MXR dirt pedals...

[frigid midget]

There's a ton of different ones, I can't keep track of what's what...

Never tried any of their stuff, looking to maybe change that. I just know that the 'fullbore metal' sounds too bees in a jar' in the demos I checked, and that I don't have use for any of the low gain and clean boost options And I'm not crazy about the dist + clips I checked either.

Looking more for a alternative to a rat, hotcake or ocd, preferably even a bit nastier. The more gain the better, as long as a cranked gain control doesn't get me a mid scooped fizz party and doesn't compromise the medium gain toanz too much.

...So what's left?

78', prime, III, super badass, prime, any of those four peds that are marketed as 'overdrive' rather than dist...? There's also a couple other ones in the 'custom shop' section...?

Fwiw...I'm not much of a blues lawyer, I'm just your average noise loving -aged- indie kid looking for a cheapish pedlol that can be pushed without sounding as shrill/fizzy as a rat, as harsh as an OCD, or as muddy/dark as a hotcake

[Tristan]

Henretta Heisenberg / Pinkman or a Harmonic Percolator with diode lift switch / knob?
I have those and I think they do exactly what you're asking for, I also have an OCD and I know how a Rat or Hotcake sounds.

[frigid midget]

Thanks.

Neither of those are easy to come by though, at least not on the local used market. Which -besides the prices- is why I'm investigating the MXR offerings

I don't think I'm super picky or anything, but still I didn't really get along with the stuff I tried so far. As much as I love Boss, they don't seem to have anything high-ish gain that doesn't sound boring/mediocre or even flaout sucks

I obviously knew about the HP, but it wasn't untill now that the clips really impressed me for some reason
A quick google search for clones didn't bring up more than a handful of boutique/diy/custom replicas, nothing cheapish and super easiliy available

[ratrod]

Have you tried a HM2? Could work for the sounds you describe.

Only MXR dirt I've tried is the Doubleshot which I thought sounded awful.

[odontophobia]

Buddy of mean had the "78. Noisey as shit.
Can't say I've been impressed with MXR dirt.

Maybe pickup a metal zone and mod it?

[frigid midget]

HM2 has been on my hit list for a long time. Not for the same purpose as what I'm looking for now though. I know it's capable of more than swedish chainsaw fizz, but it does seem a bit extremly for the bread and butter od/distortion tones I'm looking for. Just a souped up Rat with more bass, or a souped up hotcake with wore mids would probably do the trick
When I say 'high gain', I mean it in a miab sort of way, not in a metal chugga chugga sort of way. I'd like a bit more saturation than what a rat, box of rock, or ocd can do though. More like the grit/hair you get with those pedals stacked...

Modding my fabtone for less of a nasal 'bees in a can' sound is also on my to-do list. But if the answer can be found in some other cheap ass dirt pedal, I'd rather take that route.

Found a super cheap '78 custom badass for less than half the new price. Been reading some reviews, didn't come across any noise complaints yet
Thanks for the heads up.

[crochambeau]

Been a long time since I've played with a Distortion +, but I do recall a couple people swearing by them. I recall it being underwhelming, like bolting a leaf blower motor to your bicycle and pretending you're on a motorcycle - but for the tubescreamer crowd.

Then again, there might have been something to do with burying it in your back yard for a year to earth steep mojo just like drum wizard weirdos do with cymbals.

[MechaGodzilla]

Been a long time since I've played with a Distortion +, but I do recall a couple people swearing by them. I recall it being underwhelming, like bolting a leaf blower motor to your bicycle and pretending you're on a motorcycle - but for the tubescreamer crowd.

Then again, there might have been something to do with burying it in your back yard for a year to earth steep mojo just like drum wizard weirdos do with cymbals.

I have a modded early script Dist+ and I love it. I think it has Si/LED clipping on a switch and a bass boost switch. I could find a use for it with pretty much any setup, but right now it's set to LED clipping for a dirty boost post-delay/verb. With Si diodes it gets fuzzy and chunky, and sounds great on bass with the switch engaged.

