John Frusciante Tone ?

Shreddy Krueger

I have an ESP KH3 which comes stock with two EMG 81's but I dont play much metal these days and im a huge fan of John's playing so im looking to replace the pickups with something that will give me a similar sound , any suggestions are appreciated !

Squidgy Black

Frusciante's tone was mainly from a strat, so unless you coil-tap the pickups it'll be hard to get his tone with humbuckers.

Shreddy Krueger

stetyrrell wrote: »

Frusciante's tone was mainly from a strat, so unless you coil-tap the pickups it'll be hard to get his tone with humbuckers.

Thought so but I do know he has had a few guitars with humbuckers ( Les Paul Custom , Gretsch White Falcon and I think he had a Jazzmaster with them) I was thinking of putting in a JB and a 59 or a Jazz and coil tapping them would be a good idea

il gatto

I don't know how much it would cost to get the coil tap put in, but maybe put it towards a Strat of some sort. You can pick up a nice playable Strat for €350-€400 these days. It'll probably get you closer to the sound you want.
Apart from that, an amp with a nice ringing clean channel (doesn't have to be valve) and maybe a compressor to give a bit of oomph to the clean sounds. It seems to be a fairly natural sound to me, so nothing too fancy is needed I suspect.

seachto7

He used a tele a lot live too (Slane dvd)

Paolo_M

The older, funky stuff was mainly/all strats.
A nice valve amp (or a good modeller) and a compressor for the cleans also helps.

Remember though that about 30% of his sound is from the gear, 70% or more is from his technique.
He has a very aggressive pick style on the early stuff. Lots of muted strings and "tight as a nuns chuff" rhythms. Many of his parts were almost like a percussion track.
Lately he's been using more varied techniques like hybrid picking.

The newer stuff, Californication +, uses a variety of tones with different geetars.

Depends and which tones of his you like, I guess.

Demeyes

I think it might be easier picking up a cheap strat and working with that instead of trying to make your KH3 do the job. You could get a mex strat for not too much and will have all that single coil sound you'd need, I don't find coil taps can really get that sound.

hidinginthebush

Hey OP if you decide to change your pickups give us your 81's! Come on, you won't be needing them

...though I'd recommend getting a second hand strat

Shreddy Krueger

hidinginthebush wrote: »

Hey OP if you decide to change your pickups give us your 81's! Come on, you won't be needing them

...though I'd recommend getting a second hand strat

Sounds fair enough :P

Looks like I better start saving for a nice wee Strat/Tele then , Thanks for the info guys !

Frusciante

Speaking from experience.....
To get a close approximation of his signature sound, strat (i put mothers milk pickups into mine, they do a fairly good job) on the neck pickup, mxr micro amp turned on to boost the signal/ drive the amp and distortion pedals harder, put a DS2 and some kind of fuzz (fuzz face/big muff etc) AFTER the micro amp and BEFORE the wah, crybaby will do fine, but get the Ibanez WH10 reissue if you want to be ridiculously accurate, then a chorus pedal into a marshall with the bass fairly high, mids set about noon, and treble cut a bit, presence a bit past noon.
Then you could throw a couple of MOOG pedals, the ring modulator etc for other sounds.

Most important parts are the strat, the wah and chorus.
Best of luck, throw up a few videos if you ever record your playing!