Anyone purposefully "muck up" their tone w/ digital?

[CID Vicious]

The cheap gear cascade keeps on pouring 

My guitar tech buddy kicked this Yamaha FX500 down to me yesterday...fitting an odd bill.

I used to be an analog/tube tone dick. Back in the 90's almost anything doing digital distortion sucked, sucks less now...my Tech 21 has had my emulator needs covered for a decade, so I don't know how good a lot of the newer stuff really is, but it's all better than say the O.G. Pod.

Anyway, back to the "bad old shit"...

Even in my wannabe cork sniffer days I liked abrasive industrial bands and thought Type O Negative was something of a middle ground. And without trying to cop their tone or gear exactly, figured an older less hifi digital multi would be great for "texture" parts as a contrast to the big Gibson/Marshall main tone.

Brought the idea back up over the years...bit of a vagabond, so my rig has been sold off and rebuilt a bunch. Had a DOD Digital Turbo Distortion that sounded a bit like some bits on older Voivod stuff. Yamaha Magic Stomp v1, was cool to dick arround with but shitty to use live unless it's just one or two sounds. Eventually it died, I ended up in the Seeds and in a bid to get a little 'boost' from the brief association was actually trying to tone down the ridiculousness so Sabrina would listen to my stuff...and had to rebuild my rig, so "specialty" sounds took a back seat.

I have decided on either a Line 6 M9 or M13 is going to replace all of my non-gain effects, better than all four "4 series" pedals IMO...but that's the new school "can't believe it's not butter" stuff.

Good thing it's freeing up some board room, since from what I'm reading and hearing on YouTube this is a keeeper. LS2 looper was in the works anyway...not huge into shoegaze, but it's hard to ignore the really "iconic" gear, & this is the Slowdive rack.

I'm kinda interested in mucking about with all the crappy distortion presets though. I'm thinking they could be useful in a "Smokey Amp" kinda way, tinny lofi stuff. Sucks the mojo outta your rig pn purpose kinda thing, just for light and shade.

Thoughts? Anyone else do this occasionally? I'll tell ya, a DOD DTD will suck all that toobiness right out of a rig if ya want it to :-) Ya won't complain as much about the late model distortion emulators you use, either...

[giantchris]

For my new solo album I'm doing I've been using all Line 6 Podfarm 2.5 and Tech 21 Leeds/Oxford with pedals and it sounds great.  I actually really like the Line 6 Soldano modeling for high gain, once you double track it it sounds really huge.  To be honest with you the Line 6 stuff does sound great IF you sit there and tweak it the presets are pretty terrible.  I think you'll be pretty happy with an m9 or m13 but I'd just get the new Pod HD500X, it's like $100 more and you get a ton more stuff with it.  I really like the ability to record and practice at "full volume" silently. 

[CID Vicious]

My rig just for clarification:

Melody Maker w/ SH5/Epi SG > modtone fuzz > modded Crybaby > T Rex Sustainer > TS Clone > Rat clone > Tech 21 Tri A.C. > Line 6 & Yamaha > TU2.

The Laney acts mostly as a power section for this uber flexible setup. All gain effects and amp models are analog. The Line 6 might just cover the Yamaha's sounds, the Verbzilla's soynds are all in there. If not I'll work the Yamaha onto my bass case sized board.


The non gain effects are still quite useable on the FX500, it's t he predecessor to the Magicstomp line. In the shoegaze scene it's pretty legendary, guys with old Jags and fuzz pedals older than they are, patching 80's rack gear in.

The Pod looks ok but I'd never choose the amp models it has over what the Tech 21 offers. The M13 IMO is the Poor Man's Bradshaw. Add two expression pedals assignable to almost any parameter. Route the effects pre or post gain etc. It's the ultimate crack pipe for guys like me who love running big effects chains and going off the deep end.

Kicked a SynthWah, DigiDelay, & Line 6 Tonecore with Space Chorus Liqua Flange & Rotomachine modules to the curb in favor of it. Less of a mess and any new stuff would have to prove itself un ballparkable by the MX, which for my budget isn't likely.

