Distortion- Amp or FX?

Amp. All I own are NMV amps ....old circuits and attenuators! Everything from a 5 watt tweed champ to a 40ish watt 6g6-b Blonde Bassman.

My gainiest amp is my Lil Dawg Pug...a clone of a Marshall 1974 18 watter. A gain monster......but I also love a tweed deluxe, a brown deluxe (which sounds decidedly Marshall.....the nastiest amp fender ever made), and I am diggin' this Blonde Bassman.

The only amp I use dirt pedals with is my Traynor YGM-3 GuitarMate. It is a clean machine and needs pedals...except with buckers and the amp dimed.

I love amp OD and distortion. It is the tone I need, want, and lust after. I play dirty and roll the volume off for cleans on the guitar. Some of my NMV amps have 2 channels and I use an ABY pedal to set one channel up for clean and one for nastiness.

 
AMP.

FX.

AMP.

Oh Sh1t, I don't know... I use an Axe FX 2 and I can get anything I like!

 
Bennyboy-UK said:
I like amp distortion if there is enough in there for me to play with, then back it off with the vol control on the guitar. That's the ultimate for me. My favourite amp distortion was a rickety old shagged-out Seymour Duncan 84-40.., that thing was mega but hella unreliable.
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great sounding amp , famous for catching fire !

 
Depends on what you want.

There are many types of distortions, or what is bundled together as distortion(s).

Grind, gain, distortion, fuzz, etc.

I like many familiar types of mentioned above.

A fender toob amp can handle many pedal types in front of it, so, the task is easy for.

A Marshall with a tube screamer is bread butter combo right there.

since I like many favors, I use a combination of my two channel Uberschall

and key pedals to yield many favorite flavors of, and combining the pedals also conjur even more sonic capabilities, except for the rockman /emoticons/default_wink.png

(the right) amp and pedal combo in this old man's ways I guess /emoticons/default_wink.png

 
I have a SigX which as you probably know is very versitile. I also bring my pedal board along for delay etc.. and have 3 pedals for distortion as well.

Usually I just use my amp cause that thing can do just about anything.

The pedal set up however gives me all kinds of flavors for distortion / gain. I have and SRB808 by effects pedal boutique that is double sided - like 2 gain boxes on one pedal. One of the most killer sounding boxes I have ever heard.

Then I have a Wampler Pinnacle Deluxe with its regular gain stage and then boost that can be set to vintage or modern.

Then I push either one of them or increase volume of the amp with one of those little single know boosts that everybody uses - can't remember the name off hand but it adds volume and grit. The little black one with one knob.

I really don't need all of these options. I use my pedal board mostly for unfamiliar back lines. But when we gig out I bring it with my Siggy.

You can get some good sounds with many combinations but the most organic and best sounding is pure amp by far.

 
The SigX is on my want list... I've got a Deliverance 60 right now and any time I think it's "not enough", I just goose the volume a little to remind me of how it can roar.

Murkat raises a great point... There are lots of other distortion sounds that I can't reach with my rig (esp. fuzz tones), but they're sounds that I seldom go after for original music, so it's not been a big deal for me.

 
Both. Dr. Z Maz 18 with a Brake Lite attenuator (amp is "crunchy" with guitar volume on 10) and then a selection of stompboxes out front to suit the need.

 
As I've gotten older that more that I am satisfied with a good overdrive sound over a metal box. I do know that Roy Clark never used one of those fancy FX box's!

 
Isn't it true that Angus Young barely used anything other than a little volume gain from his amp. A little overdrive sound, no effects at all, and a dam good guitar and cranked up amp?

 
Crimsontider said:
Isn't it true that Angus Young barely used anything other than a little volume gain from his amp. A little overdrive sound, no effects at all, and a dam good guitar and cranked up amp?
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Yes, but then there are a variety of Angus tones across the AC-DC anthology. His early tone, to me, was a little too boxy and thin sounding (TNT). The Mutt Lange albums have a decidedly richer, thicker, honkier JMP tone. The later 80s and 90s albums sounded more like a straight, cranked plexi....thinner and cleaner than a JMP, but powerful. Point is, you're right. He relied on the amp for the dirt.

 
Lately, it would be this, so....I guess that would be a tally mark for FX. Sorry...see below.

 
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Biz Prof said:
Crimsontider said:
Isn't it true that Angus Young barely used anything other than a little volume gain from his amp. A little overdrive sound, no effects at all, and a dam good guitar and cranked up amp?
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.......... Point is, you're right. He relied on the amp for the dirt.
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And what a tone it was. I got caught up in the medal pedal wars in the day.

I have been using computer amp sims, and they can replicate most FX pedals well, just not the overdrive of a cranked amp, not even close. I now use the overdrive of a real amp and the effects of the computer to get a good sound you can easily record.

 
Crimsontider said:
Biz Prof said:
Crimsontider said:
Isn't it true that Angus Young barely used anything other than a little volume gain from his amp. A little overdrive sound, no effects at all, and a dam good guitar and cranked up amp?
Click to expand...
.......... Point is, you're right. He relied on the amp for the dirt.
Click to expand...
And what a tone it was. I got caught up in the medal pedal wars in the day.

I have been using computer amp sims, and they can replicate most FX pedals well, just not the overdrive of a cranked amp, not even close. I now use the overdrive of a real amp and the effects of the computer to get a good sound you can easily record.
Click to expand...
Yep. If any of the uninitiated wish to hear the full potential of a cranked four-holer or a nice JMP should listen to "Back in Black" followed by Def Leppard's "High 'n Dry". Mutt produced both albums and one can easily hear his penchant for the JMP tone during that era. I lust for that medium-gain, honky, boingy sound. Righteous....and it really only comes from a cranked EL 34 power section with a goosed preamp.

 
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