Farview
Well-known member
I had a guitar with a sustainiac a long time ago. It really wasn't worth the added expense over just carrying around an e-bow for the couple things I needed it for.
rayc
retroreprobate
That fellows guitar tones are exactly what I want not to have.
The tone reeks of selfdeludedquasiheaviness that goes with Milo tin kick drums and MIA bass tone to make a form of metal I, personally, find tedious.
Please forgive me, TRex, Slade, Bowie etc were considered pop when I was a teen. They seem to be considered the harbingers of Hard'n'heavy now.
Just get a Big Muff and tweak about until you get all the sustain you want without too much of it's colour.
Lt. Bob, what's on the recommended list of your OD pedals?
The tone reeks of selfdeludedquasiheaviness that goes with Milo tin kick drums and MIA bass tone to make a form of metal I, personally, find tedious.
Please forgive me, TRex, Slade, Bowie etc were considered pop when I was a teen. They seem to be considered the harbingers of Hard'n'heavy now.
Just get a Big Muff and tweak about until you get all the sustain you want without too much of it's colour.
Lt. Bob, what's on the recommended list of your OD pedals?
Farview
Well-known member
I understand where you are coming from, but if someone would have told you this as a teenager in the 70's, they would have been telling you that you should be after the tone that people were using in the 1930's. How do you think you would have reacted to that?
G
Greg_L
Banned
30's metal is best.
Lt. Bob
Spread the Daf!
a no-brainer would be the Fulltone OCD.
Pretty much everyone likes it.
I have a couple that aren't so easy to recommend but I like 'em.
A Tubeworks RealTube .... but it has to plug into 110v which makes it a bit of a PIA but it really sounds nice.
A Damage Control pedal I have, the Liquid Blues sounds great but it's HUGE .....way too big for any normal pedalboard.
But there's SO many of the things out there ....... there are all kinds of semi-boutique pedals at reasonable prices I'd like to try if I weren't so broke that even reasonable is outta my reach.
Good thing I bought tons of stuff back when times were better.
G
Greg_L
Banned
Our lead guitarist got one of those and I finally got to hear it. It's pretty nice. I don't like what it does if the amp is already set up for high gain, but in front of a cleanish crunch to moderate gain setting, it's pretty awesome. Definitely lived up to the hype as far as I'm concerned.
rayc
retroreprobate
Fairview,
I wasn't looking for guitar tone in the earlt to mid 70's. I'd started playing bass & was, for most of the 70's, simply looking for an amp to borrow & 2nd hand strings for my short scale bass - both a little hard to come by where I was living.
The guitar tones that were part & parcel of the bands I like like were Page, May, Iommi, Bourke, Holder & Cohen; the 1st four playing hard rock to metal (I didn't really listen to pop/light Queen - more a fan of the 1st 2 LPs and the rockier parts of SHAttack), Noddy's rhythm always sounded cool & I still love Lenny's playing.
I was after bass sounds and wanted to get sounds like JPJones, Shelley & Lea. Deacon's was nothing special and Geezer's I liked in Sabbath but didn't like as a general tone. JPJ's was amazingly good, Shelley's (from Budgie) was toppy & aggressive, Jum Lea's was muscular & fluid. NONE of which could be captured on my Coronet bass & tiny 10w amp.
I was subject to peer pressure regarding music certainly but not much as regards to making music as very none of my peer/social group made music.
Lt Bob,
I asked about the ODs specificlly because I have a problem: my main amp is a Marshall Superbass MkII which has no master vol and a very big, loud, clean sound. It doesn't get a lovely tube break up sound when cranked, the input channels linked or any other way I have tried. I recently did some samples of me trying to drive it into overdrive with all of the above as well as a Boss SD1, Behri Blues O'drive and just a booster. All to no avail - well not entirely - I managed to produce a sound of ghastly unpleasant meltdown proportions (& had to do all of the above with ear protection as the amp is rather loud).
Any ideas as to how to get something like a pleasant breakup from something infront of the tube monster?
I wasn't looking for guitar tone in the earlt to mid 70's. I'd started playing bass & was, for most of the 70's, simply looking for an amp to borrow & 2nd hand strings for my short scale bass - both a little hard to come by where I was living.
The guitar tones that were part & parcel of the bands I like like were Page, May, Iommi, Bourke, Holder & Cohen; the 1st four playing hard rock to metal (I didn't really listen to pop/light Queen - more a fan of the 1st 2 LPs and the rockier parts of SHAttack), Noddy's rhythm always sounded cool & I still love Lenny's playing.
