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Cure Love Song Tone

Posted: Sat Nov 30, 2019 12:05 pm
by stevemac100
Hi, one of my favourite guitar tones is on The Cure's Love Song, especially the guitar break in the middle. I've tried a lot but can't really get close to the tone. Any ideas?

Re: Cure Love Song Tone

Posted: Sat Nov 30, 2019 3:08 pm
by Unicorn Warrior
I’m assuming you’re talking about the solo. Idk what he used to record. He’s played JMs, gretsches, and teles among other things through the years. A simple delay, reverb, a cheap distortion/OD, and either chorus or flange will probably get you there. I got close with my old fender mustang, trinity reverb, dd-3, and an ehx soul food. Don’t think I had flange at the time.
I’m thinking flange over chorus. But chorus will likely get it close too. Or something completely different which may not be bad.

Robert usually used boss effects. May not be exactly what he used, but these will likely work: I’d try a dd-2 or 3, boss od3, CE-3, and a boss rv, boss bf-2. I put these in no particular order buts it’s essentially the elements that comprise most of his sound


Obviously through a clean amp. Solid state preferred. Even better if a Roland but not a necessity. The track doesn’t have a ton of drive.


EDIT: I just listened again and the solo doesn’t seem to have much modulation. The last time I heard him live he played with a ton of flange which I don’t think is necessary to achieve the track tone. Although a strymon deco may help replicate that grit we can here on there although I can’t be sure. You should basically only need a a single coil guitar, mild drive, mild delay and a little verb to get there.

Re: Cure Love Song Tone

Posted: Sat Nov 30, 2019 10:42 pm
by fuzzjunkie
Robert Smith was using Boss pedals almost exclusively back then. Phaser, Flanger, Chorus, Delay, Overdrive, Super Distortion, and Tremolo along with a Cry Baby.

He has famously said that the Boss are sturdy, easy to find a good sound and being color coordinated he doesn’t have to hunt out which one. “It’s the Blue one on this song.” He also says that he sets the controls as “mostly off, half way, and mostly on,” so 9 0’clock, 12o’clock and 3 o’clock would be where he sets the knobs. Supposedly a lot of his settings are just everything at 12 o’clock.

The opening riff sounds like Flange with a bit of Distortion and Delay, the lush chord strum sounds like Chorus and Delay and the lead bit sounds like Delay with an Overdrive boost. I think that tone is going to depend on what guitar he used, maybe it’s the Jazzmaster with the Woolworth pickup and the bridge pickup on? I think the Flange riff is just the Woolworth. Reverb mostly would have been a rack effect and not from his pedals.

Re: Cure Love Song Tone

Posted: Sun Dec 01, 2019 12:35 am
by stevemac100
Cheers for the replies. It's the drive tone that I'm most interested in. To me, the drive tone sounds really warm but bright at the same time and I've struggled to match that.

Re: Cure Love Song Tone

Posted: Sun Dec 01, 2019 1:06 am
by s_mcsleazy
one sec. i'll message arri on facebook. he'll have a really good idea.

Re: Cure Love Song Tone

Posted: Sun Dec 01, 2019 8:20 am
by fuzzjunkie
stevemac100 wrote:
Sun Dec 01, 2019 12:35 am
Cheers for the replies. It's the drive tone that I'm most interested in. To me, the drive tone sounds really warm but bright at the same time and I've struggled to match that.
He used a Boss Bluesdriver later on, like Bloodflowers era, but for Disintegration he would have had a Boss Super Overdrive SD-1. I had one for a short while and while I think it depends on what guitars he used in the studio, he had a Tele, a Gretsch and a National. Live he mostly played Jazzmasters, and his amp tone was bright.

He could have rolled the tone back on the Boss, or used the neck pickup on the JM, but if I tried to replicate it, I would use the middle position, both pickups on, and set all the knobs on an SD-1 at 12 o’clock, and if that wasn’t quite there, turn the tone knob to 9 o’clock.

The amp tone is important too, it’s clean and bright.

In this video he plays an Airline National and gets that exact tone, and Porl plays the flanged parts.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=sva2qnwFGWg

Re: Cure Love Song Tone

Posted: Sun Dec 01, 2019 4:25 pm
by stevejamsecono
This was up many moons ago, thankful to wayback machine that it's still accessible. Seems to cover most everything? That being said, in the studio I assume all bets were off as far as amps and so forth.

https://web.archive.org/web/20100827191 ... pment.html

Re: Cure Love Song Tone

Posted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 10:39 am
by Unicorn Warrior
stevejamsecono wrote:
Sun Dec 01, 2019 4:25 pm
This was up many moons ago, thankful to wayback machine that it's still accessible. Seems to cover most everything? That being said, in the studio I assume all bets were off as far as amps and so forth.

https://web.archive.org/web/20100827191 ... pment.html
This is great. I’ve been a Cure fan since I found this forum. Really opened up a new gateway of music for me. Never seen this list before now

Re: Cure Love Song Tone

Posted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 1:32 pm
by stevejamsecono
T
Unicorn Warrior wrote:
Mon Dec 02, 2019 10:39 am
stevejamsecono wrote:
Sun Dec 01, 2019 4:25 pm
This was up many moons ago, thankful to wayback machine that it's still accessible. Seems to cover most everything? That being said, in the studio I assume all bets were off as far as amps and so forth.

https://web.archive.org/web/20100827191 ... pment.html
This is great. I’ve been a Cure fan since I found this forum. Really opened up a new gateway of music for me. Never seen this list before now
It's crazy what's up on the internet sometimes. The worst thing is when people let addresses lapse/take stuff down it's gone forever unless someone remembers it! I used to love this site that had a big breakdown of all of Andy Summers' stuff, but it also lapsed and is gone forever :(

Re: Cure Love Song Tone

Posted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 2:05 pm
by dc
stevejamsecono wrote:
Sun Dec 01, 2019 4:25 pm
This was up many moons ago, thankful to wayback machine that it's still accessible. Seems to cover most everything? That being said, in the studio I assume all bets were off as far as amps and so forth.

https://web.archive.org/web/20100827191 ... pment.html
this post (and thread) made me go hunting for Roger O'Donnell's Disintegration diary, which also disappeared some time ago. thank you, Wayback Machine!

https://web.archive.org/web/20100218055 ... ories.html

Re: Cure Love Song Tone

Posted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 10:22 pm
by Unicorn Warrior
stevejamsecono wrote:
Mon Dec 02, 2019 1:32 pm
T
Unicorn Warrior wrote:
Mon Dec 02, 2019 10:39 am
stevejamsecono wrote:
Sun Dec 01, 2019 4:25 pm
This was up many moons ago, thankful to wayback machine that it's still accessible. Seems to cover most everything? That being said, in the studio I assume all bets were off as far as amps and so forth.

https://web.archive.org/web/20100827191 ... pment.html
This is great. I’ve been a Cure fan since I found this forum. Really opened up a new gateway of music for me. Never seen this list before now
It's crazy what's up on the internet sometimes. The worst thing is when people let addresses lapse/take stuff down it's gone forever unless someone remembers it! I used to love this site that had a big breakdown of all of Andy Summers' stuff, but it also lapsed and is gone forever :(
I screen shot all of it already