REQUEST: Boys of Summer by Don Henley

Secret80'sMan

Experienced
The tones on this song are smokin'. I don't know exactly where to start to get that tight tone for the staccato stuff on the verses nor what to do for the distortion that kicks in on the chorus. Position 4 on a strat seems right but the rest escapes me.

Chef. Groovenut, Simeon, any of you care to give this one a try pleez....
 
Here's my 2 cents. I basically made all sounds fit into one patch since I know you're a gigging musician and rather not switch presets all the time. It is set up for 3 different tones. You control them with the mixer and also need to to turn the drive pedal on for the chorus. I hope you'll find the patch useful. It's a good start - to get you tweaking in the right direction.

I don't know the parts at all. Please bare with my playing. Left channel is the original recording, right channel is the Axe-FX. These patches sound better in stereo...


This is how the different sounds are dialed in. Find the best way to do this with your floor unit...
Boys.jpg


Good luck! :D
 
Holy balls Chef. That's pretty awesome.

I'm digging on your use of the mixer there man. I think you're really going to like the new Scenes feature.
 
Chef, I just returned from two long days of gigs and was psyched to be welcomed by this amazing gift! I can't thank you enough man, you really nailed it especially that tone in the intro which to me is spot on. I have never really played with the mixer in this way so will experiment with it this week. I don't mind using separate presets if necessary within a song so will figure out what works best for my setup and do that.

I have to drop a pitch shifter in there since we drop a half step so hopefully that won't take the preset over the edge CPU wise.

Man, I wish I had this last night at my gig as the vibe woulda been off da hook!!!! Thank you again for once again serving up an extremely tasty meal.
 
Danny Kortchmar was I believe the guitar player on those two Henley albums and did magnificent work, IMHO. Look forward to trying this out next week when I get back home, thanks!
 
Chef, I just returned from two long days of gigs and was psyched to be welcomed by this amazing gift! I can't thank you enough man, you really nailed it especially that tone in the intro which to me is spot on. I have never really played with the mixer in this way so will experiment with it this week. I don't mind using separate presets if necessary within a song so will figure out what works best for my setup and do that.

I have to drop a pitch shifter in there since we drop a half step so hopefully that won't take the preset over the edge CPU wise.

Man, I wish I had this last night at my gig as the vibe woulda been off da hook!!!! Thank you again for once again serving up an extremely tasty meal.

Cool, you're very welcome! :) It was pretty fun... :D I hope the tones translate well live.

Iaresee mentioned this also but, apparently, during Axe Fest this past weekend Cliff made an announcement regarding a new feature called "Scenes". It's basically what I did in this patch but in reality you'll be able to turn on and off a bunch of things with a push of a switch on the 101. So basically, the Intro settings would be Scene 1, and the Verse settings would be Scene 2 and so and so forth ... and you would go through them without changing the preset. It's a killer feature!
 
Cool, you're very welcome! :) It was pretty fun... :D I hope the tones translate well live.

Iaresee mentioned this also but, apparently, during Axe Fest this past weekend Cliff made an announcement regarding a new feature called "Scenes". It's basically what I did in this patch but in reality you'll be able to turn on and off a bunch of things with a push of a switch on the 101. So basically, the Intro settings would be Scene 1, and the Verse settings would be Scene 2 and so and so forth ... and you would go through them without changing the preset. It's a killer feature!

That's right, scenes! That will work perfectly for my purposes on this and tons of other songs Chef.

AustinBuddy, I'm pretty sure it's Tom Petty's guitarist who played on this one since he wrote it if I recall from reading about the session but whoever it was its great playing and tone for sure.
 
That's right, scenes! That will work perfectly for my purposes on this and tons of other songs Chef.

AustinBuddy, I'm pretty sure it's Tom Petty's guitarist who played on this one since he wrote it if I recall from reading about the session but whoever it was its great playing and tone for sure.

