If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

[Inkstained]

Have a line on a used Boss FBM-1 pedal for $70. I'm thinking about it.

I'm looking at it as an overdrive, most emphatically *not* as a magic box that will turn any amp in front of it into a late '50s tweed covered Fender 4 X 10. No pedal can do that.

But if I look at it as an overdrive, that means it's a COSM {shudder} overdrive.

Are there rules against that? Somewhere? Like here?

 

[Lazarus1140]

Re: If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

You can buy a digital overdrive without putting your soul at risk. I'm not so sure about the rules, though.

 

[P.A.Foholic]

Re: If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

You can buy a digital overdrive without putting your soul at risk. I'm not so sure about the rules, though.

That's sig-worthy material right there, sir! :laugh2:

 

[BrianS.]

Re: If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead

Boy, that's an easy one!

Yes.

 

[Aceman]

Re: If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

Here is the ONLY rule you will ever need: If it sounds good, it is good.

And here is the cool part - YOU decide if you think it sounds cool!

Too many people worry about tubes, boo-teekness, true-bypasses, sampling rates, and on and on and on. Use your ears. Everything else is BS.

I don't care if was made from tubes shaped like Angel nipples and is optically driven by the pure light God, or if it runs on chewing gum, duct tape, and spins on hamster power. If it is the sound I want/need/like - I'm down with it.

You are talking to a guy who owns A Diaz Tremodillo and a Catalinbread Supercharged Over Drive, as well as a Washburn Stack-In-A-Box and a and a Boss HM-2.

If iot rocks you, rock it!

And kudos for thinking outside the box. Don't ask "Does it emulate a Tweed Bassman?" Ask does it sound cool? I dig the Tweed model on my ROland Cube for a number of classic rock and blues stylings.

 

[Gearjoneser]

Re: If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

OD that runs through 1's and 0's usually sounds artificial, compared to tube/analog organic tone.

 

[ericmeyer4]

Re: If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

I would gladly sell you a Visual Sound Rt 808 overdrive to help save your soul.

 

[Aceman]

Re: If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

OD that runs through 1's and 0's usually sounds artificial, compared to tube/analog organic tone.

Thanks Joe. Way to have my back there...

 

[ratherdashing]

Re: If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

The only rule is "make good music."

How you go about that doesn't really matter.

 

[Gearjoneser]

Re: If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

Thanks Joe. Way to have my back there...

Oops. Did I go too far in the direction of TGWIF? :laugh2:

 

[Chickenwings]

Re: If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

Ill admit that ive never even plugged into one of these pedals, but there is one thing i wonder about them:

How many pros does anyone know that use one of these (bassman or deluxe) pedals?
Off the top of my head i can think of a few local working musicians who use real bassmans and deluxes as their amps. I know a heap of famous players who have used these amps too. Same goes for various overdrive pedals from boss sd-1s, to tubescreamers and other boutique setups. As far as modelling goes I can even think of a couple of working musos who use sansamp pedals and racks (all solid state but not digital) as drive units and for direct recording.

I cant think of a single player that i know, or have heard either live or on record who uses a COSM boss/fender modelling pedal.

Who knows? Maybe these COSM pedals are the beez knees. You'll have to let us know after comparing it with alternatives.

For cheap...its hard to go past a used boss sd-1 and perhaps a couple of your mods of choice to flavour it to taste.

 

[Van Noord]

Re: If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

Your soul no, your tone yes.

 

[guitfiddle]

Re: If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

Here is the ONLY rule you will ever need: If it sounds good, it is good.

QFT

 

[ErikH]

You'll burn in hell.

All kidding aside, who cares? Good tone is good tone regardless of whether it comes out of a tube amp or digital device.

 

[saladin]

Re: If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

I say go for it! I recently picked up the Boss Power Stack and it it definitely staying on my board. I'm gassing now for the Combo Drive and have been wondering about the tones of the FBM-1.

