrombie, who is also one of my favorites, said that in a podcast show that I heard some time ago. He said something like: "There is a new style now, a new generation of players, and this guy, Kurt Rosenwinkel, he is like their father."

[christianm77]

Prog jazz it is!

Yeah I like his tunes. One of the most haunting moment in Heartcore is that little interlude thing. I really like that...

The early - mid noughties stuff has it on the sound for me. Like you say quite subtle. Most of it's in the fingers.

Also I like the way he uses arm weight to drive the sound a bit sometimes.

[nick1994]

best way to take up more space is to play with a thick and heavy pick and use a high e string gauge of .14

gets you that fat round sound you need to go up against a sax player

round 9s on a lp through a marshall stack with a .70mm pick works better. I'd like to see any sax player match my tubescreamer

[aleksandar]

Prog jazz it is!

Yeah I like his tunes. One of the most haunting moment in Heartcore is that little interlude thing. I really like that...

The early - mid noughties stuff has it on the sound for me. Like you say quite subtle. Most of it's in the fingers.

Also I like the way he uses arm weight to drive the sound a bit sometimes.

By the way, the drummer in the above video, Jeff Ballard. Man is he kicking butt with those drums!

[Melodic Dreamer]

I know this thread is about distortion, but the last few posts have been about the use of delay and reverb. I still think this particular period of Frisell's tone works so really well in the context of horn players.

The whole performance is amazing, but the solo starts around 5:10. I actually shoot for this sound a lot.

[HighSpeedSpoon]

Speaking of Bill Frisell, he has a new album released this very today, When You Wish Upon a Star. FWIW you can tell from the previews that effects are used.

[sgcim]

I told a student of mine to use distortion on a solo he has in his High School Jazz Ensemble on a kind of funky tune with straight 8ths.
I asked him last week how it went, and he said his HS teacher screamed at him, "Turn that distortion off! What are you trying to do, turn this into some type of heavy metal, Metallica band?!"

He then played the same solo, without distortion, and the teacher said, "Very good."

The teacher was a trumpet player, of course.

[Nate Miller]

well, this weekend, I got curious about all this distorted bebop stuff, so I plugged in my strat knockoff and had a go.

On the up side, solid body electric plugged into a Marshal amp feels like riding a big horse. You don't need to play chords to get a full sound, that's for sure. It is very sax-like. In fact, give me a Marshal half-stack and I'll blow a tenor player right off the bandstand

On the flip side, I noticed that the distortion sound needs a little time to develop. On my little test track on Oleo over in the showcase section, I even slowed down a bit from where I'm used to playing that tune to give the distortion a chance.

The distortion I get out of my Marshall is probably the good kind to use for this because it actually rewards clean playing. Some distortion pedals just put up a wall of fuzz that hides sloppy playing. I would think the RATT pedal or a good amp with a great distortion channel would be the way to go

anyhow, I noticed that I would need to put some time into playing bop on this rig if I was going to do this properly. Aside from just getting used to the sound, I would want to find some more things that were truly idiomatic for the electric guitar that I could use in the context of bop. For example, the bridge I chose for Oleo was one that I could get the most out of the electric ound. Its the bridge to Apple Jump by Dexter Gordon. Let's see...big long wailing notes done by a tenor player....hmm...there must be a connection

[Fidelcaster]

Scofieldesque overdrive.

[Bluzac]

Some purists would argue there's no such thing, they may say once you add distortion or OD it's not jazz, it becomes Fusion or Blues rock. I am definitely not in agreement with that idea.
I once had this conversation with a sax playing friend of mine. When I pointed out guys Mike Stern, Sco and Bill Frisell he shot down my argument by saying they are not jazz players but "frustrated rock and funk players pretending to play jazz". I had to seriously evaluate our friendship.

[shanejohnson2002]

I think in the older days, distortion was almost inevitable, but not in the sense that we think of it today. Small, low-wattage combo amps cranked to 11 tend to distort. Period. In the early electric days if you played a large enough audience, you would almost have to do it to be heard, especially over a much larger horn section.

Coming from the rock/metal side of the house myself (and only recently back into jazz, which is what I first studied), I can honesty say that I really don't think a hard rock / death metal distortion sound has any place in jazz. It's just antithematic to the point of being abrasive....which could also be used in an artistic way, I guess, just not by me.

