The "Best" Overdrive

Lordy!  It has been quite some time.  I've been rather busy with various projects, so busy in fact, that I have yet to come up with a reasonable excuse for my absence.  To the few of you regular readers, I apologize for my absence.  Very soon I should have a nice photo blog of my 70's Guild S-100 project.  I just need to locate a bridge position Guild HB-1 and I'll be raring to go!

In the meantime, let me get back to some smug gear talk.  Probably the most common question I've ever been asked is, "Which overdrive is the best overdrive?"  If I was a prattling snob I'd tell you to get out your checkbook and buy an original Klon.   If I was a true TGP'er I'd probably tell you to buy my old dirt box, so I can leap on the next overly priced bandwagon dirt pedal.  But glory be!  This is Stonewall's Guide, not theirs!  First thing I'd like to clear up, is that there's no best dirt pedal.  If there was, we'd all have one and there would be one company.  That being said, your musical tastes will change and you may use one consistently for years and then one day, never use it again.  I used a Fulltone OCD as pretty much my only drive pedal for a long time.  I've recently gotten a new amp and now all I use is my Xotic RC Booster and my sweet sweet Orange amp breakup.  It's going to change, you'll have to get used to that.  However, don't get caught up in hype, or you're going to end up one of those people losing lots of nickels constantly buying and selling new "best pedals".

Pedals are a math equation.  Your playing/style + your guitar + your amp.  They all make a big difference on the sound that's finally going to come out of the speakers.  If I don't know you all that well, my first question is always going to be "What kind of music do you like to play?".  Please don't tell me that you like everything, that doesn't narrow things down at all.  What do you truly like to play?  Rock?  Blues?  2 Step Thrash?  All of those are going to make a difference.  Basically it helps me decide if you might be looking for something with lots of gain on tap, or just a little bit of drive.  This also tells me what kind of overdrive voicing you might like.  In a really oversimplified way there's really only two voicings, Modern and Vintage/Classic.  Modern voiced pedals are typically going to be much brighter and have a more scooped sound, which is very common in that racket you kids call "metal".  As you might guess, Classic/Vintage voiced overdrive will sound a tad darker, have a more pronounced mid range, and might be more raw sounding than edgy.  I will digress for a moment, and say that with so many boutique pedal makers there are plenty of pedals that can be vintage voiced with a scooped sound and vice versa. Some pedals even can do both with the flip of a switch.

The next bit of information I'll need to know is how you're going to use it.  Are you running a completely clean amp and using it for your rhythm sound?  Are you going to be blending any amp distortion/overdrive? Are you wanting to just massacre everyone in a 9 mile radius with your Big Muff?  Some pedals don't stack well, meaning, they sound like shit with other dirt pedals or amp distortion.  (A Merriam Webster definition of course).  Stacking is a whole 'nother ball game I'm probably going to save for a later post.  It can get complicated because it depends on what order you have your stack, how you're running each one, etc.  We're just talking about "best overdrive" here.  The final piece of the puzzle is what amp you're using.  Clean Fender-esque amp?  Pushed class A amp?  Crunchy British amp?

Here are a few recommendations that've worked for me.  They may or may not work for you, but it would be selfish of me to withhold my experience.  I haven't tried everything, but I have tried more than my fair share.  Don't take my lack of examples as lack of experience.  I only recommend the "shining stars" that come immediately to mind.  The best drives, in my humble opinion, are the ones you can get at least 3 different usable sounds out of.  There's no bigger pain in the ass than bumping the setting and feather touching the knobs to get that non existent "sweet spot".  (Guess what?  You turn your amp up or down and that "sweet spot" moves around or disappears).  I tend to prefer "Vintage" voiced pedals, but I used to love that "Modern" sound.  Both have their place in music, you just have to use your ears.

On Clean High Headroom Amps
Fender amps are fairly "neutral" sounding to me, which makes them a great platform for using dirt pedals for different colors of drive.  Since amps like a Twin or a Hot Rod series amp have lots of headroom, they also provide a great platform to use the full range of gain in a pedal.  High headroom prevents lots of natural clipping; or the amp being overdriven/compressed on its own.  Once an amp starts to overdrive by itself, there's only so much gain you can work with before that gain knob just turns into a noisy mess.  This is what worked for me:

