Built in dirt or seperate pedal?

LPMojoGL

Music Room Superstar
Silver Supporting Member
Messages
9,837
After having many different amps and pedals, I prefer built in.
The best distortion pedals I've tried, Carl Martin Plexitone and Wampler Pinnacle, are really close, but don't have the same feel as built in distortion.
I wouldn't hesitate to recommend either pedal for someone wanting rocking tones through clean-ish amp, though. They are awesome.
 
Messages
18,230
both
I have a few master control/dual channel amps (classic 30, HRDX, Vox ad30vt) and I like the amps crunch AND dirt pedals :)
 

tele_jas

Member
Messages
4,590
I like amp dirt and pedal dirt .

Me too....But let me elaborate a bit.

For overdrive and heavy overdrive, I like pedals better...... For moderate and heavy distortion, I like the amp to give it to me.. but that depends on the amp too. For as little as I use distortion now-a-days, I'm good using/stacking pedals to get me there. Now 5 years ago I would have been the exact opposite, but I played distortion 85% of the time (80s cover band), now I'm clean or slightly overdriven 85% of the time.

To be honest, I can cover most of what I play with any clean amp and a Tubescreamer.
 

UncleLarry

Member
Messages
2,246
I've flipped back and forth through the years and now I actually use both. Love my Mesa's gain channel for heavy stuff and use a Timmy into the clean channel for low gain crunch. Tube amp higher gain tones clean up much better than most distortion pedals do when you roll off the guitar volume. Lots of tone colors can be had that way.
 

MickyZ

Member
Messages
401
For me, playing classic rock: amp OD and an Alex's attenuator = sonic nirvana.
 

gtrs

Silver Supporting Member
Messages
3,086
Dirt needs to come from the amp for me.
Then I push the front end with clean boosts mostly.
KoT, Sunlion, RC Boost and I'd like to add a Tim, Kalamazoo and Sex Drive.
 

jlagrassa

Silver Supporting Member
Messages
6,508
I prefer pedals into a clean amp, you can change your tones or the voicing a lot easier with the right pedals.
 

rockonomics

Member
Messages
516
Two ways to look at it. If you only need one OD sound and your amp has it, you're set. But what happens if/when you want something different? If you only have your amp's OD you're a bit limited. Pedals are fairly cheap by comparison. Get a good clean amp and add some pedals. When you get tired of one pedal, get another.
 

Figaro

Silver Supporting Member
Messages
14,005
If you have a good, versatile amp (like a RedPlate!) a pedal is not needed.
 

CharAznable

Silver Supporting Member
Messages
17,778
I use both for reasons of variety and practicality.

But when I kick in amp gain, there's no contest. It's just better.
 

schrom81

Member
Messages
400
I like pedals because I grow tired of distorted tones after a while. It is a lot cheaper to buy a new dirt pedal then to replace a amp.
 

timmy2tone

Member
Messages
819
I haven't played through every available combination of guitars and amps, but based on what I've owned in the past, I just get a better tone with pedals (or cascading pedals) into a clean tube amp! That's just me! LOL :)
 



Trending Topics

Top Bottom