Distortion Pedal Recommendations

[dougeds]

i play mostly single coil guitars (strat and tele) through a blackface fender super. i use a modded ts9 for blues and mild overdrive, but i need a good distortion for some tunes. nothing too heavy - mostly a classic rock type sound. i'm looking for something smooth, creamy and that has a transparent type of sound. nothing that completely changes the sound of my guitar/amp combination too much. i've tried my old RAT, Boss pedals, Radial Classic, but didn't quite like any of them. Can anyone point me in the right direction? Thanks.

[dave s]

You're lucky you play an amp that sounds good with just about anything. Here are a few choices that'll get you to the next level of gain/dist:

Fulltone OCD - works well with Fender type amps

MI Audio Crunch Box - Marshall stack in a small pedal

Keeley or Analogman modded Boss DS-1 (orange pedal) These sound really good with just about ANY tube amp.

None of the pedals will break the bank either. Around $100 used, give or take a few dollars either way.

Good luck and let us know.

dave

[Funky Monkey]

Box of Rock!

[Aruntang]

I really like the Xotic BB preamp. Check out the Xotic Pedals website and listen to the clips Allen Hinds part II and Scott Henderson clips Part II to get an idea of what the pedal can do. If you can try one even better.

http://www.prosoundcommunications.co...ts/lineup.html

http://www.prosoundcommunications.co...deo/index.html

I would try stacking that TS with a Timmy/Tim. You can get some heavier distortion sounds without losing your amp/guitar tone.
Thats what I'm doing these days. After having gone thru dedicated "distortion" boxes. I never could get them to sound quite right.

Bob

[musickbox]

MI audio tube zone. It is a better choice than the crunchbox since you want smooth sound. I would also check out Big muff style pedals. Skreddy makes some good ones. I am surprised that you didn't like the Rat. I would also check out pedals that are more overdrive than distortion. A good example is a Barber DD or a Skreddy screwdriver. There's a bunch. I would do some search on past threads.

[markom89]

+1 on the BoR...best thing for what you described. My favourtie distortion box at this time.

[Hamer95USA]

Hey dougeds,

I might recommend the following:

Analogman DS-1 Super mod: I used an early MIJ stock DS-1 for the mod. Great sounding pedal.

MI Audio Crunch Box: I'm waiting for mine to arrive this week.

Xotic BB preamp:Good tranparent sound, great EQ. I felt it was lacking in its thickness and some mids. Great pedal for some folks, but it didn't last long in my distortion pedal collection. Traded it for a Visual Sound H2O.

Keeley Rat 3 way switch mod: Takes a stock Rat, improves the tone & distortion of the Rat. I've played my friend's Rat and was impressed with the improvement it made on the sound of the pedal.

What Boss pedals & Radial Engineering pedal did you try out?

Guitar George

Guitar George

[DejavuDave]

+1 on the Xotic BB.

[therhodeo]

Barber Direct Drive.

Supposed to be amazing through fender amps.

[braxton906]

I was pretty impressed by the new TC Electronic vintage distortion pedal; in fact, the entire "vintage" series that they recently came out with are all pretty remarkable sounding. I actually ended up buying the delay pedal within that series but like I said, was pretty taken by the distortion pedal. They have another one called "dual distortion" which is identical to that one but has an extra channel for the extra kick...

[Glowing Tubes]

Originally Posted by Big Bob

I would try stacking that TS with a Timmy/Tim. You can get some heavier distortion sounds without losing your amp/guitar tone.
Thats what I'm doing these days. After having gone thru dedicated "distortion" boxes. I never could get them to sound quite right.

Bob

+1
the Timmy replaced my TS actually but they stack very well together.

I play mostly single coil stuff too.