Tipton’s ‘You’ve Got Another Thing Comin” Gear

Glenn at the '83 US Festival (click to see it bigger).

Cool riff, cool tune, cool lead and a WET tone. That’s what I hear and have always heard in the Judas Priest tune “Another Thing Comin’,” off 1982’s Screaming for Vengeance.

While I of course know it’s a two-guitar band, I always think of the chords/riff and Glenn Tipton’s solo on this tune, hence the look at just his gear. Here’s what I found. First, some overall comments by Glenn from the book Gear Secrets of the Guitar Legends:

> “I’m like a mad professor in the studio. I like to try new processors and preamps, or even try out rackmount keyboard effects like the T.C. Electronic Fireworks. It actually works very well on guitar. I’ll try anything.”

> “The gear I use in the studio doesn’t differ greatly from my live rig….”

Guitars/Pickups

According to Glenn’s website, these seem to be the two guitars he used on Screaming for Vengeance:

> A ’78 maple necked, black and mirror-plated Fender Strat, customized with a Kahler Pro flat-mount tremolo system, and two cream-bobbined Dimarzio Super Distortion humbuckers. He calls it “a weighty beast indeed,” which implies it is northern/hard ash, and says “it’s very powerful.” He likes hot pickups (see below). He added: “I recorded the solo in Metal Gods with it.”

> A Gibson SG with a chrome pickguard and stock PAF humbuckers.

> Even though I could’ve sworn he played a Hamer in the “Another Thing Comin'” vid, turns out he didn’t (see below vid). He said that “around ’84, I switched to a custom Hamer Phantom made for me by Jol Dantzig. This model was fitted with one EMG humbucker, a Kahler tremolo and one volume pot. A signature model of this was developed and sold to the public from ’84-’86. I still use this guitar model.”

> On pickups for live work: “They’ve got to be hot! Most of my stage guitars are fitted with EMG 81s, which are of course active. All the EMG 81s are wired with the batteries in series so they run the pickups at 18 volts. That makes them last longer and the pickups sound hotter, with more edge and poke. This is partly for the signal-boosting active circuitry and partly so you’re not worrying about the danger of picking up the local radio station midway through a solo.”

> He prefers thin picks and light strings, 9s or Ernie Ball RPS 10s.

“Another Thing Comin’,” Official Vid

Amps/Effects

> From his website: “I used regular vintage [plexi] 50- and 100-watt Marshall heads without a master volume until 1982, when the JCM 800 head was developed. I then used the JCM 800 with Rocktron preamps….” [Not sure if he means a preamp.]

> He used a Pete Cornish custom pedalboard, the specs of which follow and are from Pete Cornish via the vintageamps.com forum:

I found the full details of Glen Tipton’s and Kenny Downing’s effects boards. I made these in October 1980 so they would have been used on the 1982 recording of Screaming For Vengeance.

The effects in the boards are as follows:

> PC [Pete Cornish] Input Isolator
> TB-83 (the original Pete Cornish Treble Boost)
> SS-2 (Cornish boost/OD)
> NG-2 (fuzz)
> Variable tone boost dual voltage 9/18 VDC, “an unreal EQ boost/shimmering pedal”
> ST-2 (gain/boost with Bass/Treble EQ)
> MXR Phase 100
> MXR Flanger
> MXR Analog Delay
> Echoplex EP3 Send/Return
> MXR 10-band EQ
> NB-2 (Linear Boost)
> Mute
> Four isolated outputs to 50w Marshall heads
> D.I. to PA.

Pete noted that “combinations [of effects] would have been used.”

Not even a chorus?! Does that argue for an Eventide Harmonizer? It was a ubiquitous studio effect, but “Another Thing Comin'” does sound more like a chorus. A tribute website also had this (all unsourced):

> Line boosters between each effect [on the Cornish pedalboard] to preserve the signal from input to output.

> A [Dallas] Rangemaster-based custom treble boost connected to the bass channel of Marshall 50- and 100-watt heads with no master volume [but JCMs had a master volume].

> Roland Chorus pedal.

Glenn also talks about using a Rocktron Intellifex unit, which has all kinds of chorus options.

That’s it!

“Another Thing Comin’,” Live, US Festival, 1983
> Here you get a good listen to Glenn’s tone, especially in the solo which starts around 2:33. He’s standing right in front of his Cornish pedalboard.

Notable

> Glenn says his mirror pickguards are, or at least were, “highly polished stainless steel,” not plastic!

> Here’s KK Downing’s 1980 Cornish pedalboard:

> PC [Pete Cornish] Input isolator
> TB-83
> NG-2
> ST-2
> MXR Phase 100
> PC-modified Cry Baby wah
> Echoplex EP3 send/return
> NB-2 (linear boost)
> Mute
> Four isolated outputs to 50w Marshall heads.

Category: DiMarzio, Echoplex, Judas Priest/Tipton/Downing, Marshall, MXR, Rocktron, SG, Strat