There are very few guitarists that sound like Albert Collins. His tone is instantly recognisable and sets him apart from almost every other blues guitarist in the modern era.

Blues guitarists often use words like ‘thick’ and ‘warm’ to describe the type of tone they consider desirable.

Albert Collins took the opposite approach. He crafted a killer tone with a real bite and earned the nickname ‘Iceman’ in the process.

Hhe managed to do this whilst producing a tone that had real power. His playing never sounded thin or strident.

It is a great tone to have in your arsenal. Not only will it help you cut through the mix when playing live, but it will bring a clarity and sizzle to your lead playing that few players have ever achieved.

If you have a similar, staccato playing style – or if you blend the blues with other styles of music, like funk – then it will complement your playing perfectly.

So without further ado, here is everything you need to sound like Albert Collins.

The Fender Telecaster

When it comes to recreating the tones of the ‘Iceman’, there is only one guitar you need to consider – the Fender Telecaster.

Also known as ‘The Master of The Telecaster’, Collins played a Telecaster for his entire career.

Not only did this set him aside from his contemporary bluesmen – very few of whom played Telecasters – but it played a key part in his sound.

Telecasters are renowned for their bright, twangy sound. They pack a punch and produce a biting tone that is very different to either a Strat or a Les Paul.

This top end is too much for a lot of blues players, and it is perhaps why Telecasters are more commonly used by country guitarists. It worked perfectly for Collins, however.

If you want to get that same bite and sizzle in your sound, you need to get yourself a Fender Telecaster. Luckily, there are options here to suit every budget.

In the lower price bracket, I would recommend opting for a Squier Telecaster. Some great options to consider here are as follows:

• Squier Bullet Telecaster
  
  
• Squier Affinity Telecaster
  
  
• Squier Classic Vibe ’50s Telecaster
  
  
• Squier Classic Vibe ’60s Custom Telecaster
  

In the middle price bracket, the Mexican made Fender Vintera or Player Telecasters are a brilliant option. Some great choice here are as follows:

• Fender Player Telecaster
  
  
• Fender Vintera ’50s Telecaster
  
  
• Fender Vintera ’60s Telecaster Modified

If you are looking to spend a bit more, I would recommend going for an American made Telecaster or Custom Shop Telecaster. Some of the best options here are as follows:

• Fender American Professional Telecaster
  
  
• Fender American Original ’60s Telecaster
  
  
• Fender American Vintage II 1963 Telecaster
  
  
• Fender Custom Shop ’52 Heavy Relic Telecaster
  
  
• Fender Custom Shop LTD Heavy Relic Telecaster
  

Last, and by no means least, if you really want to sound like Albert Collins and are looking to make an investment, then I would recommend the Albert Collins Signature Fender Telecaster.

This is built to replicate the 1966 Custom Telecaster that Collins used for the majority of his career.

It features vintage pickups, frets and hardware and importantly, it also includes the humbucking neck pickup that Collins had on his Telecaster.

Do you need a humbucker to sound like Albert Collins?

You may have noticed that aside from the Albert Collins Signature Telecaster and the Custom Shop Heavy Relic Telecaster, none of the guitars listed above have a humbucker pickup in the neck.

There are a couple of reasons for this:

Firstly, all of the stock Fender guitars that have an SH (single coil, humbucker) pickup configuration are in a higher price bracket.

For whatever reason, the cheaper Fender models are either fitted only with single coil pickups, or they are set up so both pickups are humbuckers.

Secondly, I don’t think you need to have a guitar with an SH pickup configuration to sound like Albert Collins.

Whilst there is no question that Collins’ pickups contributed to his tone, the classic Albert Collins tone does not require a humbucker. In practice, Collins didn’t use this pickup a lot.

He relied more heavily on his bridge pickup – especially during lead work – and opted to use the bridge pickup and middle position during rhythm playing.

So you can definitely get those ice pick tones with a regular Telecaster, should you wish.

If you are looking for authenticity though, you have two options:

You can buy a Telecaster fitted with a humbucker. There are some amazing choices here, but as mentioned – they are all in a higher price bracket.

If you really want to sound like Albert Collins though and you are happy to make an investment, there are some brilliant American made and Custom Shop guitars with an SH pickup configuration:

• Fender Custom Shop ’60s Telecaster
  
  
• American Performer Telecaster
  
  
• Fender American Pro Telecaster

If you already have a Telecaster, or if you buy a cheaper guitar that doesn’t have an SH pickup configuration, I would recommend switching out your neck pickup and replacing it with a humbucker.

This is both easy and much cheaper than going for a Custom Shop or American made Telecaster.

In Collins’ signature guitar, the neck pickup was a Seymour Duncan 1959 Humbucker.

That would be my first recommendation, but any vintage style humbucking pickup will work well.

Amps

Just like fellow Texan Freddie King,  Albert Collins is best associated with the Fender Quad Reverb amp.

The Fender Quad Reverb is a huge amp. It is 100 watts and is built with 4×12′ speakers. So unsurprisingly, it has a lot of power and headroom.

The way that Collins used his Quad Reverb was very similar to Freddie King. He cranked the amp fully, turned the treble up to 10 and dropped the mids and bass out.