[Ghost Hip]

LED clipping in a Dist + circuit is one of my favorite basic distortions to work with. I have come across many different MXR dirt pedals. They all have their purpose for different folks. The Prime distortion sounds like utter garbage, and the only I tell people not to get. They had a green overdrive tube screamer pedal that was cool in a feedback loop. The blue box is an old favorite of mine, no other octave down fuzz sounds quite like it. They Super Bad ass and 78 Bad ass are pretty straight ahead/easy to dial in high gain overdrive/distortions. La Machine is a pretty good foxx tone machine clone. And the one I tried most recently is the FET driver which was a pretty cool overdrive. If I wasn't all set in the overdrive department, that would have been tempting.

Plenty more outside of those I mentioned that are all at least decent pedals. In other news, their new Reverb pedal is really sweet too.

EDIT: To actually more constructively respond to your post, I would suggest the FET Driver. Bass and Treble control are pretty useful and it has a good gain range from near clean to heavy overdrive.

[penelope tree]

The LA Machine is good but it's based on the fOXX Tone Machine and probably isn't what you are looking for. The Double-Double Overdrive might interest you, I think it has two modes: one based on the Tube Screamer and another on the OCD.

[PeteeBee]

Other guitar player in my band has an il Torino and he loves it. I haven't messed with it at all, but it does sound good. Three band eq seems to work well to make it pretty versatile

I've never heard him do super high gain, but I think it can. It has a little button to push for more gain that every so often he pushes then quickly pushes again to turn off after a few bars. I always think it sounds good, but he plays mostly cleanish

[penelope tree]

The Shin Juku Drive sounds pretty good in the PGS video.

[youtube][/youtube]

[frigid midget]

cheers.

Had a bluebox for a while. Helluva lot of fun, but I couldn't really find good use for it. Might've kept it if the fuzz didn't sound that weak on its own. The shitty tracking and synthy glitches were awesome though.

I came across the La Machine too. Seems rad, totally my thing, but I'm forcing myself to NOT buy anything like that cause that way it'll only take me even longer to finally start building that FM2 clone I've got laying around waiting to be assembled

But yeah, not really for anything but a distortion, or somewhat meaty overdrive that goes further than the usual tubescreamer type of gain levels.

The Shin-Juku *would* be a nice contenstant here, if it weren't pretty new and priced like a booteek pedlol, i.e. impossible to find used/cheapish

Can't find for the life of me find any other reports of the custom badass 78 distortion being overly noisy. I guess a fair amount of hiss is to be expected when a high gain dist pedal is cranked and plugged in between a single coil guitar and a loud amp...right?

[aholidayatthesea]

I have the overdrive version of the super badass. I haven't experienced a lot of noise issues with it. Worst thing about it is that the power jack is right below the side input jack, so my right angle plug knocks it sometimes.

I've tried the super badass 78, and it just seemed like a more trebley version of my overdrive. It's supposed to mimic a cranked Marshall afaik, and judging by your musical preferences I'm not sure that's what you want. Unless you really like classic rock tones?

If you're going to look at anything, look at the super badass distortion M75. I looked it up and many people like it better than the fullbore metal for high gain tones.

[odontophobia]

cheers.

Had a bluebox for a while. Helluva lot of fun, but I couldn't really find good use for it. Might've kept it if the fuzz didn't sound that weak on its own. The shitty tracking and synthy glitches were awesome though.

I came across the La Machine too. Seems rad, totally my thing, but I'm forcing myself to NOT buy anything like that cause that way it'll only take me even longer to finally start building that FM2 clone I've got laying around waiting to be assembled

But yeah, not really for anything but a distortion, or somewhat meaty overdrive that goes further than the usual tubescreamer type of gain levels.

The Shin-Juku *would* be a nice contenstant here, if it weren't pretty new and priced like a booteek pedlol, i.e. impossible to find used/cheapish

Can't find for the life of me find any other reports of the custom badass 78 distortion being overly noisy. I guess a fair amount of hiss is to be expected when a high gain dist pedal is cranked and plugged in between a single coil guitar and a loud amp...right?

Maybe my experience was clouded by the rest of the other guitarists chain. Or maybe it had settings in a place that produced some noticeable hiss.