The Ultimate Distortion Box

[Anderton]

Okay guitarists, let 'er rip...what's the best, coolest, sweetest, most wonderful distortion box/effect/plug-in/pedal in the world for guitar? Amps don't count; I'm talking something that you could use with a PA, or for direct recording. Speak up!

[alphajerk]

its a secret. ever notice how we all paint them a different color or put tape over them?

[Guest]

Choose any piece of gear and wave a 12AX7 over it, and you'll be fine.

 

Rich...

[alphajerk]

i will say i have an old zoom, tabletop kind,grey. its got the most amazing flanger ive ever heard. i have about 6 different flanger/phaser pedals costing up to $300 for one TC model. it crushes them all. the perfect swoop, but its noisy as hell.

[Guest]

Wow, how can you choose just one? They all sound different, and have their own space. I gotta say, though, it's hard to beat the Z. Vexx Fuzz Factory for overall weirdness and range of mutation. The Jeckyll and Hyde is a pretty nice box, too. Still, I think it's hard to beat a 59 Les Paul Jr. through an old Big Muff, or a Strat through a Fuz Face. Then there's the Tube Sceamer.....

 

And wah choice makes a WORLD of difference - you don't really know what a fuzz can do till you stick a wah in front. My fave is a giant thing made by Musonic - pretty close in tone to a true Crybaby, but a nicer pedal (IMHO).

[Chip McDonald]

First off, this is a good opportunity for someone with a position of AUTHORITY to define, or at least codify some ambiguous

subjective audio terms. Name you, Craig Anderton...

 

Hmm... If I were to categorize guitarists based on preference of sounds, there would be a tree with this at the top:

 

Guitarists who prefer to hear top octave harmonics

 

Those who don't.

 

In my experience (16 years of teaching/living in music stores) of having watched countless people tweak things, the first thing people do is try to alter the high end. Either they want to hear more attack in the high end, as a manifestation of how it breaks up on pick attack, or they set it so that the harmonics above about 3-4k are muted.

 

So right off, you have two groups of people who will have a different definition of "bright". A guy that likes Eric Johnson is going to think what a guy that likes Van Halen thinks is "dull" is "bright".

 

 

So....

 

I made a post about this in Usenet a few years ago; I'm not going to go into detail, but perhaps if there can be some definitive explanation of some terms things can be discussed reasonably. For instance:

 

 

"Warm" - 1 octave peak at 250? Roll off above 3k?

 

"Fizzy" - excess of harmonics above 5k? (5150..)

 

"chunky" - a mid scooped saturated sound with resonance below 120 hz? Or a mildy over driven sound with speaker distortion that breaks up in the low mids?

 

"punchy" - resonance at a region around 180hz?

 

"sweet" - saturation in the low mids, or high end? Both? Peaky eq?

 

 

etc....

[Chip McDonald]

Random rambling amp stuff:

 

I don't like any one thing out right now.

 

I like certain aspects. I like how Roland modelled power amp distortion in their COSM stuff. I don't like how the sensitivity isn't linear to what a real amp feels like.

 

I had a Rocktron Voodu Valve that I liked because of the semi-parametric pre eq. It had a coloration at 2k that I couldn't abide by so it's gone... a sound I associate with cheap digital devices at this point.

 

All of the modelling amps have a weirdness going on between 500-3k, in that there seems to be less dynamic action going on there - and that there is less idiosyncratic character being changed there. I don't like that.

 

It seems like with the modelling amps the engineers are either doing more math at the expense of latency, or less math with a faster output. I've noticed some amps, like the Crate modelling amp, has an almost completely quantized low end: it's either on or off, but it doesn't follow your dynamics.

On the Roland COSM stuff in the GT series, the high end sounds more natural (in the aforementioned 2k region) with the 24bit GT-3, but the low end seems to be weird... all of these amps when you play real fast through them seems to lose definition. The minor latencies makes the high end seem less bitey when you dig in with the pick, and it also seems like I'm missing the wider dynamic s on a real amp (on a Fender clean sound for instance). Realism in sensitivity seems to be the biggest issue for me with these amps.

 

A non-master Marshall is still the most versatile amp around I think...

 

Most speaker emulators I've heard soud too comb filtered. I like the effect of the Boogie Formula's inductance emulator, but it doesn't seem to take out enough high end.