Yes that is correct, it was Mike Campbell on that track. Don was using several members of the Heartbreakers on that album. (and Toto for that matter) I'm guessing it was played on a Tele type guitar for that biting tone. Either way when I have played this song live it always sounded better on my tele IMO.
 
Ok, initial impressions having just spent two hours playing with the tones...just outstanding! The intro tone is spot on and I pretty much did nothing to it besides back off the treble slightly and bump the presence to make my Lace Sensor Dually and Hot Lace Sensors match the song better.

The tone for the verse I was concerned that it was too dry but when playing along with the track it sounds spot on. I might need to drop in an EQ and dial out some low if it clashes with the bass but won't know until I get it in rehearsal or soundcheck against what my bass player is doing to know for sure. The verb I thought I heard on that part must have been an aural illusion and coming from something else in the mix because I guess for the staccato to be as pronounced as it is in the original it needs to be pretty dry if not bone dry.

For the chorus it sounds really sweet and I actually liked it with the fourth mix slider up about a third of the way to get that clean chorusy sound in there as well. Not too much but enough to add more definition to the notes when they are arpeggiated.

For the breakdown staccato parts those do have verb and I wasn't quite sure whether to use the sound from the intro on position 2 of my strat and dial back the verb or whether I need to tweak up a new tone just for that part or wait for the scenes feature and do something with that.

Dude, I wish you weren't in Sweden so we could get you to the Axe Fest East when that happens cause I think you could teach a master class on signal routing!

Final thoughts: These are the ultimate tones necessary to pull off this amazing and iconic song. Hats off to ya Chef for taking the time to put the tones together and humoring my request.
 
Ok, initial impressions having just spent two hours playing with the tones...just outstanding! The intro tone is spot on and I pretty much did nothing to it besides back off the treble slightly and bump the presence to make my Lace Sensor Dually and Hot Lace Sensors match the song better.

The tone for the verse I was concerned that it was too dry but when playing along with the track it sounds spot on. I might need to drop in an EQ and dial out some low if it clashes with the bass but won't know until I get it in rehearsal or soundcheck against what my bass player is doing to know for sure. The verb I thought I heard on that part must have been an aural illusion and coming from something else in the mix because I guess for the staccato to be as pronounced as it is in the original it needs to be pretty dry if not bone dry.

For the chorus it sounds really sweet and I actually liked it with the fourth mix slider up about a third of the way to get that clean chorusy sound in there as well. Not too much but enough to add more definition to the notes when they are arpeggiated.

For the breakdown staccato parts those do have verb and I wasn't quite sure whether to use the sound from the intro on position 2 of my strat and dial back the verb or whether I need to tweak up a new tone just for that part or wait for the scenes feature and do something with that.

Dude, I wish you weren't in Sweden so we could get you to the Axe Fest East when that happens cause I think you could teach a master class on signal routing!

Final thoughts: These are the ultimate tones necessary to pull off this amazing and iconic song. Hats off to ya Chef for taking the time to put the tones together and humoring my request.


I really hope the tones will translate well in a live situation. Some tones are great for recording while terrible live and vice versa. I usually keep this in mind when making live patches: If a tone is too dark or saturated in reverb it'll just disappear in the mix. So it's better to keep it a little brighter and conservative than fat and wet. A gated reverb tone is always excellent for live use, IMHO. It'll sound pretty big when the guitar is playing but not drown everything else in its tail. If you want more tail on the reverb for the staccato parts, just increase the release on the gate. For the middle "solo" part I'd simply bypass the gate. I think that'd also result in a slight volume boost.

80's man, I thank you for the kind words! I enjoyed making the patch and it was pretty straight forward. I'm glad to help out - to the best of my abilities. Attending and participating in Axe-Fest would've been really cool. However, not being able to be there in person leaves more room for us to do stuff like this on the forum. IMHO, sharing knowledge is a good thing in any way, shape or form. :) Thanks! :)
 
Thanks for the tips on the verb and the gate Chef, I'll play that and see if it helps. Overall I'm good to go though and I can't thank you enough. I love, just love that we're delving into these tones because they not only demonstrate that the axe fx has killer amps but amazing effects too.
 
