Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

[dsguitar1]

So using a Jcm800 2203zw 100w with 6550 power tubes.

I want to back the pre-amp gain off and use the amp fairly clean and try using stomp boxes to give me some other tones, is there any good crunch/distortion pedals that will do that crunchy marshall sound? then I can ad in my overdrive on top for screaming leads.

At the moment when I use the 2203 I use the pre-amp up to 10 and roll back the guitar volume to clean it up but just fancy playing around with new tones, Also given the fact I use vintage output pups and there 6550 tubes things don't get that crunchy unless the power tubes are almost flat out wich is stupid loud, and power breaks and hotplates etc don't do it for me.

I've got a Jcm2000dsl which can obviously do clean channel and dirty channel but the overall tone of the jcm2000 is a lot thinner and compressed compared to the jcm800.

 

[Little Pigbacon]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

I used to have and enjoy a Radial Hot British ToneBone.

Now I have a Carl Martin PlexiTone, which I think is better.

And the Fulltone OCD, which is fantastic at getting AC/DC tones and anything in that range.

But there are a lot of good pedals out there for what you want; the others will tell you about some of them.

 

[mwalluk]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

MI crunchbox

 

[YeRedHouseOverYonder]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

I got another vote for the Plexitone, particularly the bulky one. No pedal is perfect (it does have some quirks), but the Plexitone gets you damn close to that "marshall crunch" that brings a smile to your face.

 

[dsguitar1]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

cool I will have a look at youtube, any opinions on the mxr custom badass 78 distortion or the Joyo hot plexi? the joyo is very cheap but I guess that doesn't mean it will be crap.

 

[Mincer]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

i'd check out our own Dirty Deed which does the hot rod Marshall thing very well.

 

[Darg1911]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

Catalinbread Dirty Little Secret may well be worth checking out. J Rockett Animal Overdrive too for cranked plexi.

I cant get cranked Marshall tone in the bedroom but I can get satisfying enough Marshall tone playing with the MV and volume controls so personally, I'm not big on a Marshall pedal into a Marshall. But that's just me.

 

[Kamanda~SD]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

Great pedal for Marshall Crunch when you have 2 Marshalls...

You're doing it wrong. OR you have amps that are way too overpowered for your needs.

 

[IMENATOR]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

I have not tried this but the AMT M1 or M2 are preamps in pedal format that connected to FX return (power section of your amp) are very well rated in reviewes.

 

[JeffB]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

Can't beat the Bogner Blue. It's an actual plexi style preamp, and not a simulation/model/imitation of a cranked plexi.

It reacts like an amp, and you can run it is front or plug it into your power amp section of your amp.

 

[BloodRose]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

Wasnt the BOx of rock "the" Marshall tone pedal to own a few years back?

 

[JimmyO]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

i'd check out our own Dirty Deed which does the hot rod Marshall thing very well.

I second the Dirty Deeds recommendation. It knocked a wampler pinnacle off my board. It's an all around great distortion pedal that sounds great from lighter Cream style leads through to heavy rock and metal. When I run it straight into a clean Mesa lone star the other band members comment on how well defined the tone is, and it sits in the mix great. The pinnacle was more compressed in a band situation.

 

[JeffB]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

Wasnt the BOx of rock "the" Marshall tone pedal to own a few years back?

It and the Distortron from Zvex, are very good. Ill also nominate Niels' Plexitone (Carl Martin)

 

[Archer250]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

I use a pedal that's based on the crunchbox circuit. I suggest you start there... oh, mine has a presence knob, though. Might change the tone.

 

[Chickenwings]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

i dunno but for some reason i reckon the humble sd-1 sounds as good as anything else out there for crunch into powerful master volume marshalls. It just feels squishy, bad mannered, organic and fun to play. The pedal with its trimmed off low end just seems to work really well in that configuration.
The other one that is really cool for a long sustaining, loose singing lead sound is a rat.
Both are pretty classic and rewarding tones.
I prefer el34s in a marshall tho. You might want to experiment with that as an option too. They are a bit more unruly and a little more mid focused. Pretty fun. Very rock and roll.

 

[TwilightOdyssey]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

i dunno but for some reason i reckon the humble sd-1 sounds as good as anything else out there for crunch into powerful master volume marshalls. It just feels squishy, bad mannered, organic and fun to play. The pedal with its trimmed off low end just seems to work really well in that configuration.
The other one that is really cool for a long sustaining, loose singing lead sound is a rat.
Both are pretty classic and rewarding tones.
I prefer el34s in a marshall tho. You might want to experiment with that as an option too. They are a bit more unruly and a little more mid focused. Pretty fun. Very rock and roll.

I agree with everything here. ^

I would start with EL34 or 6CA7 (if you want more low freq push), crank the volume all the way up, run the EQ all the way up, and then dial in the gain to taste. If you feel the amp needs more push than that ... I would be far more inclined to use a humble boost pedal, like the z.vex SHO.

 

[Archer250]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

i dunno but for some reason i reckon the humble sd-1 sounds as good as anything else out there for crunch into powerful master volume marshalls. It just feels squishy, bad mannered, organic and fun to play. The pedal with its trimmed off low end just seems to work really well in that configuration.
The other one that is really cool for a long sustaining, loose singing lead sound is a rat.
Both are pretty classic and rewarding tones.
I prefer el34s in a marshall tho. You might want to experiment with that as an option too. They are a bit more unruly and a little more mid focused. Pretty fun. Very rock and roll.

SD-1 is a great pedal for both standalone usage AND boosting

 

[regan]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

You need to get the power amp working, it's the only genuine way to get that fat crunch. Id consider a lower wattage amp.
Or take your amp to a tech ask him to mod it to run on 2 6550's and fit a triode/pentode switch, it's a quite simple mod that uses few parts so shouldn't be as expensive as it sounds probably as much as a couple of OD pedals

 

[Aceman]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

Dirty Little Secret, Crunchbox, I'll throw out the recent Boss Powerstack actually….

 

[Lucy Diamond]

Re: Whats a great pedal for that marshall crunch?

The Catalinbread Dirty Little Secret is specifically designed for what you want.


EDIT: Oh ****...See...Aceman already beat me to it. But yeah...Dirty Little Secret all day long.