endofanera wrote:I'll say it again -- Tech 21 XXL -- lotsa different sounds in this box, all of them good.

I agree...it's one of my favorites. I LOVE all of the Tech 21 stuff I have though. I almost shat myself when I just looked at their website and saw that they came out with an XXL Bass model.

Oh, and just a quick thanks for Milford's input on the differences on those models. I appreciate you letting us know the exact differences on all the EH stuff.

I really love the visual sound Jekyll & Hyde, which is like a Tubescreamer and a Marshall Guv'nor in one box.

http://visualsound.net/jh.htm

Ben

Maybe I missed it, but what kind of amp are you using? Some amp/pedal combinations work "better" than others...

Are there any specific recordings that have the guitar sound you might be after?

Try an Ibanez TS-808 reissue. The personality of your guitar is still there.

For sheer out of controlness, check out a Fuzz Factory.

If you want something very few people have I'd go for a Hot Cake. Hand made by a guy in New Zealand -ex-keyboard player for Split Enz, if that means anything to you-

http://www.asapeurope.com/distribution/crowther/

MXR : Distortion+

it seems weird for me to think of the MXR Distortion+ as a distortion box, it just seems like the best sound i get out of it is something i wanna describe as "overdrive" more than distortion. my bass player tried all of my pedals and liked the mxr best for a little fuzz on the bass. i actually haven't messed around with it a whole lot for guitar. i was put off by the fact that there was no tone knob to balance the distorted sound versus the non-distorted sound, tone-wise i mean. i like it on the bass anyway.

the pedals i know better than that one:

Boss : DS-1

i've had this one the longest, maybe 15 years give or take (it was bought new by a friend in the late 80's and sold to me in 90 or 91). i think it does a great "raging" sound. that's the best way i can think to describe it. great for playing searing, biting solos. maybe the best pedal i've used, other than the XXL, for thick crunchy palm-mutes. but i never liked a damn thing out of it other than the distortion on maybe 90% or so. any more or less was just no good. it's a definite noise box. i haven't used it much since picking up a bunch of other pedals.

Snarling Dogs : Black Dog

this is the pedal i've used the most in the past couple years. it takes a lot of dialing in to get it sounding its best, and the jury's still out on whether or not the tone knob or tone disengage is the way to go, but i like the sound i get out of it when it's tweaked right. definitely similar to the DS-1, but i would characterize this one as sounding like more of a "fuzz" whereas the DS-1 sounds more like a "distortion". it's the pedal i used to get the sound for the heavy part that comes in about 4:30 into this mp3. the bass at that point is going through the MXR Distortion+ also. but only part of that guitar sound is coming from that pedal, all of the guitar parts in the mp3 are being shaped by:

Z.Vex : Super Duper 2-in-1

i use one of the gain stages on this pedal pretty much at all times. it's capable of a very wide range of quantities of gain and distortion, in four discreet settings, with two individually selectable serial gain stages and a master volume. i generally use the first gain as an overall level/presence adjustment (especially good at compensating for different output levels of different guitars) and the second channel to introduce a little bit of dirt/grit at times. it's easy to set it so it's providing an absurd amount of gain, but i don't find that particularaly useful for an everyday guitar sound, and like this pedal in a much more subtle role. i have no idea what this pedal is like for anything except driving the input of one specific tube amp. that's all i've really done with it. they may not all take to it as well as mine does.

ProCo : Vintage Rat

i think i have two of these. i know i have a Vintage Rat that i bought within the past year. and i also have another Rat, i don't exactly know what model it is, that was recently given to me by a friend who had bought in the mid 90's and stopped using it maybe 5 years ago. the two pedals look identical. i dunno. ... it's another pedal like the DS-1 where i really like its not-quite-dimed sound and never got into much else that it did. great for buzzy, thick distorted power chords. searing leads. etc etc.

Aramat : Mojo Fuzz

the sound clip on this website makes me wanna puke. it doesn't even begin to capture my two favorite aspects of this pedal, one being the thick low end, and the other being its ability to make a guitar sustain indefinitely on a single note. i blame both of these on the fact that they used a strat! i like it for, well, making single notes sound huge and sustain indefinitely. not in my signal chain at the moment, but it will be as soon as i'm feeling fully at home with the setup i have now. fuzz. lots of fuzz. supposedly similar to a fuzzface, but with Aramat's improvement of the "mojo" knob. yeah baby! he was exceptionally nice in correspondence. handmade by a really nice guy.

Tech21 : XXL

this pedal is crazy! the XXL has a nice range of overdrives/distortion/fuzzes or whatever they are. i just can't use it for anything other than one part of that range, the "RAWR!" part. that part of the range that's crazy. it is to sound like so: the teenage boy, he has never to get wet his willy, but now is after the prom, he is with beautiful bambina at these hotel, they are to move nervously to the bed, and then 16-headed dragon is to break through window and eat their faces. this is the sound the XXL asks me to let it make. i am scared!

i have never plugged into a muff. never have i played around with a muff. i'm not even sure what a muff is like.

salut, stompbox innuendo!

"salut, stompbox innuendo!"


After a year and a half, these innuendos get a little creepy... having to say it to potential new customers, esp. to the bible belt customers, who have never heard of the Big Muff or the Black Finger...

My boss refers to cold-calling as "penetration".

When we were calling for our last promotion for the new Pulsar and Double Muff pedals Mike kept referring to it as "double penetration"

Christ!

I feel dirty sometimes here at work...

fender have reissued the Fender Blender which is pretty fucking crazy.

It is the MBV - Loveless pedal. Resist not.

I have a Turbo Rat which is lovely sonically I think I prefer it to my big muff though they do different things ie the Rat makes lovely crunchy spikey sounds where as the muff is total cunt.

This sounds interesting. I'd like my Distortion+ to have a little more output but I don't want the sound of the pedal to change. Does replacing the 10k pot with a 100k pot change the sound of the pedal at all?


[quote="TheMilford"]Ok also here's a neat mod to try with your MXR dist+.

Open it up and replace the 10k Volume pot with a 100k pot. this will give you more output volume. you can use it at lower distortion levels and still be louder than your clean sound. with the 10k the output volume is low, so you have to use more dist level to get the output up.

In my experience, you really get what you pay for. I, personally, haven't been happy with a distortion pedal for <$100. But that's just me.

benadrian wrote:I really love the visual sound Jekyll & Hyde, which is like a Tubescreamer and a Marshall Guv'nor in one box.

http://visualsound.net/jh.htm

Ben

Seconded. I've been pretty happy with my visual sound Route 66, which is basically a TS808 Tubescreamer on one side and a compressor/boost on the other side (instead of the Guv'nor). They're solid pedals, too.

But I think I'm going to trade mine in for just a clean boost pedal. The other guitarist in my band just bought one, and it sounds amazing with old tube amps (not sure what you're playing through - he plays a 61' bassman modded for 100w, I play an Ampeg vt-22). I can't imagine having good results with a modern amp, but for what we use, these sound amazing. Sounds just like your guitar plugged straight in with your amp cranked to 10. No tonal coloration, no excess noise, nothing.

Ours are made by the Smart People Factory, which I think is just some dude in atlanta, but I could be wrong. I'm at work so I can't find a link. I think the Seymour Duncan Pickup Booster does the same thing.

-w.