I've not tried the vaunted Palmer.

 

Some modelling amps seem to model characteristics I want, some don't seem to be doing any modelling at all (I know some are masquerading as modelling amps that aren't....).

 

The Boogie Nomad series amp has the right idea with 3 channels - but the lack of midi capability, as well as 1/4 inch jacks for my Scholz midi octopus switcher is annoying.

 

The coolest amp I've heard is the older tiny solid state Fender Bullet amps, the ones with the 2 channels and reverb. The tone controls on these little amps RULE, perfect for the sound of the preamps in these little things. And the preamp is saturated at a nice frequency and cleans up really well when you turn your volume down. Something about the cicuit makes the tone sound very pure, I don't know why; short circuit path? The new ones sound thin, fizzy and non-dynamic. The tone controls in these little amps are great.

 

Someone needs to make a cheap device that knocks the top harmonics down, like turning the volume 1 knob down on a non-master Marshall when you're plugged into the bass channel. Perhaps a simple low pass filter, but a Marshall does it better than anything... Know what I mean....?

 

The lead channel of the Boogie Nomad series is really nice for my tastes, gained out fusion. I also like the Boogie Formula's lead 1 channel for it's timbral expressiveness - not as drastic as a Rectifier set up like I previously said, but clearer. I would like less 2k pregain sound, though.

 

The way the little Fender Blues Junior amps compress when turned all the way up is neat.

Backing off on your touch makes it go almost completely clean - but it still has a bitey attack, then when you hit it hard it really clamps down drastically with the compression,

moreso than any amp I've played through. The rectifier pooping out I believe.

 

A rectifier that has a dialable sidechain based on eq, rigged with some sort of inverse feedback mechanism based on input voltage would be neat.

 

Actually, more stuff with sidechain type arrangements based on peaky variable eq would be cool - anything that can increase the non-linear aspect of the gain.

 

I want a device that emulates timbral changes in power stage distortion. The sound of a Boogie Rectifier set on vintage with the channel output knowb cranked up lets you vary the balance of high end overtones, based on a dynamic crossing of a very defined threshold... but it sounds like intermodulation distortion and it makes note definition difficult. Garbled.

 

A power stage emulation device would alter it's high end harmonic balance (perhaps relative to a wide peak in the low mids) depending on both the input voltage *and* it's frequency content.

 

36 tunable parametric pregain filters with zero phase distortion, tuned to each note in 3 octaves with variable gain and q in front of the gain stage for resonance effects.

 

Make the filter q narrower based on input voltage, wider when you lighten up your touch.

 

Have multiple parallel gain stages cascaded so that you can set a threshold before the circuit sidechains to it, that way a light touch bypasses multiple high gain preamp stages completely. Set the other stages so that the voltage of a chord activates one stage of the parallel gain stage, but have another higher gain stage triggered by louder voltages of less complex overtones - so when you play single notes hard you get more gain.

 

 

How about design something that acts sort of like a touch wah, but that alters a peaking filter before a gain stage? Make the filter tunable... something that does drastic timbral shifts but in a one octave range (again, going for the power stage distortion effect).

 

Also - what happens when you chain a signal through a whole lot of transformers - like 20 ? Is this akin to what the Boogie speaker emulator does in the Formula? I'm imagining something that looses a bit of detail to a signal, but not just in the high end, and not like a digital quantization effect...

 

"?"

 

Ok, I'll stop....

[alphajerk]

Make the filter q narrower based on input voltage, wider when you lighten up your touch.

 

that would be sweet as a stomp box.

[SiMo]

I think Marshall Jmp1 got oone of the best simulation ever heard .

Smilez...

[lisencocasema.net]

The combination of my Palmer with any amp (a VOX AC15 is really nice or my Dutch made Koch amp) is cool!

 

This sounds sweet and rich!

 

---

Marco Raaphorst

 

------------------

[makaipesteredmystic.com]

My top two favorite fuzzes are quite obscure. The first would be a 70's Ibanez fuzz that had two sliders (output and fuzz, etc.) It required constant cleaning of the slider contacts, but it sounded really cool

(of course I had only been playing guitar for about a month back in 78 so it may have sounded like crap)

Next isnt really a dist/fuzz box but rather I used to take any amp I had and hook a radio shack crossover up to one of their plastic horn tweeters. When you run a fuzz with a flanger or phaser thru this type of rig you would get this hyper high freq fuzz over the top of the normal fuzz, very Belew'ish.

