Bright Lights
Gary Clark Jr.'s tone on Bright Lights is a modern take on classic blues guitar. An SG through a Fender Vibro-King produces a warm, fat clean tone that breaks up beautifully when he digs in. The tone has more midrange warmth than a typical Fender clean, thanks to the SG's humbuckers. Clark uses a Tube Screamer-style overdrive for solo boosts, pushing the amp into rich, singing sustain.
What we checked
Computed by a program, on this recipe, every time this page is built. How this works
Preset files — 1 of 3 complete
- Helix builds complete — every block in the recipe is in the file
- Quad Cortex 5 blocks replaced with a stand-in model
Which ones
Replaced with a stand-in: Studio Comp, Green 808, Vibro-King, 3x10 Vibro, Tilt EQ. These load cleanly but are not the model named above — the file will sound wrong here until we map them. Set these blocks by hand.
- Katana 3 blocks replaced with a stand-in model
Which ones
Replaced with a stand-in: Crunch, T-Scream, Spring. These load cleanly but are not the model named above — the file will sound wrong here until we map them. Set these blocks by hand.
What we didn't check
- Nobody played this through a real amp. There is no human listening test behind any number on this page.
- The settings are reasoned from the sources below, not measured off the record.
- No audio has been rendered for this recipe yet, so you cannot hear it before you load it.
- 3 platforms on this page (TONEX, Kemper, Fractal) get a model pointer, not a preset file — nothing was built or checked for them.