One of the best overdrive and distortion sounds for rock with lead solos, I got by getting a 'peavy decade' practice amp, removing from the cabonet and sitting it on my main stage clean amp. The decade had a line out jack and i gaffer taped the speaker wires so they couldnt touch and short out. This little amp had two pots for output, 'pre' and 'post' gain, thats it no master volume. For distortion you put pre gain at 8 or 9 and your post gain at 3 or 4. The volume was totally dependant on the balance between pre and post gain. For tone, 3 pots, low, mid and high. The line out jack was brilliant. It was clean and could safely be put into anything without risk of damage, be it an amp or straight into a desk for recording. And when it's a Neve desk worth a fortune, you need to know that line out is indeed a line out, not a aux speaker or headphone jack. Anyway, that use of a pre amp for distortion (using its peavy two gain setup) or overdrive (as a simple pre amp pumping extra signal into the main amp), served me very well in the loud gig environment. I know you had to turn the knobs by hand in the middle of a solo but that was no big deal. I did get foot control to a degree with a A B switch box and a second decade stacked on top of the first one.
Great, guys! Now I (novice)know! Andy is so likeable british, and Kris so sympathic with his maghyar style gestures and face-expressions. Keep rolling!! (the colors of the furniture though..., kinda 70's vibe...you should wear T-shirts in that same color and even the guitar matching, just for fun))
I bet the two dislikes so far are from old farts like me who are triggered by the word 'gain' being used to describing clipping distortion (I am not one of those two though). When overdrive pedals came out in the 80s the sales pitch was that they gave you the sound of an overdriven amp. It was emulating the clipping distortion that happens in the valves/tubes when they are pushed past their limits of clean amplification. Gain is simply how much a signal's level increases by when passing through an amplification stage in an amp, so therefore 'gain stage'. A ECC83/12AX7 has a rated gain factor of 100. That is 100x more signal coming out than went in. When pushed past this by increasing the gain past its clean rating it will overdrive and the signal will become distorted. They can also distort if they receive a hotter signal that they were designed to. The same applies to power valves/tubes. Distortion pedals were never sold to us with that sales pitch. They did what it said on the box, i.e., made the guitar sound distorted. They were not trying to emulate the sound of an amp cranked into overdrive. p.s. When a valve/tube amp is turned up past a certain point there is no more clean headroom. That point is what people refer to as 'edge of break up'. Then when it's pushed even harder it can not get any louder, so just gets more distorted. This is called saturation. The very loud peaks of the waveform are heavily clipped and the lesser peaks are boosted (a clipped waveform looks like a hill that is flat on top because it has been cut off). The result is a form of compression, which is why a cranked amp can sustain a note longer (the other reason is feedback between the pickups and the speaker). The response will be less dynamic. The volume difference between soft and hard picking will be less. That can make things silky smooth for shredding, but is not desirable if you want a cleaner sound when picking softer.
you guys should do a breakdown/setup of multi-effects units vs pedals/pedal boards. Ive always been told that single effects pedal units are the best but BOSS, ZOOM, LINE 6 and a load of other brands have been doing multi-effects for decades and they still do. hearing the advantages and disadvantages of each setup would make an interesting video... Personally i still have a vintage Korg AX3000G that i used for most of my live playing a good 10+ years back. it doesnt see much use anymore as i prefer to hook up straight to an amp without any effects but it has always been there when i needed it.
Is Distortion generally less subtle than Overdrive? I only have a Boss DS-1 distortion pedal but no overdrive pedal. It seems to be only distortion, just at different levels or different tones of distortion when I play it, whereas I imagine the Overdrive would allow some clean tone and subtleties to come through. Is that correct? Is Overdrive more versatile for different styles of music in general because it would still allow for a slightly distorted or overdriven clean tone whereas Distortion is just distorted? It seems harder to play rhythms and lead lines with Distortion and still sound relatively relaxing to the ear because of that distortion all the time, whereas maybe Overdrive could just be an edgier sound if you wanted but still cleaner and clearer to listen to. Would that be a correct assessment?
Indeed, overdrive is more versatile and subtle. Distortion will sound the same whether your string attack is soft or strong. Overdrive can sound almost clean if you play very softly, and will start crunching and saturating the more you attack. And if you push the settings close to the max with a powerful guitar (with humbuckers), you get quite a lot of drive, more than enough for most styles. Only metal rock will require more than an overdrive, imho.