(dont try this around pets!)

D Makai

[Chip McDonald]

Marco - how much is the Palmer? I've read about it but haven't heard it or seen it anywhere. Do you know who distributes it?

 

How does it sound relative to the Holdsworth Juice Extractor? The GT load box? Kolbe?

Is it anything drastically "better" than the above or is it just an incremental improvement? Doe the high end harmonic complexity get reduced or garbled? Is the low end response linear to what it would be without it?

[Beanstudio Mastering]

Marshall makes a pedal called the Guv'nor. One of the best guitar players I work with uses it and swears by it. There is a new version of it, and I don't know if it is the same.

 

Craig's multiband distortion plug-in looks pretty cool too. Anyone use it?

 

=================================

Jim De Salvo

beanstudio@hotmail.com

Beanstudio Mastering

Audio Editing & Sonic Restoration

http://beanstudio.homepage.com

"Nobody Hears It Better"

=================================

[jtveraasreallyeasy.com]

My favorite guitar box these days is the Boss GX-700 rack mount multi-EFX. It sounds like a fully customizable set of Boss stomp boxes with COSM preamp simulations and other goodies built-in. EZ to program, sounds very musical to me - more so than other multi's I've used. I think the GT-3 is basically a floor mount version of the same thing with a few updates. I use it direct and with my amps

[lwilliam]

No one has mentioned the POD? I've used it for most of my recorded guitar parts - and a couple of bass guitar parts.

 

 

Also, the Roland VG8 is pretty killer, also.

 

...but I still prefer real tubes if I have the recording area to support the volume.

 

 

 

 

------------------

Larry W.

[Anderton]

Originally posted by Beanstudio Mastering:

Craig's multiband distortion plug-in looks pretty cool too. Anyone use it?

 

Well of course I use the "Quadrafuzz," and I have to say that the majority of the credit for the plug-in goes to Spectral Design -- they took my original hardware device and luckily, one of the guys working on the project is a guitar player and "got" the concept instantly. But they radically improved it, making it much more adjustable. Now I use it a lot on drums as well as guitar.

[Anderton]

Originally posted by lwilliam:

No one has mentioned the POD? I've used it for most of my recorded guitar parts - and a couple of bass guitar parts.

 

Also, the Roland VG8 is pretty killer, also.

 

The POD is indeed very cool, I use it live all the time. In the studio, I find that some sounds really benefit from parametric EQ. Some of the amp models are TOO faithful; they seem to include some resonant peaks that given my druthers, I'd reduce. The parametric works well for that.

 

I also like the VG-8 a lot, although I don't take it out live. Has anyone tried the new VG-88?

[alphajerk]

i tried out the pod amp model and wasnt too excited about it. there were only 2 good settings that suited my taste.

 

im looking at the roland midi module, gr30 or whatever incarnation it is now. the vg88 bugs me cause you dont get midi out of it. i do love the abilities of it. i do like that you can run direct now apposed to having to have the midi pickup.

 

however, midi is slowly turning me off with its lack of accuracy in timing. i think its time to bag it all together and use usb instead.

[Guest]

For a guitar controller? I don't think USB will have any advantages over MIDI until they fix the way guitar synthes trigger, right from the get-go. Pitch to MIDI is a horribly slow conversion process.

 

The Synthe-Axe, which Allan Holdsworth uses (and Future Boy uses to trigger drum samples) doesn't have these problems. It's a different technology, it tracks faithfully, and yet it's (was anyway) a MIDI device.

 

Of course that technology was too expensive and they went out of business.

 

Rich...

[Mark Amundson]

Actually, the "coolest" fuzz I ever used was the Anderton designed fuzz that was in a popular electronics (back in the small format days) issue. I don't have the article title handy, but the do-it-yourself construction project had other effects circuitry included.

 

The fuzz circuit was made from a two-transistor RTL NOR chip, and was pretty minimalist. But had good harmonic content and cleaned up very nicely. I still got a few spare RTL chips to build some more of these fuzzes.

