Enough distortions? Time to give it a rest?

[analogMensch]

Here's a proposal: I'll stop making unnecessary dirtboxes as soon as They stop making unnecessary and unoriginal clone music. Or at least stop playing it in supermarkets. Drives me nuts! Why can't we have a little Zeppelin or Sabbath every once in a while during grocery shopping?

You went to the wrong supermarket! I work in a packetless supermarket, and today I played Bully and Ume the whole day.

[vigilante397]

I made a bunch of these using those 6111 triodes
https://tubedepot.com/products/6111?gclid=Cj0KCQjwnqH7BRDdARIsACTSAdvtnVcvCk0i9QuKOIE4vSmAn5Tn4swQwojSnlergu9iqHcNUVfYXM0aAqx8EALw_wcB

Neat! My main tube right now is the 6N21B. The 6111 is a little lower gain than I need, 6112 would be a great substitute for the stuff I've been doing, but they're like $18 a piece

[garcho]

It's a lot easier to buy (or build, or "design") a dirt/OD/distortion/fuzz//whatever pedal than it is to make inspired, meaningful music.

[pinkjimiphoton]

It's a lot easier to buy (or build, or "design") a dirt/OD/distortion/fuzz//whatever pedal than it is to make inspired, meaningful music.

sacrilege!!

especially since almost every bit of inspired, meaningful music most people have experienced has some kind of effect pedal on the guitar if there are guitars on the track.

all them marvelous tones peeps talk about from the classic rock era..

tonebenders and fuzzfaces and rangemasters pushing tube amps into distortion.

<sigh>

[LightSoundGeometry]

I made a bunch of these using those 6111 triodes
https://tubedepot.com/products/6111?gclid=Cj0KCQjwnqH7BRDdARIsACTSAdvtnVcvCk0i9QuKOIE4vSmAn5Tn4swQwojSnlergu9iqHcNUVfYXM0aAqx8EALw_wcB

Neat! My main tube right now is the 6N21B. The 6111 is a little lower gain than I need, 6112 would be a great substitute for the stuff I've been doing, but they're like $18 a piece

i used the 5672 pentodes in some  have gotten the idea from rick holt ..thank goodness I am neater with my cuts and a better solderer now ..looking at this close up is cringes lol those little pentodes dont even need a heat sink

[amptramp]

There are a number of low-voltage tube amps out there that can be made to distort easily.  Some use 12 volt car radio tubes whereas others use ordinary tubes run at voltages from 12 to 40 volts.  One nice thing about these amps is that you can use small electrolytics and other capacitors designed for transistor equipment.  The sophtamps site:

https://web.archive.org/web/20160316202627/http://www.sophtamps.ca/mambo/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=25&Itemid=37

has designs and distortion oscilloscope captures of the types of distortion you get from them.  Like the Fuzz Face, these amps feature a smooth transition from linear to distortion of various levels but without the low input impedance and temperature sensitivity of a Fuzz Face.  Fun for everyone.

[garcho]

...especially since almost every bit of inspired, meaningful music most people have experienced has some kind of effect pedal...

Ok, even though you sadly seem to think erroneously that classic rock is the only music that matters, and even though you signed off with that snotty <sigh>, I'll still take the bait 

If you can't make good music without pedals you can't make good music. In the early days of rock, when they were experimenting with gear, they were inspired first, and geared up later. Now, everyone gears up first and then goes "ok I guess I gotta write a song now to use all this stuff I bought". Nowadays, people start off with "hey, I want to be one of those guys in a band, I guess I'll buy some stuff and make music". Back then it was, "I have all this music inside me, how do I get it out?" When those old farts were kids, they didn't have a pedal board, garage band, DSP, etc. They had one crooked banged up acoustic guitar with 1" action that took their parents a year to save up for. Now 12 year olds in the suburbs get all geared up before they start shaving, and when they grow up to be gigging, recording musicians, everyone laments "why does the music suck now?" "why was the 60/70s so good?".

Because it ain't the pedals that matter. I'm here. I build, I have a little project studio cluttered to the gills with pedals and effects. I love them, don't get me wrong. But if you need a pedal to be inspired to play guitar, the problem is in your head, not your gear. I spent years playing in a band with a guitar and a fender tube amp. No pedals. It was one of the best musical experiences I've ever had. It was like getting to know your wife all over again. "Wow, this is what my guitar actually sounds like? Crazy!"

