WORST Distortion Pedal EVER

[OklaStrat]

Re: WORST Distortion Pedal EVER

If I remember correctly, stu runs an overdrive or distortion pedal in front of a VHT 50/CL... about the gainiest amp I've ever encountered. Not something I would do (or think someone else would want to do, heheh) but it works for him.

Pete

[StuTDavis]

Re: WORST Distortion Pedal EVER

Ross,

Gotcha! [img]images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

Hehehe on the iced tea, I'm originally from South Carolina...and my family used to all drink sweeeeeeeeeet tea, so I'm used to it. I put about a cup and a half of sugar in a gallon of tea when I make it...and I've cut down quite a bit... [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

You're probably right about the channels of your head and the IE4. On my M4, I got all gain'd up channels at first, then realizing I wanted at least some kinda clean. So I traded my Egnater High Gain module in for a regular SuperLead module...which kinda gets clean when you turn it way down. But...for the little bit of clean I play...eh...I might eventually get one of the cheaper Randall clean module versions for it, but even for $200, that's a lot to me to add for clean hehehe. But the Egnater modules are around $400, and it's hard for me to justify that for just a clean channel, again, for what little clean I acutally play.

Since you asked...I just play as a hobby at home. Never played anywhere out. I know there are bigtime differences in the sound of gear when you crank them and in big halls vs. at home. My goal has always been to nail the sound I hear coming out of CDs as closely as possible. And I love yapping with people about gear...

The ERECT...hehehe...I'm sure you guessed, is a Dual Rec emulation. It's definitely got that Mesa moosh sound, and takes the most sound reworking to get to where I like it. But with my setup it nails the Metallica black album stuff I play very well to my ears.

I've tried quite a few (but not nearly all) of the high-gain amps. I've never been a big fan of Mesa's actual sound, and I've heard other people playing them and didn't care for it, so I've never personally played one. Tube amps today are getting to be higher-gain in nature...and getting closer to what I like, but, by itself? Nah... The closest things I've actually tried so far were the Bogner Uberschall and the Diezel Herbert at NAMM this year. And I've heard someone playing a couple of the new Peaveys and the Randall Warhead...again...they're closer...but wouldn't do it for me by themselves. So...

No matter what the amp, I'm pretty much 100% sure that no amp or setup would be what I want without having a lot of added junk. I run the Egnater through 10 other units between rack and pedals, to get it where I want it. The difference for me is the versatility rack gear gives me, and that's why I left amp heads. With my past tube head setup, I still needed rack and pedals to get them where I wanted them...and the setup was completely not versatile. So I never really expect any one preamp to give me what I'd want by itself, just as I'd never expect any one amp to give it to me. That's kind of like putting all your eggs in one basket, expecting really a lot from just one piece of gear, and generally can be very disappointing. So, now I go into the situation with the expectation that I'm going to have to put other gear with it. I consider the preamp a basic tone-generator...something to work with. And, if the preamp has a good, strong basic sound that I like...like the modules of this Egnater...I'm more confident that I can spruce it up with other gear to get it where I want it to be.

I've noticed the same thing you did--even though the sound of a lot of amps is "stronger" and overall heavier, the gain sort of washes away. It's, I believe, just a difference in the amount of compression that's happening...that compression is really where "metal" sounds happen. And, again, according to Egnater on the M4, there's really only so much compression you can actually force into a tube amp in a natural way (then you're turning it into a tube/ss hybrid). And that's what a lot of the amp makers know, too...but people want that really high-gain sound and don't understand why their "all tube amp" doesn't quite have it, but they expect it. So, they find other ways to add that kind of added compression and "gain". For me, as I explained to Egnater...the "front end" of the preamp just lacked the juice to me. I hate to feel like I'm having to "force" the sounds I want to hear out of my guitar, trying to bash the hell out of the strings just to get the thing to slam out some harmonics. I want the sound really heavy, really articulate, and if I want to do a freakin' screaming harmonic, I want it to fly out rather effortlessly. Okay...so maybe it means I'm not really a very good guitarist...but I have very high expectations...hehe... I had the Rocktron Prophesy at the time, and it had an actual Input Gain knob you could turn to boost the amount of input coming into the amp. I said, hey, why can't you put something like that on the M4?" And they said...well...either they couldn't or just wouldn't. I put my EQ in front to goose it some...that helped. Then, they first suggested a compressor pedal...then an overdrive/distortion pedal to get it where I wanted it. I got both, and found that the OD/DS worked better for me than just straight compression. More natural sounding, and added something I liked to the sound, and the compressor itself turned way up where I liked it was waaaaaaay too noisy.

