# Looking for a pedal that doesn't sound like one



## whammybar (May 7, 2008)

*Looking for an OD that doesn't sound like one*

I am looking for an 'available' pedal that sounds like an overdriven 5 watt amp. Just so sick of pedals that sound like.... fizzy pedals. It would be fantastic if you knew of a pedal in the afforable range but I'll take all suggestions. Just not a pedal that sounds like you just switched on a pedal and got some fizz on your playing. I'm not looking for one that needs the amp to be in overdrive before it sounds right, but something that really captures an overdriven 5 watt sound, pick attack and all, even into a clean amp.


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## zurn (Oct 21, 2009)

What is your budget? Have you tried a Tim or Timmy? If your tight on money you can try the rip off Danelectro made of them Cool Cat Transparent Overdrive.


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## whammybar (May 7, 2008)

Sorry this thread should be titled 'Looking for an Overdrive that doesn't sound like one' but I can't figure out how to change the title of the thread.

I have tried the Cool Cat but as sweet as it sounds it's a long way from one of those 5 watt 'widow maker' amps cranked all the way up. Those small 5 watts have almost fuzz like distortion yet fantastic respone to the pick when you back off. Where do I find THAT on an OD?


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## mhammer (Nov 30, 2007)

What you likely want is something that has numerous gain stages, and doesn't push each one particularly hard.


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## whammybar (May 7, 2008)

any suggesions on a pedal(s) that might do that?


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## zurn (Oct 21, 2009)

You might want to try a pedal with a preamp tube in it like a EHX English Muff’n

EHX.com | English Muff’n - Tube Distortion/Preamp | Electro-Harmonix


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## Alien8 (Jan 8, 2009)

> mhammer
> 
> What you likely want is something that has numerous gain stages, and doesn't push each one particularly hard.


There's your answer. I have 6 gain stages total (I'm a freak!) in various forms - pedals, pre-amp, EQ, power amp. The tone with all 6 stages is very dynamic for a high gain tone, but when you get down to 4 & 5 stages, each lightly pushed you find magic in anything you do!

What's wrong with using a cranked 5 watt amp? 

Anything MOOGERFOOGER has a very dynamic pre-amp, though it could use and EQ after it. Pricy.

The OCD is good, but you have to set it right. Put a EQ / Boost after it and you have 4 gain stages with your amp - ie keep the amp clean, but push it with a really lightly broken up tone and you may find what you need. The EQ is a personal thing I use to flavor the broken up tone, to highlight the amps ability along with the pedal drive tone.

You can keep the amp clean, but then push it with a booster / drive combination to get what you need. The trick can be the resulting EQ it creates.


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## whammybar (May 7, 2008)

Thanks for the suggestions people. I'll check out the ones I haven't already.

I have tried the boost thing but the amp has to be breaking up a bit as well to really get some sweetness so with a boost things get LOUD! I love the huge tone of the small 5 watts but need more volume than that and if it's in a pedal it can be moved to different clean amps. Like I said it will probably turn out to be more of a fuzz than an OD but we'll see. Thanks again for the suggestions.


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## hollowbody (Jan 15, 2008)

Alien8 said:


> The OCD is good, but you have to set it right. Put a EQ / Boost after it and you have 4 gain stages with your amp - ie keep the amp clean, but push it with a really lightly broken up tone and you may find what you need. The EQ is a personal thing I use to flavor the broken up tone, to highlight the amps ability along with the pedal drive tone.


The OCD does indeed sound very good and is very responsive to touch and knob adjustments, but I wouldn't say it sounds like an amp. Into an amp, though, it's pretty awesome

What are you looking to use it for? Recording direct? Into a SS amp? A tube amp? 

Into a tube amp, I've found great success with the Timmy and the OCD. Both are touch sensitive and clean up very nicely, but they offer different amounts of gain. With the Timmy, you can only go so far in terms of amount of overdrive. With the OCD, you can get a lot of heavier tones as well as lower drive tones. Also, it depends on how driven your amp is.

With a SS, my favourite pedal has been the Tubescreamer. Not as touch sensitive and doesn't clean up as well, but it makes the amp sing (it also sounds great with tube amps, but it's not really what you're asking for in that application).

If you're talking about direct, my favourite right now is the Tech 21 Sansamp British. It's a Marshall-inspired pedal that has a built-in EQ to emulate a speaker cab, so you can plug a guitar into it and then into an audio interface and get very usable amp tones without having to make any noise at all. It's also very touch sensitive and cleans up well too with the twist of a knob.


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## traynor_garnet (Feb 22, 2006)

I am curently looking into a Trotsky Pedal. From the clips I've heard, it seems similar to your description above. My guess, however, is that you are in love with the sound of a speaker getting hit hard . . .

TG


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## mhammer (Nov 30, 2007)

whammybar said:


> any suggesions on a pedal(s) that might do that?


Well, the Z-Vex Box of Rock has 3 successive gain stages i it, and the Box of Metal has 5. The Catalinbread Dirty Little Secret has what appears to be 4, as does the Blackstone Overdrive.

