Amp vs. Pedal

[njjessee]

Curious, for those that play out a lot, how do you get your crunch and/or lead tones: amp or pedal?

Noah

[michaelomiya]

Curious, for those that play out a lot, how do you get your crunch and/or lead tones: amp or pedal?

Noah

FULL ON Marshall. Marshall as an amp (of course), as a preamp (slave it through an attenuator), as a poweramp (back ends are fat, change tubes to taste, but EL34s preferred when stock, 6550's when modded).

[tom]

ok mikey, where do you play with that cranked up marshall? ;) i can't play anywhere near that volume, so i'm using pedals, and in all my years of playing, i've never been happier with what i'm hearing.

[pluto]

Tom, didn't you know that Mike is deaf? He has to play that loud because he can't hear a thing.

[michaelomiya]

ok mikey, where do you play with that cranked up marshall? ;) i can't play anywhere near that volume, so i'm using pedals, and in all my years of playing, i've never been happier with what i'm hearing.

At work (on the weekends!). No lie, we get to play full bore, bass, guitar, drums, PA, in an industrial complex that we manage.

When we do get to go play out (1-2x/month, if we get lucky), I end up running the 2204 through a 112 iso-box (homemade frankenstein w/ a V30 - hideous, but functional), and it gets mic'd/mixed.

Also, the modded Marshalls have been worked on by Mark Cameron and go from whisper to scream. The tapers on Cameron's heads are very, very effective. I turned Pluto onto some of his work, and now his house is full of Marshall heads.

Honestly, I could use the 2204 as a practice head. Of course, it's a MV, and has been modded. My point here is I believe MV Marshalls can be made to work at lower volumes. (perhaps a trip to the shop is in order!)

The 60's BF Fenders that Fuzzyguitars has, definitely take to pedals like kids and dirt. The V-Stack and the Keeley, IMHO, really emulate that Marshall OD when played through a ProReverb. They even clean-up OK.

So, if I was gigging weekly (like you tom), it'd be a tube Fender combo amp that I could beat-up (maybe one of the reissues), a V-stack, and an Andy. And every year, I go back to the Zvex booth, and pick up the Nano head (0.5W). I gotta say that 'lil thing sure does does a mean "Mississippi Queen"!

(waaay off topic: And it maybe it's because my hearing's completely gone :p , but I cannot seem to get an appreciable gain tone from a low wattage, MV amp. If it does sizzle and sparkle, it usually sounds A$$-thin when you dial the vol knob back, IMHO. For me, smaller wattage heads trying to do the "high gain" dance, all seem to suffer from a tone that's loose or undefined on the low end (could be poor speakers, or weak trannies) and don't have the articulation or depth of larger wattage heads. IMHO, the physics related to a low wattage amp procuring that thick gain/massive headroom cannot be negated.)

[pluto]

Also, the modded Marshalls have been worked on by Mark Cameron and go from whisper to scream. The tapers on Cameron's heads are very, very effective. I turned Pluto onto some of his work, and now his house is full of Marshall heads.

Honestly, I could use the 2204 as a practice head. Of course, it's a MV, and has been modded. My point here is I believe MV Marshalls can be made to work at lower volumes. (perhaps a trip to the shop is in order!)



Mark Cameron? Who's that?? :D 2204 IMO can easily be used as a practice head without modding-just put a ZW-OD44 in front, and instant practice head at low volumes! Yeah, it's a little buzzy, but it's a "nice" buzzy! :p

[michaelomiya]

Tom, didn't you know that Mike is deaf? He has to play that loud because he can't hear a thing.

whaaaaa? did you say some thing? :rolleyes:

[dannopelli]

Hey Noah,

I use a Distortion Pro, a red FullDrive 2, and an Ultimate Octave. Also my amp is set at the edge of break up.

Danno

But what do you care!??? You have that cool new Mesa Lone Star Special! :D

[morty]

I use a 3 channel Koch Multitone and get nice clean crounch and overdrive. the overdrive is not metal, but suits me

I also use a T.C. G-force and it cover all my delay chorus reverb tremolo and echoes and much much more..

I switched from EL34 to 6L6 I got a bit nicer clean but lost a bit of the Marchall vibe was lost..

I can go from low volumes to high volumes

[John Price]

95% LoneStar Head the other 5% could be my AC/RC booster by exotic pedals or my new toy the Ego Booster by SPF...... :D

[michaelomiya]

OK, how about HAO pedals? The Sole Driver and Rust Driver sound terrifying. Best part? They're designed to be mated w/ a Fender tube combo (or amps w/ similar architecture, like...say a Carr)!

Check out the Rust Driver at 1:31 on the Demo mp3 and the Sole Driver at 1:27!

HAO Intro (http://members.cox.net/eddyrox/HAO intro.mp3)
HAO Demo (http://members.cox.net/eddyrox/HAO demo.mp3)

[LonestarGtr]

I use both amp distortion and pedals, depending on what rig I'm playing on. I have a Mesa Solo 50 and a '71 Marshall 50w and a '62 Fender Bandmaster that I can have cranked up for distortion when I use my Bradshaw head-switcher. When I'm playing through one amp, I'll use a Matchless dc30, a Bogner Metropolis or my Diaz CD100. I've been using just the Diaz lately and it has a wonderful boost that sounds awesome. For other gain, I use a Voodoo Labs Sparkle Drive for a touch of gain and a Fulldrive 2 for heavier gain. I don't ever get or need any metal type distortion so the Fulldrive sounds great. I recently got one of the newer ones with the 3-way switch on the front for comp cut/fm/vintage and I like that a lot. At lower volumes, the vintage setting sounds best. With my Diaz the fm sounds best and at pretty high volumes or low gain settings, the comp cut rocks.

Mike

hollow t contour
drop dop classic

[sylvanshine]

Mike-

It's great to have a pro like you on the Forum. What makes it great is that this is a place where the builders, professionals and bedroom players all come together because of Anderson guitars. Thanks for the extensive gear list and pictures on your band's site.

Y'all should check out Mike's rig...

Sweet (http://www.lonestar.mu//biography_michael_gear.asp)

[cust22]

ok mikey, where do you play with that cranked up marshall? ;) i can't play anywhere near that volume, so i'm using pedals, and in all my years of playing, i've never been happier with what i'm hearing.

Tom, So what are you using?
What amp?
What pedals?

[bruce]

Cust22,

I'm laughing...wait til Tom replies.... pull up a chair... you might be here a while....LOL!

[tom]

i heard that!
ok, here's the chain. atom with m1 m1 h2 pickups-rmc wah-barber comp-oc3 in a loop-vstack-mosferatu-tube zone-double zen-burn unit-tc chorus in a loop-line6 trem in a loop-eb vol with dt7-dd4 w/doubler switch. this runs out into either the rambler, or a boogie subway with a hotplate set to-8db into a bogner cube. i have a couple other od's too, but this is the current lineup. like i have said before, i like having too many od choices because i like to mix it up a lot. this weekend it was a mos and tz weekend. variety is just plain fun. i feel like i do have a style of my own, but my sound varies a lot form day to day. in the old days i had "my sound", but now i am more of a color or texture in a band. church music is way different than traditional rock band stuff. it's really not about a particular person, it's about the whole experience for the church. it can be quite freeing, not worrying about how good i sound or how cool the lick i just played is.
i can appreciate all the tweaking some of you do with different tubes and biasing, and making patches like scott has done with his xt live, and if that's what makes your playing experience fun, then that's what you should do. for me life is just too hectic and playing is my outlet and being slightly out of control makes it more fun.