Eddie's "brown sound"...

 

Eddie Van Halen lied for years about how he got his tone - to help out a guy who didn't actually do anything.

 

From the moment Van Halen's debut album hit in 1978, guitarists became obsessed with Eddie's sound. It was big and round, with rich liquid textures like Clapton's Gibson SG tone, but with extra bite. Sharp clarity during rapid passages, majestic when needed. Nobody had heard anything like it.

 

They called it the "brown sound."

 

Other guitarists needed to know how he did it. On the first Van Halen tour, rival players would sneak onto the stage after soundcheck, hunting for the magic box - some hidden piece of equipment that produced that tone. They'd study Eddie's pedalboard, looking for the secret weapon.

 

Ted Nugent was once caught playing Eddie's rig and pedals backstage. He plugged in, turned it up, played. He just sounded like himself.

 

The gear wasn't the answer.

 

For years, Eddie told anyone who asked that amp repairman Jose Arredondo had modified his Marshall amplifier - special tweaks that created the brown sound. It became part of the legend. Jose even made money performing similar modifications for other guitarists chasing Eddie's tone.

 

The truth was simpler and stranger.

 

Jose only did maintenance work. He re-tubed Eddie's Marshalls and set the bias. That was it. The amp Eddie used on the first six Van Halen albums was stock - a 1968 Marshall 100-watt Super Lead plexi, completely unmodified.

 

Eddie later admitted he'd lied "to throw him a bone and help him out." Jose was a good guy, and Eddie figured the story would send business his way.

 

The actual secret? Eddie turned every knob on the Marshall all the way up, plugged in, and played. That was it. Well, almost.

 

The Variac was the real trick - a variable transformer that let Eddie drop the voltage to about 89 volts. This allowed him to crank the Marshall without blowing it up or melting the tubes. He could get that saturated, singing distortion at controllable volumes. But the Variac didn't create the tone. It just kept the amp from destroying itself while Eddie got the tone he wanted.

 

Producer Ted Templeman confirmed it: "I put the right microphone in front of the right speaker and stood back. It's really all Ed."

 

The brown sound came from Eddie's hands. His technique. The way he attacked the strings. Engineer Donn Landee's reverb added the concert hall vibe, but the core of the sound was just Eddie playing a cranked Marshall through his Frankenstein guitar.

 

Guitarists tore apart their rigs looking for the answer. They paid Jose Arredondo to modify their amps. They bought the same gear, the same pedals. And they still couldn't get it.

 

Because Eddie had sent them all looking in the wrong place - to protect a secret that wasn't really a secret at all.

 

From the net...