[Anderton]

Originally posted by alphajerk:

i tried out the pod amp model and wasnt too excited about it. there were only 2 good settings that suited my taste.

 

im looking at the roland midi module, gr30 or whatever incarnation it is now. the vg88 bugs me cause you dont get midi out of it. i do love the abilities of it. i do like that you can run direct now apposed to having to have the midi pickup.

 

however, midi is slowly turning me off with its lack of accuracy in timing. i think its time to bag it all together and use usb instead.

 

 

The POD really requires tweaking with a MIDI controller to do its thing properly. There are many parameters that aren't accessible from the front panel and they can make a big difference in the sound. I created a template for the PC1600 and for the DA7 mixer to make it easy to program. They include a version of SoundDiver so you can program it from a computer, but I prefer the hands-on control of real faders.

 

The VG88 is definitely not MIDI, but that's find with me. It's more a descendent of the GR-300 (a GREAT electronic guitar) than the Roland MIDI guitars.

 

USB wouldn't really offer you any advantage. The problem, as stated, is in the conversion. The only way to get fast response is with fret-wiring (I think that's what the Stepp used, and the Peavey Cyberbass) or ultrasonic systems, like the old Yamaha G10 and the Beetle Quantar. The latter is the "big one that got away" - the first rev of that was awesome, but reliability issues and undercapitalization sunk the company. These days I'm using the Yamaha G-50 for MIDI conversion, it's pretty fast and painless...GR-30 is also good if you want a self-contained box with sounds.

[Anderton]

Originally posted by Mark Amundson:

Actually, the "coolest" fuzz I ever used was the Anderton designed fuzz that was in a popular electronics (back in the small format days) issue. I don't have the article title handy, but the do-it-yourself construction project had other effects circuitry included.

 

The fuzz circuit was made from a two-transistor RTL NOR chip, and was pretty minimalist. But had good harmonic content and cleaned up very nicely. I still got a few spare RTL chips to build some more of these fuzzes.

 

That was back in the days of steam-powered guitars, as I recall....maybe it was part of the Timbre Gate article? Anyway, I'd completely forgotten about it! But it did have its own sound.

 

BTW for fans of the Tube Sound fuzz...if you do a search on that, you can find a variety of user groups with mods and such. Some of them seem pretty useful.

[Mark Amundson]

Yeah, it was the "timbre gate" project, now that you mention it. Still relevent after all these years.

 

Regarding the "Tube Sound Fuzz" project. My first one built is still my favorite as those 4049 hex inverter ICs are all over the map on stage gains. Tracking down the right unbuffered CMOS inverter (single totem pole versus triple totem) seems to be where the tone is. Lately, I have been using the TLC2202 CMOS op-amp in tube screamers with great sucess. That op-amp output stage is heavily current limited, with is perfect for getting it emulate tube saturation effects.

[Mr. G]

One of the funnest "guitar gear" memories I have is from a few years ago when I lived in Kansas City. A somewhat (okay, totally) whacky friend of mine ran a music electronics repair shop, and he was hotrodding Marshalls on the side. I took in my 50-watt tube amp, and we sat there for hours tweaking it. He had built these alligator-clip based component switchers and would "patch in" various caps, resistors, etc. "Do you like this better or this better?" Sort of the Marshall hotrodding equivalent of an eye exam.

 

But even with that level of interactive tweaking, I've never matched the best distortion set-up I ever had: A Nady tube overdrive box through a Peavey Special (note that it had to be an early Special, before they added the parametric mid control). In a fit of elitest madness, I sold the Peavey, and have been chasing that tone ever since. I still have the Nady, but it doesn't sound the same through anything else....

 

Mitch Gallagher

Editor

EQ magazine

[Guest]

First up is a good player, a well set-up guitar with hot pickups and a short high-quality cord. Skip this step at your own peril.

 

Go to the Web and download some likely looking patches at: http://www.line6.com/main/The_Lup/Tone_Transfer/Tonetransfer.cfm

 

Then fire up your POD and SoundDiver and dial in the patch details to make it do EXACTLY what you want. Forget the POD presets, you gotta do it yourself!

 

From vintage to modern, this setup will do it if you invest the edit time.

