ilovefuzz.com

So, playing in a band. Lost our bassplayer. Aren't getting a new one because it sounds better this way. In some songs I play bass and some songs I play guitar.

Everything plugs into a science mother driving a 2x15, and my pedalboard is set up like two channels, one for bass, one for guitar.

On the guitar channel I've been using a tone bender fuzz with a built in mids switch, as it's probably the bassiest fuzz I own. Seems to fill the gap left when there's no bass pretty well. For single note stuff that really needs to fill everything out I push it with a dod buzz box.

BUT...it's not what I'm hearing in my head. And some of the stuff on guitar is kinda complex and gets a little lost when running through that huge wall of fuzz. There's a lot of sort of playing bass lines one the bottom strings while counterpoints happen on the high ones. What I want is for my guitar to sound bright and thick with a really chunky low end like the opening chords of 'prayer to god' by Shellac. Not clean but not all out indistinguishable fuzz either. Something where you can make out the highs but the lows are boomy and sitting in the same general sonic territory as the bass.

We're tuned to drop C and I'd rather not mess about with the octave pedal fake bass route if possible. I want to see what low end I can create with the guitar as opposed to dropping my signal into the bass register.

So any suggestions for something that would boost the low end like that? Perhaps without overwhelming the drive channel too much on the science and making things flabby? I use a j mascis jazzmaster with an EGC neck. Pickups are stock which is something else I'm thinking about changing, and I'll probably mod it to have a ric style blend control next time I get it serviced. Going to experiment with just using a simple boss GE7 and maybe a rat with the gain right down to boost it. Or perhaps even using a crossover like the tym big bottom. But I'd love to know if there's other things you guys think might do the trick? Is this the kind of thing I should be buying a meatbox for?

daseb wrote:Is this the kind of thing I should be buying a meatbox for?

i havent played one but this was my first thought reading through your post
big bottom and eq seem like good ideas too
maybe something like a kill kill filter in the loop of a big bottom? giving a low end emphasis but not blended fully taking over the signal and making it too muddy

^^^ this is pretty much what I was going to say. PDF-1 or a Sound Saw through a blender.

Check out the Jupiter FX Integrail. It's a blender where you can change the cutoff frequency between the two loops, a high and low loop.

Consider running independent, parallel signals. A Boss LS-2 would do the trick; two signal paths that you can treat individually. It can also be used as a basic blender if you want to try that.

I saw this two piece band recently and I learned something about the Boss OC-3 that I did not know but probably everybody else knew. You can set it so it only tracks the E and A strings. His guitar sounded thick as fuck. He plugged the octave signal into a compressor and a sansamp into a bass amp.

I run a boss GE6 into a RAT to similar effect but maybe more subtle than what you're after. I would DEFINITELY recommend experimenting with graphic and/or parametric EQ before making any major rig changes or spending a lot of money on stuff because it can make an enormous difference.
Meatbox may well be a good bet too because the sub frequencies will rattle the room but not interfere as much with the guitar-y frequenices as when you're boosting the 'low' bands on an EQ.
IMO the fake bass octavey route is kinda shit depending on how you do it because it can become limiting to your actual playing, same with the Boss OC-3 poly mode although i know people who do that and it works for them pretty naturally.

drat, I thought I posted something, but sometimes the positioning of the submit button throws me off.

anyway,
If you are doing a lot of contrapunctual stuff, yep, fuzz can get pretty intermodulation heavy and ugly.

Running hex fuzz goes a long way to hep, but then you are into hex arrangements, which might be a bit much in the overhead department if you aren't already configured for it.

As was already suggested (there are a fewgood suggestions) splitting the signal into parallel paths can be effective.
for the 'bass fill in" you could agggressively eq out the highs and even hi mids to get a more "fundamental heavy" round, bassy tone. You could use a delay as an ADT (100% wet, no regen, few ms of d-time - it could even be your splitter) to give you a little separation and fill things out more.

To me is all about splitting signal into 2 amps and using equalizers/octavers.

some really good suggestions here, keep 'em coming thanks!

The more I think about it the more I think blending in some sort of low end to a parallel more distorted top end is a great idea. I'm going to experiment with the big bottom a little, maybe with compression on the low end signal?

I've gone the route of splitting signals into multiple amps in other bands. Trying to avoid that with this band if at all possible and prepared to make sacrifices in that direction.

Really want to avoid the fake bass thing. The songs we use two guitars for are written for two guitars with no bass, so it's more about just being able to palm mute the low strings and hit some thick notes to fill in some spots so it doesn't sound too ridiculous when I then pick up a bass for the next bunch of songs and suddenly everything is thundering.

blender sounds like the key here.

Octave down fuzz run at lower gain?

Yeah...I'd definitely run a stereo signal (one guitar amp, one bass amp) and mess with two signal chains. It might help if you post your board up.

Here's what I do:

Fat Fuzz Factory > Bit Commander > FrantaBit > Low Pass Filter > MIDI MuRF >(stereo outs)> H9 >(stereo)> Boomerang. Then I run the L channel into the Moog delay, then into my guitar amp. The R channel of the Boomerang runs into the CT5 > Particle, then a bass amp.

The new Meat Box would, I think, be awesome for what you need, too. It has that TRS direct out, which would kinda solve your problem. Just run the sub signal direct to a bass amp.

Sometimes I move the LPF later in the chain (use a stereo out from the MuRF or H9), and run a parallel signal from it direct to the bass amp--no delays or anything. Then you get all of the rhythmic stuff from the MuRF and your own playing, and you get reverb, delay, and other unrelated weirdness only from the chirpy guitar amp. Both are very fun.

I don't know how your setup doesn't sound huge already, would something like this let you run your guitar effects on all the strings and then your bass effects on the bottom 2?
http://www.guitarplayer.com/gear/1012/s ... ideo/51253

Jakezor wrote:I don't know how your setup doesn't sound huge already, would something like this let you run your guitar effects on all the strings and then your bass effects on the bottom 2?
http://www.guitarplayer.com/gear/1012/s ... ideo/51253

The Submarine isn't allowed to be sold in America. They got sued or a C+D against them for infringement or something. Was going to pick one up but they wouldn't let me (I think it is crowd funded anyway right now...but hopefully after that is done they are still selling them).

PumpkinPieces wrote:I saw this two piece band recently and I learned something about the Boss OC-3 that I did not know but probably everybody else knew. You can set it so it only tracks the E and A strings. His guitar sounded thick as fuck. He plugged the octave signal into a compressor and a sansamp into a bass amp.

I saw a local guy do this a while back just an acoustic act but he was killing it was some great bass
it was also an OC3 hadn't realized it either

very cool setup


When I first read your post my initial thought having played 2x15s for a long time with guitar was to just get some type of metal pedal
like an HM2 and back way off the gain

not sure that is helpful but cleaning up the signal may get you the sound you need