It's funny, no matter what I do to the EQ, I get a brilliant clean sound, and and equally good crunch sound. This amps versatility in these two areas is unrivaled by anything I've ever heard.
However, when it comes to a good lead sound I'm feeling kind of lost. I'm looking for something that's fairly high gain, yet still smooth and warm.
I've been playing around with the EQ to no avail. Usually I keep the bass between 9-11. Low if I'm using drive and higher if I'm just using the gain. For mids and treble I've tried just about everything, I just can't get it to sound as smooth as I want. With the drive on I'm finding it's giving me part of the sound I want, but a harsh edge with it that I can't seem to get out.
Also when I'm just playing by myself I tend to have the prescence either off, or around 8-9, and with my band around 9-11. I find that even the slighest bit of it starts giving the amp this "tin can" kind of feel, basically sucking all the warmth out and leaving this cold harsh make your ears bleed kind of sound.
I've played around with all of the presets from the manual, and while I like most of the channel 1 stuff, all of the channel 2 stuff shares that cold harsh sound that's just not good... At all.
I'm of the opinion that I'll need to invest in an OD or distortion pedal, simply because I'll need to have, a clean, crunch, low gain lead, and high gain lead, all easily available without having to run back and forth to the amp to change my settings around. I'm confident between the two channels and the solo switch I can get the first three covered.
So for OD pedals. I went out and borrowed a Maxon OD9, MXR Zakk Wylde OD, Ibanez TS808, a Boss DS1 and a very old ProCo RAT.
The DS1 is just not a nice pedal, except when combined with another pedal, it sounded great with the MXR pedal, and fairly nice with the 808 and OD9.
The RAT seems to contribute more to that harshness that I'm looking to avoid, but at the same time has a very unique sound that I almost kind of like. It seems to combine well with the TS808 and OD9, not so much with the MXR
The MXR is cool since it doesn't seem to change the one of my amp at all, and actually would be ideal if I could just get the amp setup in a way that I want. Doesn't seem to change or colour the sound in any way, it's just more gain.
I expected the TS808 to blow me away with the amount people talk about them. It really didn't. Not quite as smooth and warm as I expected, a little thin on the top end, and a fairly undefined bottom end. I'm not sure if this has to do with the way the amp is set, the way the pedal is set, or if it's just the way the 808 is.
The OD9 was a pleasant surprise, it actually sounded very much like a higher gain TS808, with more of a warm fullness. Or I could simply say, it's got more balls.
My best sounds so far have been a combination of 2 or even 3 of these pedals. None of them alone really seemed to blow my socks off, which considering their prices they most certainly should. As I said I don't know if it's how I've got thing's set up, or if it's just the pedals themsevles.
It's been suggested that I look into the Tone Bone series of pedals, anyone have experience with these? And are there any other pedal suggestions?
Also someone suggested a compressor to smooth thing's out. I don't really have much experience with them, but from what I've noticed is in order to get the smoothness I want I seem to have to squash it to the point where the dynamic range is crippled far more than I want it to be. I don't know if I'm being overly anal about it, since I'm assuming dynamics are much harder to hear in a band setting as opposed to simply playing by myself or not.
My band primarily plays blues with some classic rock styled stuff in the mix. At home I play a little of everything, from Satriani, to Jazz, to Metal to everything else in between. I do have a boss GT-8 wich can get most of the sounds I'm looking for, but at the same time, even with bypass turned on it takes away too much of the tone of the amp. So in the long run I'd prefer to be able to sell it to invest in pedals instead of keeping it around.
This has been a monsterously huge post, far more than I intended, so if you've made it this far, thank you. Any input on anything mentioned here would be highly appreciated.
However, when it comes to a good lead sound I'm feeling kind of lost. I'm looking for something that's fairly high gain, yet still smooth and warm.
I've been playing around with the EQ to no avail. Usually I keep the bass between 9-11. Low if I'm using drive and higher if I'm just using the gain. For mids and treble I've tried just about everything, I just can't get it to sound as smooth as I want. With the drive on I'm finding it's giving me part of the sound I want, but a harsh edge with it that I can't seem to get out.
Also when I'm just playing by myself I tend to have the prescence either off, or around 8-9, and with my band around 9-11. I find that even the slighest bit of it starts giving the amp this "tin can" kind of feel, basically sucking all the warmth out and leaving this cold harsh make your ears bleed kind of sound.
I've played around with all of the presets from the manual, and while I like most of the channel 1 stuff, all of the channel 2 stuff shares that cold harsh sound that's just not good... At all.
I'm of the opinion that I'll need to invest in an OD or distortion pedal, simply because I'll need to have, a clean, crunch, low gain lead, and high gain lead, all easily available without having to run back and forth to the amp to change my settings around. I'm confident between the two channels and the solo switch I can get the first three covered.
So for OD pedals. I went out and borrowed a Maxon OD9, MXR Zakk Wylde OD, Ibanez TS808, a Boss DS1 and a very old ProCo RAT.
The DS1 is just not a nice pedal, except when combined with another pedal, it sounded great with the MXR pedal, and fairly nice with the 808 and OD9.
The RAT seems to contribute more to that harshness that I'm looking to avoid, but at the same time has a very unique sound that I almost kind of like. It seems to combine well with the TS808 and OD9, not so much with the MXR
The MXR is cool since it doesn't seem to change the one of my amp at all, and actually would be ideal if I could just get the amp setup in a way that I want. Doesn't seem to change or colour the sound in any way, it's just more gain.
I expected the TS808 to blow me away with the amount people talk about them. It really didn't. Not quite as smooth and warm as I expected, a little thin on the top end, and a fairly undefined bottom end. I'm not sure if this has to do with the way the amp is set, the way the pedal is set, or if it's just the way the 808 is.
The OD9 was a pleasant surprise, it actually sounded very much like a higher gain TS808, with more of a warm fullness. Or I could simply say, it's got more balls.
My best sounds so far have been a combination of 2 or even 3 of these pedals. None of them alone really seemed to blow my socks off, which considering their prices they most certainly should. As I said I don't know if it's how I've got thing's set up, or if it's just the pedals themsevles.
It's been suggested that I look into the Tone Bone series of pedals, anyone have experience with these? And are there any other pedal suggestions?
Also someone suggested a compressor to smooth thing's out. I don't really have much experience with them, but from what I've noticed is in order to get the smoothness I want I seem to have to squash it to the point where the dynamic range is crippled far more than I want it to be. I don't know if I'm being overly anal about it, since I'm assuming dynamics are much harder to hear in a band setting as opposed to simply playing by myself or not.
My band primarily plays blues with some classic rock styled stuff in the mix. At home I play a little of everything, from Satriani, to Jazz, to Metal to everything else in between. I do have a boss GT-8 wich can get most of the sounds I'm looking for, but at the same time, even with bypass turned on it takes away too much of the tone of the amp. So in the long run I'd prefer to be able to sell it to invest in pedals instead of keeping it around.
This has been a monsterously huge post, far more than I intended, so if you've made it this far, thank you. Any input on anything mentioned here would be highly appreciated.
), but good tubes do clean things up remarkably compared to the stock Mesas. As delivered channel 2 wasn't that great for me with overdrive.
