Screwdriver Guitar

[Jimmee]

Odd question perhaps, but does anybody know how to do the screwdriver guitar noise that Efrim from Godspeed You! Black Emperor does?

I know he sometimes plays it like a slide guitar, but what I'm talking about is the theremin like wailing noise that occasionally appears. The best example I can think of is when Monheim really kicks in.

If anyone knows of a page explaining it, or knows how to do it themselves please share! Googling didn't turn up anything other than a photo of Efrim where the angle blocked out what he was doing

[Geleon Isking]

you talkin about makin it squeal?, if you are its pretty easy, your guitar has sweet spots that u have to hit with the edge of your thumb while u strike the string with ur pick....kinda hard to explain, just move up and down the string till u find it, sounds like shit if ur on a lil crappy practice amp tho, is sexy as shit on a nice half. and if that wasnt what u were talkin about.....sorry lol

[Shaof]

Outside of effects, the only thing I can think of(since I've never heard the song you referenced) is either manipulating the sound by starting with zero volume on the guitar itself, doing a pull-on followed by turning the volume knob up slowly with slight vibrato.

Old Metallica used this on a song who's name evades me at the moment. Kirk does a series of notes this way in the intro to give a violin type effect that sounded somewhat like a ghostly wail.

Best used in tandem with a wah pedal if you want it to mimic a Human voice.

If you can link a DL to the mp3 I can tell you exactly.

[Warrik]

When i saw this thread, I invariably thought of Eddie Van Halen using the power drill intro on For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge.

[Jimmee]

Originally posted by Shaof
Outside of effects, the only thing I can think of(since I've never heard the song you referenced) is either manipulating the sound by starting with zero volume on the guitar itself, doing a pull-on followed by turning the volume knob up slowly with slight vibrato.

Old Metallica used this on a song who's name evades me at the moment. Kirk does a series of notes this way in the intro to give a violin type effect that sounded somewhat like a ghostly wail.

Best used in tandem with a wah pedal if you want it to mimic a Human voice.

If you can link a DL to the mp3 I can tell you exactly.

It's not that, this is a sustained noise that lasts for a good minute or two. It sounds a lot like a theremin, so I'm presuming that vibrato does have a fairly major part in it.

I've pm'd you a link to the mp3 (don't want to post it and risk downing their site,) the noise I'm refering to is the wailing noise before the drums change beat, after the change it's just tremolo picking. I'm certain it's not violining with the volume, I'm pretty sure it's not an e-bow and I'm pretty sure it's done with a screwdriver.

For those of you interested, try downloading Sleep by Godspeed You! Black Emperor and you should be able to hear it.

[Shaof]

Wow that sounds like a female doing opera. Pretty cool.

He is using some sort of slide that's for sure. Probably just a really good set of pickups that have excellent sustain and sliding whatever object he's using back and forth on a small area of each fret fast to get that opretic vibrato effect.

Seems to me a smaller cylinder object would produce this easier than a standard finger size slide since he's moving it back and forth so fast, so maybe it is a screwdriver.

I think it's also important to note he is doing it on a non-wrapped string, so it's on the B or E and up high on the fretboard. If you tried this on a wrapped string it wouldn't sound like that I'm assuming.

I'll try to replicate it on my Guitar Port when I get home from work and maybe post a .wav or something. My rig has excellent sustain.

[Warrik]

Or an Ebow with a slide.