Need something for solos on a solid state

[loversmoon]

I play through a Randall solid state and it takes pedals pretty well. I'm looking for something to kinda push my amp a little more during solos. I'm in a cover band and for the most part going from my green channel to red can boost it enough but a couple of songs it needs just a bit more. Any suggestions? Things I need more boost for are tunes like still of the night from halestorm and a couple pretty reckless tunes. That sorta stuff

 

[devastone]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

An SD-1 or TS type pedal should do it, the Randall is a FET preamp and it should respond similar to tubes being pushed. To push the dirty channel just set the drive on the pedal low and goose the output, just be aware that setting the pedal like that will give you more gain and compression and a littel volume boost on the dirty channel, but it will give you a big volume boost on the clean channel.

 

[loversmoon]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

thanks deva....I took a pic for you back in the fall and completely forgot to send it to you. so here ya go...better late than never.

 

[Securb]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

The Triskelion 2.0 Harmonic Energizer will make your solos cut through the mix on any solo with any amp. I hit mine on every lead. It gives you cutting tone and thick sustain. The nice thing is you can dial it to your tastes. Add a bit of treble or bass, add some dirt if you would like. The pedal is an absolute monster.

http://www.godlyke.com/totally-wyck.../hand-built/triskelion-2-0-harmonic-energizer

 

[eclecticsynergy]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

Triskelion demo really nails that midrangey resonant Zappa solo tone, nasal but not pinched. Nice.
But will they take payment in quatloos?

 

[loversmoon]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

Yeah that's outta my price range regardless of how nice

 

[Securb]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

Yeah that's outta my price range regardless of how nice

Then I would suggest an EQ

 

[loversmoon]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

Actually thinking about a tubescreamer

 

[devastone]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

Let us know what works out for you! And yes, an EQ is another good idea for a solo boost, kinda depends on what you are looking for.

Thanks for the pics! I miss the fall colors, the "colors" here in Colorado are pretty much Poplar yellow, it was funny when I first moved here and people talked about the "fall colors" in the mountains. I'm still looking for jobs back there in TN/NC/VA within a couple hours drive of Kingsport where my family is. Sweet looking pup too!

But, that is another topic, good luck on your boost search!

 

[jeremy]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

people use tube screamer type pedals as boosts all the time. try one out and see what ya think. if you have guitar playing friends, chances are one of them has a ts you can borrow

 

[loversmoon]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

i do but none are close to me location wise so its largely trial and error for me. which kinda sucks.. anyone out there got one they wanna loan me and ill ship it back to them? lol. oddly enough Indy sg has done that for me before. Now thats a great Forum friend.

 

[Securb]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

i do but none are close to me location wise so its largely trial and error for me. which kinda sucks.. anyone out there got one they wanna loan me and ill ship it back to them? lol. oddly enough Indy sg has done that for me before. Now thats a great Forum friend.

Try Pedal Genie $19 a month and you can try as many pedals as you would like.

https://www.pedalgenie.com

 

[Dave Locher]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

Oooh, ooh, ooh, call on me! I know the answer to this question!!

I just went through something like 15 different overdrive and clean boost pedals in the past year looking for something "better" than the DOD EQ I've been using since the late 1980s into my RG100ES, and I ended up with three viable options that work to boost the gain in the red channel:
1) the DOD FX40 eq pedal with a tiny cut in the lows and highs and a tiny boost in the mids (gives great sustain)
2) a Tube Screamer-type pedal that I modded to keep more of the low end signal, and
3) a Tech21 Boost DLA.
Out of the two dozen pedals I tried, all three of these give the same singing sustain in my Randall SS amp. HOWEVER, if you have the gain pegged in the red channel no pedal will give you a volume boost. It just gets more saturated. The green channel, however, can be boosted quite a bit in volume. So if, like me, you like the red channel sound but just want a bit more gain/sustain, then an eq pedal is the cheapest and easiest way to do it because you have total control over what frequencies get cut or boosted. You can fatten it up OR "cut through the mix" to your heart's content and change your mind at any time by just pushing a couple faders up or down a quarter inch.
A tube screamer-type pedal CAN work, but it might suck. I tried three different ones and they sounded wildly different in my amp. Two sounded thin and nasally as heck.
And, if you're patient an haunt eBay like me, you can get a Boost DLA pedal which gives you boost and delay in one pedal with a volume control and a tone control for the delay echoes. But they are pricey new and kind of big and clunky as well. I ended up getting a nice used one for something like $60 but it took a couple weeks of searching before I found one for less than about $90.

The nice thing about the Tech21 is I can use it as just a boost OR add the delay. The nice thing about the overdrive is if I'm in the mood I can push it into crazy-gain/fuzz territory. The nice thing about the eq is it just works and it's infinitely tunable. If I had to keep just one it would be the eq pedal.