The Yamaha's distortion sounds may be cool in their own context, the EQ section is powerful. However if the MX can cop the sounds I'll just keep it for studio sauce.

So yeah I'm no corksniffer anymore ;-). The XX4 pedals were always goid enough I just never had the dough and etc. The M9 is all four plus more sounds and is like $50 more than a new DL4. The M13 though is what I'm shooting for even used though. Deep well to jump into :-)

[RacerX]

eh, "corksniffer" is a poor analog(y) IMO.

Wine aficianados don't just read the label & know the vintage; they sniff the cork, sniff the wine in the glass, & sample a small taste in their mouths, engaging in the whole exprerience.

True tone junkies don't just read the label, either—it's about the ear, too. Anyone who excludes digital simply because it's digital is a "label reader," not an aficionado.

So basically, you admit to being a corksniffer.

No big deal; so am I.

[CID Vicious]

eh, "corksniffer" is a poor analog(y) IMO.

Wine aficianados don't just read the label & know the vintage; they sniff the cork, sniff the wine in the glass, & sample a small taste in their mouths, engaging in the whole exprerience.

True tone junkies don't just read the label, either—it's about the ear, too. Anyone who excludes digital simply because it's digital is a "label reader," not an aficionado.

So basically, you admit to being a corksniffer.

No big deal; so am I.

Well thank you...I suppose "ignorantly biased" would be better in terms of folk who hear with their eyes.

I always shoot for the sweet spot...have to. My car was $950 to give ya a clue of my budgetary constraints. My JCM900 Dual Gain was panned by tube purists, the HB103s in my MIC G400, hell my "hot Asian bitch" gets mud from the Gibson AND Seymour crowds.ETC...

Simlarly in cars you often see this - American car guys are biased against Euro and Asian makes, Euro dudes Mercan Iron and "Jap Crap", Etc. The current Camaro is "too big to handle" yet the ZL1 posted a nearly identical time as a Ford GT at the Nurburgring, & Randy Pobst calls the Z/28 "perfect".

My opinions come from loads of research and a decent amount of hands-on experience via teching for bands and doing my projects. Dispelling the myths is crucial to my own development - I can't simply buy all top shelf gear, any single Analogman pedal goes for what an M9 goes for, & sorry, ya can't convince me one pedal with nuances that will *instantly* be lost in a mix is a better investment than 500+ effects modeled to a high degree of modern competancy.

No one could tell in the audience you were playing Line 6 back in the day, & it's waaaaay better now.

As far as the FX500, different era...but I think just like say a P90 you take the bad with the good if it's a flavor you like.

To put it a different way, I'm asking if anyone uses "bad" "cheap sounding" old digital type distortion for cpntrsst with a rather tubey/warm/"vintage" esque setup. In the way some folks use a boost pefal turned down to clean a single channel head up, rather than using it more typically for more distortion. Instead of using the tubes to warm up the Digital, using the Digital distortion to take the big tube amp sound into a completely different sonic context.

As far as "corksniffers" go, the offset guitar shoegazer types are really the last type you'd expect to fawn over an old 80's rack with a few presets that instantly make your guitar sound "beer commercial ready"...yet they are.

I dunno though it's actually really common, so many say Lace Sensors and EMGs have no "soul" & I'm like....Gilmour, Clapton, Beck, anyone?

[Submarine]

I just picked up the Caroline Kilobyte delay pedal.  Its 8bit digital with a lot of character.  It works better on clean to medium overdrive sounds though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVGgVtZFiWY

[CID Vicious]

That's a pretty cool idea. They should do an "H20" style delay/chorus, but 8 bit.

I think there's some digital "cruncher" pedals out there that are "horrible" sounding in a cool way.

Turns out,

A) FX500 not powering on even with GC's pedal kiosk power supply, &

B) After getting the Line 6 M13...good thing it replaces heaps of pedals, because there's NO roo m on the board now! No *way* I can integrate this into the rig now, & frankly...meh, the M13 likely does what it does better & easier anyway.


BUT...continue the conversation anyway. Lo Fi glichy digital stuff that's anything but "Vintage©" but cool anyway. A little industrial DMT in the Stoner bong if you will...