Over the Easter Weekend I have been experimenting with guitar tone, inspired by learning The Monkees (Neil Diamond) song ‘I’m a Believer’.

I was looking for early British clean sounds for use in practice and future recording. I tried three approaches:

• Using stock / community patches for my Blackstar ID Core 10 amplifier
• Using my Zoom G3Xn multi-effects pedal with a bespoke effect.
• Using Cockos Reaper DAW with Toontrack EZMix3 Guitar Presets

As I had not used patches for quite some time I first took the opportunity to apply updates to the Blackstar Architect software (the amps firmware was up-to-date) and the Zoom G3Xn firmware.

That done I tested several Blackstar patches and then settled on a community patch that modeled a Britsh Amp with tape delay and spring reverb.

I then moved on to creating a bespoke patch for the Zoom G3Xn effects pedal. As I had only previously created one patch from new I used that as a template and again created a patch that modeled a VOX AC30 with EL84 tubes like amp coupled with 2 * 12 Cabinet, Tape Delay and Spring Reverb. I tested this via the Blackstar Amp with its effects switched off and also via direct input to the PC and out to my studio monitors.

I then moved on to explore the Toontrack EZMix3 plugin in the Cockos Reaper DAW. Here it was a case of choosing effects / stacking effects and adjusting parameters.

The EZMix sound that I liked the best was ‘Thin Twin Amp Ambience’ but there was a rich set of tones that could easily have fulfilled the role.

In conclusion I chose the Zoom G3Xn patch as my favourite and will use this to practice the song and if I do record a cover version with Guitar then I will use this.