-  Wampler pedals:  The large amount of headroom allows the "amp in a box" Wampler pedals to really shine.  Given, you're not gonna turn your Hot Rod Deville into a Mesa Rectifier, but you'll still have a better platform to work with than say, a Vox.  They offer a pretty wide selection of tones, but I really bonded with the Black 65 and the Pinnacle.  The JHS stuff claims to do the same thing, but to me sounds like nasally shit.
-  Fulltone OCD:  It's based on a Marshall circuit, I used this for years.  I like the Fulltone stuff.
-  Tubescreamer Variants:  Although TS circuits aren't my cup of tea, they really fatten up a Fender.  Fender amps lack midrange, and a TS has a mid hump, making it an obvious choice.
-  Proco Rat (only with LM308 chip):  If you want to sound like old Sabbath get this.  The models without the LM308 chip sound thin and fizzy to me.
-  Visual Sound Jekyll and Hyde:  These pedals are underrated.  Despite the ugly triangle (even uglier on current versions) they sound great.  Provides you with a TS circuit on one side, and a nice distortion on the other.

On Class A Amps
All you need to know about Class A amps for this post, is that they have a different power section, which in turn creates less headroom for you to work with.  (If you want to know more about Class A, Mesa has posted a nice little article about most of the differences).  Due to the lack of headroom, your amp will break up nicely without having to kill everyone at the volumes you'd be playing at with a non Class A amp.  A Vox AC15 or a Mesa Lonestar Special are great examples of a Class A amp.  Most people who buy these types of amps do so, because they want this type of natural drive/compression.  So if you've got this nice creamy  drive, why would you muck it up with an "amp in a box" pedal?  You can, but I'm not a fan.  I like to simply blend a more transparent drive, or simply boost the amp to get more gain from the amp itself.  If you boost the right frequencies on these amps, you can get a nice warm fat sound.  If you boost the wrong ones, you'll get an ice pick in the ear.  Here are some recommendations:

-  Xotic RC Booster:  Does a nice job of getting more dirt out of a Class A amp, while leaving the natural tone of the amp intact.  The Gain on the pedal itself blends very nicely without taking over the show.
-  Durham Sex Drive:  Same deal as the RC Booster, just with the ability to choose a Raw, Soft, or Hard Compression within the boost.
-  Fulltone OCD:  If you turn the Volume up to 2 or 3 o clock, and the Gain down to maybe 9, you can get a nice crunchy rhythm tone.  A lot of people recommend the Hot Cake for amps like an AC30, but I much preferred the OCD because it wasn't as fizzy.
-  Klon:  If you know what a Klon is, you can feel however you want about it.  I like it.  It's a Swiss Army knife for either a little grit or just a boost.  It's not my go to, but it sure makes a Class A amp sounds pretty.
-  Fuzz Face Variant:   I think FF's sound incredible when blended with some natural amp drive.  It makes 'em warm and fat. (Everything a man looks for in a lady).  I had great success with Analogman products and the new version of the Fulltone '70 (the old one sounds like shit).
-  Muffs:  A Muff can be brutal sonic mayhem, but like the FF I think they sound best when blended with a little drive.  I personally like the Wren and Cuff stuff, but I've heard Mojo Hand has been making some great clones as well.  You'll have to look online at the different types of muffs (probably shouldn't search that word at work) to find the kind that suits you best.

For Those High Gain Fiends
If you asking me, and you're wanting to play high gain/heavy music, buy an amp that's gonna get you there.  Although I don't dabble in the black, hairy, unshowered corners of music anymore, I learned quickly that there's no pedal that will ever do it right.  Some do an okay job, and will get you by if you're not wanting to dish out.  But, do you really think a little metal box with transistors can do a better job than 15 glowing KT88's?  If you didn't buy that $250 boutique "Mesa in a box", you could have saved up a few more bucks on gotten yourself a used Sovtek MIG, Read Bear, or 5150 secondhand that would leave you feeling more satisfied.

You can blend drive pedals with these types of amps, but once you reach a threshold of distortion you're either gonna get lots of buzz or not as much buzz.  You should sit down with a well produced metal record and listen to how "distorted" the guitars are, not as much as you think.  If you really need a little push, this is what I'd recommend:
-  Turn the Gain halfway down on your amp and try some pedals and see if you like the blended drives more than your amp alone.  If you do this, Muffs and FF's come back into the picture and they'll actually be usable.
-  TS Variant:  Turn the Gain down (or even off) and turn the volume up on the pedal.  It'll have the same effect as those Class A amps, but you can use the tone knob to color your drive without adding unnecessary gain from the actual pedal.
-  EQ or Clean Boost:  When you're dealing with lots of distortion, it's all about hearing the right frequencies. The audio engineers out there will appreciate this advice, don't always boost frequencies.  If you find that you  want more Treble, cut some Bass.  If you cut frequencies to enhance others, you'll get much less noise and your signal will be "cleaner".