If, on the other hand, you want to go crazy with the green channel then a simple EHX LPB-1 will do wonders. But it's too noisy for the red channel in my opinion. The eq pedal will also shove the green channel into heavy territory.

 

[Mincer]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

The Pickup Booster will do it. And it doesn't add any color of its own.

 

[loversmoon]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

Oooh, ooh, ooh, call on me! I know the answer to this question!!

I just went through something like 15 different overdrive and clean boost pedals in the past year looking for something "better" than the DOD EQ I've been using since the late 1980s into my RG100ES, and I ended up with three viable options that work to boost the gain in the red channel:
1) the DOD FX40 eq pedal with a tiny cut in the lows and highs and a tiny boost in the mids (gives great sustain)
2) a Tube Screamer-type pedal that I modded to keep more of the low end signal, and
3) a Tech21 Boost DLA.
Out of the two dozen pedals I tried, all three of these give the same singing sustain in my Randall SS amp. HOWEVER, if you have the gain pegged in the red channel no pedal will give you a volume boost. It just gets more saturated. The green channel, however, can be boosted quite a bit in volume. So if, like me, you like the red channel sound but just want a bit more gain/sustain, then an eq pedal is the cheapest and easiest way to do it because you have total control over what frequencies get cut or boosted. You can fatten it up OR "cut through the mix" to your heart's content and change your mind at any time by just pushing a couple faders up or down a quarter inch.
A tube screamer-type pedal CAN work, but it might suck. I tried three different ones and they sounded wildly different in my amp. Two sounded thin and nasally as heck.
And, if you're patient an haunt eBay like me, you can get a Boost DLA pedal which gives you boost and delay in one pedal with a volume control and a tone control for the delay echoes. But they are pricey new and kind of big and clunky as well. I ended up getting a nice used one for something like $60 but it took a couple weeks of searching before I found one for less than about $90.

The nice thing about the Tech21 is I can use it as just a boost OR add the delay. The nice thing about the overdrive is if I'm in the mood I can push it into crazy-gain/fuzz territory. The nice thing about the eq is it just works and it's infinitely tunable. If I had to keep just one it would be the eq pedal.

If, on the other hand, you want to go crazy with the green channel then a simple EHX LPB-1 will do wonders. But it's too noisy for the red channel in my opinion. The eq pedal will also shove the green channel into heavy territory.

thanks for the input. i know i dont like ehx pedals much because they tend to add alot of unwanted noise. ill look into the eq pedal. Ive been curious about the tech 21 stuff for a long time but ive never actually tried one yet.

 

[loversmoon]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

The Pickup Booster will do it. And it doesn't add any color of its own.

this has my attention for sure.

 

[Dave Locher]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

I did not try the Pickup Booster, but it would probably do the same thing as the LPB-1 but maybe without all the noise. I did try two other clean boosts (3 total). Did not quite match the eq pedal. They both emphasized pick noise too much.

Personally, I'd say try the pickup booster and an eq pedal and keep whichever one you like better.

The only advantage of the Tech21 is that it has the delay going on. The boost itself sounds 99% exactly the same as my EQ pedal the way I use it. Really nice sustain. I run the delay with one slapback repeat, tone all the way down (which makes the repeat more like a dull echo rather than a doubling), and the balance way down so the repeat is not quite as loud as the original signal. As far as I can tell, all the "Boost ___" Tech 21 pedals have the same boost circuit; I tried their Boost RVB first and the boost was just what I wanted but the reverb did NOT work in front of a gainy amp so I sold it and got the delay. I assume all their others (Boost Comp, Boost overdrive, etc.) would have that exact same boost circuit. It works really well for my guitar/amp/style.

Oh yeah, I forgot I also tried 3 or 4 different compressors. Did not work as well as the rest, although one (the Moen Ulite or Uni-lite Comp with a bypassable tone circuit) has a TON of boost available and I probably would have kept it if I didn't have the other pedals first.

 

[Demanic]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

Keeley Katana. Either clean boost or top boost. I bet that the top boost function would sound the best. And the sucker is LOUD if you want it to be.

Sent from my MotoE2(4G-LTE) using Tapatalk

 

[frostopsy]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

Maybe try out an EQ-pedal. For the solos, you can crank up the mids and the lows to punch through the mix. It's an alternative to getting a boost pedal which might over drive the amp rather than make it louder.

 

[loversmoon]

Re: Need something for solos on a solid state

I appreciate all the input. I've been checking out vids and this isn't helping my pedal fetish at all lmao. Now I want a Kalamazoo pedal too. Completely different than what I was looking for. Lol. I'll check into the katana. I've always been interested in keeley.