[pinkjimiphoton]

hahahahah
i feel ya gar!

i use guitar > wireless >marshall these days. no pedals. too lazy to move bernice, that thing weighs like 80 lbs lol..

but pretty much all modern music came from blues. once blues was electrified,
distortion became a valid component of, well, pretty much everything. tubes made stuff fuzzy. that was an effect. loud ass volume alone is an effect, or can be.

all the stuff that came later used effects. damn near everything any of us have ever listened to, or tried to emulate. that was my point.

people go on and on about the pure tone of their amps, and say clapton, as an example, was "god". i hear a shit load of fuzz in his tone, all thru the early years. a rangemaster is a fuzz.

i hear peeps go on and on about pagey. he used a tonebender. and the knobs on his guitar.

shit, when i started, it was a kay guitar amp with a kay fuzztone, both abysmal but i got a lot of mileage out of them.

my point is, a lot of the sounds and tones people lust after are quite literally a guitar into a fuzzface into a tube amp with the guitar rolled back to where ever that tone resides, and not "just the tube amp" that people think it is.

your/our/everyone's tone is in the fingers. right guitar? right amp? yeah, you can get what ya need. but if ya don't have that right stuff, pedals make it easier for peeps to get those sounds in a lot of cases, and that's why its so popular.

for me? playing an unplugged guitar is about as interesting as painful rectal itch. the guitar is just a vehicle, may as well be a keyboard.... i play my amp/effects <if i use any> and the guitar, to me, is a tool for just that.

i'm not a strummer, i don't really ever use accoustics, my only interest is the disgusting stench of too-loud electric guitars torturing electrons into pooting forth some kind of gawdawful noise. THAT is what gets ME off. but i am a sick, demented puppy.

but i agree... peeps got it too easy these days. you need zero talent <hello!! pink waves> to do damn near anything. you can re-mix audio recorded decades before. you can pitch correct. drag and drop loops and stems and even have your phone create tracks for you. its recawlkulous  how easy it is, and i appreciate your concerns with that.

its not about the music, as it should be, but all about the hype and bullshit, imho, all too often. which i think we both agree on.

but man, there's COUNTLESS peeps way less jaded than us who get really turned on by even the simplest pedal. if it sounds like what you hear in your head, it makes you play better, more, inspires you.

thats how it was when i was young, anyways, before you could get digital vegematic boxes that did everything but wipe your bottom for you.

by the way, i am one of them old farts you speak of, and you are correct.

its a brave new world, but all i want is mushrooms n mountaintops..lol
peace

[Steben]

hahahahah
i feel ya gar!

i use guitar > wireless >marshall these days. no pedals. too lazy to move bernice, that thing weighs like 80 lbs lol..

but pretty much all modern music came from blues. once blues was electrified,
distortion became a valid component of, well, pretty much everything. tubes made stuff fuzzy. that was an effect. loud ass volume alone is an effect, or can be.

all the stuff that came later used effects. damn near everything any of us have ever listened to, or tried to emulate. that was my point.

people go on and on about the pure tone of their amps, and say clapton, as an example, was "god". i hear a shit load of fuzz in his tone, all thru the early years. a rangemaster is a fuzz.

i hear peeps go on and on about pagey. he used a tonebender. and the knobs on his guitar.

shit, when i started, it was a kay guitar amp with a kay fuzztone, both abysmal but i got a lot of mileage out of them.

my point is, a lot of the sounds and tones people lust after are quite literally a guitar into a fuzzface into a tube amp with the guitar rolled back to where ever that tone resides, and not "just the tube amp" that people think it is.

Did Hendrix ever record true clean?

[Mark Hammer]

Actually, a lot of his recorded work IS pretty clean.  He needed it for that Curtis Mayfield rhythm work you can find all over the place but is exemplified by tunes like The Wind Cries Mary or Wait Til Tomorrow.  Of course, the fuzzy solos tend to be what stands out in our minds and recollection.

[vigilante397]

If you can't make good music without pedals you can't make good music.

I'll see myself out then

[Steben]

Actually, a lot of his recorded work IS pretty clean.  He needed it for that Curtis Mayfield rhythm work you can find all over the place but is exemplified by tunes like The Wind Cries Mary or Wait Til Tomorrow.  Of course, the fuzzy solos tend to be what stands out in our minds and recollection.

