Amp EQ setup/preset... pls help (Simple Plan/Hoobastank)

[stonely0]

Dear all im lost here twitching the knob on my amp and distortion pedal everywhere and not getting anywhere please help...

I've a 15watt amp with it's own HIGH/MID/LOW/GAIN knob so before i have a distortion pedal i use these built in for my distortion. The problem/burning question now is that i have a distortion pedal so what should i set the Amp's (Clean mode) HIGH/MID/LOW/GAIN setting?

- should i still use the amp's EQ to adjust my sound or use the EQ on my pedal to? (my amp is set to CLEAN when using my distortion pedal)

- should i use both?

- My pedal have the LEVEL/HIGH/LOW/SUSTAIN/DISTORTION so what does SUSTAIN do? it say on the manual that it control the length of the note to be longer but i feel the higher it is the more murky(dirty) the sound and it's like a low grinding not really nice. Lower sustain sound better.

- what's the recommended EQ setting on AMP when using distortion pedal? and what is the best distortion setting on the pedal? i'm looking at more on the sound of Rock/Power ballads like Simple Plans (Welcome to my life) Hoobastank (The Reason)

- also one more question. am i laying out the correct way for my pedal? Guitar>Compression/sustainer>Distortion>Noise Gate>Delay>amp

Pls advice thanks

 

[EugeneSmasher]

You should set the tone of your amplifier to a nice clean tone first, then adjust your pedal's settings to your liking. The amplifier is what actually makes the sound, so I find it more suitable to settle the amplifier's settings before the pedal's.

You can have both your amplifier and pedal on distortion, but if both are on heavier distortion tones, you're going to get a gruesome, fizzy, overly distorted tone that even a death metal guitarist won't use. It will sound horrible! My method is to set one (usually the amplifier) on a clean or very, very slight distortion tone, and set the other (the distortion pedal) on heavier distortion. I get the best tone doing this because from my experience, most small-wattage solid-state amplifiers with 6" or 8" speakers don't even have passable distortion tones.

You will not be able to get the exact same sound as Hoobastank or Simple Plan because you'll need the exact same guitar, exact same strings, exact same amplifiers and cabinets and exactly the same recording techniques. And professional musicians as well-known as they are also go through a whole room-full of rack equipment so you'll need lots of money to replicate their tone exactly.

My advice is to find a tone that you like. If you like the tone, and the tone sounds suitable to your ears for that style of music, then you're already there.

Hope this helps!

 

[stonely0]

My method is to set one (usually the amplifier) on a clean or very, very slight distortion tone, and set the other (the distortion pedal) on heavier distortion. I get the best tone doing this because from my experience, most small-wattage solid-state amplifiers with 6" or 8" speakers don't even have passable distortion tones.

You will not be able to get the exact same sound as Hoobastank or Simple Plan because you'll need the exact same guitar, exact same strings, exact same amplifiers and cabinets and exactly the same recording techniques. And professional musicians as well-known as they are also go through a whole room-full of rack equipment so you'll need lots of money to replicate their tone exactly.

My advice is to find a tone that you like. If you like the tone, and the tone sounds suitable to your ears for that style of music, then you're already there.

Hope this helps!

That's a good one i can try on my amp and pedal. Thnks. yup u r rite that its nearly impossible to chase the sound May i know your Bass,mid and treble setting on your amp? if it's ok

thnks

 

[EugeneSmasher]

On my personal amplifier: Gain 2, Bass 10, treble 5.

I play a lot of jazz improvisations these days so my settings are generally with more bass and the gain is as low as possible to get a clean tone, but with just enough dirt to give it power and tube amplifier quack. I might increase the treble for other genres though but usually I can use this clean tone for pretty much anything.

 

[guitarfan84]

Hi friend,

The majority of your tone will come from the amp itself so I will set the EQ on the amp first to the desired + volume and level of reverb.

Then set the EQ of the pedal to the desired tone. You might want a slightly trebly-er crunch tone than your clean sound so adjust the EQ. most importantly balance the volume so that the clean sound volume = distortion volume.

I'm just taking a guess, but the sustain function is probably similar to the compressor. When using the compressor with distortion, it might get slightly noisy and as you say murky thus adjust to the desired levels.

Recommended EQ setting for amp depends on the amp itself, for example, on my Fender i'll probably opt for a less trebly, warm tone so Ill put low at 3 o clock, mids at 4 and treble at 12 o clock or less. For an amp with less mids you might wanna turn it up and so on.