 

[MetalManiac]

Re: If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

I wouldn't. You can get a much betyter sounding analogue pedal for less than 40 bucks. Don't listen to that "Tone is Subjective" crap people are always trying to shove down your throat around here and everywhere else.Tone is about as sujective as hemmorhoids. Ya either got it or ya don't, and theres no mistaking it when you do.

 

[Diego]

Re: If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

If you like how it sounds, nobody can take that away from you.

However, chances are you could do better than that. Nothing's simpler than a analog OD box and there's plenty of reasonably priced options out there that have been tried for years.
Like someone already said, who's recorded with a digital dirt box?

Not to say they'll all sound bad because of that, but it adds some weight to the argument.

 

[guitarded]

Re: If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

For playing live.... doesn't matter too much.... Your signal has a long journey either way from pickups to people's ears. Recordings often bring out shortcomings of such devices but at the end of the day it is what your fingers do that determine if it rocks or not.

 

[zenmindbeginner]

Re: If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

Most of the posters in this thread seem to have a 1995 era knowledge of digital equipment.

The year is 2012 and digital technology has caught up to analog gear and is currently surpassing it.

I've said it before, but digital emulation technology is waaaay ahead of conventional solid state electronics at producing great tube tone.

Do you Luddites know what sampling is?

It's how they encode music digitally, like on a CD.

Have any of you technology wizards ever ripped an LP to your computer?
The computer takes samples of the LP and recreates the record through chaining those samples together. It recreates the sound quite accurately and the LP sounds exactly the same as it did in the computer as it did coming through the unconverted analog outputs you monitored it through. A perfect copy that maybe a dog could tell the analog from the digital but not a human because the sample rate and dynamic range falls within the range of human hearing.

BOSS makes great pedals and it's parent company Roland put a LOT of money, time and resources into developing it's COSM technology over the years. It is undeniably good.

Yes, tube amps respond in a certain way and solid state modeling just sort of scratched the surface and now digital modeling is picking up where they left off. To make an emulation appear as it's model is not difficult yet making an emulation behave like it's model is not so easy. Making digital emulators behave like tube amps is the next hurdle and will be accomplished in about 6 or 7 years.

I've got a lot of experience with COSM sounds over the last 15 years and they are REALLY good.

Get the pedal, they sound great.

 

[phil_104]

Re: If I buy a digital overdrive, is my soul dead?

I wouldn't. You can get a much betyter sounding analogue pedal for less than 40 bucks. Don't listen to that "Tone is Subjective" crap people are always trying to shove down your throat around here and everywhere else.Tone is about as sujective as hemmorhoids. Ya either got it or ya don't, and theres no mistaking it when you do.

See, this is exactly why you CAN get a digital pedal. No matter what you play, someone out there is going to think that you are approaching "tone" wrong.

I'll admit it took me a long time to realize it, but people need to stop wearing themselves as hats, and realize that at the end of the day, if you make good music, that's all that matters. The truth is that some random guy could have a 59 burst LP into a Dumble, playing leads in his band, and I'll still pay 10x the price of that admission to go see David Gilmour perform a few of his songs on a Walmart Hanna Montana acoustic guitar.

I've stopped reading to much into the technical or "on paper" side of things. Listen, I'm not just pushing for cheap gear here ; I am guilty of playing mostly Gibson guitars, nice pedals, amps, etc. But what I've learned through spending thousands on guitar stuff : you make the gear sound good, not the other way around.

PS. My first effects rig was a Boss ME-50 multi effects my parents got me from X-mas (I begged for it!) and it had COSM technology for overdrive and distortion. I played it through a Traynor combo, and then a Peavey Windsor. I was in a band, playing out twice a week in clubs. Often had compliments coming my way about my playing and songwriting after shows, and the only negative feedback I had ever gotten with that rig was from people on forums who had never heard me play. They said that setup was entry level, and would sound sterile, un-organic. It was good enough to get people to come out to shows.

Get it, rock it, repeat. Cheers.