Nail the ToneWeezer

Buddy Holly

Weezer · Weezer (The Blue Album) · 1994

The Blue Album riff tone is a P-90-loaded Gibson Les Paul Junior Special borrowed from producer Ric Ocasek, plugged straight into a 60-watt Mesa Engineering (Mark I) head through Rivers Cuomo's tall '68 Marshall 4x12 — no pedals at all. Push the preamp gain hard and keep the master low, pull the bass back and leave the mids up so the doubled guitars and unison bass read as one fat instrument. Tune the whole guitar down a half step or the shapes will be in the wrong key.

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

Tuning

Eb standard (down a half step)

Nine of the ten Blue Album tracks are a half step down (only "No One Else" is standard), and the bass is tuned down with the guitars — the riff shapes read as F#5/G#5/A5 but sound in Ab major.

Part: Riff

Guitar

  • Gibson Les Paul Junior Special (double-cut, '50s) · P-90 · bridge pickup
  • Fender Jaguar (1960s) · single-coil · bridge pickup

Amp

Mesa/Boogie Mark I (60-watt head) + tall '68 Marshall 4x12

GAIN
8.0
BASS
3.0
MID
6.0
TREBLE
6.5
PRESENCE
4.0

Set Volume 1 high and the Master low — Karl Koch and Cuomo both describe the Mesa being cranked in preamp but run at unusually low room volume, which is why the crunch is thick without getting boomy; Presence and Reverb live on the Mark I's rear panel, and the record is dry, so leave reverb off.

Amp

Mid-gain tube head into 4x12 (substitute)

GAIN
7.0
BASS
3.5
MID
6.5
TREBLE
6.0
PRESENCE
4.5

If you don't have a Mark-series Boogie, any mid-forward tube crunch channel works: enough dirt that palm-muted downstrokes chug, but clear enough that the chord tones stay separate under the doubled guitar and unison bass.

Tone character

thick P-90 crunch · forward mids · tight, controlled low end · dry, no effects · cranked preamp, low master

easy

Two-note power-chord shapes and open low-string hits driven by relentless straight-eighth downstrokes, so the challenge is picking-hand stamina and clean muting between chords, not the fretting.

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