If you want to sound like Albert Collins then, the challenge lies in creating a similar tone, but at a much lower volume.

The good news here, is that whilst for most of us it is near impossible to play at the same volume as Collins, the rest is relatively straight forward.

If you are predominantly playing at home, I would recommend opting for a small Fender amp that will give you a cranked sound, but at a lower volume.

Thankfully Fender have choices to suit every budget. Some different options to consider here are as follows:

• Fender Blues Junior IV
  
  
• Fender ’68 Custom Princeton Reverb
  
  
• Fender Pro Junior IV
  
  
• Fender ’65 Deluxe Reverb
  
  
• Fender ’57 Custom Champ
  
  
• Fender ’65 Princeton Reverb

Alternatively, if you are playing in large venues and want a powerful amp, then either a Fender Twin Reverb or a Fender Super Reverb would be my top choice.

Regardless of which amp you choose though, if you want to sound like Albert Collins, the key is to push the amp. When you crank it and get the tubes working is when you’ll get those fiery Collins tones.

Pedals

As is true of most of the early electric bluesmen, guitar pedals didn’t feature as part of Collins’ rig.

So the good news is that you don’t need to go and buy a whole assortment of new pedals to sound like Albert Collins.

Having said that, there are two types of pedals that will definitely help you recreate Collins’ cranked tones.

So much of Collins’ tone came from the volume at which he played at. He drove his amps hard and that played a huge part in his sound.

The challenge for most of us is getting that cranked sound at a volume that you can play at home or in a small venue. This is where a choice guitar pedal or two will help.

Specifically, I would recommend adding either a clean boost or a treble boost pedal to your rig.

A clean boost will push your amp and add a bit of extra overdrive and aggression to your tone. There are a huge number of different pedals to choose from, but some of my top choices would be:

• Keeley Katana Mini Boost
  
  
• MXR Micro Amp M133
  
  
• Tc Electronic Spark Booster

A treble boost pedal works in much the same way as a clean boost, with one key difference – it disproportionately boosts the upper frequencies of your guitar signal.

So your tone will become brighter and sharper, which is perfect if you want to sound like Albert Collins. Here my top choices are:

• Analog Man Beano Boost
  
  
• Catalinbread Naga Viper Treble Booster
  
  
• Compact Series Rangemaster

In contrast to a clean boost pedal, these treble boost pedals will somewhat colour your tone. So if you are looking for authenticity, then I would not go down this route.

Instead you should focus on dialling your amp in to get the sounds you want.

However, if you want to sound like Albert Collins, as well as to create a range of beautiful blues tones, one of these pedals could be a great addition to your rig.

Capo

When it comes to tone, guitarists tend to focus all of their attention on guitars, amps and pedals. They often totally forget about the finer details.

However if you want to sound like Albert Collins, you need to factor these in, because they played a significant part in his tone.

The first and most important accessory you need is a capo. Collins rarely played without one, and typically fitted it quite high on the neck – normally around the 5th, 7th and 9th frets.

Fitting the capo in this way added a lot more tension to his strings, and this helped him to get that extra bite and snap from his sound.

It is unclear which brand of capo Collins used. Whatever it was though, for most of his career, Collins’ capo was only held together by copious amounts of electrical tape.

So I don’t think you need to sweat too much over the specifics. If you are looking for a high quality capo though, either a Shubb or a Kyser capo would be a great option.

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Cables

After the capo, it is worth looking at your guitar cables. Collins typically used a very lengthy guitar cable, around 100ft long!

A key part of his act was to jump down off the stage and interact with the audience and there are countless stories of him leaving the clubs in which he was playing to go out on the street.

Legend has it that one time he got on a bus whilst still playing. On a separate occasion, he reportedly left the club, ordered a pizza in the restaurant next door, and returned to finish his set, pizza in hand.

Even if you don’t plan any similar on stage antics, it is worth considering the length of your cable if you want to sound like Albert Collins. The longer your guitar cable, the more treble it saps out of your tone.

This might sound counter intuitive, because the rest of the advice here is aimed at increasing the treble in your sound. Yet this trick works well to take some of the sharper, more grating treble tones out of your signal.

When your amp is cranked so loud and the treble is also at 10, it can make your tone sound brittle and sharp. Using a very long cable helps to take a bit of the edge off your tone.

It is quite tricky to find high quality cables that are 100ft long, but these cables from Seismic Audio 100ft cable make a great option.

Alternatively, you could go for a Fender Deluxe 25 ft cable or an Ernie Ball 25ft Cable. At 25ft long, these cables won’t sap quite so much treble out of your tone, but they will still take a bit of the edge off your sound.

This is obviously a more nuanced element of Albert Collins’ rig, but it is definitely worth considering to capture those Iceman tones.

Interestingly, this was also a technique that Stevie Ray Vaughan used. It allowed him to increase the treble in his amp without adding any harsh frequencies to his sound.

Bridge & Ashtray cover

Collins switched the regular ‘3 barrel’ bridge that you find on vintage Telecasters and replaced it with a 6 saddle bridge.

