How NOT to dial in a good sound!

[gball]

Good discussion and good points....

I'm starting to realize almost everyone I meet uses a distortion pedal and I seem like the oddball because I have never used them. I feel as though my amps all produce plenty of gain on their own, even with a 5751 tube in V1, I still have plenty of gain and I'm generally running it all the way up.

I think distortion pedals can be very useful, even with a high-gain amp.

Turning the gain all the way up on a modern channel-switching, cascading gain amp is normally an exercise is extreme compression, loss of dynamics and reduction in articulation. Oh, and it introduces a ridiculous amount of noise into the signal path, and I personally have never heard an amp sound its best with the gain maxed or anywhere close to maxed.

Running a high gain amp with moderate amounts of gain and sculpting the tone with dirt boxes is an effective way for many (myself included) to build a tone that has plenty of dynamic sensitivity and color without having to squash it too much.

I use an overdrive as a clean boost for my Mark
I use a distortion with the drive turned way down for my Recto

Both amps have the gain at about noon, maybe one o'clock depending on the cab. The dirt box is not on all the time, just when I need it for tone shaping. I don't use them to try to goose the amp for solo volume, that's what the guitar's volume knob is for.

I find this, personally, to be a very effective way to balance the amount of crunch I want with still having a dynamic and controllable tone.

 

[Inspector #20]

All part of the process. Learn what you can and roll with it.

For sure....im way outside my comfort zone on this project.

 

[smitty_p]

For sure....im way outside my comfort zone on this project.

Just stick with it and take your lumps where necessary.

It's called, "growth".

We believe you can do it!

 

[smitty_p]

Running a high gain amp with moderate amounts of gain and sculpting the tone with dirt boxes is an effective way for many (myself included) to build a tone that has plenty of dynamic sensitivity and color without having to squash it too much.

That's kind of my approach, too. I don't overdo the gain on the amp, but I'll use a clean boost, or my Tubescreamer to saturate the channel just a little more, if I need to.

It really is a great approach to tone shaping and layering a gain structure. Your usage of the term "sculpting" is great way to describe it.

 

[eSGEe]

Ahem...

But, in reference to volume, I think ol' Colin is spot-on. In a mix, at gigging volume, it's even more important to cut through and occupy your own sonic space.

I've met a lot of people who tell me they don't like Mesa's because they are too mid-heavy. They prefer the traditional Fender/Marshall scooped mid sound because, well, when you're just banging away by your self those tones are just more fun. But they can get lost in a mix pretty quickly, and even moreso if there are two guitars in the band. One of the things I like about Boogies is the mid presence they have at high volume. Really tough to get lost.

The other thing I see at shows I go to all the time is guys running too much bass. They use up all their headroom trying to compete with the bass guitar and end up with sonic mud. Why?? The bass is going to overpower you anyway so why add so much compression to your sound and give up punch trying to bang out a bunch of low end? Sure, it sounds bitchin' and brootal when you're just palm muting by yourself, but when these guys and the bass players are walking all over each other in a mix it sounds a mess.

And gain? Turn it DOWN motherf#$ckers!! FFS, this is the curse of modern guitar players - gain got too cheap and easy to add to your sound. The toughest thing I run into when I play with other people is they, A.) have become so reliant on using stacks of gain that they don't even have a defineable tone anynmore, and B.) they make the mistake of equating gain with "heavy" and it's really the opposite; You want to move a lot of air and sound heavy? Back off the damn gain and let the amp's headroom breathe a bit. The gnarliest tones I have ever heard have the gain turned down farther than you think and let the power section and speakers do the heavy lifting.

THanks Gball you will be sending this out to me tomorrow then?

 

[Dave Sloven]

Cutting through and having the bass sit in the mix well are always issues, but we seem to have worked it out in our band even with two guitars.

Our bassist does for a very bottom heavy sound. He doesn't so much cut through as slide under. No high end clang to clash with the guitars, the top is mostly rolled off. He has some pedals to bring aspects up when playing a part out there on his own with the drummer.

With the guitars I was worried at first as our new second guitarist bought the exact same model of amp as me (Peavey 6534+). We have a full two guitar sound though in which both of us are clearly audible.

I initially set his EQ the same as mine and then rolled the bass and high off slightly and the mids up just a little. But the main difference is probably in our effects rigs. I run a rather wet sound with reverb etc except when playing tighter palm-muted chugging sections (which are rare). Josh runs minimal effects, just a noise suppressor together with a delay and wah, and the latter two pedals are only used for leads. No reverb.

Why I think it works is to do with the perceived sound field. A wet, reverb heavy sound will tend to sit in the background and fill out the sound. A dry, tighter sound will tend to sit forward in the mix and occupy the front of the sound field. You can try this trick when mixing if a cymbal is too strident in the mix, you add some reverb to it. The combination of the two sounds enables them to sit together and fill out the room, giving a 3-D quality.