Marshall-in-a-Box pedal for both lower gain/vintage and modern hot-rodded Marshall tones?

EricTheWeary

Voxman said:

Skarloey said:

Hi Dave.

Yeah the BB2 is I spose more of an OD (in comparison with the others in Marshall's range) but it comfortably covers territory like AC/DC.

Mine's long gone but I used mine back in the days when I had an old Marshall transistor amp. Set to crunch on that and mix in the BB and it fills the sound out beautifully.

I have a BB2 and again its back in its box. It's fairly dark sounding and my Behringer T0800 (TS clone) is a much nicer and more transparent overdrive. The Boost is useful but it does colour the tone.  I have a BBE Boosta Grand that is way better for clean boost.  

But another excellent pedal that's like a JTM45/JCM800 in a Box is the ZVex Box of Rock.  It's pretty expensive, but sounds absolutely superb and so much like a big Marshall valve amp its uncanny.  Plus it has a built in boost that makes it sound massive.  I think its the best 'Marshall' crunch pedal I've ever heard with gorgeous harmonic overtones and I would love to have one myself.  Check out the vid to hear what I mean (and listen to the comparison with a real Marshall - can you hear any real difference?) 

The BOR is essentially the same pedal as the Distortron except the Ditortron doesn't have the additional boost but does add a high gain mode ( and a bass eq switch). Hence, it is pretty much what the OP is describing. :bz

Dave_Mc

Thanks for all the replies again, everyone. I was messing with my distortion pedals last night... and you know what, I think my Joyo Hot Plexi might just get heavy enough for what I want (at least with a boost in front). If so, that's awesome, because apart from being a bit light on distortion, it's virtually perfect for what I want (plus I already have it so it'll save me money). I need to try it with lower output single coils to be sure (plus I've heard some horror stories about Joyo reliability so it could die tomorrow) but initial thoughts are that I might not need to buy any new pedal. ) Sorry about that. If it does die on me, though, I have plenty of info to decide on something else. Thanks again for everyone's help.

@ChrisMusic Thanks. Yeah I copy and paste too so I don't get the username wrong. ) Sometimes that makes the "@" bit not take, though. I find copy and pasting first, and then putting the "@" in front of it normally works. Normally. )

@therose789 Thanks. I think the MK1 (or maybe the Mk2) had a switch to go between plexi and hot-rod 800 tones. That's my concern about the newer one, since it seems to be much more aimed at the vintage Marshally tones. But I could be way off.

@Voxman No problem. And thanks for the info about the JH versus Guvnor. I know exactly what you mean about A/Bing and it then hitting you in the face ) I also know exactly what you mean about the characters being a bit different- it's a similar thing when I compare my joyo hot plexi to my more crunchbox-based (I suspect) distortions. There's a difference there in the tone and thickness (for want of better words) that turning down the gain doesn't really get rid of.

@mike_l  LOL thanks for the heads-up. As I said, I think I'm ok for the time being- @ThePrettyDamned should go for it (if he wants)


@Voxman Thanks. Yeah if I ever change my mind I'll keep an eye out for them. I'll give the video a listen now too.

@ThePrettyDamned Go for it )

@EricTheWeary Thanks I'll definitely keep it in mind if I ever change my mind about the Joyo (or if it dies ) ).

ThePrettyDamned

Thanks @dave_mc (and @mike_l for pointing it out) but I just won a pedal I've wanted for YEARS AND YEARS on eBay.

Sadly, it's not a DS-2 but I'll be getting one of those soon, too.  

mike_l

oooh, @ThePrettyDamned what you getting?

ThePrettyDamned

mike_l said:

oooh, @ThePrettyDamned what you getting?

A very special box indeed

I found a Boss Super Feedbacker and Distortion on eBay and picked up, including postage, for £36.  It's missing a knob, but the pot itself works fine apparently, and that's a bit of a steal for a classic pedal I reckon!

ICBM

ThePrettyDamned said:

I found a Boss Super Feedbacker and Distortion on eBay and picked up, including postage, for £36.  It's missing a knob, but the pot itself works fine apparently, and that's a bit of a steal for a classic pedal I reckon!

The Super Distortion & Feedbacker is far superior. I'll give you £20 for it and you can put it down as a lesson learned.

As you'll already know, there is no difference! Good price. Which knob is missing? If it's the feedback harmonic one you probably won't use it all that much anyway…

The best distortion pedal ever made in my opinion.

