There are several thousand guitar bends out there, and the chances of us agreeing on the greatest one of all time are pretty slim. You're allowed a different opinion. But mine is the one Prince plays live at the Super Bowl XLI halftime show, and I want to share the joy of that sound with you.
The notes themselves are quite simple. What makes it special is a couple of small details in how you play it, and a tone that's honestly a bit ridiculous. So here's the technique, then how I got close to the tone by ear, before I looked up what he actually used.
The notes: a bend with a held note on top ▶ 2:07
The bend is on the 18th fret of the B string, bent up a whole tone. Underneath your bending finger, you hold the 18th fret on the high e as well. That held note against the bending note is what gives it the crunchiness.
e|--18---------| B|--18b(20)----| G|-------------| D|-------------| A|-------------| E|-------------|
If you've played rock guitar, there's a good chance you've done a bend like this. But there are a couple of details that make sure you actually get the sound right.
Pick flat and dig in ▶ 2:34
First off, make sure the pick is nice and flat against the strings as it goes through. You really need to strike the strings. If you pick at too much of an angle, you lose the attack and the aggression.
So when you pick, go downwards through the strings, not across them.
Bend it slightly flat on purpose ▶ 2:53
The most important thing, in my opinion (alongside the tone, and being Prince, which helps), is that the bend doesn't quite reach the pitch it should.
You're bending the 18th fret a whole tone, so normally you'd be aiming for the pitch of the 20th fret. But there's a real crunchiness in his version that's quite hard to copy, and part of how you get it is by falling slightly flat of that pitch while you hold the other note.
Play it bang on the pitch and it sounds fine. Let it sit a little bit flat and it gets extra crunchy, almost nasty and gritty. It's a weird thing to aim for on purpose, but trust me, it sounds good.
This works on any bend where you're holding another note at the same time. Try it on a unison bend. Do one that's perfectly in tune, then one that's slightly flat, and you'll hear that same crunch appear in the second one.
It's a weird thing to aim for on purpose, but trust me, it sounds good.
If you want to check what "slightly flat" really means, play the 20th fret on the B string first so you know where the target is, then bend to just under it.
Getting the tone by ear ▶ 4:11
I didn't look up his gear before I started. I just used my ears, and I'm really happy with how close I got. To me, the overdrive is quite smooth and very saturated, but not too aggressive. Here's the chain I built, step by step, all in plugins.
The amp [4:17]
I used a Marshall-style amp model (a "Rock 75" in Slate Digital's amp plugin). On its own it sounds pretty flat and not super exciting. I turned up the overdrive and level controls to really push the amp, turned the bass down a bit, boosted the mids and treble, and set the presence quite high too. I made a lot of these adjustments while I was playing with everything else, so don't treat them as a starting point you set once.
I also put a noise gate in front, to stop the extra hiss that inevitably comes through when you add loads of overdrive.
A fuzz pedal, cranked [5:10]
Next, a fuzz pedal with both the fuzz and the volume turned all the way up. You can hear in his playing that when he lets go of the strings there's loads of extra noise, which tells you there's a lot of overdrive going on, probably too much. But it sounds really cool.
That got me a lot closer, but it was a bit harsh.
Dark EQ and a bit of reverb [5:39]
So I added EQ and reverb. Using just the graphic EQ from another amp plugin (Archetype: Nolly, with the amp, cab and pedals turned off), I:
- boosted the low end and low mids
- cut some of the highs and upper mids
- put a low pass filter right down at 6 kHz, cutting a lot of the high end out
Then a bit of reverb, no delay, mixed in at about 25%. If you're playing a stadium you get a fair bit of reverb for free.
More drive and compression [6:31]
At that point the tone was close, but it still didn't feel ridiculous enough. So I put another overdrive in front of the fuzz, and a compressor pedal for a bit more sustain.
It's ridiculous, but that is kind of the sound. You've got to embrace a bit of ridiculousness sometimes.
What Prince actually used ▶ 7:13
After searching Reddit and a few forums, I was half right and half wrong. I'd guessed a British-style amp with a fuzz into it. The internet pretty consistently says a Mesa/Boogie amp (a Mark II, possibly the Mark IIC+) along with Boss pedals. I did guess a Boss pedal, something like a distortion or Super Overdrive, and it seems he used those. Whether there was a fuzz at the Super Bowl, I don't know.
So my guesses were a little way off, but I think my ear got me pretty close on the tone. And that's the useful bit: you don't need the exact gear to get near a sound. Listen for how saturated it is, how bright it is and how much noise is there, and build towards it.
Go and try the bend first, though. Hold the 18th fret on the high e, bend the 18th fret on the B string up just shy of a whole tone, and listen for the crunch. Have a go.