There's also an argument to be made for clarity. Jazz is all about the "interesting" intervals in chords. 3rds, 7ths, 6ths, 9ths, 11ths, etc etc. Those can quickly get lost in the noise (quite literally) if you are pushing a Randall Diavlo with a cranked TS808 (my favorite rock / metal combination, btw).

Tubescreamer with the gain wide open? Sure. ProCo Rat on a low-ish setting? Absolutely. Even tasteful use of fuzz I can definitely agree with. Much more than that can quickly become too much and uncontrollable.

Other common rock / metal sounds though can be integrated much more easily. I actually prefer stacked delays with a touch of modulation to a reverb. Phasers, flangers, chorus, synths...all have been used in a "jazz" context before, whether fusion or mainstream.

Just my .02

[christianm77]

I'm sure Django would have had something to do with jazz/rock had he lived

[Duotone]

I think in the older days, distortion was almost inevitable, but not in the sense that we think of it today. Small, low-wattage combo amps cranked to 11 tend to distort. Period. In the early electric days if you played a large enough audience, you would almost have to do it to be heard, especially over a much larger horn section.

Coming from the rock/metal side of the house myself (and only recently back into jazz, which is what I first studied), I can honesty say that I really don't think a hard rock / death metal distortion sound has any place in jazz. It's just antithematic to the point of being abrasive....which could also be used in an artistic way, I guess, just not by me.

There's also an argument to be made for clarity. Jazz is all about the "interesting" intervals in chords. 3rds, 7ths, 6ths, 9ths, 11ths, etc etc. Those can quickly get lost in the noise (quite literally) if you are pushing a Randall Diavlo with a cranked TS808 (my favorite rock / metal combination, btw).

Tubescreamer with the gain wide open? Sure. ProCo Rat on a low-ish setting? Absolutely. Even tasteful use of fuzz I can definitely agree with. Much more than that can quickly become too much and uncontrollable.

Other common rock / metal sounds though can be integrated much more easily. I actually prefer stacked delays with a touch of modulation to a reverb. Phasers, flangers, chorus, synths...all have been used in a "jazz" context before, whether fusion or mainstream.

Just my .02

Speaking of Frisell, I just thought I'd post a link to John Zorn's Naked City:

Very entertaining to watch and listen to. Lots of distortion going on, beyond all control, notably from 14:00 on. Not only distorted guitar btw.

[trap]

I think in the older days, distortion was almost inevitable, but not in the sense that we think of it today. Small, low-wattage combo amps cranked to 11 tend to distort. Period. In the early electric days if you played a large enough audience, you would almost have to do it to be heard, especially over a much larger horn section.

Coming from the rock/metal side of the house myself (and only recently back into jazz, which is what I first studied), I can honesty say that I really don't think a hard rock / death metal distortion sound has any place in jazz. It's just antithematic to the point of being abrasive....which could also be used in an artistic way, I guess, just not by me.

There's also an argument to be made for clarity. Jazz is all about the "interesting" intervals in chords. 3rds, 7ths, 6ths, 9ths, 11ths, etc etc. Those can quickly get lost in the noise (quite literally) if you are pushing a Randall Diavlo with a cranked TS808 (my favorite rock / metal combination, btw).

Tubescreamer with the gain wide open? Sure. ProCo Rat on a low-ish setting? Absolutely. Even tasteful use of fuzz I can definitely agree with. Much more than that can quickly become too much and uncontrollable.

Other common rock / metal sounds though can be integrated much more easily. I actually prefer stacked delays with a touch of modulation to a reverb. Phasers, flangers, chorus, synths...all have been used in a "jazz" context before, whether fusion or mainstream.

Just my .02

i agree. Listen to old Charlie Christian recordings at jam sessions. Overdriven amp , note bending, awesome!
I like very few jazz players overdrive tones. I think a solid body with a light OD like a zendrive sounds best. Even though Henderson sounds great with some serious OD on standards.
as for whether or not it is jazz? Having gone thru the Jazz purist stage in my twenties it now repulses me. Jazz is about change as much as changes.