This obviously was a very short overview.  It'll at least get you looking at videos deciding which ones work best for you.  I'm obviously biased, but it's been based on what's worked for me.  If you want a recommendation, feel free to drop a comment.  Although they won't throw me shillings for this, I would recommend checking out the Pro Guitar Shop, "Demo It Live" service on their site.  It allows you to hear various pedals through your amp so you can get an idea how they'll work for you.

Until next time,

Cheers!

- Stonewall

Freshly Squeezed Signal. Compression.

I apologize for my disappearance the past week.  Sometimes trials in life require a good smiting, and I had some "project management training" that needed a good dose of smite.  Anyhow, a topic I've been wanting to address that has been grinding my gears lately, is compression.  I'm not going to get into what compression actually is, because there are a number of excellent articles about it, but I will hit on a few key points about compression here and there.  A compressor has a variety of applicable uses for guitarists.  It can give a nice "pop" to your sound if you're swattin' at some funk guitar.  If you're doing some serious finger tapping, compression can definitely help bring your signal up in the mix.  A soft right-hand fingertip just isn't going to give you same sustain as a plastic pick.

Do I Need a Compressor?
The short answer to 95% of you is, no you probably don't.  Most pedal junkies assume that a compressor is something needed to complete their ever changing pedalboard of smugness.  Let's be real here, having one of everything is much more American than just having what you need.  Am I right?  Compression really isn't an "effect", but is actually a "dynamic".  In a basic sense, it will bring up the signal of softer dynamics, and smash down some of the more extreme signals.  In most cases if you know that compression is being used, you're most likely using it wrong.  Many of you are about to retort, "This chump has some kind of nerve!  Everyone knows there shouldn't be any RULES to using effects!"  True, but these people also live horribly discontent lives trying to figure out why their guitar tone isn't spinning the world the opposite direction.  A compressor does not cover up bad playing, in fact, it enhances it.  If you suck, you will still suck.  A common "reason" many people buy them is to add some more "sustain" to their lead phrases.  Most compressors will do this, but they also raise the noise floor adding quite a bit of muck to your signal.  So in addition to that sweet string bend you just ripped, you also blasted everyone with quite a bit of snake hiss as well.

Another common "misuse" of a compressor pedal, is using it with an already overdriven signal.  Ladies and gents, an overdriven signal is already compressed.  This fact is especially true if you're using a tube amp that's cooking.  At that point you're simply squashing and already squashed signal.

But Stonewall, What about Transparent Compressors?!?
There are a lot of Jabronis that are going to talk up the Diamond, Keely, etc comps. While excellent compressors, I would argue that given most people's needs, you don't need something like that. I'm going to take it a step further and say that if you're playing live at stage volume, having a transparent compressor is pointless.  Unless you're using extreme settings for a very compressed sound (which defeats the purpose of a transparent compressor). If you're using a tube amp, playing at stage volume will add natural compression.  I fell into the trap of playing the nicer ones and owning a lot of the big names. When I played live with them, I never touched them because I didn't need to.  Also, as "transparent" as most of them are, they will add a dash of Treble to your signal.  If you're doing A LOT of recording, then a nicer compressor may be up your alley. However, wouldn't most studios have a nice thousand dollar compressor... 

So What IS a Compressor Good For?!?
In classic Stonewall fashion, I've now berated a topic and now most of you are wondering what the point of a compressor really is.  Having a compressor can be a convenient Swiss Army knife for a number of situations.  Have you ever had to use a backline at a gig?  If you have, you can appreciate the frustration of showing up at a gig only to realize you will be performing with a 100 watt solid-state POS.  Even an extremely high wattage clean tube amp (a Twin comes to mind) can be a pain.  Having a compressor handy can give you a little more sustain to work with.  It'll be a lot like slapping a band-aid on a bleeding ulcer, but you do what you can.

I've seen a number of artists do some really innovative stuff with compressors to help keep a strong signal, like rhythmic tapping stuff.  If you haven't already, check out Minus the Bear's Highly Refined Pirates record.  Dave Knudsen is the master of tapping and compression.  That album is drenched in the blood of a Boss CS3 and a Barber Tone Press.  Two compressors!  He's even been fabled to have used an FMR Really Nice Compressor during live performances as well.  A lot of chickin' pickers like compression because it give them a good "spank" while they're firing off the licks of the South.

Sweet mother of delay...

I've worked in some pretty lo-fi studios home studios, doing some session work for local artists.  Having a nice transparent compressor is nice in such a situation, because the "engineer" may not even know what compression is.

It's best to evaluate your needs and really understand why you would actually need a compressor, rather than gripe about why you don't have one.


-  Stonewall