Since you say that you run your amp a bit lower, you might want to check into a trick I did with my VHT 2-50-2 power amp. It normally runs on EL34s or 6L6s...but I wanted it to sound and feel closer to my Mesa 20-20 EL84 power amp. I got some of the THD Yellow Jackets, which are adapters that come with EL84s, you stick em with the adaptors in the EL34 sockets. My setup's articulation and sensitivity went way up with that amp, and it's got a thicker overall sound. You might like that, you might not, but you did say you like high-articulation. The EL84s naturally distort much earlier than EL34s, and the extra "gain" helps everything overall. [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

[horns666]

Re: WORST Distortion Pedal EVER

a Maestro Fuzz Tone

[Doc Dryer]

Re: WORST Distortion Pedal EVER

"MUFF FUZZ" ???

I sorta LIKE FUZZ around ANY MUFF that I MESS WITH !!!! [img]graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

SHAVED is kinda COOL as well !!!! [img]graemlins/laugh.gif[/img] [img]graemlins/laugh.gif[/img] [img]graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

[ February 14, 2003, 02:02 AM: Message edited by: Doc Dryer ]

[RacerX]

Re: WORST Distortion Pedal EVER

Wow Stu!
That was a heckuva epic novel you wrote there!

[img]graemlins/toast.gif[/img]

[Dreamland_Rebel]

Re: WORST Distortion Pedal EVER

stutdavis, you don't need all that sh*t to get high gain. and tube amps do have all that high gain that you can't seem to find. your problem with getting a good sound out of striaght tube amps is that they are ment to be cranked way up. your gain comes with volume. 100 watt tubes heads will never sound good in your bedroom or living room at a volume that won't knock the pictures off the walls. thats their nature. thats why many playes like 50 watt tube amps so they can crank them and push them to the appropriate level for them to break up properly and have the right amount of gain verses speaker breakup while not holding their ears. i'm personnly going to the mesa .50 cal with el84's so i can get that great tube gain at a slightly lower volume. my mkiii is way to powerful to sound right even at practice with out making my drummer def. yeah your gobs of rack gear will sound great in your living room but take it to a club and turn it up real loud and watch how muddy it becomes. and the mettalica black sound is many many guitars (tracks) at once, so if you tried to play with a band using that sound you'll either never hear yourself enough or never hear anybody else in the band enough. and never will you hear the bass guitar. come to think of it i haven't heard the bass guitar in mettallica since ride the lighning except on orion cause clif wrote it.

oh yeah and from the original post - why whould you even put a pedel with a jcm 800. they totaly rock all by themselves!

[ February 14, 2003, 09:18 AM: Message edited by: Dreamland_Rebel ]

[Cleveland Metal]

Re: WORST Distortion Pedal EVER

why whould you even put a pedel with a jcm 800.

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Surely, you're kidding?... An 800 with a SD-1 or TS-9 is THE sound of Bay Area Metal...

No pedal? You get Foriegner, haha...

[OklaStrat]

Re: WORST Distortion Pedal EVER

I'm not getting the JCM800 without a pedal thing either... mine was a gutless wonder without a Super overdrive or a TS9 in front of it.

btw, most modern amps like VHTs, Mesas, Soldanos, etc - might sound better turned up a bit, but if you crank the gain AND the master, you're going to get a ton of mush.

Cranking tube amps to 10 to get the best sound is most useful with low gain and older amps - crank a plexi to 10 (if you can stand it) and enjoy the rich power tube saturation. Crank a Dual Recto to 10 with the gain cranked and enjoy a horrible feedbacky mush.

The only way to crank a newer (and most) master volume amps is to dime the master, and then adjust the preamp volume until you get what you're looking for. Most poweramp distortion is 'blurry' - it's not as tight and focused as preamp drive.

