At a loss with distortion pedals

I

iamthesuck

New member
So I play a wide variety of styles and have used about 10 different distortion/OD's/Fuzz pedals in my life. I have been using a GGG ts808 clone with keely mods and some other mods in there, but the issue I have is that when I solo, my sustain is shot to crap. I have access to an old whiteface rat right now, although I can't keep it (go figure!). I like the legato style the rat gives me access to, but it has it's own problems. The closest I've gotten is an EHX metal muff. It's pretty smooth, high powered, and sustains an awful lot more than my TS clone. I was thinking about some kind of EHX BMP, but I'm not sure which one would work best (I'd probably get a GGG clone, and they have an awful lot of possibilities from different editions that EHX has made). My TS has pretty damn good rhythm sounds and ZZ top meets Tony Iommi leads, but I just need more sustain. Clarity, full bass, and no harshness are critical as my fender HRD amp can get pretty buzzy.

Any and all recommendations would be appreciated!
 
Re: At a loss with distortion pedals

There is another thread on compressors. Check it out. I would say to put a compressor in front of your tube screamer which would allow you to kick in more sustain for your leads without otherwise coloring the tone.
 
Re: At a loss with distortion pedals

Ummmm…..all kinds of problems here.

First of all, what guitar are you playing? Honestly, that would be my first stop for problem issues.

Second, we need to talk about your technique. What exactly are you doing, and how long do you need a note to sustain?

Then, Fender HRD.

Also, we should probably discuss the difference between an 808 clone and a Metal Muff….

Talk to us….I can take the amp and boxes you are talking about and get as much sustain as I'd ever need.
 
Re: At a loss with distortion pedals

I'd agree with Aceman and look closely at your guitar, then at technique.
Next, I'd look toward a compressor, although I don't really need one to get lots of sustain.
Are you using the 808 on the clean channel or 'drive' or 'more drive'? I have more success using the distortion pedals on the clean channels.
 
Re: At a loss with distortion pedals

Sorry for not being clearer. I play a PRS paul allender. My technique is above average for what most "jam with friends" guitarists do. I use gentle vibrato on each note and my pull off technique is pretty good. I play a huge variety of styles, but what I need this for is for hard rock soloing. I play a lot of dead and phish, but my dead soloing is fine with the tube screamer. Stuff with pull offs and hammerons galore is the stuff i need more sustain from. Like where you hammer on and pull off a note over and over again at max speed kind of thing. I'm always improving my technique as best I can, but the Rat seems to have the legato sustain I really want. The metal muff on low drive (below 12 o'clock) does the job but I can't seem to coax a good tone out of it with it's eq. I run into a dirty channel but the drive is very very low. I like that channel better just because the tone sort of tames the HRD brightness the best out of the 3 possibilities (clean, drive, more drive).

I run my tube screamer at full scream, medium volume because my mods made the output volume incredible. It seems to put out in volume at 9 oclock what most of my other pedals do at 3. Also I get my distortion for any songs that require it by running into that and turning vol. down for rhythm and up for soloing.

Please let me know if I can help clarify anything. I was looking into compressors but am pretty lost in that area because none of my friends, relatives or jam pals use one
 
Re: At a loss with distortion pedals

https://youtu.be/avUeS5SZHTU?t=572

This is the kind of sustain i'm talking about. He uses a 2 tube screamers into a ross compressor. I want to emulate that with as few pedals as possible. My 808 just doesn't cut the mustard, but if a compressor before or after the TS will help that'd be great because I love the tone, just not the sustain from the pedal. And I'm very confident it's a pedal side issue because I sound very smooth, legato and sustain-y on other distortion units, just with poor tone
 
Re: At a loss with distortion pedals

The two knob version has internal attack and clipping controls. It is a very transparent compressor. It maintains pick attack and the attack control determines how soon the compression kicks in. The sustain can be squashed down or run all the way up to infinite. If they are out of stock on the two knob, get a 4 knob. I also have one of these and tend to use it with my bass. The only difference in the pedals is that the 4 knob puts the attack and clipping controls on the outside.
 
