Bare Knuckle Pickups Forum
Forum Ringside => Guitars, Amps and Effects => Topic started by: schenr on May 17, 2010, 04:55:34 AM
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Hey guys I've been doing a lot of pondering and have decided to sell my boss mt2 (metal zone) and buy a hardwire metal distortion. I guess the mt2 just doesn't cut it for me, and the hardwire gets good reviews and the demos sound good (I know that's notthe best indication of how it sounds).
Any comments on the hardwire?
Also, has anyone tried the biyang metal end king? It's about $100 aus on eBay and it seems to be good but there's not much info on it.
Cheers
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Not much help really but I've got the hardwire Reverb pedal and it is great. I've tried their overdrive pedal and really liked that too. They are a really good range of pedals, very solid.
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Get a decent tube amp and boost it with a Tube Screamer/Clean boost/Treble boost. Metal guys love the Maxon OD808.
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The Hardwire Metal pedal does seem to cover all metal bases from what I've heard. Here's how it sounds... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGwc0MY3lM8
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Maybe an Emma Electronics "PisdiYAUwot" pedal could suit you.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Awo1dFERMQY&feature=related
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Get a decent tube amp and boost it with a Tube Screamer/Clean boost/Treble boost. Metal guys love the Maxon OD808.
I did this after having used distortion pedals/effects for metal for years. I'm so much happier with the sound now that the only things between my strings and the speakers are: BKPs, van damme cables, Bodenhamer bloody murder (tube screamer type), Peavey 5150-II and ISP decimator prorackG (noise gate-type).
Keep it simple, and the sound is just so much NICER! I get a fat, beefy tone with more gain than even I need and a low noise floor.
There's something so grating to me now when I hear guitarists using cheap 'metal' distortion effects rather than the gain stages of a high gain amp.
Maybe I'm just a snob now :(
Roo
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Not much help really but I've got the hardwire Reverb pedal and it is great. I've tried their overdrive pedal and really liked that too. They are a really good range of pedals, very solid.
Yeah I've owned the hardwire valve distortion which was very impressive (which is why I'm leaning towards the metal distortion), but I have the MI audio tubezone and crunchbox which I can get the same and more sounds out of.
Get a decent tube amp and boost it with a Tube Screamer/Clean boost/Treble boost. Metal guys love the Maxon OD808.
I bought myself a new fender hotrod deluxe (wine red version) just last year, so I'd be very reluctant to get another one (not saying I wouldnt love to get something better tho). And I'm using the pedals through the clean channel (the distortion is pretty cr@ppy on the amp), and as mentioned before i have the mi audio pedals, but want something a bit more "metal" (for lack of a better word), and better than the metal zone (which i bought for $25 aud off a mate who thought there was no market for 2nd hand pedals).
Maybe an Emma Electronics "PisdiYAUwot" pedal could suit you.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Awo1dFERMQY&feature=related
looks good, but very expensive, way over my budget...
Nothing on the biyang pedal though?
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A couple of pedals that might work for you:
Electro-Harmonix Big Muff.
Homebrew Electronics Full Metal Jacket.
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My fav is the Distortus Maximus.
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Get a decent tube amp and boost it with a Tube Screamer/Clean boost/Treble boost. Metal guys love the Maxon OD808.
I bought myself a new fender hotrod deluxe (wine red version) just last year, so I'd be very reluctant to get another one (not saying I wouldnt love to get something better tho). And I'm using the pedals through the clean channel (the distortion is pretty cr@ppy on the amp), and as mentioned before i have the mi audio pedals, but want something a bit more "metal" (for lack of a better word), and better than the metal zone (which i bought for $25 aud off a mate who thought there was no market for 2nd hand pedals).
Ah ok. I had the same amp years ago and I used to play a Keeley Modded MT2 through it. We used to play stuff like Avenged Sevenfold and Trivium :lol: Sounded pretty decent. It can get stupidly tight and aggressive. Since you already have an MT2 that might be a nice cheap option?
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I had the same amp years ago
Did you do any mods to the amp itself? I've been looking into getting JJ 6V6s for the power tubes and some high gain preamp tubes to improve the cr@ppy o/d channel and make the amp break up a bit earlier (it also lowers the wattage to about 28W instead of 40).
And i've been doing a lot more tweaking with my mt2 and the tubezone and i get a much fatter sound out of it which seems to be doing it for me now, so i may just keep the mt2....who knows.
Also, my new bkp cold sweats have just arrived so i think i'm going to have to redecide what i do once theyve been installed and see how i go.
A couple of pedals that might work for you:
Electro-Harmonix Big Muff.
Homebrew Electronics Full Metal Jacket.
I looked into the eh big muff a while ago, but it didnt really cut it, but the HE FMJ, that is one nice sounding pedal, but a bit over my budget though...maybe in the future.
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MI Audio Tube Zone? Quite expensive though but I've heard it gets a good Mesa Boogie sound if that interests you at all.
