Nuno Bettencourt once played through Eddie Van Halen’s rig, but said it was “a horrible nightmare”

Nuno Bettencourt and Eddie Van Halen

It’s an age-old topic of conversation that to this day still pits players against one another: “Does guitar tone lie in the fingers or the gear?”

Though it’s probably fair to say the majority of guitarists lean towards the former, it’s by no means a settled debate, and we’ve seen our fair share of evidence supporting both sides of the argument.