Re: At a loss with distortion pedals

The video you posted certainly has very little to do with finger based technique, however in general overall:

1. Technique when playing legato lines is important as is ensuring the strings aren't buzzing/choking due to too low an action/poor setup or too high an action causing note cutoff. Hard finger pads and precision.
2. Volume and position for feedback... not talking about wildly shifting feedback... just being near enough to the volume necessary to get the feedback loop started helps massively. So move around to find the right position... turn up or move nearer to the cab and find the sweet spot.
3. It is the compression aspect of the signal that you seek with sustain rather than overdrive/distortion tone aspect. Obviously to a certain extent the two go hand in hand.. but getting compression is a matter of how hard the front of pedals/tubes are hit, how cranked the tubes are relative to their ability to continue offering headroom.

So hitting front end hard/cranking/compressor pedals are all the way to go regarding compression/clipping and feedback keeps it cyclic.

Cheers.
 
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Re: At a loss with distortion pedals

For Phish, part of the technique is that his guitars naturally feedback and sustain. The other part is the compressor and two tube screamers as you pointed out.
 
Re: At a loss with distortion pedals

So I'll look into the Kelley compressor. I'll probably end up selling my fuzz war and some other pedals to fund it. In terms of legato soloing, I'll try to upload a clip tonight to show you the differences I'm talking about. The tube screamer reacts incredibly hard to my dynamics. The rat just seems to take small notes that Don't get hit as hard as a picked note and bring them to volume. I think a compressor would help with that if I understand correctly
 
Re: At a loss with distortion pedals



All you'll ever need... :smokin:
 
Re: At a loss with distortion pedals

pretty much any overdrive pedal and an HRD should be enough to get you almost unlimited sustain at almost any volume.
Something along the way is not working properly.
You seem pretty confident in your technique so i guess its not that although working on picking softly and efficiently helps even the best players to sound more legato.
How old are your tubes?
 
Re: At a loss with distortion pedals

iamthesuck said:
https://youtu.be/avUeS5SZHTU?t=572

This is the kind of sustain i'm talking about. He uses a 2 tube screamers into a ross compressor. I want to emulate that with as few pedals as possible. My 808 just doesn't cut the mustard, but if a compressor before or after the TS will help that'd be great because I love the tone, just not the sustain from the pedal. And I'm very confident it's a pedal side issue because I sound very smooth, legato and sustain-y on other distortion units, just with poor tone
Click to expand...

Ain't he using something like a sustainer? besides the long sustain he gets some harmonics on every long note at some point, and I can see a minitoggle in his guitar that reminds me of those sustainers.

But the suggestion about using two pedals stacked is actually very good and I have tried that myself too, I used to use my PlimSoul to get the amp like tone and a Boss SD-1 infront to bosst the distortion for soloing. Just keep in mind staking pedals can be noisy too sometimes and you may want to get some kind of noise supressor depending on how bad it gets.
 
Re: At a loss with distortion pedals

Have you tried a ProCo Solo? Its a Rat on Steroids. I love the Rats, switched from a Metal Muff to the Rat and never played the Muff again. I do use a Fender Hot Rod Deluxe (heavily modded) and the Solo gets the best sustain out of my pedals.
 
Re: At a loss with distortion pedals

So when I went through and played around with my pedal layout and found putting my tube screamer after that cheapie AM 64 I got pretty good sustain without coloring the sound too much. I'll probably build a Ross clone here soon, but the tubes are as old as the amp although they haven't been played much. Less than 75 hours I'd guess. My uncle never played it because it was too loud. But that is worth checking out.

I don't think he used a sustainer, but I'll consider some other changes. I think the Ross clone is destined for my pedal board either way but I got a satisfactory sound for now!
 
Re: At a loss with distortion pedals

I hate to ask this but when was the last time you changed your strings?
 
Re: At a loss with distortion pedals

iamthesuck said:
So when I went through and played around with my pedal layout and found putting my tube screamer after that cheapie AM 64 I got pretty good sustain without coloring the sound too much. I'll probably build a Ross clone here soon, but the tubes are as old as the amp although they haven't been played much. Less than 75 hours I'd guess. My uncle never played it because it was too loud. But that is worth checking out.

I don't think he used a sustainer, but I'll consider some other changes. I think the Ross clone is destined for my pedal board either way but I got a satisfactory sound for now!
Click to expand...
Sometimes all it takes is a placement change for an effect.
 
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