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Could be a lot of things. If you have a very dark tone or are extremely saturated, that mitigates a lot of the distinctive character between fuzzes. A lot of the differences between fuzzes lies in the dynamics, upper mids and highs. In a hard pushed fuzz tone, with a lot of high end rolled off, in a crowded band mix, that can disappear quick.

Then again, maybe you just have a distinctive style, everything just sounds like "you". Tone is in the dingus.

Tell the others in the band to shut the fuck up while you lay down some heavy fuzz licks.

MechaGodzilla wrote:I think you might need to get friendly with that bridge pickup.

This, but also what pickups are you using?? That STEP should cut like crazy with the treble Booster and octave on.

Green Ringer > Harmonic Percolator should cut like a knife.
Reminder your instrument likely has a tone knob. Turn it up

How many piece band/what are the other instruments?

Let me clarify, all these pedals cut just fine, in the sense that they can be heard over the band with no problem. We're just a 3 piece- guitar, bass, and drums.

The problem is not being heard, it's that if I a/b all these different fuzzes in a full band setting, they all sound pretty similar to each other.

All my lower gain sounds are pretty distinct from each other, which makes me think maybe I just need to stick to various levels of weird and nasty overdrive.

And I've never had a bridge pickup that I liked the sound of. It's always too thin or honky

neonblack wrote:Let me clarify, all these pedals cut just fine, in the sense that they can be heard over the band with no problem. We're just a 3 piece- guitar, bass, and drums.

The problem is not being heard, it's that if I a/b all these different fuzzes in a full band setting, they all sound pretty similar to each other.

All my lower gain sounds are pretty distinct from each other, which makes me think maybe I just need to stick to various levels of weird and nasty overdrive.

And I've never had a bridge pickup that I liked the sound of. It's always too thin or honky

That makes sense, I have the same issue a lot of the time. As far as the bridge pickup thing, what guitar are you playing?

neonblack wrote: The problem is not being heard, it's that if I a/b all these different fuzzes in a full band setting, they all sound pretty similar to each other.

Generally the more gain you play with, the more fuzzes are gonna sound the same.

You might wanna examine what's causing 'em to clip and how they're EQ'd. Those're probably the big differences. Look for something unlike what you've tried.

You could always try turning the amp down a bit or trying an amp with more headroom or something like that.

The amp I'm using is super clean. It's basically a jazz chorus minus the chorus part. And Rich, I'm using a Squier jag right now, which might be part of the pickup problem. It's those "Duncan designed" single coils. The neck sounds fine!

I really think the solution might be less gain and more weirdness. The STEP is awesome, but not big and thick. But honestly, that might not be what I'm looking for. I'm still in the "throwing everything at the wall to see what sticks" phase of my tone search.

Honestly, so far the Mini cranked at minimum bias is my favorite heavy sound. Probably just gonna stick with that.

neonblack wrote:The amp I'm using is super clean.

Try turning the gain down on the fuzz itself and hear if that helps.

I think I own 10 Fuzz pedals now and I have a couple of pedals that do 'fuzz' but that's not what they're marketed as. Like distortion, I think the amp has A LOT to do with it.

That said I own a MidFi Demo Tape (using this as an example) and I think regardless of amp and volume would sound WAY DIFFERENT than a Montreal Assembly Your & You're (I don't own that though). The Shoegazer circuit is a Soda Meiser and a torns peaker and when I play either switch of that pedal loud, they sound WAY DIFFERENT.

I mean that said, Neon, are you only listening while you are playing or are you listening to recordings afterwards? I can imagine while I'm playing in a band I would be more focused on actually playing in time and hitting my notes as opposed to timbres. There is a lot more going on in live context (for your brain) than just hearing the fuzz.

In short, I don't know .

I should have the recording from last night's practice to listen back to today. I'll know if I'm just feeling crazy in the moment or if it's really true.

My first thought was a second Perc that's set louder, with more harmonics percolating and such (I get setting it for low-gain, because HFS!!)... but maybe it's not that. Maybe you need something that's going to boost it and change the fuck out of the EQ? I used to run my Rangemaster in front of my HP and when you hit that RM for hooks/leads, it was GNAR. AS. F. and the EQ change cut through anything and everything and made the HP sound way more percolate-y and differenter.
Maybe that? Or a version of the boosty-EQ changing thing?

What is HFS?

High Frequency Spacebeams
Hot Fart Steam
High Fort Snacks
Huckle Fairy Snuggles
Hurting Fuzz Stream
Ho Face Slap
Happy Flipping Squid
Hard Finger Sucking

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XcCaIGGWe8[/youtube]