Electric Guitar at Open Mic

[MattM]

If I did this, I would buy a small pocket sized preamp like the pocket pod so that all I had to do would be to plug into the direct box. The reason is simple...if you're going to be the oddball do NOT be the oddball who is also a pain in the rear for the person running sound! The sound I would use would depend entirely on the song I was singing. One would naturally probably think of really glassy strat clean, but this can be a hard tone to pull off playing by yourself with the soso tone of a digital modeler. If it were me, I would use a fairly dark tone with a lot of reverb and delay, playing either very stripped down chord voicings or arpeggios. You could pull off a song like "Every Breath You Take" with this approach, and it would give you a reason to actually have an electric guitar up there, reather than just trying to make it sound like an acoustic and strumming along to something.

[isiton212]

I think you'd need to be exceptionally talented to pull off a stage set using the 'wrong' instrument simply because that's all you had available, but it would depend a lot on the context. I've been heartily entertained by a bloke playing an old beater found in a cupboard that started the 'set' with 5 rusty strings and finished it with 2. But it was a spontaneous thing where somebody made magic out of severely limited resources.

Walking up onto a stage with your own guitar under your arm is a different scenario. The audience would presume that you sound that way because you want to. If you chose an electric because it enhanced your act then fine, but otherwise it seems like the tail wagging the dog and it almosts suggests a lack of respect for the audience to perform with a substitute simply because finding the right instrument would be too much bother.

[BoB/335]

A guy showed up with an electric and this small battery powered Line 6 amp last night at an Open Mic I go to that is usually all acoustic. (There also happened to be a keyboard also last night) The Line 6 was a bit too loud and you could see that the "host" was frustrated that he had no control at the bord for the guitar volume. Just saying.................

[Rick Jones]

I have done this, alot, before I had an acoustic.
I used my PRS into an electroharmonix "black finger" tube compressor in the fx loop of a Para DI, then xlr into the desk.
I selected the two outside coils of my humbuckers, in phase, and it sounded clean and guitar like, if not acoustic in any way.
It was sufficiently clean for polyphonic fingerpicking, but I moved to a flattop when I started wanting to be more percussive.

[RockerDuck]

I was going to say, use an optical compressor and a DI. The EH black finger is an optical compressor. Then DI out.

[ELK]

Originally Posted by Allman_Fan

So how does an acoustic guitar simulator work? Either in a multi-effects processor or stand alone unit. Is it just a EQ presets (with the ability to tweak) or are there other "processes" going on as well?

A volume swell is usually involved in an acoustic simulator effect, along with other effects, such as chorus. I've never heard one that really sounded like an acoustic guitar.

[bdock]

Originally Posted by Allman_Fan

There maybe a practical reason for this thread, and then again, maybe it's just a speculative question for fun. Either way, jump on in!

Suppose you were doing a open mic/writer's night where you are gonna wait in the audience with your guitar and then perform three songs, maybe original, maybe not . .. doesn't matter, but it's just you. Probably singing, but maybe not. The songs are typical stuff for that environment, not "death metal" etc.

Here's the catch, you don't have an acoustic guitar, only a solid body electric and you can't (or won't) borrow one. So, do you run it directly into the board or do you bring a stomp box (in-line processor) with you? If so, what is it? You can bring more than one, but the more you bring, the more hassle, so that become part of the issue. Assume that your processor can run on a battery and/or there is an AC outlet close by to plug into.

What say you?

The Newest Line 6 Pod HD or Live.