Homme, Josh

Dial in Homme’s classic tone in Nooneknows

As it turns out, no one really knows how Josh Homme and Troy Van Leeuwen dial in their sound. The QOTSA brain trust keeps its own counsel on gear and tone. But this much we know: Homme is a vintage gear aficionado, favouring guitars by Ovation, Maton and Motor Ave. He loves Ampeg’s VT series combos. Having played a Maton MS500 in the No One Knows video, we’d bet one would have been in the studio, too. He’s a neck pickup guy but his tone is never muddy. There’s plenty of low-end, some overdrive crunch and a saucing of fuzz. Pedals such as the Stone Deaf PDF-1 add the dirt, the likes of the Fulltone Fat-boost hold it together. Probably. Homme tunes down to C, so using a heavier gauge of string (0.011s should do it) will help those riffs cut through.