If you’ve been dissatisfied with your acoustic guitar sound of late and are looking for a new instrument, a holistic rebuild of your technique, or divine intervention, take a moment, breathe, and consider this: your guitar pick might be the problem
Because Yungblud has some friendly advice might just save you the expense of finding a new instrument – or a teacher.
Speaking to the Gibson Gazette about his new album, Idols and the ethos behind his BludFest, Yungblud says he has never been happier with his acoustic sound, and it’s all thanks to his choice of pick.
“The acoustic on the album is all J-200, with a really soft, 0.44mm plectrum,” he says. “Best guitar sound I’ve ever had on acoustic. It’s a new J-200, which is amazing.”
You might argue that a Gibson J-200, with its all solid build, made in the USA, is going to sound huge no matter what. But as Yungblud explains, how you play it matters, and you have to find the pick gauge to best complement your style.
To the surprise of no one, he has an animal of a right hand, and that can give him the opposite effect from what he is looking for.
“I hit guitars really hard, and sometimes it makes them sound small,” he says. “When you use a thin pick on the J-200 and hit it really hard, it’s f**king straight out of the nineties, man, straight out of [The Verve’s]Urban Hymns. I’m like, oh my god. It sounds three-dimensional, it’s epic. Real instruments, real orchestra, real f**king album. That’s what we wanted to do.”
That real orchestra he is referring to is the London Philharmonic, which you can hear on Zombie, the third single shared head of Idols’ release, and which features Florence Pugh in the video.
A black 330 with the matching scratchplate to mine would be just a dream. Put this in the article, put some feelers out, see if the kids would be into it!
The real instruments include the aforementioned J-200, a Les Paul into a Marshall tube amp, and a number of Epiphone Casinos. But they also include another hollow-bodied electric guitar – a cousin of the Casino that deserves further investigation. It’s a 1964 ES-330 in a super-rare Factory Black, and it might just be haunted.
“It’s f**king epic, man, I call it ‘Ghost.’ It’s rare from that time,” says Yungblud. “Back then, black guitars were seen as the devil’s instruments. A guy painted the scratchplate with a ghost, and apparently he died two weeks afterwards, so it’s full of the voodoo!”
The ES-330 and Casinos were both deployed for rhythm parts for an “Oasis, Richard Ashcroft, Verve, kind of Radiohead element” and who knows, in the next few years we might see the ES-330 Ghost reincarnated as a signature guitar sequel to the MusicRadar-approved Epiphone Yungblud SG Junior.
“My vibe is that I would love to make Ghost. I would love to make an Epiphone Ghost,” says Yungblud. “A black 330 with the matching scratchplate to mine would be just a dream. Put this in the article, put some feelers out, see if the kids would be into it! Again with that guitar, no-one’s got it, it feels really iconic. With the scratchplate, it’s so f**king sick.”
Idols is out now via Island. You can read the full interview with Yungblud at the Gibson Gazette and find out more about his current signature model at Epiphone.
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