Great job, Chef! I love the tones on this song too. Had a question: if it was Mike Campbell who played on this song, would it have been perhaps more appropriate to use one of the Vox amp sims? I think your preset sounds REALLY good, but I see you used the Hiwatt sim instead. Any particular reason you used that sim? Thanks!
 
Great job, Chef! I love the tones on this song too. Had a question: if it was Mike Campbell who played on this song, would it have been perhaps more appropriate to use one of the Vox amp sims? I think your preset sounds REALLY good, but I see you used the Hiwatt sim instead. Any particular reason you used that sim? Thanks!

Thank you very much! :D

My outlook is always: Whatever works, works. Meaning: Copying the signal chain verbatim doesn't necessarily reap the same results. With that said, I consider having a pretty decent mental sound image of most of the amps in the unit. When I heard the recording, I was instantly drawn to the Hiwatt, a punchy yet chimey tone... That was the first choice actually. Then the cab: I tried 3 or 4 prior to using the Orange V30. Like I said, it was very straight forward. The Vox is more squashy and ringy - to me. It's perfect for some situations but IMHO not here. The Matchless on the other hand and IMHO is a better option for that Vox flavor - if you want that type of tone for this song. :razz
 
Last edited:
Thank you very much! :D

My outlook is always: Whatever works, works. Meaning: Copying the signal chain verbatim doesn't necessarily reap the same results. With that said, I consider having a pretty decent mental sound image of most of the amps in the unit. When I heard the recording, I was instantly drawn to the Hiwatt, a punchy yet chimey tone... That was the first choice actually. Then the cab: I tried 3 or 4 prior to using the Orange V30. Like I said, it was very straight forward. The Vox is more squashy and ringy - to me. It's perfect for some situations but IMHO not here. The Matchless on the other hand and IMHO is a better option for that Vox flavor - if you want that type of tone for this song. :razz

I hear what Chef is saying. If you know the signal chain and it's easy enough to start there as a point of reference well it probably makes sense but if you know the tones of each amp in the Axe inside and out like Chef and some of the other guys on here then you can more quickly get the desired results.

I remember Chef attempting to get the Flesh for Fantasy tone and going through the exact virtual signal chain Steve Stevens used but the tone was missing the boat on some levels. He then went Back and just used his ears and nailed it!
 
Simply amazing stuff Chef.... Always a learning experience to see the potential of building these presets out like you do.
 
What up gang! I am excited to post a live recording from this past Saturday's gig of my band playing this song using Chefster's amazing patches. Please forgive the shitty board mix and the fact that I came in late with the very first lick at the intro. The slight latency you hear at the breakdown is because I am fighting the pitch shifter block since we tune down electronically a half step on this one. Other than that I feel pretty good about it and once again my kudos to the chef. Enjoy!

 
Last edited:
What up gang! I am excited to post a live recording from this past Saturday's gig of my band playing this song using Chefster's amazing patches. Please forgive the shitty board mix and the fact that I came in late with the very first lick at the intro. The slight latency you hear at the breakdown is because I am fighting the pitch shifter block since we tune down electronically a half step on this one. Other than that I feel pretty good about it and once again my kudos to the chef. Enjoy!



Great! Thank you very much, 80s Man! Well played and the band sounds absolutely fantastic! IMHO, the guitar's perfectly blended in the mix and cut just enough.

Small suggestions: Increase the "Input Trim" parameter of the amp block a few notches, up to about 2 o clock? I also remember playing all parts with the bridge humbucker of my Tyler. This thing has a really hot output. I'm somehow under the impression you are using lace sensor pickups - I mean, I can vaguely remember you mentioning it!? In any care, if you haven't, try the humbucker for a bit more break up and a mid frequency boost. This will, IMHO, sound closer to the original. Great! Thank you very much!
 
Back
Top Bottom