Most of the rest of what's out there concentrate all the gain in either one or two stages. For example the vast majority of Tube Screamer variants (including the Tim/Timmy) place all the gain in one stage.


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## david henman (Feb 3, 2006)

...my solution, after finally reaching pedal overload, was to buy an overdriven five-watt amp - the blackstar ht5.

we're probably talking different styles of distortion here, but i have to add the difference in tone between the ht5 and my tonebone hot british is, well, minimal. at least at very low volume.

at full volume, i suspect the ht5 would rule.


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## whammybar (May 7, 2008)

I came across a pedal that does a prety good job. Not perfect but pretty good. GFS Bluesdrive clasic. Pretty close....... I foind the Trotsky's pretty cool but still a little too much like an OD to me. There seem to be many variations on the same pedal though so maybe I just hven't hit the one that sounds just right yet. I'll keep listening.


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## whammybar (May 7, 2008)

In the end I realized what I'm looking for is Garrett Mason in a pedal. (check out the tone on 'And Everything' and 'Howlin for my Baby' Garrett Mason - Player ) Then I came across Menatone. Woooow! I'm still trying to find out if I can get some of their older pedals but they are incredibly 'amp' sounding. 'Workingman's Blues' and 'Top Boost in a Can' have amazing breakup and the older pedals had a 'sag' knob. The look really expensive so time will tell. Looks like Menatone is the holy grail of amp sounding pedals though.


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## zurn (Oct 21, 2009)

You can grab them at RJP Guitar Studios here in Canada!


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## whammybar (May 7, 2008)

Hey thanks for the link. The Canadian distributor doesn't even show up on Menatone's web site. I'm really looking for the older eight knob 'Workingman's Blue' and 'Top Boost In A Can' versions of these pedals. They had high cut, EQ, sag and presence controls as well. These options seem to have been removed from the newer smaller pedals. So if anyone has one of the older ones for sale lofu


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## mrmatt1972 (Apr 3, 2008)

zurn said:


> You might want to try a pedal with a preamp tube in it like a EHX English Muff’n
> 
> EHX.com | English Muff’n - Tube Distortion/Preamp | Electro-Harmonix


Nope, that won't do it. That's more of a big, bassy, fuzz monster.

But in response to the OP, the price of a 5 watt amp is about the price of many pedals, why not just use the little amp?


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## whammybar (May 7, 2008)

You can't really even jam with a loud drummer, using a 5 watt amp but with the right sounding pedal you can use a Super on 2 and have the tone like you're on 7. It is just so much easier to have it in a pedal, that is if I ever find the right pedal. I can also change amps and while they will not sound the same, I will still get that huge tone at lower, but usable, volumes.


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## mhammer (Nov 30, 2007)

Use of a compressor in conjunction with an overdrive can often soften up the resulting sound by keeping the signal within a certain range of the clipping threshold. So, you don't get the hard pick attack and all those harmonics quite so much. The initial pick attack tends to sound smoother, and more like the sustain portion of the ringing note.


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## hollowbody (Jan 15, 2008)

whammybar said:


> You can't really even jam with a loud drummer, using a 5 watt amp but with the right sounding pedal you can use a Super on 2 and have the tone like you're on 7. It is just so much easier to have it in a pedal, that is if I ever find the right pedal. I can also change amps and while they will not sound the same, I will still get that huge tone at lower, but usable, volumes.


If you want your Super Reverb to sound like it's at 7 at a lower volume, your best bet is an attenuator. Then you don't have to worry about a pedal at all. I have an Ultimate Attenuator that I use with my YGM-2 and my JTM45, and both sound amazing through it. I don't use any overdrive or distortion pedals at all, just the sound of my amp being driven hard.

Also, if you plug a 5w amp into a 4x12, you certainly CAN jam with a drummer. They only sound small when they're going through a 6" speaker. Through a nice Marshall cab, you'll be able to get at least 100db or so out of them, which should be enough to compete with most kits unless your drummer is Thor. A really hard rimshot is around 130db or so, but a regular snare hit is quieter.


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## JMann (Feb 18, 2007)

Dirty Little Secret.

Never had the pleasure of trying the Timmy, will soon, but the DLS is the best light to medium and beyond OD's that I have used over the years. I've described it as addictive and after almost 2 yrs with it I still love the heck out of it. So touch sensitive and responsive to picking dynamics that you sometimes have to spank your plank harder to confirm you have it on or have enough gain dialed in. I have(soon to be "had", I hope) a Marshall Class 5 watter that I enjoyed the cranked tones out of but I prefer the tones of my DLS through a tube amp that I have dialed in for largely clean tones. The DLS has the 4 gain stages mentioned above, does not add any fizz even when you dig in, comes cheaper than the Timmy and OCD and has that OD feel and tone that to me sounds like your playing through that cranked 5 watt amp the OP describes.

The OCD on the other hand has more gain on tap with very dynamic controls but to me it is more distortion than overdrive and imparts a more compressed tone than the DLS which has an open, transparent feel to it. 

I'm a little bit confused as to what the OP really wants as he describes the Trotsky (never tried this) as too much of an OD pedal. I would think a good low to mid gain OD pedal would be more amp sounding and provide that touch sensitive break up as opposed to a distortion pedal which, imo, has potential to add "fizz" to your tone.

