Paranoid amp settings — Markbass Little Mark III

The Black Sabbath guitar tone for “Paranoid”, dialed in for a Markbass Little Mark III with a Squire Classic Vibe Duo-Sonic HS. Studio version, Paranoid album (1970) — recorded in approximately 8 hours total session time

Original rig

Gibson SG Standard → Dallas Rangemaster treble booster → Laney LA100BL (normal channel, inputs overloaded for boost)

Aggressive, cutting midrange grind with no low-end mud — raw and direct with upper-mid bite

Amp settings — Markbass Little Mark III

Knob	Setting (0–10)
Gain	0
Bass	0
Mid	10
Treble	10
Presence	10
Reverb	0
Master	7

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Guitar

PICKUPbridge TONE10 VOLUME10

Signal chain

01Electro-Harmonix LPB-1 or TC Electronic Spark Mini (treble booster substitute)

RECOMMENDED — not currently owned. Critical to this tone. A Rangemaster-style treble booster cuts bass and pushes upper mids into the amp. Without this, you cannot authentically recreate Iommi's sound. Budget alternative: EHX LPB-1 ($45) or TC Spark Mini ($50). Run directly into amp input.

Boost/Gain 8

Why these settings

Your Markbass Little Mark III is a bass amp designed for clean, flat response with very different EQ voicing than a guitar tube amp — this is a fundamental mismatch for replicating Iommi's overdriven Laney tone. The Markbass will not break up or distort naturally. I've maxed mid/treble/presence and zeroed bass to approximate Iommi's settings, but without a dirt pedal you will only get a clean, bright tone with no grit. A treble booster or overdrive pedal is mandatory to get anywhere close.

PRO TIPIommi's secret was overloading the Laney's input stage by daisy-chaining the normal channel inputs with a patch cable while using the Rangemaster — this created preamp saturation before the power section. On your rig, the only path to that saturation is a gain pedal. Consider a Tube Screamer with drive at 7, tone at 8, level at 6 as an alternative to the treble booster if you want something more versatile.

Get this tone on your amp

These settings are for a Markbass Little Mark III. ToneAdapt matches any song to whatever amp, guitar and pedals you own — first match is free.

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Song, artist and gear names are used to identify the tone being matched; ToneAdapt is not affiliated with or endorsed by the artists or manufacturers mentioned. Settings are AI-generated starting points — trust your ears.