Hey Guys/Girls,

I'm looking for a few tips on how to cut through the mix whilst playing in a ridiculous band.

I play guitar in a band with 3 drummers, 3 bass players & an electric uke.

Recently iv'e noticed that i'm not cutting through the mix as well as i'd hoped.

I play a home made guitar through a Fuzz Factory -> Tube Screamer -> Music Man Combo.

To be honest, the clean tone is fine. But when i stomp on the Fuzz Box, it just gets lost. Even with the pedal on full volume, it seems quieter than the clean tone.

I've tried turning up the MIDS which has helped some what.

Am i just going to have to ditch the Fuzz Box? It's my fave sound, so that would suck.

Would a Distortion type effect cut through better? I need another level after the TubeScreamer.


Sorry if this has been covered before.

Wilbur. DiNGUS KHAN

Morning Wilbur.
Let me first say that you are all mad as a box of frogs and hurtling down the path of premature deafness at the speed of sound! Ok, bye bye nanny.

You are on the right lines with a mid boost (one of "our" player/designers fitted such to a pedal)but in the end you cannot boost what you don't have. What I mean is that the amplifier is probably nearing clipping, putting in a bigger, more heavily clipped waveform does not produce much in the way of increased subjective level. Yes, you are producing more high harmonics (and hum believe it or not!) but guitar speakers filter out such frequencies since most fall off a cliff at 8-10kHz.
Do you have a valve rig? If not try one. Then you need to find a "hole" where everybody else "isn't", an EQ pedal in an A/B/ loop might help here. But, and it pains me to say it from a health point of view, you just need more headroom. A 100watt valve head, maybe even a 200watter!
Dave.

(from locked thread....)

I dont really know how to advise you re fuzz pedal, but I would advise you to keep doing stuff like this. Class.

(....because its worth it)

Great band. Keep up the good work and greatness will be yours!

Are you on tour? I'd be well up for seeing you play live if you ever make it London! If you have a mailing list I'd be interested to have my email added to it...

Back to tone, I myself don't think a Fuzz Pedal is the solution to your problems. I think headroom is a issue as mentioned above, a louder amp or two is needed. Three drummers and three bass players are gonna create a lot of volume, I myself would go for two amps, the louder the better!

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http://soundcloud.com/earwighoney

Nope, he's already deaf... YOU'RE ALREADY DEAF!

If you're YouTube videos (v v entertaining) are anything to go by. All I can hear on #1 is guitar. Best invest in a roll of gaffer tape and fix the amp to the side of your head, leaving the other free for butterflies and whispery breezes.

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Ohm's Law states, "Your PA isn't as powerful as you think it is".

i think the difference here is transient response. you say your clean tone is ok - that's because it's a spikier, more transient sound. the fuzz sound will be less transient as that's what fuzz does - it distorts and compresses the sound. so because you haven't got as much transient in the sound, it doesn't cut through like it does on the clean sound, and hence seems "quieter".

you probably need to abandon the fuzz sound and find a different effect. shame as that is for your fave sound, if it can't be heard there's not a lot of point in having ultimate tone.

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hourglass | random thoughts | doubledotdash!? collective

I've noticed this effect with guitarists quite often - a little bit of fuzz is good, therefore a lot of fuzz will be even better, but the actual effect is disappearance of guitar in the mix, as you've described. That's not a judgement on your choice of fuzz by the way, just that what sounds great on its own often doesn't work when competing with other stuff.

Fuzz spreads out the frequency response into areas that compete with other instruments e.g. cymbals and snare, and removes the transients as mentioned above - flattens the sound out so that nothing whatsoever can poke out above the clipping ceiling - consequently you need a MUCH bigger volume to compensate, given what you're competing against. If it's for solos then it probably IS appropriate to blow everyone's balls off and compensate with tons more volume.

It's also worth having a listen to ascertain which part of the sound survives best, often it's the trebly "fuzz" itself, which carries little musical information (matter of opinion of course!) but depending on what aspect of the fuzz you're keenest on it might be possible to reduce the foaminess at the top and keep a bit more of the so-called musical part of the sound, allowing you to crank up more before being accused of taking over the mix.

Reducing the gain also helps - if the sound is so fuzzed that it doesn't actually work, you might find that less fuzz is better. I wouldn't go as far as "less is more", but nevertheless more isn't always more...

And - just a though, as I don't know what you're band's like and this is really delving in where my opinion wasn't asked for - are the musical arrangements beyond question? E.g. is everyone playing their @rse off all the time? Or is there a bit of give-and-take? I coach bands at a college, at the beginning of a course I often find piano and two guitars all comping at the same time, in the same register, in roughly the same way but not quite identical enough to be like one double-tracked part - I split them up into different textures/roles, so they stay out of each other's way and complement each other, and everything's much more hunky dory. Might there be that issue in your band?

Quote ef37a:

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Let me first say that you are all mad as a box of frogs and hurtling down the path of premature deafness at the speed of sound! Ok, bye bye nanny.

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one of my favorite SoS comments of all time....

btw, it explains something i've longed wondered about: when some of the old yardbirds reformed about fifteen years ago, they called themselves 'box of frogs'. i figured there was some old idiom behind this ... now i know ;-)

cheers,

d

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"Patsy had the drug tolerance of Keith Richards and the moral rectitude of Brian Jones." - Dr. Walter Bishop, "Fringe"

Dunno Dubbman.
In the dim recesses of my memory I seem to recall none other than Jezzer Clarkson refer to a lady TV presenter as "Well! She's mad as a box of frogs anyway!" And I think the lady in question was Kate Silverton but I could be wrong.

The term certainly has "northern" overtones do you not think?

Dave.

Quote ef37a:

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The term certainly has "northern" overtones do you not think?

Dave.

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I can confirm that it is indeed a not uncommon phrase at this particular latitude (53N 26')

Chris

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http://www.random-thought.co.uk/

I find I'm cutting through better with Neodymium speakers. Try a Jensen. It is a EQ question as previously identified. The Jensen I find occupies freqencies not used by the other guitarist.
Bakerman

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Mackie Onxy 1640 > Saffire PRO 40 & Fostex VC-8 > RME Hammerfall > Home made silent PC > Cubase 5. Bliss ;-)

Quote Bakerman:

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I find I'm cutting through better with Neodymium speakers. Try a Jensen. It is a EQ question as previously identified. The Jensen I find occupies freqencies not used by the other guitarist.
Bakerman

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Interesting, how much are they? The Celestion Century Neo is a bit brighter than most guitar speakers and could be a home grown solution. They are not exactly cheap however at about £80? Still, not as bad as Alnicos!

Dave.

Since you're the sole guitarist and you have 3 drummers and bassists in the band I'd also suggest trying something along the lines of Brian May where he uses several AC30s to get his tone, or SRV who also used more than one amp. The idea is basically that they'd fill in more of the tonal spectrum and you would sound like say two guitarists, etc. Brian delays one of the amps by a few miliseconds and adds light chorus on the 3rd one if not mistaken.




As far as the fuzz losing steam - you're most likely reaching the solid state clipping point of the amp at which point you're not adding level. I'd suggest you try a valve amp first and see how things work.

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www.descentintomadness.com

Thanks alot for the tips guys.

We now have a 7" vinyl set for release in March !!

Here is a link to the A side - http://soundcloud.com/mick_squalor/knifey-spoony

& here is a link to our Facebook page - http://www.facebook.com/dinguskhanband

Thanks again.

The amp i use is a Music Man 212 HD 75 watt thing.

I've just had my Laney VC 30 fixed, when i can afford to pick it up, i plan to run them at the same time.