Nail the ToneB.B. King

Every Day I Have the Blues

B.B. King · RPM single (later collected on Singin' the Blues, 1957) · 1955

The 1955 RPM original is a bright, twangy, almost clean electric guitar cutting through Maxwell Davis' horn chart — thin lows, forward mids, hard treble bite, and essentially no reverb or effects. No session sheet names the guitar or amp, so treat the rig as period attribution: a P-90-loaded Gibson (ES-5 or ES-175) on the bridge pickup is the most likely instrument, with a small tweed combo just starting to break up on the loud picks. For the solo, get the treble high and the gain low, then let vibrato and bends carry the sound rather than dirt.

Where these numbers come from: worked out from the documented rig and the sound of the record

Tuning

Standard tuning, no capo

Single electric guitar in standard tuning, played against Maxwell Davis' horn arrangement — B.B. plays fills and one solo chorus, not rhythm guitar.

Part: Solo

Guitar

  • Gibson ES-5 · P-90 (three) · bridge pickup
  • Fender Esquire · single-coil · bridge pickup

Amp

Tweed-era tube combo (1x12/1x15 class)

GAIN
4.0
BASS
3.0
TREBLE
7.0

No amp is documented for this 1955 Los Angeles session; period sources place King on small Fender tweed combos in these years, so this is a category, not a confirmed model. Guitar.com describes the track's guitar as a DI'd sound — if King went straight into the console, part of the twang is the desk, not an amp, so keep the treble up and the dirt low.

Amp

Fender Deluxe Reverb (modern stand-in)

GAIN
4.5
BASS
3.5
TREBLE
7.0
REVERB
1.5

Practical substitution for players today: just breaking up on hard picking, almost no reverb, so the notes stay dry and snap like a horn line.

Tone character

bright, twangy attack · near-clean with light breakup · forward mids, thin lows · very dry, no reverb · horn-like note snap

medium

One chorus of up-tempo swing 12-bar over horns: the notes are few, but the wide finger vibrato, unison and half-step bends have to land dead in tune and the phrasing has to sit behind the beat.

Want this on your own amp?

These are the record's settings. Tell us what you play through and we'll translate every knob to the amp you actually own — free.

Adapt it to my gear

Sources