Mdou Moctar – Funeral for Justice

Used on Funeral for Justice, as stated by producer Mikey Coltun in this May 28, 2024 Guitar World interview. An image of Moctar with the guitar at Coachella 2024, taken by Frazer Harrison, is included.

What can you tell us about the guitars Mdou used on Funeral For Justice?

“Mdou used his American Professional series left-handed white Strat. We got this in 2018. It’s a newer American-made Strat with Lollar pickups and a Sustainiac pickup at the neck. He uses D’Addario NYXL 10s and doesn’t like the sound of new strings. I think the ones that were on the guitar for Funeral For Justice were two years old.”

Installed in Moctar's American Professional Stratocaster, as stated by producer Mikey Coltun in this May 28, 2024 Guitar World interview. It can be seen in an included image of Moctar with the guitar at Coachella 2024, taken by Frazer Harrison.

What can you tell us about the guitars Mdou used on Funeral For Justice?

“Mdou used his American Professional series left-handed white Strat. We got this in 2018. It’s a newer American-made Strat with Lollar pickups and a Sustainiac pickup at the neck. He uses D’Addario NYXL 10s and doesn’t like the sound of new strings. I think the ones that were on the guitar for Funeral For Justice were two years old.”

Used on Funeral for Justice, as stated by producer Mikey Coltun in this May 28, 2024 Guitar World interview.

What effects did Mdou use for the sessions?

“In terms of pedals, we had a TC Electronic PolyTune 2 and an EarthQuaker Devices Acapulco Gold. I had the latter modded for an internal trim pot to not blow amps – Mdou tends to just turn the knobs on pedals all the way up so I needed to find a boost, but not too much, since the EarthQuaker pedal has a lot of headroom.

“There was the Union Tube & Transistor Shiny pedal, our signature [Champion Leccy] Rockstar Fuzz V1 – this pedal is almost always on as his preamp for slight crunch – and the Boss PH-3 Phaser and a Boss DD-7 for slapback delay.

“I took a few different DI signals from Mdou. There was a clean guitar without pedals, DI with pedals, and a DI with an amp simulator, which was just used for headphone monitoring. With the clean DI, I did use a few different Analog Man pedals such as the King Of Tone and Astro Tone Fuzz through an old Vibro Champ – that’s what you’re hearing on Takoba.”

Used on Funeral for Justice, as stated by producer Mikey Coltun in this May 28, 2024 Guitar World interview.

What effects did Mdou use for the sessions?

“In terms of pedals, we had a TC Electronic PolyTune 2 and an EarthQuaker Devices Acapulco Gold. I had the latter modded for an internal trim pot to not blow amps – Mdou tends to just turn the knobs on pedals all the way up so I needed to find a boost, but not too much, since the EarthQuaker pedal has a lot of headroom.

“There was the Union Tube & Transistor Shiny pedal, our signature [Champion Leccy] Rockstar Fuzz V1 – this pedal is almost always on as his preamp for slight crunch – and the Boss PH-3 Phaser and a Boss DD-7 for slapback delay.

“I took a few different DI signals from Mdou. There was a clean guitar without pedals, DI with pedals, and a DI with an amp simulator, which was just used for headphone monitoring. With the clean DI, I did use a few different Analog Man pedals such as the King Of Tone and Astro Tone Fuzz through an old Vibro Champ – that’s what you’re hearing on Takoba.”

Used for Funeral for Justice as stated by producer Mikey Coltun in this May 28, 2024 Guitar World interview.

What details can you share about Mdou’s amp setup?

“[Mixing engineer] Seth Manchester and I reamped Mdou’s guitar through a Soldano SLO-100 and a Traynor 4x12 cab. This amp is made for Mdou. Since Mdou doesn’t play with a lot of dynamics and it’s pretty much just hard fingerpicking on the bridge pickup, there tends to be a lot of bright sizzly highs and not enough clarity. The SLO just scoops all the unwanted high frequencies out. For mics, we used a Neumann U 77 and Coles 4038, like, 3ft to 5ft away going into API preamps.

“After reamping, I throw a Space Echo [RE-]201 on the left and right sides for a bigger sound. There were no Roland JC-120s on this record – however, on some songs like Oh France, I used a Roland Chorus Echo [RE-]501 for that chorus sound.

“The chorus on the 501 is a bit different than the JC-120 – it’s more similar to the Roland battery-powered Cube chorus, which is widely used throughout all of West Africa and one of Mdou’s favourite amps.”

