Combining overdrives

[Tomm Williams]

On my pedal board (among other pedals) I use a Dirty Little Secret into a HotRod3 with a Soulfood to kick it up a bit. I have a line on a great deal for a East River Drive (which don't cost much anyway) which I'm going to grab for no particular reason 😄

 

 

 

What experiences can be shared about combining overdrive units ? Any interesting possibilities there ?

[1001gear]

I have a zillion ODS and distos (around 20) and I spent several of the early years searching for, combining. and cataloging tones and eventually grew out of it and went with learning to play in the first place. In that regard single pedals respond to player input better than stacks but also demand the player refine dynamics, touch and articulation to very high standards. (still working on it )

 

That said, plain ole TS9s are great for attenuating stubborn gain catalyzed bass content.as are Digitech SC twos with active bass and treble. These in front of anything that pushes the amp too much work wonders for clarity and spectral harmony.

 

I will still stack ODs out of boredom but the only combination I really like is a the boost from a Marshall BB2 into mode three or four of an Ibanez DX Turbo. This yields a monstrous crunchy thing kinda like those vintage blonde fenders.

[StratStevo]

Always put the higher gain pedal closest to the amp, stuffing a higher gain pedal through a lower gain pedal has never worked for me.

[mbengs1]

I use a boss sd-1 super overdrive for additional sustain and gain in front of my main distortion pedals. it also warms up the signal a bit. I plan to buy other overdrives like the blues driver and the ibanez TS-9. i heard those are great.

[WRGKMC]

I too use lower gain pedals before the higher gain pedals.

 

I did read some place recently that said you should do it the other way around to get the best results.

 

It got me curious because I've done it the other way around for so long. I don't like having a closed mind on the possibilities so I thought I might try it the other way around next time I power up my rig.

 

 

To me the logic and results are this. Having a low gain pedal first acts like a preamp on the pickup to make it louder. Its like swapping a vintage pickup for something hot wound. From there you hit the higher gain pedal and it goes from driven to saturated. You wind up with a smooth saturation and the string sensitivity when you pick them contain the dynamics before its saturated by the higher gain pedal.

 

If you do it the other way around, the signal is already saturated. The lower gain pedal simply boosts the volume of the high gain and ads a coarser grit to it. Since there's very little dynamics if any left after the first pedal, your pick attack isn't going to change. The output of the high saturation pedal into the low is more like an on off switch so there's very little dynamic response preserved or gained having the low gain pedal after the high.

 

Any noise from the high gain pedal will be amplified and microphonic feedback is much more likely.

With low gain before you have lower noise levels at idle and less chance of feedback.

 

I know these are the results from trial and error so many times, but in keeping an open mind, I might try it anyway. Sometimes breaking the normal habits helps you understand why you preferred it in the first place.

 

If I use a tube screamer just before the amp so it does what it's supposed to (drive the preamp tubes into saturation) and just use a slight amount of gain, it might be OK to have a higher gain pedal before it. I'd likely have to move my time based effects to my amp loop so they are after the preamp section. If I have the Tube screamer before the echo and chorus it defeats the purpose of that pedal in making the tubes sound hot. The pedal would then act like a channel switcher between clean and driven channels.

 

I'm not real sure how well this might work out, but it makes logical sense. I'd likely have to dial back some of the higher gain pedals clipping to reduce noises levels, but its not like I leave those running all the time.

 

With the dual loop pedal I built I can actually wire up both options having low gain before high and high gain before low. I have enough gain pedals on my studio board to make this an option. I rarely if ever use more then two gain pedals at once anyway. Too much of anything is bad, even if you do run stereo amps with separate chains like I do.

[iodine74]

Only a bedroom player, but here's my thoughts FWIW.

 

First, here's my chain (minus time or filter based effects):

Guitar ->

EQD Bit Commander (using only the square wave signal maxed - no octaves) ->

Comp on Ibanez UE400 ->

Overdrive (TS - gain almost maxed) on Ibanez UE400 ->

Comp on Ibanez UE405 ->

PEQ on Ibanez UE405 ->(to board)

MAD Effects DD30 (gain 25%, volume 50% - it's an odd beast)

Rat 2 (gain at 1o'clock) ->

Huckleberry v2 (gain and bias at 1-2 o'clock) ->

ToneFactor Cream Pie Deluxe (gain at noon) ->

iStomp Sparkledrive Model (gain and mix at noon) ->

iStomp Red Fuzz (gain maxed) ->

Catalinbread SFT (gain around 1-2 o'clock)->

Catalinbread DLS (v1 low gain setting, gain around 12 o'clock)

 

From there I run into couple delays, trem, magicstomp 2 and Big Sky. Amps are an AC15 Twin Twelve and a Princeton running in stereo - both are set clean.

 

Basically I end up combining lots of lower gains together when I want higher gain. The Huck is actually a really good rock sound and when pushed with the UE400 OD or Rat just gets fuzzier, which is nice. The way I have the Cream Pie Deluxe after it... that CPD acts as a massive volume boost of that tone. I actually want to change the order so that boost pushes the Huck to give me bigger fuzz.

 

The CPD does do some nice things pushing the DLS as well.

 

SFT and DLS together is a nice combo as well. But I have them placed where I do in the chain to act as that "foundation" like Catalinbread suggests, coloring any drives in front of them in a way they would if they were an amp, and I'd love to add a Formula 5F6, RAH or WIIO and EQD Monarch as well (or something akin to each) to give me a maximum flexible pallete.

 

One more note. The Red Fuzz is pretty smooth and I can see how it'd get lost in the mix... when I push it with the Huck, CPD or even the Sparkledrive Model it does ad some extra hair.

 

 

[Juicy Elk Man]

Parallel connection (Pharaoh with the Small Fry) with a mixer - a Boss LS-2

 

[morrisonic]

I play low watt tube amps, between 5 watts and 15 watts. Had a 20 watt amp once, more power than I needed. I usually dial them in as loud as I can get without completely breaking up, then push them with a clean boost (EHX Soul Food with drive all the way down, etc.) . . . the clean boost is at the front of the chain, immediately afterwards I place a tubescreamer-type pedal (so many to choose from) and kick that on for solos, single note runs, etc. Works nicely, I get lots of compliments on my tone even though I use cheap gear.

[mbengs1]

I sometimes use two boss super overdrives together and a boss GE-7 put more hair to the sound to get a peavey 5150 type of tone. it sounds great.

[mikesr1963]

To get Zakk Wylde without active pickups or a Marshall tube amp I use and MT2 with a SD1 after it.

[Tom Mc1]

I use a Visual Sounds Jeckel an Hyde a 2 in 1 on my board. They put a distortion before the overdrive. This works well for me because I use the gain side as a volume boost and the distortion side to get a dirty to screaming sound.

[arcadesonfire]

Interesting. I put my higher gains first. Muff--Rat--OCD--TS9. I turn the TS gain allll the way down, and it's modded for less gain too! I'm playing through a slightly OD'd plexi and keep all the other pedals' gains pretty low. When I'm playing along with one of them and I need some extra definition and sustain, I kick on the tube screamer. It doesn't change the sound much. It's kinda like a tubey normalizer, if that makes sense. But it makes everything really thick, even w/ the low-gain OCD, so I've gotta turn off the TS for rhythm. The TS boost makes the sound LESS complex, so palm muted power chords, for example, sound all 70s and fugly. I want some complex VH cuttin in my rhythm guitar!

 

Fun stuff! For me though, my amp is already providing a lot of gain and character, and in my younger and less experienced years, I woulda thought three distortions in a row would inevitably be terrible. Then I learned. Oh my how I've learned.