I was after bass sounds and wanted to get sounds like JPJones, Shelley & Lea. Deacon's was nothing special and Geezer's I liked in Sabbath but didn't like as a general tone. JPJ's was amazingly good, Shelley's (from Budgie) was toppy & aggressive, Jum Lea's was muscular & fluid. NONE of which could be captured on my Coronet bass & tiny 10w amp.
I was subject to peer pressure regarding music certainly but not much as regards to making music as very none of my peer/social group made music.
Lt Bob,
I asked about the ODs specificlly because I have a problem: my main amp is a Marshall Superbass MkII which has no master vol and a very big, loud, clean sound. It doesn't get a lovely tube break up sound when cranked, the input channels linked or any other way I have tried. I recently did some samples of me trying to drive it into overdrive with all of the above as well as a Boss SD1, Behri Blues O'drive and just a booster. All to no avail - well not entirely - I managed to produce a sound of ghastly unpleasant meltdown proportions (& had to do all of the above with ear protection as the amp is rather loud).
Any ideas as to how to get something like a pleasant breakup from something infront of the tube monster?
Farview
Well-known member
I think you completely missed my point.
Farview
Well-known member
You should be able to drive that first tube into distortion with just about anything that will give you enough of a gain boost, even with the volume turned down. If you are looking for power section breakup, you are just going to have to turn the amp all the way up. If I remember, the mkII has 6550 tubes in it and those have more headroom than EL34's. (or at least they don't compress as much/fast)
Unfortunately, that amp wasn't really designed to give a nice, warm breakup. But there has to be some sort of pedal that will get you something in the ballpark.
Lt. Bob
Spread the Daf!
super bass is a bass amp so it has 1. .... a different freq response than a guitar amp and 2. .... is designed to stay sorta cleanish.
personally, I'd think in terms of an overdrive that has a sound you like. I wouldn't look so much at overdriving that front end even though you could.
It's likely to be harsh sounding.
You want something that is sorta like an amp in a box. So I'd still suggest the OCD. Like greg said ...... they work best into something clean like what you have. If the amp is already distorted they mush things up. But into a clean amp like say, a twin ..... a or your amp, they behave very much like an amp .... you can clean them up by rolling back the volume and so forth.
Not too expensive ...... I almost can't imagine you wouldn't like it and/or be able to get a nice sounding distortion out of it.
rayc
retroreprobate
Farview,
I didn't miss the point. That one should expect much when teaching a kid to suck eggs when he has a microwave. It was a kid being told s/he ought to emulate a tone from a bygone era then by nature as a teen they'd laugh, reply with "whatever" & turn their iPod up just a little louder to block any further interference.
My point was that as a kid at that age/stage I wasn't subject to any pressure to meet/match/aspire to a sonic goal, that I did like much of what was contemporary, albeit occassionally less well know, (Queen, for example,were pariah's amongst the then rock'n'pop music cogniscenti of Oz until NATO due to a misunderstanding at our premier outdoor festival of the time) and that I was busy just tring to make A sound with my meagre bits & pieces.
The reason I made that belaboured point was to point out that not all kids are nose ring in their position on music.
Re the amp - I was of the belief that pushing the front end would garner the results I was after but it is something I've tried very unsuccessfully to do. The most recent attempts are listed on the thread I started in terms of signal path & there are samples of the sound as well. Cranking the amp. linking the channels, clean boost, EQing, and adding a pedal driven tone to boost & EQ were all equally unsuccessful in generating a tone that was pleasing to the ear.
Lt. Bob,
Thanks. Having read your post on ODs I garnered that may be your answer. I did, however, want to make the context clear. You've added that to your store of knowledge/experience and come up with an answer. I say thanks heaps for the answer.
I'll start looking at the pedal and prices as well as the Xmas list.
I've just done a search across Australia. the OCD price (for the latest version) varies from $198 to $350. That's a big leap. I'll have some more sussing to do then think about that excellent quote about asking for forgiveness as opposed to permission.
Thanks again.
I didn't miss the point. That one should expect much when teaching a kid to suck eggs when he has a microwave. It was a kid being told s/he ought to emulate a tone from a bygone era then by nature as a teen they'd laugh, reply with "whatever" & turn their iPod up just a little louder to block any further interference.
My point was that as a kid at that age/stage I wasn't subject to any pressure to meet/match/aspire to a sonic goal, that I did like much of what was contemporary, albeit occassionally less well know, (Queen, for example,were pariah's amongst the then rock'n'pop music cogniscenti of Oz until NATO due to a misunderstanding at our premier outdoor festival of the time) and that I was busy just tring to make A sound with my meagre bits & pieces.
The reason I made that belaboured point was to point out that not all kids are nose ring in their position on music.
