McAlmont & Butler – The Sound Of McAlmont And Butler

In this interview, Bernard explains how he acquired his 1961 335. "I bought this at Guitar Center in Los Angeles for $4,500, the most I have spent on a guitar. The inspiration of getting a red ES-355 was Johnny Marr, but also Chuck Berry and Roy Orbison. My dad loved Roy Orbison, so big red semis are a childhood memory. From an early age, I thought: that’s an electric guitar.

“But Johnny playing one was one reason. I remember seeing The Smiths on The Tube, 1983, with Johnny playing a red ES-355. It’s odd, as he only played a 355 for about six months, but that was enough for me.

“I’ve just been touring with Ben Watt, and he says he was out shopping with Johnny when he bought his own red 355 that day in the 80s. It was at (Fat Rick’s) Vintage Guitar Emporium. I know Rick, too, and he’s joked, ‘if Johnny ever comes in we can close the doors, that’s business done for the day!’

“This is on a lot of my recordings, from late Suede to McAlmont & Butler, my solo albums, to my producing and playing. On Ben Watt’s album [due spring 2014], it’s all this 355 straight into my Lazy J 20 amp

Used on McAlmont and Butler tour and Ben Watt record, 2014.

"The Strymon Timeline is a delay with is always on a "slap" (110ms) the delay setting except for "Bring IT Back" and "Where R U Now?" which have tempo matched longer settings.

"Also used this identical setup whilst recording the recent Ben Watt record"

"Strymon is endlessly tweak able, sounds amazing, you can also store song names which is crucial detail for playing live that almost no one else thought of"

There was lots of 355, Tele and Les Paul, mainly. I was using AC30s, but also my Boogie MkIII and the Les Paul for the solo on How About You?, a Selmer Zodiac (The Debitor) and an ancient Ampeg combo, which weighed a ton and belonged to RAK (Tonight). Yes uses the 355, with AC30s and a Leslie cabinet for the chorus-y parts, and also some Les Paul on the choruses and outro. I was also using a valve Watkins Copicat for almost everything at the time as a preamp, as well as for echo. The intro to Tonight is my 355 mic’d up with a KM84 taped onto the f-hole.

There was lots of 355, Tele and Les Paul, mainly. I was using AC30s, but also my Boogie MkIII and the Les Paul for the solo on How About You?, a Selmer Zodiac (The Debitor) and an ancient Ampeg combo, which weighed a ton and belonged to RAK (Tonight). Yes uses the 355, with AC30s and a Leslie cabinet for the chorus-y parts, and also some Les Paul on the choruses and outro. I was also using a valve Watkins Copicat for almost everything at the time as a preamp, as well as for echo. The intro to Tonight is my 355 mic’d up with a KM84 taped onto the f-hole.

There was lots of 355, Tele and Les Paul, mainly. I was using AC30s, but also my Boogie MkIII and the Les Paul for the solo on How About You?, a Selmer Zodiac (The Debitor) and an ancient Ampeg combo, which weighed a ton and belonged to RAK (Tonight). Yes uses the 355, with AC30s and a Leslie cabinet for the chorus-y parts, and also some Les Paul on the choruses and outro. I was also using a valve Watkins Copicat for almost everything at the time as a preamp, as well as for echo. The intro to Tonight is my 355 mic’d up with a KM84 taped onto the f-hole.