With overdrive some of the sound signal is still clean and not clipped. With distortion all of the harmonics in the notes or chord at any playing aggression will be distorted.
hard clipping, soft clipping, boost, square wave , mid monsters and bass breakers distortion is just lots of overdrive then fuzz is a wooly bully distortion stack them all for a twisted clipping tone. I think it was Cory Taylor that said... I will remember before I forget Before I forget that then the drums go all blatt dat dat blaatt blatt da da da dat or something IDK
So new to signal chains, if I wanted to try boosting my distortion or boosting my over drive, whichever one im trying to boost should go before correct? And then a noise gate would go after the boosted pedal?
Hi Andy, I know you are a katana guy, so what’s your recommendation for good OD and Dist pedals into the katana clean channel? I ask because the kat clean channel is cleaner than a clean tube amp on the edge of breakup.
Judosailor why not try the onboard effects or the overdriven channels? You could also try turning the gain up on the clean channel and more volume etc. sounds pretty good without any pedals already :) Else: an sd-1 is always a good choice
Hey! I would actually recommend using the crunch channel on a very low gain setting. Works really well with a lot of pedals. The actual pedals you choose is very personal. //Andy
Thomann Music Thanks guys. While I appreciate the responses, part of the reason that I specified the clean channel is because I want to be able to go back-and-forth between clean and dirty. And I’m talking about a situation in which I’m either using a katana mini which does not have foot switches, or using my katana 50 which doesn’t have an effects loop, so I’m running pedals in front of a looper into the clean channel. Are there not any OD or distortion pedals that work well for that kind of application?
Judosailor best thing you can do is go to a guitar store and try some pedals! Or you buy a bunch at thomann and send those back, you didn‘t like. No one can say to you if this or that pedal is right, because everyone got a different taste. Sure, the Sd-1 will work, but if you‘ll like it is up to you to find out!
I will sustain on leadguitare with dealey verschiedene dealay zeiten chrunsh sound Sound alla el 34 Nature preamp ecc 83 and rhytmen sound not with dealay and cleansound little chorus and reverb
Stomp box vs multi effects pedals ...I see .I said , stomp pedals , can be , will be great , long , larger on line , of no limit....one piece by piece 's ,.. . From brands A , to brand D ....like point A to point D .....drive crazy '
Overdrive is good for pushing an amp into breakup without having to be too loud. Unless you have a smaller amp. To get good tube saturation in a Fender twin or a 100 Watt Marshall , it’s gotta be loud as hell. An attenuator could lower your volume and still allow your tubes to growl. Good ones are expensive, though.
sneifert1968 so true, it’s annoying on 100w+ amps to try and get distortion while other people are in the room. You either deafen everyone or there’s none. And the pedals fix that, I have the bluesbreaker 2 and i can lower the volume on the pedal, to keep the volume of the amp lower while having a nice distortion.
*Overdrive is an effect and distortion is a outcome (tube amps) or added layer to the signal (solid state).
I tried many different distortion pedals. Thorpy Warthog is my favourite.
Are y’all using teles?
One of the best overdrive and distortion sounds for rock with lead solos, I got by getting a 'peavy decade' practice amp, removing from the cabonet and sitting it on my main stage clean amp. The decade had a line out jack and i gaffer taped the speaker wires so they couldnt touch and short out. This little amp had two pots for output, 'pre' and 'post' gain, thats it no master volume. For distortion you put pre gain at 8 or 9 and your post gain at 3 or 4. The volume was totally dependant on the balance between pre and post gain. For tone, 3 pots, low, mid and high. The line out jack was brilliant. It was clean and could safely be put into anything without risk of damage, be it an amp or straight into a desk for recording. And when it's a Neve desk worth a fortune, you need to know that line out is indeed a line out, not a aux speaker or headphone jack. Anyway, that use of a pre amp for distortion (using its peavy two gain setup) or overdrive (as a simple pre amp pumping extra signal into the main amp), served me very well in the loud gig environment. I know you had to turn the knobs by hand in the middle of a solo but that was no big deal. I did get foot control to a degree with a A B switch box and a second decade stacked on top of the first one.