Re the amp - I was of the belief that pushing the front end would garner the results I was after but it is something I've tried very unsuccessfully to do. The most recent attempts are listed on the thread I started in terms of signal path & there are samples of the sound as well. Cranking the amp. linking the channels, clean boost, EQing, and adding a pedal driven tone to boost & EQ were all equally unsuccessful in generating a tone that was pleasing to the ear.
Lt. Bob,
Thanks. Having read your post on ODs I garnered that may be your answer. I did, however, want to make the context clear. You've added that to your store of knowledge/experience and come up with an answer. I say thanks heaps for the answer.
I'll start looking at the pedal and prices as well as the Xmas list.
I've just done a search across Australia. the OCD price (for the latest version) varies from $198 to $350. That's a big leap. I'll have some more sussing to do then think about that excellent quote about asking for forgiveness as opposed to permission.
Thanks again.
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Lt. Bob
Spread the Daf!
Holy CRAP!!!!
do ya'll have ebay over there?
That's a bunch more than over here ........
since you have to pay so much more over there be sure to look for demos of anything you're gonna get.
You want a unit that has a sound of it's own that you like.
Farview
Well-known member
With that amp, there is a mod you can have someone do that takes the output of channel one and feeds it into channel to. The two channels now feed different sides of the first tube, so even linking them together the way you are available(Im assuming are linking the low input of channel one to the high input of channel two) you aren't adding any gain, you are jutting two clean-ish preamps at the same time.
All that said, Im still not sure that amp will ever give you the sound you want. I haven't looked at the schematic for a very long time, but I seem to recall the back end of the amp being different from the guitar amp versions.
The only way to test it is to turn it all the way up. If that doesn't give you the type of distortion you are looking for, then the amp isn't the right one for you.
Obviously, if you could find a pedal that gives you the distortion you want, you can use this as a clean-ish poweramp with character. But it will take some time to wade through the hundreds of choices that are out there.
good luck.
All that said, Im still not sure that amp will ever give you the sound you want. I haven't looked at the schematic for a very long time, but I seem to recall the back end of the amp being different from the guitar amp versions.
The only way to test it is to turn it all the way up. If that doesn't give you the type of distortion you are looking for, then the amp isn't the right one for you.
Obviously, if you could find a pedal that gives you the distortion you want, you can use this as a clean-ish poweramp with character. But it will take some time to wade through the hundreds of choices that are out there.
good luck.
rayc
retroreprobate
Lt. Bob, yep, pricey so I'll be listening before spending.
Farview, Def doesn't help at 100% vol & with the channels linked. Just gets loud then ugly.
I have to admit that I quite like the general tone of the amp so will have to think twice about modding it to Superlead - it's easily done & my tech offered to do it whilst also saying that an SBMkII in the kind of condition mine is in is a rarity and it was worthwhile preserving.
I'll have to do some looking, playing & thinking.
Thanks gents.
Farview, Def doesn't help at 100% vol & with the channels linked. Just gets loud then ugly.
I have to admit that I quite like the general tone of the amp so will have to think twice about modding it to Superlead - it's easily done & my tech offered to do it whilst also saying that an SBMkII in the kind of condition mine is in is a rarity and it was worthwhile preserving.
I'll have to do some looking, playing & thinking.
Thanks gents.
Lt. Bob
Spread the Daf!
there are lots of pedlas that'll do what you want. It's just a matter of finding the one that's right for you.
I play at such low volumes often that I basically get my sound from pedals despite having a great amp collection.
I have zero problem getting a sound I like.
I did buy a few pedals I didn't like though.
But you don't want an uncolored transparent pedal ....... you want something that provides a goodly amount of the overall sound/distortion.
What are some of your favorite distorted sounds?
rayc
retroreprobate
Lt. Bob,
Thanks for the interest. I love a lot of noisy guitar (Kossof, Elvis Costello, fuzzy garage bands, Tool, early Sabbath etc) but
the stuff I play isn't very distortion oriented to be honest. Recently I've been trying to achieve some of a tube amp's potential so that I'd have another string to the bow.
If you wouldn't mind listening to a couple of tracks on my soundclick page
Music page of Pygmy Beat - MP3 music page on SoundClick
you may be able to zone in on something that'd work for me. There are 3 distinct styles in the bundle:
a) Pygmy Beat Augmented (or +) is rockier; probably classic rock oriented. (haemophillic heroes & the master)
Pygmy Beat is a bit of Folk rock with a bit more rock and ventures into psych. (Solong Shuffle & Sewer Song)
Then there's a much folkier form. (Eyes Wide Open & Gimli's Lament).
the guitar I usually play (a semi acoustic Bruno Royal Artist) is the main rhythm guitar in most of thsoe tracks, it may be under some other treated guitars but is usually there in the mix as part of the sound. The nice leads lines are by Ido1957 on his rig.
