be back in five you guys I gotta "take a fuzz"

[lost in music]

Ok, so as I've mentioned previously, I'm a life-long solid state guy who's interested in maybe finally getting into some tube amps. I've read hundreds of message board posts, dozens of articles, watched numerous youtubes, etc. Basically the only thing left is going out to a store and trying some out, but that might not happen for a few months until I go and scrape up the cash.

And so, one phrase that I keep coming across is that a particular amp "takes fuzz well" or alternately "takes pedals well". I think I get the basic meaning behind this: something about the circuitry of the amp and the circuitry of the pedal not working together.

My question then being - I'd love to hear some examples of amps not playing well with pedals. Are there some youtubes of this problem in action? Does it sound like, bad bad? Or boring bad? Or is it one of those things where yeah, it sounds different, but this kind of thing is only the concern of timbre litigators? Is this even a real issue?

And then, how do you shop for an amp with this in mind? If you have a particularly cherished pedal, do you bring it in with you to make sure that it works well with whatever amp you're trying out? Sorry if this sounds stupid, but I've really only been buying gear online.

[friendship]

And so, one phrase that I keep coming across is that a particular amp "takes fuzz well" or alternately "takes pedals well". I think I get the basic meaning behind this: something about the circuitry of the amp and the circuitry of the pedal not working together.

In your research you may have learned that tubes contribute tonal coloration, saturation, and distortion to your signal. How much and what character this coloration takes on depends on a lot of things, not the least of which being how loud you turn up your amp, whether you're using preamp gain, etc. So when people are talking about an amp taking fuzz well, they're usually talking about whether or not they find this interaction pleasant (the tone stack makes a big difference too, but you're probably already familiar with this interaction from your solid state experience).

Some people really love pushing low gain fuzz into hot glass, it's a cool sound. Others love amps with lots of headroom, which is to say amps that get very loud with little or no distortion from the tubes. This lets the "true" character of the fuzz pedal be amplified. If it helps, think of it the way you would stacking different dirt pedals. Your tube amp is the final unit in a stacking process. There's no right way, just different ways of gain staging that produce different timbres that only you can determine are desirable or not. The best way to find out is to try out the tube amps you're interested in with your pedals at volumes that introduce the coloration the amp is capable of.

[rfurtkamp]

Clean headroom is king for pedals for me at least. You cannot make an amp without headroom clean if you start slamming it with pedals.

And some aren't voiced for anything but straight guitar and certain styles of music - add pedals, and the mush emerges.

[DarkAxel]

I don't have clips, but for example my Madebymike Green Muff had way to much bass and mass for the combo amp I was using, the cab was not big enough and it just got choked up and muddy. Another example would be like when you play a Fulltone Fulldrive 2 and think it's absolute shit because it has zero headroom and gets squashed all the time when you hit not-wimpyly. That's how fuzz-not-playing-well-with-an-amp sounds like to me

or way too sharp and broken when it should not be and stuff like that

[frigid midget]

Bad, good, boring,...All in ear of the beholder

If you'll ever find a demo comparing something like an AC15 with a loud clean half stack, both with the same fuzz peds...There's a good chance you'll find out for yourself what the difference is between an amp that takes pedals NOT so well, and one that does.

The AC15 probably isn't even the best example, I'm sure there's lots of guys dissagreeing with me on that. From the amps I played though, it's probably the most picky one when it comes to effects pedals. For whatever dark electrotechnical reason that's far beyond my scientific comprehension