One of my first CD’s (that’s a Compact Disk for any of you Millenium-ers) was Greenday’s Dookie so it'll always hold a special place in my heart. Aside from that it's a class album (I don't care what you say!). Today we’re going to dive into how Billie Joe Armstrong got his tone on Dookie.
Billie’s main guitar on Dookie was the one they call “Blue”. A Mexican Fernandez Strat his mom bought from his guitar teacher for his 11th birthday. This guitar came with a Bill Lawrence Humbucker in the Bridge but was later replaced with a white Seymour Duncan JB model after it got f’d-up at Woodstock ’94.
It was strung up with Ernie Ball Slinky’s gauges .010-.046. In fact, this is Billie’s go-to string gauges. Part of Billie's tone also comes from his picking technique which is a hybrid between Thumb and Pick for that thwack. He also doesn’t play with his wrist, instead, he beats the sh*t out of the strings by putting his shoulder into it.
Billie used a Modded Marshall 1959 100W Super Lead Plexi and continues to use this as one of his two main amps both live and in the studio. The amp is also known as Pete being that “PETE” was sprayed across the front. To mod the amp they replaced one of the Master Volumes with a Gain knob, giving it more gain.
His side piece amp is another Modded Marshall 1959 Super Lead Plexi. This one has a Golub SE Lead mod, adding an additional preamp tube for more gain.
They mic’d up the modded amp with an ol’ trusty SM57 and a Sennheiser MD421 on the two best sounding cones and used a Neumann U87 about 15 feet from the amp to mic up the room.
Want that Marshall Plexi sound in a pedal? Here are a few options to look into:
https://www.soundonsound.com/people/green-day-basket-case
https://www.groundguitar.com/billie-joe-armstrong-guitars-and-gear/
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