In each of our last three gigs, guitar players from the bands with whom we were playing complimented me on my tone. I, too, really like the tone I've been getting lately. The tone is a result, in part, from my amp and guitar (which I will detail in a later post). But in this post, I want explain my overdriven tone coming from my pedal board. Craig Sinclair (who plays in the band Dirty Grampa) helped me redesign my overdrive set-up several months ago. The new big idea for me was not using just a single overdrive pedal, (I was having trouble getting exactly what I wanted out my my TS-9 tube screamer), but instead use more than one pedal at low levels--all together. The issue was finding multiple pedals that complimented each other (played nice together).
I remember Shane Johnson (from Professional Music Center and the band Crawford County) singing high praises about the Fulltone Fulldrive 2 Mosfet, so I tried one, liked it, and bought it. I also snagged a Marshall Jackhammer from Craigslist, which has a toggle for both distortion and overdrive, and a variety of tonal options. The Jackhammer's thick, beefy sound, really complimented the Fulldrive's classice overdrive, which was a little thin by iteself, for me. The cherry on top was a micro-sized pedal called the EP Booster (which I bought from Professional Music Center). This is a magic pedal that, besides boosting the signal, just gives a finishing touch to the end of the chain. An on-line reviewer once wrote of the EPB, "I don't know what pixie dust gets sprinkled in these magic little boxes but dang it makes everything sound better." I agree.
This is my "go-to" overdrive...for now. Three overdrive pedals, layed on top of each other, each played at about level 3 or 4 out of 10. To hear an example of this tone check out this video, Stranger.
~Tom
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