Best usage of guitar synthesizers?

Jan Akkerman - From the Basement.

 

Tommy Bolin on Billy Cobham Spectrum
Trevor Rabin on Yes 90125 or anything

 

Has no one mentioned "Going Mobile" yet? Always loved the sound of that one.

 

I always loved the guitar synthesizer solo in Don Henley's "Sunset Grill".

 

I don't think Tommy used a guitar synth. Tommy played guitar, and Jan Hammer played synth.

 

Not to be pedantic, but that's not a true guitar synth. Pete played his guitar through an envelope follower, a feature of the ARP synthesizer that produces the wah wah sound, and he also overdubbed a VCS 3 synth part.

My choices:

Secret Journey, Don't Stand So Close To Me (The Police, Andy Summers using Roland guitar synth)
Chinatown, What A Fool Believes, Minute By Minute (The Doobie Brothers, Jeff Baxter using Roland guitar synth)

 

Okay, it's not a guitar synth. It's a guitar played through a synth. My bad

The Classic Albums documentary referred to it as some kind of synth effect - maybe I shouldn't be participating in a thread about synthesizers considering how much I (usually) hate them

 

Which songs did Trevor use a guitar synth on? I hear effects, but not a guitar synth. I like 90125 and Big Generator very much, but never really checked into his rig. Most concert footage, I thought he was just playing a straight strat?

A lot of Trevor's sounds is from an Eventide Harmonizer (same thing that EVH uses on intro to Women in Love).

 

I like Clapton's use of it on 'Never Make You Cry'.

 

Ahh, close enough

 

Allan Holdsworth.

 

Thought that was all Fairlight and regular synths.

 

Firewood?

Take it easy! It's a joke.

 

Listen at 1:56, 2:54, and 3:50

 

The speculation was that it was a SynthAxe or a Fairlight, which the producer Trevor Horn liked to use, but looking into it further you're probably right.

 

I was going to suggest Steve Hackett on Counting Out Time, but on seeing the OP's avatar and name I felt that would be about as helpful as a concrete lifejacket.

I may also meekly point out that Mike Rutherford used a stack of them too - he's playing the chords on Second Home By the Sea, not Tony.

So after, literally, seconds of thought I offer Tom Robinson. Saw him years ago using keyboards and Casio synth guitar on his one man show. Very good it was too.

 

not to speak for him, but the OP is asking for examples of guitar synthesizers, which are synths that are controlled (played) by a guitar instead of a keyboard, such as the roland GR series.

there have been numerous posts to this thread thus far of regular electric guitars being processed through synths, effects pedals, or the like. these are very different things.

ironically, this is the conversation we were having just upthread--unless you're particularly familiar with the player's rig or the sound of these synths, it can be difficult to tell on record if someone is playing a keyboard or guitar-controlled synth. and on stage, not all guitar synth controllers looks 'synthy'--many look just like regular electrics at first blush.

 

Mike Rutherford and Tom Robinson were definitely using things with 6 strings to make keyboard sounds.

 

this is a good example of the above. here, Bolin is playing a standard electric which is being run through an analog, solid-state effects pedal. he's not controlling a synth.

I'm not super familiar with Bolin's gear, so I'm not sure what guitar he's playing (looks like he played an SG, a les paul, and a strat all during this period), but I do recognize the sound of a maestro echoplex pedal in use--obviously, it's the source of the delay and shifting effect immediately before your first example in the video at 1:56, but it's also the source of the 'lasery' sawtooth effect that begins at that point. (I believe he's manipulating the tone and repeat delay controls simultaneously.)

 

Okay, I've been fooled.

 

Trevor R also used an MXR Pitch Transposer to add a 5th harmony on Owners of a Lonely Heart. This was from an old interview in Guitar Player.

Here's an interview you may find interesting.http://www.innerviews.org/inner/rabin.html

 

Fooled again.

 

Adrian Belew also!!

 

Doesn't sound like a guitar synth to me. I hear his echoplex being used at points during the song, along with whatever Jan Hammer was playing, but nothing I hear indicates his axe was controlling a synth.

 

absolutely.

Ade shows off the GR300 using a G505 controller in 1981. ​