The Edge ditched his tube amps for residency

[Jarick]

U2 is a legacy band and there’s nothing thats going to change honestly. They aren’t going to somehow recapture the punk rock energy of Ireland in the late 70s. That was nearly 50 years ago!

I’m not 100% convinced that even if Fractal has the best charts and graphs, it’s going to be the preferred modeler. I mean distortion itself was originally a defect. Low fidelity gear has a charm and tone that we now will emulate.

My guess is Edge is a gear junkie who tries just about everything and when the UAD stuff came out he got a really good sound out of it for his ears right away. And could easily swap the amps out for the pedals using the Fractal for effects.

 

[ejecta]

I remember that time I liked U2 when they were actually good 40 years ago

Yeah because he was using real amps. Duh.

 

[Sascha Franck]

his Tech could easily have put together a looper board and midi-control what's in line at any given moment.

I'm absolutely sure this is what happens anyway. The guy seems to be a true sound nerd, constantly trying to improve things, so I think it's a safe bet that he won't be running all those UA devices in series while going for his best Fred Astaire reincarnation.
Fwiw, there's a pretty lomg rig rundown from 2018, and interestingly enough, all his amps are running as backends, no fancy 4 cable stuff, all the rack stuff sits in front.

 

[synthpenguin]

Yeah I haven't seen one either. I'm almost tempted to buy the UA Lion just to debunk some of the "so much better than Fractal" notions that are flying around on The Other Place. Fractal themselves have already said in charts&graphs the UA pedals have much higher aliasing. UA also have a bit higher latency than a fullblown Axe-Fx 3 and then there's of course all the feature stupidity on UA.


While UA's amp modeling is good, to me the thing they truly did well is their cab sims. They sound very nice.

Now, I am still confident they are just IRs + speaker drive etc processing under the hood and not some new paradigm or UA would have patented the shit out of it. Their marketing is mysterious for this, with some videos with UA reps claiming they are not IRs but those might be marketing people misunderstanding the product. So far no evidence has been presented that they are anything but close mic + room mic IRs + speaker drive processing.

I expect the main things people like are that the close mic + room mic combos sound good. While e.g the Strymon Iridium also offers a room reverb mixing convolution and algorithmic reverb, it's not necessarily the same thing as room mic IRs from a prestigious studio.

The UA Lion sounds really good, but honestly it did not impress me as much as the Dream and Ruby. And yeah I remember reading about the aliasing, I think I read the Fractal forum thread you're referring to.

The speaker part does sound really good, even if I'm also skeptical about their vague claims.

It would be interesting to compare a Ruby or Lion to an equivalent Fractal (or Helix) model running through their OX Stomp for the speaker sim and room side of things, though I can't say the demoes of modelers running into the OX Stomp really impressed me vs just good IRs (I had looked at it to possibly put in the FX loop of my HX Stomp, but the combo of that, their approach to apps, and no MIDI for program changes didn't make it seem worth it), so maybe there is something else going on.

 

[burningyen]

Kind of a derail for this forum, but I went to the 10/13 Sphere show, and it was amazing and The Edge was amazing. Even for this hardcore gear nerd, what he was playing through was like the 10th thing on my mind. Although I did find it interesting that he played a few tunes on an EOB Signature Strat.

 

[paisleywookiee]

Kind of a derail for this forum, but I went to the 10/13 Sphere show, and it was amazing and The Edge was amazing. Even for this hardcore gear nerd, what he was playing through was like the 10th thing on my mind. Although I did find it interesting that he played a few tunes on an EOB Signature Strat.

Edge of Breakup? Is that The Edge’s full name? I mean, makes sense.

 

[Sascha Franck]

Although I did find it interesting that he played a few tunes on an EOB Signature Strat.

I'd guess he just likes the built in Sustainer.

 

[Jarick]

Kind of a derail for this forum, but I went to the 10/13 Sphere show, and it was amazing and The Edge was amazing. Even for this hardcore gear nerd, what he was playing through was like the 10th thing on my mind. Although I did find it interesting that he played a few tunes on an EOB Signature Strat.

Everything I’ve seen and heard about the Sphere and U2 there has been amazing. It’s like next level entertainment.

 

[synthpenguin]

I hate that this thread made me think about the Ruby again, and it's on sale, so now I want to get one to pair with the HX Stomp, even though I really really don't need it. Time to play with some AC30 patches on the Stomp to talk myself out of it lol...

 

[TubeStack]

I hate that this thread made me think about the Ruby again, and it's on sale, so now I want to get one to pair with the HX Stomp, even though I really really don't need it. Time to play with some AC30 patches on the Stomp to talk myself out of it lol...

 

[FuzzyAce]

I hate that this thread made me think about the Ruby again, and it's on sale, so now I want to get one to pair with the HX Stomp, even though I really really don't need it. Time to play with some AC30 patches on the Stomp to talk myself out of it lol...