[Guest]

And of course if you need that super sustain feedback effect, slap a Sustainiac on the guitar.

 

Anybody know whatever happened to Maniac Music, the manufacturer of Sustainiac?

 

curious:

bfury@romp.com

[Anderton]

Originally posted by bfury@romp.com:

Anybody know whatever happened to Maniac Music, the manufacturer of Sustainiac?

 

Actually, they're back and located in Indianapolis...they had a booth at the last NAMM show. Go to http://www.sustainiac.com for more info, or call 317/587 3235. Tell 'em you heard about it here, maybe they'll drop by the forum and fill in some more details.

[lisencocasema.net]

I'm sorry that I reply so late...

 

The Palmer cost me about 200 dollars (second hand). It's rock solid, needs no power supply.

 

I haven't compared it with the other things you mention because I don't know anybody who own one. I think the Palmer is just great! The most difficult sound for me is getting my Fender Voodoo Strat making Jime and Stevie noises. Well with my Koch and Vox amps I can get it to tape!

 

The Palmer is really great, build like a tank, totally Rock n Roll and dynamic! I bought it in Holland, so I don't know about you...

 

If you want more you can email me at lisenco@casema.net.

 

I have used the Palmer live with a rack system and the mixer guys always seem to love it! I have used it on a CD as well and it worked great! The only thing I'm missing is that low end air moving thing you get with playing in the same room as your amp.

 

Yes, great!

 

Greetings,

 

Marco

 

Originally posted by Chip McDonald:

Marco - how much is the Palmer? I've read about it but haven't heard it or seen it anywhere. Do you know who distributes it?

 

How does it sound relative to the Holdsworth Juice Extractor? The GT load box? Kolbe?

Is it anything drastically "better" than the above or is it just an incremental improvement? Doe the high end harmonic complexity get reduced or garbled? Is the low end response linear to what it would be without it?

 

[sustainindy.net]

Originally posted by Anderton:

Actually, they're back and located in Indianapolis...they had a booth at the last NAMM show. Go to http://www.sustainiac.com for more info, or call 317/587 3235. Tell 'em you heard about it here, maybe they'll drop by the forum and fill in some more details.

 

 

Hi, Folks-

 

This is my first post to the forum, at Craig's request. My name is Alan Hoover. I run Maniac Music, the makers of the Sustainiac sustainer products. As Craig mentioned, we have a website that gets into some detail about our sustainers.

 

After several years of being "semi-dormant", Maniac Music is back at it, having more fun than ever.

 

We make two general types of sustainer: Acoustic and magnetic. This refers to how the vibration energy of the instrument strings is sustained.

 

Our Sustainiac Model B, which we have made since 1987, puts acoustic energy into the instrument strings by a transducer that mounts to the headstock of an electric guitar.

 

Our newest magnetic sustainers, the Stealth series (which replace our old "GA-2" sustainer), magnetically force vibration energy into the strings by a driver that looks much like a pickup. In fact, for the Stealth Plus version of the sustainer, the driver does function as an active pickup when the sustainer is off.

 

Our Sustainiac Stealth series sustainers are designed to be installed into most electric guitars without doing extensive permanent modification to the instrument. Unlike our old GA-2, no special pickup requirements are necessary to make the sustainer work.

 

You can read much more about these sustainers, and also some history of sustainers and Maniac Music by going to [url=http://www.sustainiac.com]

[alphajerk]

i dont know about modifying my guitar. i get sustain for days anyways. sit there and hold a note for hours. dickie betts style. its all in the guitar connection.

 

i did used to own a boss cs-2(?) compressor/sustainer. it was noisy but it could make some killer distortion in the amp to orgasmic feedback levels. somebody dropped a table on it and broke it.

 

most of these days, the best guitar sounds are going directly in to the amp. at least with who im recording. i was recording one band @ this studio and another engineer came in and stopped in his tracks about how good the TONE was. i work with another guy who just touches the guitar and it lights up, of course its at arena levels, gets the total jimi sound. im always like turn it down, might have to buy him a power brake for xmas.

 

all these boxes, while they might model to a degree have little soul to them. sure they have some fancy effects and i love to get lost in a vg8 but for tones sake, they are all pretty lame.

 

i guess is prefer amp distortion.