Nail the ToneJohn Lee Hooker

Boom Boom

John Lee Hooker · Burnin' · 1961

The riff is Hooker on his 1961 natural Epiphone Zephyr, an all-hollow archtop with mini-humbuckers that his estate and Epiphone both describe as his main studio and touring guitar through the '60s; his sideman Rich Kirch also said the blonde Epiphone is on a lot of the old records. The amp for the Chicago session is not documented, so treat it as a small tube combo pushed just to the edge of dirt — mostly clean, thick in the mids, with the pick attack doing the work. Some coverage of this era associates him with the Epiphone Sheraton E212T instead, and both guitars are period-correct for him, so the specific instrument on the master is not beyond argument.

Where these numbers come from: worked out from the documented rig and the sound of the record

Tuning

Standard tuning, no capo

Standard tuning in E; the riff is Hooker's own part, while Larry Veeder plays a second, straight comping guitar behind him on the same take.

Part: Riff

Guitar

  • Epiphone Zephyr (1961, natural) · Epiphone mini-humbuckers · bridge pickup

Amp

Small tube combo, no master volume

GAIN
4.0
BASS
4.0
MID
6.0
TREBLE
6.0

No amp is documented for the October 26, 1961 Universal Recording session (producer Calvin Carter, engineer Bernie Clapper), so this is a period category: a low-wattage tube combo turned up to the edge of breakup, with the ambience on the record coming from the room and the mix rather than an onboard reverb.

Amp

Fender Twin Reverb

GAIN
4.0
BASS
4.0
MID
6.0
TREBLE
5.0
PRESENCE
4.0
REVERB
2.0

Hooker told Jas Obrecht in 1989 that Fender was all he used and that he loved the sound of the Twin — that is his later live and studio preference, not a documented 1961 amp; use these numbers if a Twin-style amp is what you own.

Tone character

clean with light breakup · forward mids · round humbucker attack · short percussive notes · dry, roomy 1961 mix

easy

The notes are a short single-line figure in open position, but it has to sit in a lazy swing feel and stop dead in the stop-time gaps, so the timing is harder than the fingering.

Want this on your own amp?

These are the record's settings. Tell us what you play through and we'll translate every knob to the amp you actually own — free.

Adapt it to my gear

Sources