Oh yes, i love his " clean " sounds. I just wonder whether they are clean. 😁

[pinkjimiphoton]

Actually, a lot of his recorded work IS pretty clean.  He needed it for that Curtis Mayfield rhythm work you can find all over the place but is exemplified by tunes like The Wind Cries Mary or Wait Til Tomorrow.  Of course, the fuzzy solos tend to be what stands out in our minds and recollection.

well, after 52 years of chasing that kind of tone, my ears say most of the "clean" tones hendrix used, is quite literally a strat thru a fuzzface with the volume way down.  put it on the neck pickup, play with your thumb, bingo. marshall, fender, sunn, ampeg, all pretty much the same.

most of those tones are literally achievable two ways... set the amp up to that sound with the right amp and the right guitar, or just use the knobs on your guitar to find those shades with a guitar, a fuzz, and an amp.

its all about harmonic content. there's plenty of ways to get there, but i cannot get those curtis mayfield kinda sounds thru my marshall alone, but add in the fuzzface, and its right there.

jmo, ymmv and should, but.... without them pedals, most of the sounds we grew up listening to simply wouldn't exist.
i mean... even a boogie is a boogie from trying to get an amp to sound like a guitar with a fuzz, right? its not the crystal clear reproduction we seek usually, its the increased harmonic content that makes us get that little wiggle down there.

i've been blessed to play thru a lot of rare and classic gear coveted by a lot of folks over the decades, and to me, certain tones are only really plausible in certain ways... and most distorted guitar sounds, particularly the early ones, are from abused tube amps, and then, tube amps abused with stuff to push them deeper into distortion. with that distortion comes compression, which reduces dynamic name significantly while also increasing volume. if you can turn your guitar up and down to control the distortion level, exploiting that compression, you can get a lot more tone out of a guitar than you can without it. the tones don't exist on a guitar without it. i mean, turn a strat down to 1 with a fuzz on, and without... without it may not even be audible, but with, odds are it will be compressed, crystaline and clear.

apples and orangutans.

we need more distortion!

[Steben]

Guess a deacy amp is never used nor useful without a rangemaster or equivalent ?

But I am on the same wavelength with the fuzz clean up pn hendrix stuff. Not that you might not get mary crying her wind on a near break up amp.

Blown supro for led zep ii sounds is possible.

[Mark Hammer]

Actually, a lot of his recorded work IS pretty clean.  He needed it for that Curtis Mayfield rhythm work you can find all over the place but is exemplified by tunes like The Wind Cries Mary or Wait Til Tomorrow.  Of course, the fuzzy solos tend to be what stands out in our minds and recollection.

well, after 52 years of chasing that kind of tone, my ears say most of the "clean" tones hendrix used, is quite literally a strat thru a fuzzface with the volume way down.  put it on the neck pickup, play with your thumb, bingo. marshall, fender, sunn, ampeg, all pretty much the same.

most of those tones are literally achievable two ways... set the amp up to that sound with the right amp and the right guitar, or just use the knobs on your guitar to find those shades with a guitar, a fuzz, and an amp.

its all about harmonic content. there's plenty of ways to get there, but i cannot get those curtis mayfield kinda sounds thru my marshall alone, but add in the fuzzface, and its right there.

jmo, ymmv and should, but.... without them pedals, most of the sounds we grew up listening to simply wouldn't exist.
i mean... even a boogie is a boogie from trying to get an amp to sound like a guitar with a fuzz, right? its not the crystal clear reproduction we seek usually, its the increased harmonic content that makes us get that little wiggle down there.

i've been blessed to play thru a lot of rare and classic gear coveted by a lot of folks over the decades, and to me, certain tones are only really plausible in certain ways... and most distorted guitar sounds, particularly the early ones, are from abused tube amps, and then, tube amps abused with stuff to push them deeper into distortion. with that distortion comes compression, which reduces dynamic name significantly while also increasing volume. if you can turn your guitar up and down to control the distortion level, exploiting that compression, you can get a lot more tone out of a guitar than you can without it. the tones don't exist on a guitar without it. i mean, turn a strat down to 1 with a fuzz on, and without... without it may not even be audible, but with, odds are it will be compressed, crystaline and clear.

apples and orangutans.

we need more distortion!

My wife bought me a DVD of Jimi on the Dick Cavett Show, where he plays a Strat through what appears to be an Ampeg bass amp (B-15?) with the flip top, and it sounds like Hendrix.  I have a vague recollection of another talk show he was on where he played a Flying V through a borrowed non-Marshall amp, and it sounded like Hendrix.  So I am of the view that, as much as he could wring things out of a Fuzz Face and Uni-Vibe, he was quite at home plugging directly into a clean amp.

I suppose we're going to have to rely on Eddie Kramer to settle any disagreements.

[pinkjimiphoton]

Guess a deacy amp is never used nor useful without a rangemaster or equivalent ?

But I am on the same wavelength with the fuzz clean up pn hendrix stuff. Not that you might not get mary crying her wind on a near break up amp.

