RUSH Lifeson patches anyone (gnx3K) ?
Are there any RUSH fans out there with patches to share for the gnx3K? I know there are a TON of different setups Lifeson used throughout his career, but anything at all would be appreciated. It's going to take me a while to get up to speed on this thing, and right now I just want to jam.
Comments
Good luck
Keys to Lifeson tones-
Early stuff:
Plexi's, Fenders, Marsh JTM with od pedal.
80's- Marshall amps, ha had a BV Crate at one point, then he switched around from Mk III's at one concert and back to JCM800's. Some stuff on Moving pictures and Perm Waves have some Chorus and or wah.. watch the speed setting on the Chorus. keep it low.
90's to Current- Hughes Kettner (you could use a newer Marsh model)
Things to do:
Early stuff he blended phase efx, chorus and mild delays. Use tap tempo feature to set delay times.. it works well unless you know and understand timing gaps and note based delay times.. of course with Rush, use the tap tempo since it's easier. I like Ping Pong delays for \"Red Barchetta\" \" Vital Signs\" Entre nous\" etc.. KEEP FEEDBACK LEVEL LOW.
You can assign gain changes in stompbox mode. I really think to do Rush, stompbox mode is the best.. You'll have 3 amp combinations of Green Red and Yellow amps. Adjust the gains slightly. Go to the Expression assig page of the editor and set the amp channel switches (far upper right) to Green/Warp(yellow) /Red.
Assign the Wah parameters to some patches if needed. \" Spirit of Radio\" for one.. Copy the patch over to another area or your HDD (save as a file) and make moderate changes to accommodate other sounds and or effects. Expression Assigns can help you dramatically change up to 3 tones/efx etc at once. And.. vary them. For instance, you can assign the Gain of REd Ch to Exp assign 1, Change the Chorus Depth on EXP Assign 2, and or Change the Compressor, enable any efx.. etc. The possibilities are numerous.
The reason I list these details is you need to dig in and see what the pedal can do.. One or two patches for Lifeson just won't cut it if you are a heavy Rush Fan.. He's done so many things. You have to experiment.
I customized a GNX4 for a guy in a Rush Tribute band.. all 80 User patches were used plus another 16 were required on a Comp Flash card.
Start with the amp models and then go to the Expression assigns in stompbox mode... many options await you!!
Notice the fullness of the ambience for many Rush rhythm parts - again Working Man comes to mind. This effect is readily achieved by having a low-feedback, short-length delay; pan it to one side or the other if you have a stereo setup. Chorus at low speed and moderately high depth will create a similar effect (chorus being a modulated variation on delay).
From this patch, you can create new patches as guitar3456 suggests, adjusting gain and eq settings for the amp and the ambient effects (modulation, delay, reverb if you're using it) to get the specific sounds of the songs you want to play, or the sound you want to replicate.
When trying to emulate an artist guitar sound, I find it helpful to listen to stylistically similar material they've produced, to get a better grasp for the \"average\" of the tone I'm going for. Unlike suggested above, I prefer to have a single patch do many different things (by using controls, amp channels, stompboxes, etc) as opposed to having many patches do variations on a similar thing. It's a matter of both taste and your habits when it comes to making settings on the GNX.
Good luck.
Control assigns for some functions. Set stompbox mode to use