ThePrettyDamned

ICBM;418345" said:

ThePrettyDamned said:I found a Boss Super Feedbacker and Distortion on eBay and picked up, including postage, for £36.  It's missing a knob, but the pot itself works fine apparently, and that's a bit of a steal for a classic pedal I reckon!





The Super Distortion & Feedbacker is far superior. I'll give you £20 for it and you can put it down as a lesson learned.

























As you'll already know, there is no difference! Good price. Which knob is missing? If it's the feedback harmonic one you probably won't use it all that much anyway…

The best distortion pedal ever made in my opinion.

It's the level knob, but I was planning on moving the harmonic one across!

Yeah, it sounds really thick and meaty. When I first heard a demo, I immediately thought of the Dani California chorus tone. Not sure if that's what he used, and it's not my favourite song, but it's a massive sound.

I nearly paid 65 quid for one a while back, so for that money I can't complain! Though seller messed up his payment address so I've had to claim the payment back and am now waiting for the correct PayPal address...

I'm very excited. And I'm fully aware of how much you love them it'll be up against a visual sound son of Hyde, which is a shred master clone apparently. And one of the best distortion boxes I've heard... So it's got tough competition.

I doubt I'll ever use the feedbacker, but if I can tune it for a drone note and the distortion has enough clarity, I can use it for that sort of thing.

monquixote

ThePrettyDamned said:

I'm very excited. And I'm fully aware of how much you love them it'll be up against a visual sound son of Hyde, which is a shred master clone apparently. And one of the best distortion boxes I've heard... So it's got tough competition.

Funny you should mention that, but it occurred to me that a Son of Hyde would be a good choice for Dave though the lower gain sounds don't excite me much.

ThePrettyDamned

monquixote;418458" said:

ThePrettyDamned said:I'm very excited. And I'm fully aware of how much you love them it'll be up against a visual sound son of Hyde, which is a shred master clone apparently. And one of the best distortion boxes I've heard... So it's got tough competition.

Funny you should mention that, but it occurred to me that a Son of Hyde would be a good choice for Dave though the lower gain sounds don't excite me much.

Yeah, it occurred to me and while it does do a nice low gain od tone, it doesn't like a very hot signal or being boosted compared to when the gain is, say, above halfway (where boosting it really works great for more saturation). The od alone is usable, but it doesn't compare to a box of rock, which is very "ampy" and responsive.

@dave_mc I'll pm you if I prefer the super distortion and I will happily lend you the son of Hyde regardless, if you don't mind paying postage back. Tis an AWESOME box of Marshall rock tones, but more on the jcm side than jtm.

srato

Marvel Drive.

Dave_Mc

Tried the hot plexi with single coils last night... I think it'll do. It's a bit less saturated than I'd like, but everything else is close enough to what I want that I don't want to pay a ton of money for something which I might not like as much.

Now I just have to keep my fingers crossed that the darn thing doesn't die. ) I've heard some iffy reports about Joyo reliability.

@ThePrettyDamned Nice score

Thanks very much for the offer of the lend, but I've already got a joyo high gain distortion (which also is supposedly a shredmaster clone) and I don't really like it that much. )

@monquixote That's funny, I'm not that fussed on the Joyo shredmaster clone ) It's always pretty hard to recommend for other people, I suppose as they say there's no accounting for taste )

@srato Thanks

monquixote

Which joyo is a shredmaster?

Dave_Mc

The high gain distortion.

I think. ) I'm guessing it has a preset bass knob.

http://www.coda-music.com/joyo-jf04-high-gain-distortion-pedal-p-12081.html (I have the Thomann/Harley Benton version, I'm guessing it's the same, it seems to be out of stock on Thomann)

Voxman

I'm really fickle! :P - I was in the mood to play some ranchier stuff this afternoon with my SG and so swapped out the Marshall Guvn'r2 for the Marshall Jackhammer JH1 in my pedal board for a bit more 'grunt'.  Experimented with the settings and found nice ones for both the OD and Distortion.  Think I'll leave the JH1 in there for the time being.  
  

Dave_Mc

LOL

I spent ages like that not being able to decide which pedals to keep on the board. Eventually I just got sick of it and made a decision.

mike_l

I just got a bigger board.

ChrisMusic

mike_l said:   I just got a bigger board.

So you'll be needing some more dirt pedals for that then...    

Gassage

If you got a KoT you'd cover both your boost and OD and have the best Marshall in a Box sound ever.

Dave_Mc

^ Isn't it bluesbreaker-based?

mike_l said:

I just got a bigger board.

LOL

mike_l

ChrisMusic said:

mike_l said:   I just got a bigger board.

So you'll be needing some more dirt pedals for that then...    

Quite right....