Blown supro for led zep ii sounds is possible.

brian may's amp had a rangemaster in front of it, in fact. the deacy was a backend for a rangemaster from what i recall.

i've owned a few original supros, they're fairly clean til pushed into distortion, but their distortion alone isn't a really great one. but add a tonebender or fuzzface, and it becomes brilliant and huge. very midrange honky kinda blatty distortion without the fuzz pushing it.

[pinkjimiphoton]

Actually, a lot of his recorded work IS pretty clean.  He needed it for that Curtis Mayfield rhythm work you can find all over the place but is exemplified by tunes like The Wind Cries Mary or Wait Til Tomorrow.  Of course, the fuzzy solos tend to be what stands out in our minds and recollection.

well, after 52 years of chasing that kind of tone, my ears say most of the "clean" tones hendrix used, is quite literally a strat thru a fuzzface with the volume way down.  put it on the neck pickup, play with your thumb, bingo. marshall, fender, sunn, ampeg, all pretty much the same.

most of those tones are literally achievable two ways... set the amp up to that sound with the right amp and the right guitar, or just use the knobs on your guitar to find those shades with a guitar, a fuzz, and an amp.

its all about harmonic content. there's plenty of ways to get there, but i cannot get those curtis mayfield kinda sounds thru my marshall alone, but add in the fuzzface, and its right there.

jmo, ymmv and should, but.... without them pedals, most of the sounds we grew up listening to simply wouldn't exist.
i mean... even a boogie is a boogie from trying to get an amp to sound like a guitar with a fuzz, right? its not the crystal clear reproduction we seek usually, its the increased harmonic content that makes us get that little wiggle down there.

i've been blessed to play thru a lot of rare and classic gear coveted by a lot of folks over the decades, and to me, certain tones are only really plausible in certain ways... and most distorted guitar sounds, particularly the early ones, are from abused tube amps, and then, tube amps abused with stuff to push them deeper into distortion. with that distortion comes compression, which reduces dynamic name significantly while also increasing volume. if you can turn your guitar up and down to control the distortion level, exploiting that compression, you can get a lot more tone out of a guitar than you can without it. the tones don't exist on a guitar without it. i mean, turn a strat down to 1 with a fuzz on, and without... without it may not even be audible, but with, odds are it will be compressed, crystaline and clear.

apples and orangutans.

we need more distortion!

My wife bought me a DVD of Jimi on the Dick Cavett Show, where he plays a Strat through what appears to be an Ampeg bass amp (B-15?) with the flip top, and it sounds like Hendrix.  I have a vague recollection of another talk show he was on where he played a Flying V through a borrowed non-Marshall amp, and it sounded like Hendrix.  So I am of the view that, as much as he could wring things out of a Fuzz Face and Uni-Vibe, he was quite at home plugging directly into a clean amp.

I suppose we're going to have to rely on Eddie Kramer to settle any disagreements.

eddie's unnecessary. just use your ears. i've seen the cavett show, as i recall, he played a flying v with a fuzzface. i'd have to investigate further, but i doubt he could do a lot of "hendrixisms" without extreme volume unlikely to have been done on the tv show without it. but a small tube amp, cranked? yeah, you can get close to it. as i recall too, some of the distortion jimi used on that was the woman tone from humbuckers with the tone knob rolled literally off.

here's the clip from cavett mark's talking about

in this, it may just be a small amp cranked, i don't hear that chimey crystal sound you get with the fuzz added, sounds more like just cranked tubes.

[aron]

Maybe a distortion/fuzz with UVC-LED? Clean and disinfect and fuzz too!
https://www.mouser.com/datasheet/2/244/SML-LXF3535UVCC10-1862212.pdf

[pinkjimiphoton]

i use them uv ones all the time they look cool, but seem to contribute to "hash" on the power rails

[Twhjelmgren28]

I love me some dirt. From a purely consumer standpoint, the one type of pedal I'm always excited about is new ODs and distortions.  I love all the different flavors and I think it's fun listening to variations on demos and in real life. 

I find other types of pedals are more redundant. For things like delay and reverb, although there are many variations, I end up going for a pedal that can do multiple different types. I'm not as keen to put 3 different delay pedals on my board versus 3 different drives when I can get one delay pedal that does multiple things well. To me the flavor differences of something like a delay aren't as exciting as drive.

From a modulation standpoint, I think there is a fine line between something sounding corny and something sounding awesome. I feel like modulation is much more hit or miss but I can almost always find something useable with a drive pedal.

Just my 2 cents.