A much cheaper option (and very good) would be the Vox Mystic Edge. I can personally say it works quite well with a Stomp too.

https://voxampshop.com/products/veme

 

[synthpenguin]

I'm tempted to do it, but I still can't figure out if my inability to setup a "perfect" AC30 patch is me being new to Vox style amps or if it's the Helix model behaving differently. Because wow the Ruby "how to" videos make it look so easy, but trying to sort of copy (not just the settings exactly, but by ear too) what is being done with the Essex A30 is coming up short. imo Helix can easily cover the Dream 65 ground (especially with a mid boost), but then I'm more familiar with dialing in a Fender sound.

 

[Mongillo19]

I'm tempted to do it, but I still can't figure out if my inability to setup a "perfect" AC30 patch is me being new to Vox style amps or if it's the Helix model behaving differently. Because wow the Ruby "how to" videos make it look so easy, but trying to sort of copy (not just the settings exactly, but by ear too) what is being done with the Essex A30 is coming up short. imo Helix can easily cover the Dream 65 ground (especially with a mid boost), but then I'm more familiar with dialing in a Fender sound.

I think that's the calling card of the UA stuff though isn't it? Being a simple device to get good tones out of.

I like to enable and say do it. It's on sale and if you hate it, send it back

 

[synthpenguin]

A much cheaper option (and very good) would be the Vox Mystic Edge. I can personally say it works quite well with a Stomp too.

https://voxampshop.com/products/veme

That whole line of pedals looked cool and seemed very underappreciated. I remember not being super impressed with how the Mystic Edge did cleans though, but that was only based on a few video demoes. What's your experience with that, and are you running it in preamp mode?

 

[synthpenguin]

I think that's the calling card of the UA stuff though isn't it? Being a simple device to get good tones out of.

I like to enable and say do it. It's on sale and if you hate it, send it back

I SUPPOSE haha. I'm strongly considering it. I'll definitely mess around with the Helix more though. I really want to make sure it's not just me! And it doesn't help that a lot of the AC30 patch tutorials for the Helix seem to be very focused on rounder sounds or sounds designed to be covered in FX (I guess because it's popular with worship guitarists?), which is really not what I want from the AC30 I imagine in my head.

 

[Mongillo19]

I SUPPOSE haha. I'm strongly considering it. I'll definitely mess around with the Helix more though. I really want to make sure it's not just me! And it doesn't help that a lot of the AC30 patch tutorials for the Helix seem to be very focused on rounder sounds or sounds designed to be covered in FX (I guess because it's popular with worship guitarists?), which is really not what I want from the AC30 I imagine in my head.

Definitely! I'm sure you can get very close with the helix but sometimes the journey can be a pain

 

[FuzzyAce]

That whole line of pedals looked cool and seemed very underappreciated. I remember not being super impressed with how the Mystic Edge did cleans though, but that was only based on a few video demoes. What's your experience with that, and are you running it in preamp mode?

I use it both ways. As a preamp/front-end it can do the sparkly clean quite well. The whole valve range (i have them too) can go full clean if needed, even the Cutting Edge. I like to use the Mystic Edge in pedal mode mainly as a boost or nice od. Either standalone or into another od, or into a Helix model. It has that midrange quality you'd expect from a vox.
And it's a tube pedal, so it has more harmonic and immediate character you can feel. The Copperhead is very good too. I like to use it as a preamp into Helix. It sounds better to me than the Plexi models, and I like those.

 

[synthpenguin]

Definitely! I'm sure you can get very close with the helix but sometimes the journey can be a pain

Yeah! But also if I can get a base sound I like, I'll just set it as the default for the model, so that's sort of my aim.

And also I dislike a lot of elements about the UA approach to these pedals, so part of it is also me being stubborn and not wanting to give in haha

 

[synthpenguin]

I use it both ways. As a preamp/front-end it can do the sparkly clean quite well. The whole valve range (i have them too) can go full clean if needed, even the Cutting Edge. I like to use the Mystic Edge in pedal mode mainly as a boost or nice od. Either standalone or into another od, or into a Helix model. It has that midrange quality you'd expect from a vox.
And it's a tube pedal, so it has more harmonic and immediate character you can feel. The Copperhead is very good too. I like to use it as a preamp into Helix. It sounds better to me than the Plexi models, and I like those.

Interesting, thank you! I'll look into them more! I appreciate it

 

[FuzzyAce]

Interesting, thank you! I'll look into them more! I appreciate it

If you're curious, here's a track I did with the Mystic Edge and Copperhead > into Helix Native, WhoWatt100 amp and cab. There's a slight flanger going on in helix too.

Mystic edge is the main pedal til 2:00 min mark, using my tele. After that would be my strat with the Copperhead.
Here I have them set similarly tone wise, but the eq is very responsive. The Copperhead has that nice upper midrange snarl.