How much of the roaring, fuzz-jacked-up-on-roids, distortion tone Prince uses comes from his amps and how much comes from the Boss DS-2? I've noticed that he often manages to get the same tone from the Honer with its vintage pickups as he does from the red Strat with EMGs, which suggests that he is using the pedal a lot. But I also know that he tends to put an SLO-100 in his rack setups, so that could also be the source of the gain. So if I want that killer high-gain tone can I get by with a DS-2, or do I need to start saving up for an SLO and a house in the country?

Good question. I've always wondered the same thing back in his 80's setup also.

There's times when I've seen him roll up his volume, step on a box and get a full on distortion sound, click it off and get a clean sound.

Then there's other times when he's had a clean sound, step on 1 box and then another box for

heavy rhythms and hyper lead tones.

I guess depending on the song he'll do it both ways. I'm guessing his distortion comes from his amps first and then pushes it with a Boss dist. pedal for leads.

P also has a huge rack system (power amps/multi-effects) offstage and wet and clean amps and cabs also. I think his old roadie (Zeke Clark) hipped him to this. EVH used to do that and still does.

If you can get your hands on an SLO then you are the king. Great amps.

Funny I was wondering the same thing yesterday, I'm planning on buying this DS-2 to put it in front of my Mesa Lonestar. It's really hard to get his tone with just a strat and the drive channel. He also uses a blues driver. So is his killer sound made by DS-2 + BD-2 combined with clean channel/ one of the boxes with the drive channel? Well unless one of his guitar technicians is posting over here I guess we'll never know

I hope these pedals will deliver when I use the clean channel. I'm not expecting the exact Prince tone because I know he's using racks etc. but that would be easier for me (less 'stomping')

The DS-2 is a cool pedal.

I have a DS-1 that I was going to get modded. But I picked up the new MXR 78 (which is the same circuits in the modded DS-1) and it's fantastic.

Great topic,my question is how come Hohner sometimes sounds great and sometime thin on solos

I really do not know about his set up these days, his sound is changing every year or so and even between consecutive show..

What I know is that the DS-2 will give you this RAW disto sound he used on undertaker video.

I could manage to get the aprox sound with EMG 81 (cold clean signal) -> DS-2 (to crank up the volume) -> Soldano 100 (to get the dynamic and add more disto).

Also, a brass nut on the guitar will help a lot.

The bridge also is important, fender has to much resonance.

Last year in Amager bio - Denmark, i saw hes guitar rack. I think it contained two Mesa Nomad 100 amps, with two mesa top 4x12 cabs on the stage. This year, the same place, he had two Fender twin reverb amps on stage and no amp footswitch in the pedalboard.

Pedalboard Amager bio:

from right to left:

Line-6 MM4, Whammy, customized stereo Dunlop wah, Boss tuner, Boss bd-2, Boss ds-2, Boss oc-2, Boss dd-3, Boss- bf-2, Boss vb-2.

I think the final signal comes from the Line-6 MM4.

I don´t think he is using any amp distortion, but the Fender amps were cranked a lot in Amager bio.

It looks like, a blue line connects from the vb-2 to the whammy?

Thanks for posting that pic. So he's using Fender Twins? Very cool.

Maybe he's cranking the amps (and is using what little gain is from there) and then stepping on

the Boss gain pedal for more kick.

I wonder if his Boss pedals are modded?

all this mess is SOOOO over my head...

wish i knew all this stuff

Prince is guitar tone comes from the guitar, his hands, the pedals and the amp.... and there it is. a guitarist's hands are an often overlooked aspect in tone.

jpnyc said:

So if I want that killer high-gain tone can I get by with a DS-2, or do I need to start saving up for an SLO and a house in the country?

Probably the latter.