I did a search but didn't want to bring up too ancient of a thread, and most people don't have an answer.

I see the gear on his site, but how EXACTLY does he set up, and what's the cheapest/best way I can emulate his tone? Most people hate it, but I love it. It's so damn aggressive.

Compression, compression, compression. Also as you probably know he uses two amps - sets one for highs, and one for lows. The two pickups on his bass have their own inputs. One drives each amp.

He has 2 Ampeg SVT 4 Pro's, One is ran with his SVP BSP Preamp and a additional parametric and is eq'd for highs only, plus that is the rig that he uses distortion from his preamp on. The other is plugged straight into from his bass and is eq'd only for lows. Both of these is ran through a dual channel compressor and out to 2 Ampeg 8x10's...

His bass is ran with the Pstyle pups through the highs and the other for the lows....

You should check out his latest DVD, there is a section on it where he actually goes step by step through his rack and explains everything... It's pretty cool.....

Is his latest DVD Astauria (sp?) with Vai?

No, there are actually 2 out called Basic Bass and Advanced Bass. There are also books available for them too

Both of'em are cool....

Will I learn anything from the Advanced bass DVD? The book seemed not to teach me much.

dont know if you will or not..... It's pretty much the same stuff from the past vids... I just enjoy watching stuff on bass..... it covers economy of motion, practice techiques (sp??) and other stuff... it's cool if your a fan of billy's stuff, I own both but never really sat down to learn anything from them.....

Ah. What kind of Compression can I use to emulate that Sheehan tone? Would the Boss one work? Since I'm a huge BOSS guy. (Just ordered an ODB3 to go with my CEB3 and TU2, It's in working progress.)

Ah. What kind of Compression can I use to emulate that Sheehan tone? Would the Boss one work? Since I'm a huge BOSS guy. (Just ordered an ODB3 to go with my CEB3 and TU2, It's in working progress.)

I use a tech21 bass compactor, only one compression control but it has a level control which can give you a real Sheehan sound I think.
Check out the tunes on my band's website to hear it, it's just an old P bass, through the tech21 and into a peavey firebass + 4x10.

www.sonsofmerrick.co.uk

Interesting. Is that what he uses?

Interesting. Is that what he uses?

Don't think so. But it gives a good sound. :)

Is his latest DVD Astauria (sp?) with Vai?

Austria? Austrailia?

asoria. that's it.

Urie LA 4 Compressor/Limiter

Where can I get info on that?

Where can I get info on that?
google:

http://www.celestial.com.au/~rosswood/diy/singleoptocomp/optocomp.htm

Check out this guy's videos http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AfUPgS-BkXM&search=danny%20growl
He's got a pretty close sheehan's tone

Dimarzio Will Power P pickups(Billy Sheehan's), I have them on my bass, and they sound pretty close to his clean tone, theyre very middy and fat...

I'm also curious, I love his overdriven tone, how do you think I should eq my amp or bass, and which kind of distortion should I use...

it's 'Astoria' :

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0000TSRAQ/104-7457816-6325567?v=glance&n=130

I have a Yamaha Attitude bass, and it's clear to me a certain part of Sheehan's sound is due to the mix of the low end from the humbucker with the P pickup

in addition to all the compression and overdrive & bi-amping stuff of course

so if you want to emulate his tone, pick up a 'tude bass for starters :)

what's the cheapest/best way I can emulate his tone?
Biamp. Get a Y cord that split's your bass's signal into two. Plug one into your bass amp and turn the bass amp's treble control turned down or to zero.

Plug the other into a guitar amp with the guitar amp's bass control turned down or to zero.

As simple as this set up sounds it's the best way to get started in bi-amping and works surprisingly well.

he also uses a chorus effect and overdrive of some kind. The distortion doesn't sound natural to me so I assume it is from a pedal or rack unit. He also boosts the treble big time to get those harmonics. Such a distinctive sound.

P-bass, chorus, overdrive, compression = Billy Sheehan tone

Check out this guy's videos http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AfUPgS-BkXM&search=danny%20growl
He's got a pretty close sheehan's tone

Not to be disrespectful but that guy has more than billy's tone, he plays just like him. You'd think you'd want to find some new territory and not just become a clone.

I know this guy and I have seen him play some other stuff as well and he does it really good...I like his playing, now a days everybody's influenced by some famous players, everyone wants to become a Victor Wooten, a Jaco, a Flea,etc...I don't blame on somebody for being a "clone" so all my respect to him for getting to this level. I wish I could play just half of what he does.

Can you ask him what the secret is to getting Billys tone :P?

yes people, there is no easy way to the Sheehan sound, but as many here mention, its two sounds, one clean and one dirty, and alot of compression. Im workin on some sort of near-close sound, a preamp + eq (rane) and to that a zoom 9030 and an eq to that also, first I split the signal, one goes to the preamp with clean sound, the other signal goes first into the eq where I trim off the low freq, and raise the middier parts and some of the high freq before it hits the zoom for distortion, both signals goes to a mixer, where i blend in the distorted signal, I can tell that its kind of a shimmering distorted tone, its maybe not the Sheehan sound but its a really good distorted sound, well, the way to sheehan sound is loooooong.

Can you ask him what the secret is to getting Billys tone :P?
He said there's not such secret...just play as much as you can and never stop practising and learning.
You can use a similar sound settings, the same bass, same effects,etc... but there's a bunch of other important factors such like your hands, your technique, the knowledge you have on the instrument, your creativity,etc...