which is more of an entry-level guitar. That
one has a bolt on neck, isn’t chambered like
the Dominion, doesn’t have the coil taps,
and has different tuners and pickups.
Stiletto sound on the bottom end—just a
tighter low end than a Rectifier has.
It’s pretty uncommon for a metal
guy to use a chambered guitar.
Why did you implement that on
the Dominion?
Morton: It started years ago when
Jackson sent me a Swee-Tone model. It
was chambered and I just really liked the
way it resonated—it had a really bright,
loud resonance to it. I was playing the
Swee-Tone for a while on Ashes of the
Wake album and the As the Palaces Burn
tour. So I incorporated that when we
went to do the signature model.
and I absolutely love it as the Mark V, and
then the Mark IV, I absolutely love as the
Mark IV.
Morton: I have a Mark V and have used it a
bit, but until very recently I was pretty much
using the Mark IV. Recently I’ve been switching over to a Royal Atlantic with EL34s.
Is it Marshall-y?
Morton: Not really. It’s got a nice, tight
saturation. To me, it’s kind of a blend of the
Mark IV, with a little bit of the Rectifier/
Your respective sounds mesh really well.
Do you guys EQ your amps differently to
accomplish this balance?
Morton: Sometimes I’ll use an overdrive
pedal with the distortion turned all the way
off and just use it as a line boost for a solo.
For a while I was using the MXR GT-OD,
but recently I’ve been using the Way Huge
Green Rhino.
Active pickups seem to be the de
facto metal pickup, but you guys
seem to remain firmly in passive-pickup territory.
Adler: I don’t know if I’m particularly a
fan of the way that those active pickups
sound through a [Mesa/Boogie] Mark IV
or Mark V. I’ve been a passive pickup guy
for so long, man. In my mind, tone needs
to come from the amps and cabinets that
you’re using, not from your pickups. Not
to say that I don’t really love the Duncan
JBs and ’59s—they have a real gushy,
powerful tone with so much bottom-end
growl. They complement my Mesa tone so
well that it was just like, “Okay, I’m sold.”
Morton: I’m not a big fan of active pickups. I don’t think they have anywhere
near the tone or dynamics that a passive
pickup does.
You guys are both big Mesa/Boogie
aficionados. Which of their amps are
you using?
Adler: The Mark V. I’m kind of messing around with combining the Mark
V and Mark IV tones to get that gushy
low end that the V has, and brightness
that the IV has.
You mean the real Mark IV and not the
Mark V’s IV mode?
Adler: Yeah, a real IV.
How would you say the Mark V’s IV
mode compares to the actual Mark IV?
Adler: It’s good, but a Mark IV is an
actual amp. The Mark V has a killer tone