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No, I did not do any mods to the amp. I mainly ran pedals through the clean channel.
I wouldn't recommend using high gain tubes to improve the OD channel. That OD channel just isn't going to do metal by itself. High gain tubes amplifies your input signal more but doesn't dramatically change the distortion characteristics of the amp. It's the preamp that does most of the sound shaping. If you're sticking with the amp, I think you're doing the right thing in looking for a distortion pedal.
If anything, I'd say put a low gain preamp tube in V1 so you have more headroom so that your pedal's input signal doesn't overload the amp input.
You have a tube zone? Is that not working out for you then?
What's your budget anyways?
Keeley MT2 can get that tight aggressive thing really well. Great string separation. Great for thrash but not that great for smooth recto nu-metal distortion.
I just won a Zoom Tri-metal on ebay (cos it was cheap) and I've been impressed by the Zoom analogue pedals in the past so I'm holding high hopes for this when it arrives.
EHX Big Muff is a muffled buzzy POS imo but the new Big Muff with Tone Wicker is meant to bypass the tone stack so you get more presence in sound which the BM badly needs. So it may be worth checking out.
Blackstar DistX might be good too.
Wampler/Emma/Tech 21/Catalinbread etc etc lots of boutique makers make high gain pedals but I have a feeling they're outside your budget.
Good luck with your search :)
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EHX Big Muff is made of win.
Fixed!
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:lol:
I don't know I just can't ever get them to work for me. You switch that thing on and you instantly dissappear from the room. They're ok with single coils but with humbuckers I really dislike them. Just my opinion of course.
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MI Audio Tube Zone? Quite expensive though but I've heard it gets a good Mesa Boogie sound if that interests you at all.
normally bout 260 aud, but good ol' ebay gave it to me for 150. I have to say, it is a bloody good pedal, can pretty much do everything the crunchbox can.
@LazyNinja
i may just be retarded, but i can't really seem to get the tone i want just out of the tubezone by itself (i love the sound of it, but just not this particular sound i'm looking for at the moment)...but that just may be my lack of tweakability, who knows...maybe my impatience is getting the better of me.
i've heard some good things bout that tri-metal too, but i've never been a big zoom fan (probably cos ive used a multi effects unit by them that sounded terrible) so it's tarnished my opinion of them.
and my budget is 200 aud max, so the wampler (i love the pinnacle II) probably doesnt fit in there :(
but tomorrow i've promised myself a visit to a guitar shop to try a few other pedals out and look a bit more into this tube business.
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What sound are you trying to achieve??
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Have a listen to c.o.t.e. And themata by karnivool. That sort of punchy distortion. When I've seen them live I saw one of them with a 5150 amp and I'm pretty sure I've read somewhere that one of the guitarists uses a boss gt8 but I'm not sure if he uses that for the distortion on delay and other modulations.
I also love the pinnacle II sound, but again it's a bit pricey.
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If you had a 5150, you'd be mental to use a distortion pedal with it! I slam the front end of mine with a tubescreamer, but all the gain comes from the amp, and it's glorious. SO MUCH BETTER than any pedal I've owned! :)
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I slam the front end of my JCM800 with a Blackstar HT-DIST X (the high gain one). Just use it as a boost and it makes me sound MASSIV!
Paddy
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but i dont have a 5150 unfortunately :(
If i had the cash back when i bought the HRDx then i probably would have gone for something like that...but i didnt.
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Ok...so I've stumbled across a really good sound with my current setup (the setup i originally wanted to change) that is what I've been looking for (for those still interested).
I guess its a mix between EVH and a tight prog metal sorta sound.
I've decided (as someone suggested previously for me to do) to keep the mt2 for the time being, and i have that going into the tube zone, with quite a low distortion on the mt2 and have the eq with: mids and high at 2oclock, bass at 4oclock and frequency at 1oclock. Then use the tubezone as a gain boost and use the eq on that to get rid of any harsh bity-ness and make it smoother.
I've just installed cold sweats on my guitar, so maybe that has helped me with my tone i was after (awesome pickups just quietly).
And thanks everyone for all your input, if I ever do decide to sell the mt2 I'll definately have your suggestions in mind.
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i've never heard of any band you mentioned, but the boss HM2 is a great distortion... that's how swedish death metal was born!
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The Hardwire Metal pedal does seem to cover all metal bases from what I've heard. Here's how it sounds... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGwc0MY3lM8
This is a pretty good pedal. I tried this out when buying my own, but in the end I bought a Blackstar HT-DIST X (great pedal). I think the Seymour Duncan Twin Tube Mayhem was slightly better, but I couldn't afford it.
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also look at the guyatone mmx and mm1 theyre awesome pedals the sound clips on the site are utter cr@p though.
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Randall RH150G is both cheap and damn good for it.
If you're lucky then Find a Ampeg vh140c - This is legendary as $%&#!
If you're rich - A Dual/triple Rectumfrier
Line 6 Products are also very suitable for death metal tones.
If youre swedish - A HM-2 pedal