For a tight metal tone, I'd rather have a VHT like the one I used to own with the gain up and the master down than ANY JCM800 or amp like that cranked.

Pete

[Snoogans]

Re: WORST Distortion Pedal EVER

I've had a few distortion pedals in my time,and the worst I ever encountered was an Ibanez "L.A.Metal" circa '90. Try as hard as I could, I just couldn't get a usable tone out of it!
Tubescreamers all the way!! [img]graemlins/headbang.gif[/img]

[ColdVayne]

Re: WORST Distortion Pedal EVER

Originally posted by Doc Dryer:
"MUFF FUZZ" ???

I sorta LIKE FUZZ around ANY MUFF that I MESS WITH !!!! [img]graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

SHAVED is kinda COOL as well !!!! [img]graemlins/laugh.gif[/img] [img]graemlins/laugh.gif[/img] [img]graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">I like shaved all the way [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

[JacksonShredder]

Re: WORST Distortion Pedal EVER

Funny

I don't need a Pedal in front of my Marshall JCM800 2205

i get the sound i am looking for perfect
it sounds like a mix between Anthrax and Testament

[rstites]

Re: WORST Distortion Pedal EVER

Stu,

Sorry about starting all this. I was just discussing. I know about "the South" and their ideas of what makes good iced tea! [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img]

Ironically, I ditched my rack setup this last fall because it was too much of a pita to haul around everywhere. Plus, I don't like using much outside of the actual amp. If I can't get a sound I like from an amp without outboard gear, I know it's not an amp for me. For the last couple of months, I've been running a basic half-stack with nothing else around it. I keep taking pedals, rack pieces, etc. with me and never get around to hooking them up. I actually like the power stage to stay clean for me. I like the headroom for clean. I also believe that you only want distortion coming from one source: preamp or power amp. Actually distortion coming from both is going to turn to mud very quickly.

I think the limitation in gain/compression there is probably due to his design. He uses two tubes per unit which gives him 4 gain stages. Most of the high gain amps out there use 5-6 gain stages. You naturally get more compression out of more gain stages, even if the distortion is similar. (Obviously, you can get more gain from more stages too but that's a side issue here.) I realize there are some other tubes on the basic preamp, but I really suspect they're strictly for buffering and not gain.

Ross

[lerxstcat]

Re: WORST Distortion Pedal EVER

Originally posted by JacksonShredder:
Funny

I don't need a Pedal in front of my Marshall JCM800 2205

i get the sound i am looking for perfect
it sounds like a mix between Anthrax and Testament

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Would you say it's more Testhrax, or Anthrament? [img]graemlins/poke.gif[/img] [img]graemlins/headbang.gif[/img] [img]graemlins/band.gif[/img]

[rstites]

Re: WORST Distortion Pedal EVER

Some other random thoughts here...

The difference in a 50 vs. 100 W amp is negligible when it comes to volume and power amp distortion. You won't get substantial distortion increases by simply going from a 100 W amp to a 50 W amp. However, feel free to try it. Just pull a pair of tubes from your favorite 100 W amp and try it.

I agree with most here...I don't know how you expect to get good distortion from a stock Marshall 2204/2203 without a pedal. You can crank them way up for power tube distortion, but at that point they're too loud for anything short of a stadium and they really don't get any more distortion than a non-master volume 1987 or 1959...and the non-masters sound better up there.(Note: Jacksonshredder, when people use the generic term 'JCM800' they're almost always refering to the single channel master volume model 2204 or 2203 amps. The 2205/2210s are completely different amps, so you can't apply the same generalizations to them. I realize this can be confusing - especially since the 2203/2204 models predated the JCM800 run by several years - so I usually try to refer to the model numbers. No one would dispute that those amps have plenty of gain stock.)

People, listen to Pete. His post is 100% on IMO when it comes to how to get good distortion.

Ross

[stratvox]

Re: WORST Distortion Pedal EVER

Worst distortion pedal EVER in my opinion is the Ibanez LM7 LA Metal pedal. nuff said.......best? my ts808,83 ds1 and FULLTONE fulldrive2