The joys of pedal stacking

[spawnofthesith]

I’ve almost always been a primarily “amp gain” kind of guy over the years but do appreciate sweet dirt boxes. Never really went down the whole “stacking” thing though. I’ve kind of been off the pedal train for years but I got both an EQD dunes (for the second time, best TS clone out there as far as I’m concerned) and an archer ikon. Both are awesome on their own but I’ve been having the time of my life combining them running into my Mark V clean channel. Just sounds so fuckin good and definitely a different flavor than “amp gain” souunds I usually go for

 

[JasonE]

Stacking OD pedals has been a part of my sound for a very long time. I have 3 drive pedals on my board. One is a higher medium gain tone and the other two are set lighter. I use them individually as well as stacked, along with the volume knobs on my guitar all the time. Some of my amps have drive channels and some do not so I built one board to work with them all.

 

[spawnofthesith]

Stacking OD pedals has been a part of my sound for a very long time. I have 3 drive pedals on my board. One is a higher medium gain tone and the other two are set lighter. I use them individually as well as stacked, along with the volume knobs on my guitar all the time. Some of my amps have drive channels and some do not so I built one board to work with them all.

I currently have 3 dirts on my board, aside from the aforementioned also have this SUF dire wolf

I ignored klones for years, by the ikon is serious special sauce m. Beefs evwrything by itself and just enhances the othwr dirts for new tonal exploration at the end of the chain

 

[EOengineer]

Amp gain just seems to work best for the stuff I write/play, but every once in a while I’ll set up my trusty SFDR and start cascading pedals to see what I can make happen.

I seem to have more luck with my telecasters than with my Gibsons, unless I’m using an amp in a box type pedal as the core of the drive tone and then using boats or fuzz when I want it to get wild.

I do really love the way a TS style pedal sounds through my Mark III clean channel though. It’s bolder than I can get out of my deluxe and holds together better.

 

[spawnofthesith]

I think another cool thing about stacking dirts (or even just stand alone dirt) into a clean channel is the relative lack of overall compression

My current setup on my MK V for channel 2 is edge mode that’s just barely not clean and some very light breakup. Running dirts on that channel in that config is cool, but the same dirts on the clean channel just sound waaaay more open and alive

 

[Sascha Franck]

I can highly recommend adding a compressor to the picture as well. Not the 90s clean (chorused) kinda stuff and also not the squashing country thing. Just something to a) beef up your decay and b) possibly boost things a little. When doing so, you can instantly dial back the gain of the following devices and yet get a similar amount of "meat".
Obviously doesn't work for all styles, but I find it to be very useful quite often.

 

[EOengineer]

My current setup on my MK V for channel 2 is edge mode that’s just barely not clean and some very light breakup. Running dirts on that channel in that config is cool, but the same dirts on the clean channel just sound waaaay more open and alive

The compression happening at the amp is IMO hugely under-attributed to the contribution it makes towards the final result with pedal drive.

I’d been on a Bassman kick the last 6 months or so. That amp has WAY more compression happening compared to my SFDR, which can result in the Bassman getting very ratty with even lower-moderate boosting. On the flip side, unless the SFDR is CRANKED it’s clean to the point of being unforgiving with my Klones or anything that isn’t an amp in a box kind of thing.

 

[spawnofthesith]

I can highly recommend adding a compressor to the picture as well. Not the 90s clean (chorused) kinda stuff and also not the squashing country thing. Just something to a) beef up your decay and b) possibly boost things a little. When doing so, you can instantly dial back the gain of the following devices and yet get a similar amount of "meat".
Obviously doesn't work for all styles, but I find it to be very useful quite often.

I suppose I should at that my keeley comp + is on 100% of the time

 

[djd100]

Don't forget the ever popular fuzz at minimum gain with the guitar volume rolled back, into a mostly transparent OD for gain, great with single-coils.

 

[spawnofthesith]

Don't forget the ever popular fuzz at minimum gain with the guitar volume rolled back, into a mostly transparent OD for gain, great with single-coils.

This is the main reason I miss my A.man sunface

 

[DrewJD82]

Every time I have more than one Lovepedal in front of an amp I end up spending the whole time stacking them and finding different ways to set them to get more out of them. If I’m ever in a class rock band I’m totally setting up that Ceriatone Plexi50 to utilize stacked drives for all the dirt.

For the metal stuff I’ll always love amp distortion, but for almost everything else I’d prefer to stack drives for everything. I just think there’s far more control you can have and a lot more variation you can get from just a couple pedals than you can get with an amp set to sound one way.

 

[Alex Kenivel]

Sweet shag pedalboard

 

[Eagle]

I’ve never found stacking pedals to do anything other than magnify the shortcomings and why amp gain sounds bigger. One to boost amp gain is great but boosting pedal gain is not for me. I get why low gain guys do it but at lower gains I massively prefer amp gain.

 

[Sascha Franck]

I’ve never found stacking pedals to do anything other than magnify the shortcomings and why amp gain sounds bigger. One to boost amp gain is great but boosting pedal gain is not for me. I get why low gain guys do it but at lower gains I massively prefer amp gain.

Regardless of whether one still prefers amp gain for certain things (which I perfectly understand), there's much more to the story.
Combining two different gain variations results in "superimposed" different waveforms, at least as long as we're not just talking boosts.
And when you stack, say, a lower gain drive running into another one, the impact of the waveform of the lower gain one will become vastly less once you back up the guitar volume or pick softer. The result being a very different dynamic behaviour than what you'd get from a single gain source.

 

[gearJunkie]

Every time I have more than one Lovepedal in front of an amp I end up spending the whole time stacking them and finding different ways to set them to get more out of them. If I’m ever in a class rock band I’m totally setting up that Ceriatone Plexi50 to utilize stacked drives for all the dirt.

 

[gearJunkie]

 

[la szum]

One one series of clipping diodes is not enough.

 

[la szum]

I’ve never found stacking pedals to do anything other than magnify the shortcomings and why amp gain sounds bigger. One to boost amp gain is great but boosting pedal gain is not for me. I get why low gain guys do it but at lower gains I massively prefer amp gain.

Sir David Gilmour on line 3 would like a word with you.

 

[la szum]

I think when you are post-40 it is required by Common Law, that if you play guitar you
need to invest the next decade of your life exploring the landscape of a pedalboard
into a clean amp.

You just an old soul, or a little early, @spawnofthesith .

Stacking can be fun, and is a bit like adding channels to an amp.

I spent more time using pedals into clean-ish amps the past decade

I gigged than any other type of rig. I was very That Pedal Show,
except I didn't talk and gib-gab as much as those guys do.

 

[la szum]

The compression happening at the amp is IMO hugely under-attributed to the contribution it makes towards the final result with pedal drive.

I’d been on a Bassman kick the last 6 months or so. That amp has WAY more compression happening compared to my SFDR, which can result in the Bassman getting very ratty with even lower-moderate boosting. On the flip side, unless the SFDR is CRANKED it’s clean to the point of being unforgiving with my Klones or anything that isn’t an amp in a box kind of thing.

1000%! That compressed squish and sag is there in spades on some amps. I feel this is why
some amps are so darn fun to play completely clean, and others are like riding in a car with
no suspension on a bumpy road. A bit jarring.

I feel in love again with my Vibrolux.... because of that. What a luxuriously smooth ride that
amp is.