Fuzz into wah or vice versa?

WillEdmunds

I'm using a Fulltone 69 Fuzz into an Xotic XW1 wah. I wired the fuzz into my board first due to the general consensus that fuzz works best first in the signal chain. It just sounds a bit shit when I'm after those Hendrix fuzz and wah tones. I've tried it both ways and neither are great to my ears. I know that Jimi seemed to run fuzz before wah but don't get how he sounded so great!

I know its an age old debate but any suggestions? Buffer between fuzz and wah perhaps?

antifash

I always put wah first. 

Lebarque

Wah, fuzz. The Xotic is fuzz-friendly, so should sound great.

hotpickups

Xotic wah I pot first as it's buffer friendly for fuzzes etc . Then my fuzz and sounds fine 

Funnily enough though two pedals I hardly use

bbill335

if you're doing it properly and there's a dirty amp or OD pedal after the fuzz and wah, I think it always sounds best fuzz into wah. 

tampaxboo

maybe the wah is 'spectrum bracketed' in a way the fuzz doesn't like?
eg. the wah is only offering the fuzz a bracketed slice of tonal content which, because of the nature of that particular fuzz circuit, it can't do much with.

for a full fuzz tone you need a full tonal range in, once you filter that range (wah is a variable filter) you are limiting raw materials the fuzz has to work with. harmonics and overtones stripped out. octave fuzzes work well after wahs as they add new info rather than only distorting input.

it may also be that your wah has a funny range. if has an option to vary range, or an internal trimmer (mark starting point before tweaking so you can easily get it back), that might be another way to approach resolving this.

WillEdmunds

Lebarque said:

Wah, fuzz. The Xotic is fuzz-friendly, so should sound great.

This is good to know! I just built a Temple board with custom cable. Took me ages. Looks like I'll be re-doing it to put the wah first though...

antifash

My Crosstown fuzz didn’t play nice with a wah in front (impedence). So it went. 

ICBM

WillEdmunds said:

I'm using a Fulltone 69 Fuzz into an Xotic XW1 wah. I wired the fuzz into my board first due to the general consensus that fuzz works best first in the signal chain. It just sounds a bit shit when I'm after those Hendrix fuzz and wah tones. I've tried it both ways and neither are great to my ears. I know that Jimi seemed to run fuzz before wah but don't get how he sounded so great!

Jimi mostly (or always, I'm not sure) used wah before fuzz, as here - 

https://i.pinimg.com/236x/63/05/51/630551a3dd870876752959d7983e7783--jimi-hendrix-experience-guitar-players.jpg

One problem is that with modern cables, that can sound very shrill because there is much less capacitance to suppress the high frequencies - or it can even oscillate. FoxRox make a buffer to fit inside the wah (between the circuit and the switch, so it's bypassed when the pedal is) which fixes this.

bbill335

ICBM said:

WillEdmunds said:

I'm using a Fulltone 69 Fuzz into an Xotic XW1 wah. I wired the fuzz into my board first due to the general consensus that fuzz works best first in the signal chain. It just sounds a bit shit when I'm after those Hendrix fuzz and wah tones. I've tried it both ways and neither are great to my ears. I know that Jimi seemed to run fuzz before wah but don't get how he sounded so great!

Jimi mostly (or always, I'm not sure) used wah before fuzz

Silicon FFs are more forgiving than their older Ge brothers, based on the different stuff I've tried. Hendrix used both and has been pictured with his wah both ways. It's probably just a case of whatever worked with what he had on the day. The other thing is, maybe he got a shit tonne of oscillation running the wah first and just didn't give a fuck coz he was out of it! No oscillation with the fuzz first, ever.

Sassafras

WillEdmunds said:

I'm using a Fulltone 69 Fuzz into an Xotic XW1 wah. I wired the fuzz into my board first due to the general consensus that fuzz works best first in the signal chain. It just sounds a bit shit when I'm after those Hendrix fuzz and wah tones. I've tried it both ways and neither are great to my ears. I know that Jimi seemed to run fuzz before wah but don't get how he sounded so great!

I know its an age old debate but any suggestions? Buffer between fuzz and wah perhaps?

I think the fact he was Jimi might've had something to do with it.

WillEdmunds

Sassafras said:

WillEdmunds said:

I'm using a Fulltone 69 Fuzz into an Xotic XW1 wah. I wired the fuzz into my board first due to the general consensus that fuzz works best first in the signal chain. It just sounds a bit shit when I'm after those Hendrix fuzz and wah tones. I've tried it both ways and neither are great to my ears. I know that Jimi seemed to run fuzz before wah but don't get how he sounded so great!

I know its an age old debate but any suggestions? Buffer between fuzz and wah perhaps?

I think the fact he was Jimi might've had something to do with it.

Very true of course. His unparalleled playing aside, I was thinking more about the interaction between fuzz and wah!

WillEdmunds

Thanks all. I've rewired my board with wah before fuzz and it sounds a lot better than it did.

Ro_S

both

Lebarque

WillEdmunds said:

Thanks all. I've rewired my board with wah before fuzz and it sounds a lot better than it did.

Good to hear. I thought that should work fine. Enjoy.

Babones

Classic wah sounds: wah before dirt.
Noise terrorism: wah after fuzz/dirt

The former is better for classic rock/blues etc
The latter is better for shoegaze/ambient/'grunge'/noise rock etc

shaunm

I use a 69 with a Buddha Wah before it. Works a treat. Tried it the other way and didn’t like it.

Great fuzz pedal though!

p90fool

Babones said:

Classic wah sounds: wah before dirt.
Noise terrorism: wah after fuzz/dirt

The former is better for classic rock/blues etc
The latter is better for shoegaze/ambient/'grunge'/noise rock etc

This ^^^

Also, never underestimate the importance of a pushed amp at the end of the chain to smooth out weird frequency/volume spikes.