Help with legato sustain or liquid feel.

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thalweg

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Ive had my v combo for about 2 years. Love the amp as it really cuts through with the mids in a live setting. But ive always struggled with finding a more liquid feel on my channel 2 crunch rhythm without having to push the gain so hard. Im using les paul standard with bb pros and a prs ce 22 loaded with hfs and they both produce too much bark and not enough sustained growl.

Ive tried a range of eq settings in triode mode both in variac and full power.

Would a compressor do the trick...any suggestions? I play hard rock, blues rock and some progressive stuff. Thanks in advance.
 
Gotta say, I usually lean on Ch3 for 'liquid' leads. MkIIC+ or MkIV modes.

That being said, I think the biggest way to get a smooth legato is work on your technique...it's in the hands, man.

Cheers!
 
Yes my leads are fine in channel 3..its channel 2 rhythm that I'm trying to tone down the bark without too much breakup/gain.
 
I gemerally use channel 3 for leads but when i do use channel 2 and need a bit more sustain I'll bost it with either overdrive or a compressor, depending what kind of sound I want (more scream or more clean sustain).
 
That's all the push I need...gonna start researching decent pedal based compressors...
 
I vote for channel 2, Mark I mode, thick on;

Gain: ~2 o'clock
Master: depends on who's sleeping
Presence: ~12 o'clock
Treble: ~2 o'clock
Mid: ~11 o'clock
Bass: Rolled off completely
EQ: as desired

I also like a TS808 in front of this. With the neck pup, It makes for a nice, chewy, thick, milky, sustained, somewhat darker lead tone. Couple that with 10W & Variac and you got yourself a pleasing little tone!

Petrucci talks about this tone in his videos on the youtubes where he discusses his Mark V tone tips.
 
What did you come up with? I too am having this issue with my LP 2012 standard. I think the stock pick ups are weak for shredding/ legatos though are awesome for rhythm. Love the growl I can get mixed with my nova drive. My IB which has the JP sig Dimarzios is better but not quite there. Channel 3 gives me some fitts with hissing not as bad as my 5150 though.
 
May be a silly question, but are you using any delay to bridge the delay between notes? Do you use some vibrato at times to lengthen notes? A clean boost will help with that, as will a compressor sustainer.

Of course there is a technique to fretting harder and sliding in and out of notes.

Good luck with the tone quest!
 
Thanks for all the feedback.

To be clear...this isn't about lead work. Its about rhythm work and chording progressions using channel 2 crunch. I have my leads pretty dialed in on channel three iV mode.
 
I've had the same problem and have found ch2 to be fairly unusable for me. You can try swapping out different tube in V2 as it only affects ch2. I found it a bit lacking in over drive so I first put a JJ that was sorted for high gain. That helped a little. I currently have a nos RFT in V2 which is known for early break up and it sounds better. I'm going to start experimenting with circuit mods soon to see if I can get some more mojo out of ch2.
 
Try more volume and less gain on the 90 watt mode. Lots of magic there.
 
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