THE Guitar Tones OF GRUNGE/aLT

How Did The Most Iconic Grunge/Alt Guitarists Get Their Iconic Sound?

Introduction

In this research project I am going to be studying the guitar tones of grunge/alt music. I am going to be mainly focusing on Kurt Cobain (1967-1994) of Nirvana, and Jonny Greenwood (1971-Present) of Radiohead.

I am researching this because My Project 3 band is a grunge/alt band and I will need an accurate guitar tone to create an effective and fitting tone. I am focusing on these specific guitarists because they are both very influential in their respective scenes, and I personally love their tones. Kurt Cobain was one of the pioneers of grunge, and his guitar tone is just as iconic. Similarly, Jonny Greenwood used techniques unlike any guitarist before him, always approaching the guitar differently than others. His guitar tone is very strong and always cuts through even with two other guitarists playing with him. I will only be talking about the gear used in the studio recordings rather than live.

Amps - Kurt Cobain

I will be focusing on the In Utero (1993) album tones. For this album he used three amps to get his signature tone. These amps were:

A Fender Quad Reverb (Anon, Equipboard, 2025, 24.03.25)
A Randall Commander II (Anon, Equipboard, 2025, 24.03.25)

A third amp has been speculated for a long time, but was recently discovered to have been a modified old Marshall Super Lead, found in a dump, salvaged and modified by Earnie Bailey. (Rash, A. 2024, 2:11)

These amps were used for different things. The Modified Marshall Super Lead was used for clean tones (Rash, A. 2024, 9:01), the Fender Quad Reverb was used for distorted tones, and the Randall was used sparingly. (Rash, A. 2023 4:50)

Pedals - Kurt Cobain

During the In Utero era of Nirvana, Cobain had switched from his traditional DS-1 Boss Distortion, to the DS-2 Boss Turbo Distortion (Anon, Equipboard, 24.03.25). He used this, in conjunction with a Tech 21 Sansamp (1: Rash, A. 2023 3:25) to achieve his distortion tone. He also used a small clone chorus (Anon, Equipboard, 24.03.25) These pedals were the pillars of his sound. Some other pedals were used live to help make up for the lack of post production effects, but these were what was used in the studio.

I own a DS-2 Distortion Pedal and Olly (Other guitarist in my band) owns a Small Clone Chorus Pedal, Therefore between us we can come very close to the tone on the album.

Guitars - Kurt Cobain

Cobain used many different guitars on the In Utero recordings. One of these was his famous 1965 Sunburst Jaguar. It was modified with Humbucker Pickups, among many other modifications. (Anon, Ground Guitar, 24.03.25). The most interesting guitar used on the In Utero Sessions was the all aluminium guitar owned by Steve Albini, which was brought to the In Utero session (2: Rash, A. 2023 1:57)

He also used a Blue Fender Mustang, as seen in the image on the right. It was modified in many ways, quite simillarly to the Jaguar. "As noted, this guitar was fitted with a humbucker in the bridge position – most likely a Seymour Duncan JB model, which Kurt used in many of his guitars. Aside from that, the only change seemed to have been replacing the stock bridge with a Gotoh Tune-o-Matic." - Anon, GroundGuitar, 2025, 24.03.25

I own a Stratocaster and a Jaguar, so I should be able to get quite close to his guitar setup used on this album.

Pickups

Cobain was known for using Humbuckers in his guitars, as it gave him the punchy tone that he needed.

"As noted, this guitar was fitted with a humbucker in the bridge position – most likely a Seymour Duncan JB model," - Anon, GroundGuitar, 2025, 24.03.25

Single coils were invented first and were a set of magnets "It electromagnetically converts the vibration of the strings to an electric signal." - Anon, Wikipedia, 2025, 07.05.25

Humbuckers do the same job, but combine two single coils wound in opposite directions to cancel out 60 cycle hum (the buzzing that comes from a guitar when it is not being used).

Amps - Jonny Greenwood

For this section, I will be focusing on the gear he used during the recording and touring of both "The Bends" (1995) and "OK Computer" (1997) Albums.

"By the time Radiohead recorded The Bends in 1994, Jonny was using either a Orange OR80/OD80 or a Fender Twin Reverb as his clean tube amp (he switched back and forth), but kept on using his Eighty-Five and Shredmaster combo for his distortion sounds. The Orange combo was the amp he used as the Astoria in 1994. But it seems the Twin Reverb became his favorite, because he used the Twin for touring in support of The Bends once it was released in early-1995." - Anon, The King Of Gear, 07.05.25

Jonny Greenwood at this time used mainly both the Fender 85 and the Fender Twin Reverb, however the only thing that stayed constant in his setup was the 85, which has seen use for all of this era, and OK Computer (As seen below). The 85 Amp was used for distorted tones in conjunction with a Marshall Shredmaster whilst the Twin Reverb was used for clean tones.

"By the time Radiohead recorded the bulk of OK Computer at St Catherine’s Court in late-1996, Jonny seems to have switched to an 1990s re-issue AC306TB. But the AC30 was used in the same way as the Twin (for clean tones or for lower gain in combation with an overdrive pedal)" - Anon, The King Of Gear, 07.05.25

As you can see in this image, Greenwood is seen using both the Fender 85 (Bottom) and Vox AC30 (top). I have added reference images for all amps mentioned below.