The extent to which this change affected Collins’ tone is somewhat debatable, especially when you consider it within the context of his rig. Yet there are those who believe that making this change reduces sustain.

In a lot of circumstances this would be perceived as a negative. However it could in fact help you to sound like Albert Collins by adding a bit of extra snap to your sound.

Collins also played with the Tele ‘Ashtray’ cover fitted over his bridge. This had an impact on his sound, but more because of the way that it affected how he played his guitar.

Using an ashtray cover alters your picking position by forcing you to move your hand closer towards the neck. This actually adds a bit of warmth to the sound, and like the longer cables, takes a bit of the harshness out of the sound.

The cover also stops you from muting your guitar strings with your palm. This means that you have to control unwanted noise with your fretting hand, rather than your picking hand.

These are some of the more nuanced elements of Collins’ rig. As such, I would argue that they are much less important than a lot of the other advice laid out here.

However if you are really serious in your quest for tone, and are happy to tweak your set up, you can buy these parts easily and cheaply:

• Fender Standard Series Telecaster Bridge
  
  
• Fender Vintage Telecaster Bridge
  
  
• Vintage Telecaster Ashtray Cover

Finally, for a bit of added mojo and to really recreate the Albert Collins vibe, make sure you wear your guitar strap over your right shoulder!

Strings & tunings

One of the most unconventional elements of Albert Collins’ set up was his tuning.

Although it varied during different points in his career, Collins would typically tune his guitar to open F minor. In other words, when he played all of his open strings, he sounded an F minor chord.

So his strings from low to high were as follows: F-C-F-Ab-C-F.

Interestingly, when tuning to F minor, you are tuning every string up, apart from the G string.

This made a significant contribution to Collins’ tone. Tuning up created greater tension in his strings, giving his sound that added bite. It also had an impact on the licks that he played and the way he moved around the neck.

Having said that, I would not recommend adopting the same tuning. 

Tuning in this way is not common at all. In fact I am yet to come across any other bluesmen – famous or otherwise – who have adopted the same tuning.

In addition, I believe you can create the extra bite that Collins had in other ways, without over complicating your playing unnecessarily (more on this below).

With regards to the guitar strings Collins played, there seems to be very little concrete evidence out there.

However all of the information I managed to track down suggests that Collins favoured light guitar strings, running from 0.09-0.38. These are pretty light on the top, and even lighter on the bottom strings.

It is difficult to find a stock set of guitar strings with the exact same gauges, but some of my top choices that will get you close are as follows:

• Ernie Ball Classic Pure Nickel Super Slinky (0.09-0.42)
  
  
• DR Pure Blues Strings (0.09-0.42)
  
  
• Curt Mangan Strings (0.09-0.42)
  
  
• Ernie Ball Super Slinky (0.09-0.42)

If you are naturally used to playing heavier gauge strings, then don’t feel the need to go down to 0.09s. Playing a heavier gauge will actually create more tension in the strings and help with the bite and twang of Collins’ tone.

Just make sure that you can still play comfortably with that heavier gauge if you do tune up and use a capo, both of which will add tension to your strings.

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Playing style

A huge part of Collins’ tone came from the way he played.

Like both Freddie King and Albert King, Collins didn’t use a regular pick and instead played with his fingers. He used his thumb to play his bass strings and then just his index finger to play the treble strings. He would snap at his bass strings, which gave his playing a more funky feeling.

The technique that he adopted with his index finger was also quite unusual. Unlike Freddie and Albert King, Collins didn’t pull at his treble strings with his finger.

Instead he placed his finger on top of each string, and pressed down on the strings with the pad of his finger. He would simply adjust the pressure that he applied with this finger, depending on whether he wanted a softer or more aggressive tone.

This is not an easy style to recreate. However, if you really want to sound like Albert Collins, it is worth learning, as it played a key part in his sound.

Alternatively, playing with your fingers – and not with a pick – is a great first step. This will help you get some added snap to your sound, which is what you need to recreate Collins’ ice pick tones.

Closing thoughts

Well there we have it, everything you need to sound like Albert Collins. Of all of the great bluesmen, Collins has one of the most unusual tones, and it is definitely one of the more challenging to recreate.

But follow the advice here, and you will be able to recreate a bit of the Iceman magic.

Let me know how you get on, and if you have any questions, drop them in the comments below, or send me an email on aidan@happybluesman.com.

Images

Feature Image – Albert Collins (Alamy Stock Photos)
Photos of Gear – Fender Custom Shop, Amazon, Gear 4 Music, Amazon, Pinterest, Amazon, Sweetwater, Amazon

References

Youtube, Blues Guitar Unleashed, Wikipedia, Music Radar, Roman Guitars, TDPRI, Guitar World, Ultimate Guitar, Youtube, TDPRI

Links

Many of the links embedded in this article are affiliate links. As such, if you buy one of the pieces of gear I recommend, or an item from the same store after clicking one of these links, I will earn a small commission.

I never recommend pieces of gear that I wouldn’t use myself, and I include these affiliate links to ensure that I can keep this content free. If you have any questions, please feel free to reach out to me on aidan@happybluesman.com.