60's bluesy sound?

[mattpocket]

Hi,

I am trying to decide which pedal to build to get a kind of sixties bluesy sound. Like Cream, Santana, Joe Walsh, etc...

I have heard of some booster giving this kind of sound, particularly the rangemaster.

Please point me in the right direction...

Thanks!

[Thomas P.]

depends on what kind of amp you've got....

[BD13UK]

Like the previous post mentions Your amp will play a major part in the pedal selection process. If it's valve/tube then I would look at boosters as people like Rory Gallagher Robin Trower Tony Iommi and apparantly Eric Clapton all used them. The Rangemaster may be best suited to the darker type amps Vox Marshall etc whereas used with a Fender type amp it can be a bit brittle and over bright although some adjustment of the tone controls may help. I also feel the RM works best with non master volume amps. If Your looking for a full boost then there are plenty to choose from starting with the Electro-Harmonix LPB-1 which was probably the first of the silicon boosters, the layouts gallery has a really good selection of boosters for just about any application. The only transistor amp that I've had experience with using a booster was an old Lab Series 2x12 combo, it was ok but tranny amps just don't react in the same way as valves/tubes.

[mattpocket]

I'd be using it with a solid state amp, I wanted to build the pedal as a present for someone. I was thinking of a kind of bluesy overdrive, as the amp this person has is basically crap. The gain channel is real fuzzy, its only a cheapo amp. I was thinking an overdrive pedal on the clean channel would provide a good substitute for a half decent amp.

Any ideas?

[jonathan perez]

well, i think that any distortion can be "bluesy" based on your overall guitar technique...

otherwise, i think you should just build a DOD250.

[JimRayden]

Take a listen to Doug's Highway89 pedal. Don't know if that's what you're looking for but I've always liked the cream it puts out.

http://dhammond_1.tripod.com/sounds.htm

---------
Jimbo

[markm]

well, i think that any distortion can be "bluesy" based on your overall guitar technique...

otherwise, i think you should just build a DOD250.

OD250 is a GREAT sounding circuit!
Maybe check out the '77 version.....
Would be fine for Bluesy tones. 

[BD13UK]

If as You say that the amp isn't too clever then I suspect that it's going to be difficult to get it to sound any better with any pedal, that said there are a multitude of overdrive projects in the layouts gallery and elsewhere on the net to choose from so just go with the one that sounds good to You.

[Yun]

well, here's my couple "clams" on this matter:

Cream= gibson guitar(s)---->Fuzz-Face--->Old marshall amps

Santana= depends on what era, man.  but a lot of his tone comes out of a Big-Muff.  

Cheap ways:

Dano fab distortion, the ones that cost only 15 bux at www.musiciansfriend.com .  It IS actually a very decent pedal, man.  REALLY touch synsative

DIY route:

DOD250 scores another point, however- i'd put a tone control in there for the sake of versatility (uh, is that even a word?).  

Alternative route:

Buy a better amp, dude.  Go look in pawn shoppes and stuff like that, you know?

Out of all those things i mentioned, i have to stress that if you buy an EQ pedal or of the sort- you'll open up A LOT of tonal posibilities, man.  

Good EQ buys:

Danelectro Fish & Chips

But let's not forget that the best tone is in your soul, and how you use it  

[mattpocket]

Thanks for the help guys!

I am actually building an MXR Dist+ which I gather is VERY similar to a DOD250, what about this tone control. I'd interested in putting one into my current build (the mxr)

Matt

[GibsonGM]

A big problem when working on this kind of problem is the the SS amp doesn't give you a "clean palate".  So, if you threw together a booster, it might actually sound phenomenal, but you wouldn't know it if you test it with the SS amp! 

As people said above, most any overdrive/booster will get you something, but the result may be a little 'flat' sounding unless you have a tube amp.  Hey, I have a tube amp, and still tried a whole bunch of things to get THAT SOUND.   In the end, an LPB-2 that I modified ended up giving me the closest tone to what I consider 60's blues...gives me a hot signal to send into my preamp, which has a 12AX7, followed by 12AT7 in V2.  I believe the best thing I purchased is my amp, well worth saving 100's of $ to get!  The rest is just tone shaping; if you took my pedals away, I could still play a mean Clapton/Santana set just fine 

Back in my solid state days, a fuzz face gave me a passable "60's sound"...more fuzz, less tone, since the amp couldn't deliver good tone anyway - you could start there, maybe...
Good input, Yun (I wrote this before I saw your post)

Maybe put a Stupidly Wonderful Tone Control on  the Dist+, matt...I never found the Dist+ to be very 60's bluesy, but more AC/DC...good sound, I use one all the time with the SWTC!

[markm]

Thanks for the help guys!

I am actually building an MXR Dist+ which I gather is VERY similar to a DOD250, what about this tone control. I'd interested in putting one into my current build (the mxr)

Matt

I don't think ya want the MXR for bluesey.....
Go with the OD250. 

Of course, the Peppermill is quite a good candidate as well.

[Steben]

BSIAB II with low gain FET's (all 2N5457 f.e.). Than you have a "little" amp-in-a-box, that you can use after all Fuzzes and boosters that were around in those days. That's my 2 cents.

[Barcode80]

+1 on the OD250, though if you are playing through a crap amp, you can't polish a turd! I will say, though, that my little cheap Marshall DFX30 amp sounds phenomenal with all my pedals, at all volumes.

I just built the OD250 from MarkM's pcb layout, it sounds kickass, and can get some very bluesy sounds.

Basically, IMHO, anything low gain and high volume is going to be close to what you want, though the amp will be a HUGE factor.

Yun, +1 on the Dan pedals. highly underrated in the marketplace. I just bought a Fab Chorus, love it!

[petemoore]

  Guitar
 Speaker[s [and enclosure]
 Amp
 Dirtboxes
 ...not taking cables for granted...
 That's the 'priority order' in which I look at a system, first if it's a kinda speaker I like for blues, greenbacky or jensen-y...or...other good/better types that are 'upgrade' quality I'm less familiar with...or something power soak-ey with mid-honk....be critical.
 Then the amp, at this point the options are as great as the subjectiveness of discussion, and vary with application..
 JBL suggests examining speaker options first [as do other good but unreferenced sources], no mention of dirtboxes in their manuals, but excellent stuff on systems building.
   

[Hanglow]

I have a solid state carslbro and have built a couple of overdrive pedals from GGG - the standard bluesbreaker and the TS808 with the keeley mods among others - the the bluesbreaker sounds nice through my amp. the ts808 was a bit dissapointing to say the least, but I kind of expected that.

my advice would be to buy (or build!) a small tube amp and work from there

if thats not on your agenda then I would heartily recommend the marshall bluesbreaker clone - its quite easy to build and sounds pretty good to my ears through the carlsbro.

[Thomas P.]

of course the blue magic is never out of style! I also have good sounds with the shaka-tube if you want the starved plate kinda thing.
And like some others said the ROG stuff is increadible - one of those might do the trick as well.

[Yun]

Thanks for the help guys!

I am actually building an MXR Dist+ which I gather is VERY similar to a DOD250, what about this tone control. I'd interested in putting one into my current build (the mxr)

Matt

I've allways had good luck with this tone control (i modified the MXR Dist+ for you to show the tone control):

[QSQCaito]

Marshall Bluesbreaker, very easy build. Great for blues,  I love it  

[KerryF]

+1 for the BluesBreaker.  Theres never a time when its out of my chain.