Fender Twin Reverb

Fender 85

Vox AC30

Pedals - Jonny Greenwood

Greenwood used upwards of 40 pedals over his time with radiohead, (Anon, The King Of Gear, 12.05.25) The only pedals I will be going over are the main ones that are applicable to my setlist.

Boss OD-3

Roland RE-20 Space Echo

Marshall Shredmaster

Digitech Whammy

(1: Anon, The King Of Gear, 12.05.25)

These pedals are the most integral parts of Greenwood's Pedalboard, as seen in the photo to the left and the website referenced before. These images show both of Greenwood's Pedalboards. He uses two live, one for Modulation and Pitch, (Bottom) and the other for everything else (Top) (2: Anon, The King Of Gear, 12.05.25)

All of the pedals I previously mentioned are present in these two pedalboards. For my personal setup, I have:

Marshall Shredmaster (Re-issue)
Boss RE-2 Space echo (Compact version of RE-201)

These are the only pedals I have that are the same as Greenwood's. However, the song that we are doing (The Bends), Does not need the Digitech Whammy and it it not applicable for any other songs in the set. As for the Boss OD-3, I can use my Boss BD-2 Blues Driver, which will give me a similar effect and sound.

Guitars - Jonny Greenwood

Greenwood is known for his use of Telecasters, and this is his main guitar, His sunburst Telecaster which has been heavily modified, both visually and hardware wise.

"Jonny obtained his current Telecaster Plus V1 in late-1995, after the theft of his original pair of Telecaster Plus guitars. According to the band’s tech, Plank, the current Tele Plus was built by Fender in 1992 or 1993. For a short time after the theft of his original Teles, Jonny experimented with many different guitars and neck/body combinations, but soon settled back on a standard V1 Telecaster Plus with some rewiring." - Anon, The King Of Gear, 12.05.25

"The mods include an added a cutoff switch (also known as a kill-switch) and some other re-wiring. The cutoff switch is a momentary pushbutton, which allows Jonny to mute his volume only while the switch is pressed." - Anon, The King Of Gear, 12.05.25

As for my own gear, I have a Telecaster but it does not have a Humbucker or Kill switch, Luckily however the Kill swtich is unnecessary for our set and the lack of humbuckers can be accounted for by messing with the amp settings to better sound like him

A/B Testing With My Gear

IMG_5674.mov

Amp "Normal" Setting

IMG_5675.mov

Amp "Fat" Setting

IMG_5676.MOV

Blues Driver On

IMG_5678.mov

DS-2 Turbo Mode

IMG_5677.mov

DS-2 Standard Mode

IMG_5679.mov

Marshall Shredmaster Contour High

IMG_5681.mov

Marshall Shredmaster Contour Middle

IMG_5680.mov

Marshall Shredmaster Contour Low

How Will This Help Me?

I will be using all of this information to benefit myself at the project 3 gig. My band is doing a Grunge/Alt rock set, including a Nirvana song, and as I came to realise in the A/B testing section, The tone I achieved happened to also suit the other songs we are performing. The main reason I chose Kurt and Jonny was because they both have similar clean tones yet different Distortion Tones, my plan is to get a clean tone close to Kurt's due to how well it fit the other songs in the set, I can then use my DS-2 for All Apologies, Which is the distortion pedal he used while touring the album (Anon, Equipboard, 24.03.25), and my Marshall Shredmaster for The Bends, Which was consistently Jonny Greenwood's main distortion (1: Anon, The King Of Gear, 12.05.25). As you heard in the A/B testing, both of these pedals are very suitable for the other songs in the set.

Final Thoughts & My Setup

Amp Settings:

"Fat" setting: On

Treble: 6, Bass: 6

Pedal Board:

Boss DS-2 > Blues Driver > Boss Chorus Ensamble

Guitar: Stratocaster

(Tone: 10, Volume: 10)

As we can see from the evidence shown above the guitar tones of the 90's Alt/Grunge scene have a few things in common, Their clean tones were extremely dry and almost like a DI tone, and their distortion tones are aggressive and fill out a lot of space. I have learnt how to achieve this, and how to apply it to the gig. I was limited by my own gear and what I have access to. I do not own a lot of the gear that was used by the artists I researched, and nor can I afford them. However I was able to substitute some of the gear I own to help this. To further my research, I would look into more artists, such as Billy Corgan of The Smashing Pumpkins, or Jerry Cantrell of Alice in chains. I would also look further into specifics, such as guitar strings, picks, Etc.

References Used

Aaron Rash (2024) the INSANE amp Kurt Cobain used to record clean tones on in utero

Available At: https://youtu.be/NXOHsHfETGw?feature=shared

(Accessed: 24.03.25)

Aaron Rash (2023) the distortion tones of nirvana's in utero and how to nail it

Available At: https://youtu.be/0euCne5CTJo?feature=shared (Accessed: 24.03.25)

(Video 1 in the text)

Aaron Rash (2023) the extremely rare guitar kurt cobain used to record in utero

Available At: https://youtu.be/fukLQHOMbU4?feature=shared (Accessed: 24.03.25)

(Video 2 in the text)

Equipboard (2024) Kurt Cobain

Available At: https://equipboard.com/pros/kurt-cobain