Crunchtones are a tricky subject but most people will recommend having the 'smiley face' EQ (full bass and treble, no mids) to get an awesome thrash tone but really you will just get drowned out when jamming with the other guys. Kerry King emphasises mids to get a heavy sound. For me personally, I adjust the bass just enough to get the heavy chunky bottom without sounding too muddy, enough mids to sound full without sounding like im playing thru a radio, and enough treble to the point where i cut through without sounding too sharp. These are just guidelines.

Different overdrive or distortion have different characteristics to them so there's no one universal rule for all pedals. For example, some pedals like my Digitech Tone driver will have more treble than say an OCD. The trick is to use your ears, and of course, get good gear.

For your last question, the usual recommended setting for pedals is as such:

Guitar

1) Wah/Phaser/Auto Wah
2) Compressor
3) Overdrive or Distortion
4) Modulations (e.g. Tremolo, Chorus, can be phaser as well)
5) Delay/Reverb
6) Noise Gate

Amplifier

Again, this is just a guideline and you may wish to experiment.

 

[stonely0]

Hi friend,

I'm just taking a guess, but the sustain function is probably similar to the compressor. When using the compressor with distortion, it might get slightly noisy and as you say murky thus adjust to the desired levels.

Recommended EQ setting for amp depends on the amp itself, for example, on my Fender i'll probably opt for a less trebly, warm tone so Ill put low at 3 o clock, mids at 4 and treble at 12 o clock or less. For an amp with less mids you might wanna turn it up and so on.

Crunchtones are a tricky subject but most people will recommend having the 'smiley face' EQ (full bass and treble, no mids) to get an awesome thrash tone but really you will just get drowned out when jamming with the other guys. Kerry King emphasises mids to get a heavy sound. For me personally, I adjust the bass just enough to get the heavy chunky bottom without sounding too muddy, enough mids to sound full without sounding like im playing thru a radio, and enough treble to the point where i cut through without sounding too sharp. These are just guidelines.

For your last question, the usual recommended setting for pedals is as such:

Guitar

1) Wah/Phaser/Auto Wah
2) Compressor
3) Overdrive or Distortion
4) Modulations (e.g. Tremolo, Chorus, can be phaser as well)
5) Delay/Reverb
6) Noise Gate

Amplifier

Again, this is just a guideline and you may wish to experiment.

Thanks Guitarfan84. So do i still turn on the Distortion mode switch on my amp as suggested by EugeneSmasher? the thing is that my amp have 2 mode, the clean mode and the Distortion mode and at any one time only one mode can be activated.

Also placing the noise gate at the end of the chain wouldn't it cut off some tone from the Delay/Reverb pedal? i turn my Noise Gate pedal on all the time to remove some background white noise. From my limited understanding is that the sound from the Amp to the compressor is to be the sound that we should finally wanted for a Clean mode and then from there the 'Clean' sound will pass through Distortion/Overdrive/modulation (e.g. Tremolo, Chorus, can be phaser as well) and that will be the sound we wanted from the many efx pedals out there and from there to the noise gate to remove any unwanted sound (if any) before going to the Delay/Reverb as the Delay/Rever is to be use to enhance the final sound after the Noise gate.

Am i right? or is it the other way round?

 

[guitarfan84]

Hmm I would actually do it differently from Eugene. From what I understand (from my limited knowledge)...

The basic dirty rhythm sounds should come from the amp itself. So it would be set as chunky to your preference.

Then to get a singing lead sound, kick in the overdrive. Ideally overdrive should have minimal gain and enough volume, like Eugene says if amp + pedal has lots of gain, then you will get a horrible tone.

Ill just add a disclaimer that I don't actually use this method, it's methods that guys like Glenn Tipton or SRV have used. I prefer to get an all round solid tone using the amp eq, then boost using either a clean boost or an EQ when I need to.

It appears that your amp is two channel, but does not have a footswitch. In this case, what I would do is purely use the clean channel and use a pedal for distortion. This is of course out of convenience, cos you don't always wanna be near your amp just to switch it between channels (i'm guessing your channel switch is on the amp itself.)

I have a lack of experience with noise gates, but I know that a noise gate should only cut off the background noise and not the delay and reverb effects. However, I could be wrong and you might wanna try it out with your fx? Doesn't hurt to switch round.

Last thing, about compressors, read up and ask how other players use them. I myself am still learning but I find compression best for nice, even clean tones and not for the heavy stuff. For some music that requires a lot of nuances, you might not even use the compressor as it makes the volume even throughout the song.