Great, guys! Now I (novice)know! Andy is so likeable british, and Kris so sympathic with his maghyar style gestures and face-expressions. Keep rolling!! (the colors of the furniture though..., kinda 70's vibe...you should wear T-shirts in that same color and even the guitar matching, just for fun))
You are too kind! I like the t-shirt idea.
//Andy
I bet the two dislikes so far are from old farts like me who are triggered by the word 'gain' being used to describing clipping distortion (I am not one of those two though).
When overdrive pedals came out in the 80s the sales pitch was that they gave you the sound of an overdriven amp. It was emulating the clipping distortion that happens in the valves/tubes when they are pushed past their limits of clean amplification.
Gain is simply how much a signal's level increases by when passing through an amplification stage in an amp, so therefore 'gain stage'. A ECC83/12AX7 has a rated gain factor of 100. That is 100x more signal coming out than went in. When pushed past this by increasing the gain past its clean rating it will overdrive and the signal will become distorted. They can also distort if they receive a hotter signal that they were designed to. The same applies to power valves/tubes.
Distortion pedals were never sold to us with that sales pitch. They did what it said on the box, i.e., made the guitar sound distorted. They were not trying to emulate the sound of an amp cranked into overdrive.
p.s. When a valve/tube amp is turned up past a certain point there is no more clean headroom. That point is what people refer to as 'edge of break up'. Then when it's pushed even harder it can not get any louder, so just gets more distorted. This is called saturation. The very loud peaks of the waveform are heavily clipped and the lesser peaks are boosted (a clipped waveform looks like a hill that is flat on top because it has been cut off). The result is a form of compression, which is why a cranked amp can sustain a note longer (the other reason is feedback between the pickups and the speaker). The response will be less dynamic. The volume difference between soft and hard picking will be less. That can make things silky smooth for shredding, but is not desirable if you want a cleaner sound when picking softer.
Perfectly explained! Cheers!
A+
you guys should do a breakdown/setup of multi-effects units vs pedals/pedal boards. Ive always been told that single effects pedal units are the best but BOSS, ZOOM, LINE 6 and a load of other brands have been doing multi-effects for decades and they still do.
hearing the advantages and disadvantages of each setup would make an interesting video... Personally i still have a vintage Korg AX3000G that i used for most of my live playing a good 10+ years back. it doesnt see much use anymore as i prefer to hook up straight to an amp without any effects but it has always been there when i needed it.
Loved the SD-1 sound very crunchy, yet smooth.
Like when granola soaks up the right amount of milk
That 78 distortion is pure classic rock. Great video as always guys 🤘☺️🤘
Is Distortion generally less subtle than Overdrive? I only have a Boss DS-1 distortion pedal but no overdrive pedal. It seems to be only distortion, just at different levels or different tones of distortion when I play it, whereas I imagine the Overdrive would allow some clean tone and subtleties to come through. Is that correct? Is Overdrive more versatile for different styles of music in general because it would still allow for a slightly distorted or overdriven clean tone whereas Distortion is just distorted? It seems harder to play rhythms and lead lines with Distortion and still sound relatively relaxing to the ear because of that distortion all the time, whereas maybe Overdrive could just be an edgier sound if you wanted but still cleaner and clearer to listen to. Would that be a correct assessment?
Indeed, overdrive is more versatile and subtle. Distortion will sound the same whether your string attack is soft or strong. Overdrive can sound almost clean if you play very softly, and will start crunching and saturating the more you attack. And if you push the settings close to the max with a powerful guitar (with humbuckers), you get quite a lot of drive, more than enough for most styles. Only metal rock will require more than an overdrive, imho.
Distortion always rules over overdrive and fuzz. Distortion is king.
With overdrive some of the sound signal is still clean and not clipped. With distortion all of the harmonics in the notes or chord at any playing aggression will be distorted.
hard clipping, soft clipping, boost, square wave , mid monsters and bass breakers
distortion is just lots of overdrive then fuzz is a wooly bully distortion
stack them all for a twisted clipping tone.
I think it was Cory Taylor that said...
I will remember before I forget
Before I forget that
then the drums go all blatt dat dat blaatt blatt da da da dat or something IDK
Damn. I have both pedals. Nice review/explanation.
I use both simultaneously. Very nice combo.