Used for Funeral for Justice as stated by producer Mikey Coltun in this May 28, 2024 Guitar World interview.

What details can you share about Mdou’s amp setup?

“[Mixing engineer] Seth Manchester and I reamped Mdou’s guitar through a Soldano SLO-100 and a Traynor 4x12 cab. This amp is made for Mdou. Since Mdou doesn’t play with a lot of dynamics and it’s pretty much just hard fingerpicking on the bridge pickup, there tends to be a lot of bright sizzly highs and not enough clarity. The SLO just scoops all the unwanted high frequencies out. For mics, we used a Neumann U 77 and Coles 4038, like, 3ft to 5ft away going into API preamps.

“After reamping, I throw a Space Echo [RE-]201 on the left and right sides for a bigger sound. There were no Roland JC-120s on this record – however, on some songs like Oh France, I used a Roland Chorus Echo [RE-]501 for that chorus sound.

“The chorus on the 501 is a bit different than the JC-120 – it’s more similar to the Roland battery-powered Cube chorus, which is widely used throughout all of West Africa and one of Mdou’s favourite amps.”

Used for Funeral for Justice as stated by producer Mikey Coltun in this May 28, 2024 Guitar World interview.

What details can you share about Mdou’s amp setup?

“[Mixing engineer] Seth Manchester and I reamped Mdou’s guitar through a Soldano SLO-100 and a Traynor 4x12 cab. This amp is made for Mdou. Since Mdou doesn’t play with a lot of dynamics and it’s pretty much just hard fingerpicking on the bridge pickup, there tends to be a lot of bright sizzly highs and not enough clarity. The SLO just scoops all the unwanted high frequencies out. For mics, we used a Neumann U 77 and Coles 4038, like, 3ft to 5ft away going into API preamps.

“After reamping, I throw a Space Echo [RE-]201 on the left and right sides for a bigger sound. There were no Roland JC-120s on this record – however, on some songs like Oh France, I used a Roland Chorus Echo [RE-]501 for that chorus sound.

“The chorus on the 501 is a bit different than the JC-120 – it’s more similar to the Roland battery-powered Cube chorus, which is widely used throughout all of West Africa and one of Mdou’s favourite amps.”

Used for the guitar amps on Funeral for Justice as stated by producer Mikey Coltun in this May 28, 2024 Guitar World interview.

What details can you share about Mdou’s amp setup?

“[Mixing engineer] Seth Manchester and I reamped Mdou’s guitar through a Soldano SLO-100 and a Traynor 4x12 cab. This amp is made for Mdou. Since Mdou doesn’t play with a lot of dynamics and it’s pretty much just hard fingerpicking on the bridge pickup, there tends to be a lot of bright sizzly highs and not enough clarity. The SLO just scoops all the unwanted high frequencies out. For mics, we used a Neumann U 77 and Coles 4038, like, 3ft to 5ft away going into API preamps.

“After reamping, I throw a Space Echo [RE-]201 on the left and right sides for a bigger sound. There were no Roland JC-120s on this record – however, on some songs like Oh France, I used a Roland Chorus Echo [RE-]501 for that chorus sound.

“The chorus on the 501 is a bit different than the JC-120 – it’s more similar to the Roland battery-powered Cube chorus, which is widely used throughout all of West Africa and one of Mdou’s favourite amps.”

Used for the guitar amps on Funeral for Justice as stated by producer Mikey Coltun in this May 28, 2024 Guitar World interview.

What details can you share about Mdou’s amp setup?

“[Mixing engineer] Seth Manchester and I reamped Mdou’s guitar through a Soldano SLO-100 and a Traynor 4x12 cab. This amp is made for Mdou. Since Mdou doesn’t play with a lot of dynamics and it’s pretty much just hard fingerpicking on the bridge pickup, there tends to be a lot of bright sizzly highs and not enough clarity. The SLO just scoops all the unwanted high frequencies out. For mics, we used a Neumann U 77 and Coles 4038, like, 3ft to 5ft away going into API preamps.

“After reamping, I throw a Space Echo [RE-]201 on the left and right sides for a bigger sound. There were no Roland JC-120s on this record – however, on some songs like Oh France, I used a Roland Chorus Echo [RE-]501 for that chorus sound.

“The chorus on the 501 is a bit different than the JC-120 – it’s more similar to the Roland battery-powered Cube chorus, which is widely used throughout all of West Africa and one of Mdou’s favourite amps.”