Mostly I play a trebbly jangly noise that's most clearly described after the intro of the master. I would love to be able to get that with a little break up. I have a fairly common strum that finds its way into most of my stuff so I suppose the tone would have to be compatible with that.
Within the scope of such I own a Boss SD1, a Behringer Blues Overdrive and a Big Muff clone, (Big Fluff made in Tasmania), as well as the Behri Sansamp clone and a Yamaha FX500 (it generates the synthish tone in some of the songs on the list but has, probably, the worst of 80's distortion/fuzz/overdrive). Being that I had hoped to get something from the amp I haven't really spent money on a pedal to do the work.
Sorry to drag this out.
Thanks for the interest. I love a lot of noisy guitar (Kossof, Elvis Costello, fuzzy garage bands, Tool, early Sabbath etc) but
the stuff I play isn't very distortion oriented to be honest. Recently I've been trying to achieve some of a tube amp's potential so that I'd have another string to the bow.
If you wouldn't mind listening to a couple of tracks on my soundclick page
Music page of Pygmy Beat - MP3 music page on SoundClick
you may be able to zone in on something that'd work for me. There are 3 distinct styles in the bundle:
a) Pygmy Beat Augmented (or +) is rockier; probably classic rock oriented. (haemophillic heroes & the master)
Pygmy Beat is a bit of Folk rock with a bit more rock and ventures into psych. (Solong Shuffle & Sewer Song)
Then there's a much folkier form. (Eyes Wide Open & Gimli's Lament).
the guitar I usually play (a semi acoustic Bruno Royal Artist) is the main rhythm guitar in most of thsoe tracks, it may be under some other treated guitars but is usually there in the mix as part of the sound. The nice leads lines are by Ido1957 on his rig.
Mostly I play a trebbly jangly noise that's most clearly described after the intro of the master. I would love to be able to get that with a little break up. I have a fairly common strum that finds its way into most of my stuff so I suppose the tone would have to be compatible with that.
Within the scope of such I own a Boss SD1, a Behringer Blues Overdrive and a Big Muff clone, (Big Fluff made in Tasmania), as well as the Behri Sansamp clone and a Yamaha FX500 (it generates the synthish tone in some of the songs on the list but has, probably, the worst of 80's distortion/fuzz/overdrive). Being that I had hoped to get something from the amp I haven't really spent money on a pedal to do the work.
Sorry to drag this out.
Lt. Bob
Spread the Daf!
actually talking about gear is about the only thing I still like about coming to HR anymore.
From what I heard (I'm kinda hearing some Bowie in that track) you want a basically classic vintage sound.
I would rule out a Tubescreamer ...... they have a very pronounced midrange that I don't think would fit into what you're doing very well plus they don't have much gain .... they need to OD the amp which hasn't been working for you.
Can you get Guitar Fetish pedals over there?
They're pretty cheap and might not be that expensive even after whatever VAT tax you have to pay on them. Their 'Brownie' pedal might work well for you.
Since you don't have a lot of pedals and since they cost so much over there (what's up with that?) you wany something with a range of gain so you can use it for different things.
Although people act like there's a big definitive difference between OD pedals and distortion pedals there often isn't.
In theory an OD pedal is just to overdrive the amp's input but in reality VERY many OD pedals will merrily distort away if you crank the gain. But some, like a Tubescreamer, will not.
I wonder what all is available to you for any sane price though and that makes it harder to recommend specific pedals.
Bang for the buck, the Guitar Fetish pedals are awesome ..... I have a few and they all perform very well at stupid cheap prices.
www.guitarfetish.com
What about building one?
Would that be cheaper?
Maybe not so much added cost in the form of taxes on parts?
You have sites like www.Buildyourownclone.com that have kits and pretty good descriptions of their sound. and another is diyeffects.com
You could also go the multifx route.
Something like a Zoom G2 which is 100 bucks over here so it's probably a grand there ... lol
rayc
retroreprobate
Lt. Bob,
Thanks for the additional info.
In terms of DIY I can honestly say I have the tools. That's it - can't use them.
I've looked up the Brownie & it seems it may be quite useful.
I checked out a few of their pedals & kept in mind that I needed one that generated the sound rather than pushing the amp.
The Brownie certainly seems to fit the bill & at US$70 delivered across the pond it's a safe experiment.
I'll let you know how I get on.
Thanks for the additional info.
In terms of DIY I can honestly say I have the tools. That's it - can't use them.
I've looked up the Brownie & it seems it may be quite useful.
I checked out a few of their pedals & kept in mind that I needed one that generated the sound rather than pushing the amp.
The Brownie certainly seems to fit the bill & at US$70 delivered across the pond it's a safe experiment.
I'll let you know how I get on.