Happy you liked it! Yes, great combination for sure.
//cheers, Kris
So new to signal chains, if I wanted to try boosting my distortion or boosting my over drive, whichever one im trying to boost should go before correct? And then a noise gate would go after the boosted pedal?
I preferred the amp on its own. Neither of those pedals sounded that great to me.
If we stack to overdrive, can we have a proper distortion?
which pedal would work great to copy the crunch on the xone 96 mixer? its for electronic music (tech house and techno)
WHATS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN TUBE DRIVE AND OVERDRIVE . EXAMPLE BK BUTTLER TUBE OVERDRIVE VS ROCKET .45 OVERDRIVE PEDAL.
I have a Wamplur Tumnus deluxe and I love it. Would stacking a Boss Blues Driver either before or after make it sound better or worse?
The difference is how much 🤘 there is.
I couldn’t have said it better myself.
Dont expect a Marshall to sound clean like a fender amp
Gooood that tele sound narly AF...never would have thought i'd ever say that...
Well then welcome to the Tele universe. Once you walk down that road, there's no way back. Ha ha!
//cheers, Kris
Overdrive VS Distortion - What is the difference?
first thing they say, we're not going to get technical, lol
Mrx the Distortion sound great
ah my favorite two youtube gear nerds (i mean that in the best way!)
These two pedals sound great stacked. I have them both. The '78 isn't that great on its own.
Hi Andy, I know you are a katana guy, so what’s your recommendation for good OD and Dist pedals into the katana clean channel? I ask because the kat clean channel is cleaner than a clean tube amp on the edge of breakup.
Judosailor why not try the onboard effects or the overdriven channels? You could also try turning the gain up on the clean channel and more volume etc. sounds pretty good without any pedals already :)
Else: an sd-1 is always a good choice
Hey! I would actually recommend using the crunch channel on a very low gain setting. Works really well with a lot of pedals. The actual pedals you choose is very personal.
//Andy
Thomann Music Thanks guys. While I appreciate the responses, part of the reason that I specified the clean channel is because I want to be able to go back-and-forth between clean and dirty. And I’m talking about a situation in which I’m either using a katana mini which does not have foot switches, or using my katana 50 which doesn’t have an effects loop, so I’m running pedals in front of a looper into the clean channel. Are there not any OD or distortion pedals that work well for that kind of application?
Moritz Lienhard Hey man, see above for a better explanation of what I’m looking for. You think the sd-1would work for that?
Judosailor best thing you can do is go to a guitar store and try some pedals! Or you buy a bunch at thomann and send those back, you didn‘t like. No one can say to you if this or that pedal is right, because everyone got a different taste. Sure, the Sd-1 will work, but if you‘ll like it is up to you to find out!
I will sustain on leadguitare with dealey verschiedene dealay zeiten chrunsh sound Sound alla el 34 Nature preamp ecc 83 and rhytmen sound not with dealay and cleansound little chorus and reverb
he looks like napoleon dynamite mixed with david cross
Clean more el 6 and 12 7 sound
angry charlie taught me distortion and overdrive can have a baby.
Stomp box vs multi effects pedals ...I see .I said , stomp pedals , can be , will be great , long , larger on line , of no limit....one piece by piece 's ,.. . From brands A , to brand D ....like point A to point D .....drive crazy '
Stomp boxes. Are a rooms ...of no limit
Cool
Boss Mt
The best (overdrive or disstortion) pedal is NO pedal! Guitar - cable - amplifier!
Well that really depends! On your guitar, amp, style, and first and foremost taste!
Overdrive is good for pushing an amp into breakup without having to be too loud. Unless you have a smaller amp. To get good tube saturation in a Fender twin or a 100 Watt Marshall , it’s gotta be loud as hell. An attenuator could lower your volume and still allow your tubes to growl. Good ones are expensive, though.
sneifert1968 so true, it’s annoying on 100w+ amps to try and get distortion while other people are in the room. You either deafen everyone or there’s none. And the pedals fix that, I have the bluesbreaker 2 and i can lower the volume on the pedal, to keep the volume of the amp lower while having a nice distortion.
Sembrate due babbei! I'm joking
The whole point in vibrato is to bend the strings, not shake the entire neck of the guitar 😂
oh please play chords...