Jim


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## hollowbody (Jan 15, 2008)

JMann said:


> The OCD on the other hand has more gain on tap with very dynamic controls but to me it is more distortion than overdrive and imparts a more compressed tone than the DLS which has an open, transparent feel to it.
> 
> Jim


That's a really interesting description of the OCD. I love mine for higher gain stuff, but always thought it was kind of OK for lower gain. Though how you use the HP/LP switch really changes things around. I've been wanting to try a DLS for a while and you're really helping me want to speed that up!


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## JMann (Feb 18, 2007)

hollowbody said:


> That's a really interesting description of the OCD. I love mine for higher gain stuff, but always thought it was kind of OK for lower gain. Though how you use the HP/LP switch really changes things around. I've been wanting to try a DLS for a while and you're really helping me want to speed that up!


After many OD's and Distortion pedals, I have hung on to these as my mainstays with the OCD the longest serving.

Your right, that HP/LP switch is crucial in what type of tone you're after. I almost always use the HP setting as it's more in-your-face with a tighter, chunkier bass response. I like the LP when I'm in the mood for a warmer, darker tone. Great pedal for sure but of the 2 the DLS is my desert isle dirt box. 

Jim


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## hollowbody (Jan 15, 2008)

JMann said:


> After many OD's and Distortion pedals, I have hung on to these as my mainstays with the OCD the longest serving.
> 
> Your right, that HP/LP switch is crucial in what type of tone you're after. I almost always use the HP setting as it's more in-your-face with a tighter, chunkier bass response. I like the LP when I'm in the mood for a warmer, darker tone. Great pedal for sure but of the 2 the DLS is my desert isle dirt box.
> 
> Jim


Same here, I've had my OCD for a long time and it's definitely my longest-serving dirtbox and I'll probably keep it no matter what just because I'm so familiar with it's sound and how it works, but yeah, I'll definitely give the DLS a try at some point. I'm not using too many pedals these days, but it's nice to have a go-to dirtbox that you know can reliably give you a certain tone with ease.


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## whammybar (May 7, 2008)

First question is am I the 'OP' referred to above? (I have no clue what OP means sorry) I'm a little confused by the 'confusion' between the differences of overdrive, distortion and an overdriven 5 watt amp. The three sounds are very, very different to me but sound is a very subjective thing right, so here's the simplest I can put what I'm looking for.

When I listen to the 'Top Boost In A Can' sound samples by Menatone, I can't tell whether it's a pedal or an overdriven amp and I want to be able to do that at a volume setting of 2 on a bigger tube amp. I want the portability of a pedal so I can change amps and I absolutely never want to be able to tell that I just stepped on a pedal to get some smoothness and 'hair'. In the Garett Mason sounds I posted on the previous page (particularly 'And Everything' and 'Howlin for my Baby') I can't tell if that's just his overdriven Bandmaster or he's using a stomp box. That's the sound I'm looking for. In a pedal.

Menatone's TOP BOOST IN A CAN Sound Samples


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## whammybar (May 7, 2008)

JMann said:


> Dirty Little Secret.


Gotta say, pretty cool. I found the Formula No 5 to be incredibly amp like as well. Many Thanks.


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## hollowbody (Jan 15, 2008)

whammybar said:


> First question is am I the 'OP' referred to above? (I have no clue what OP means sorry) I'm a little confused by the 'confusion' between the differences of overdrive, distortion and an overdriven 5 watt amp. The three sounds are very, very different to me but sound is a very subjective thing right, so here's the simplest I can put what I'm looking for.
> 
> When I listen to the 'Top Boost In A Can' sound samples by Menatone, I can't tell whether it's a pedal or an overdriven amp and I want to be able to do that at a volume setting of 2 on a bigger tube amp. I want the portability of a pedal so I can change amps and I absolutely never want to be able to tell that I just stepped on a pedal to get some smoothness and 'hair'. In the Garett Mason sounds I posted on the previous page (particularly 'And Everything' and 'Howlin for my Baby') I can't tell if that's just his overdriven Bandmaster or he's using a stomp box. That's the sound I'm looking for. In a pedal.
> 
> Menatone's TOP BOOST IN A CAN Sound Samples


OP refers to "original poster," so whoever it was who started the thread. In this case, you 

One thing to take into consideration, you can't always rely on videos 100%. A lot depends on the gear they used to record the pedal (guitar, amp, mic, pre-amp, VRTs, other effects, all settings associated with all of these variables), the original audio and video bitrates, whether or not the sound or video was then compressed, where it's posted, whether it was altered during posting (further compression), what gear you're using to listen to it (sound card, amp, speakers, headphones, size of room, etc.). Yes, a decently recorded video can give you an _impression_ of the piece of gear in question, but it isn't until you get that thing home and try it there that you really begin to understand whether or not it's what you were looking for.


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## whammybar (May 7, 2008)

hollowbody said:


> but it isn't until you get that thing home and try it there that you really begin to understand whether or not it's what you were looking for.


absolutely true, and I have a wad of pedals I hate to prove it.


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