Runnin' with the Devil guitar tone
Van Halen · Edward Van Halen
Van Halen (Warner Bros.), tracked at Sunset Sound Recorders, Hollywood, in the first week of January 1978; released 10 February 1978
dimed non-master 100W Marshall through 25W Greenbacks, mains lowered on a Variac
The rig Van Halen used
Researched from interviews, production write-ups and gear histories — not guessed.
Guitar
EVH 'Frankenstrat' - 1977 partscaster with an ash Boogie Bodies body, a single wax-potted Gibson PAF humbucker at the bridge, one volume control and a stock Fender synchronised vibrato bridge
Amplifier
Marshall 1959 Super Lead 100W 'Plexi' (mains fed through a Variac lowered to 80-85 V)
Cabinet
Marshall 1960 4x12 (Celestion G12M Greenback 25W)
Microphone
Shure SM57
Signal chain
The order the original sound was built in. The exact settings get dialled for your own amp or modeller when you generate the tone.
Get this tone on your rig
Pick your amp or modeller and we’ll build Runnin' with the Devil for it — with a preset file you can load, not a list of knob positions.
Why we think this is right
Tracked in the first week of January 1978 at Sunset Sound with Ted Templeman producing and Donn Landee engineering, not in late 1977 as the stored record implied. The amplifier is a single Marshall 1959 Super Lead with every control on 10, its mains lowered on a Variac to a fixed 80-85 V - Landee's own recollection, and the opposite of the 130-140 V story Eddie told the press in 1978 and later admitted was a lie planted to protect the trick. The MXR Phase 90 is retained in the chain because it was genuinely in the rig, but it is bypassed on every section: no sweep is audible on this master and the first-album songs Eddie himself named as Phase 90 tracks do not include this one. That is an ownership fact, not a song fact. There is no flanger on this recording either. The spatial effect around the guitar is Sunset Sound's live echo chamber returned opposite the off-centre guitar, so the Echoplex tape echo is bound only to the solo and the outro rather than being left running for the whole song. The solo was overdubbed after the basic track.
Sources
- Guitar Player, interview by Jas Obrecht recorded 15 January 1980, published April 1980 - Eddie on the Variac and the first-album rig
- Tape Op, 2024 - Donn Landee on tracking the first Van Halen album at Sunset Sound, the fixed Variac setting and the live chambers
- Guitar World, Eddie Van Halen interviews on the Frankenstrat's bridge history and the single Marshall used across the early albums