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Band-pass distortion pedals?


simwells
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Am I right in thinking that the Lomenzo Hyperdrive is the only distortion pedal available that you can select a specific frequency range to apply the distortion to? I have one and love it but wish I could get something smaller that was capable of the same sounds (I thought the b3k might cover both grounds but it has quite a different tone).

Any suggestions on what else might do the same job?

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The Owen Gremlin and Markbass Distorsore do the same thing as the Lomenzo - I've owned all 3 but quickly sold them on as I didn't like their sounds at all. You end up with a big mid boost which makes the bottom end drop out if you have to reduce the overall volume to match effect on and off, and the sound is a bit like a distorted half-way wah pedal mixed with your clean sound.

There are others that do the same trick too, like the Iron Ether QF2 and Empress Multidrive.

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[quote name='simwells' timestamp='1332454600' post='1588744']
Looking at the size of most of these units I'd probably be best to stick to the Hyperdrive I'm thinking!

How about good more metallic sounding blendable distortion pedals? That may cover me for the sounds the b3k doesn't.
[/quote]
size ?

[url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kuLu-Nb3nn4"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kuLu-Nb3nn4[/url]

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[quote name='phil.i.stein' timestamp='1332440383' post='1588480']
ah, nice of you to chip in Mr.Excane, that FEA looks awesome.

wouldn't you include the Toneczar vault in that, or does that qualify as more of a fuzz ? your demo made me think that it had great distortion qualities. :)
[/quote]

The Vault is definitely a fuzz, and a very unique one. It's not a frequency specific pedal - meaning you can't fuzz or distort a single freq. or group of frequencies like the other pedals I mentioned. It definitely has extensive tone controls (main voice, treble and bass) but they apply to the ENTIRE spectrum entering the pedal. :)

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[quote name='phil.i.stein' timestamp='1332454939' post='1588751']
size ?

[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kuLu-Nb3nn4[/media]
[/quote]

Ah just looked into this a bit more, think I've always underestimated how much control Rat style pedals give you, this may suit.

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Just an added note - you may want to go the "purist" route and really get a dedicated mixer for distorting specific frequencies. I do this with a multi amp setup. I usually leave one amp clean and boosting lows, while I use another amp and EQ plus mixer to distort the higher freq and cut all the lower freq. I do this in the studio with fantastic results.

Just another option to explore :)

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just seen this on TB.

might be of interest .. :huh:

[url="http://www.vfepedals.com/VFE_Pedals/Triumvirate.html"]http://www.vfepedals...riumvirate.html[/url]

[url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DtM4UxseSTA"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DtM4UxseSTA[/url]

Edited by phil.i.stein
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Thanks for the suggestion this has made me realised how hard it is to work out how most of these pedals will actually sound without actually trying them. The Triumvirate and Rat Tail are likely possible choices to give me a fair bit of extra space on the board.

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Wouldn't the soundblox dist pro work?
I have the BEF pro and it has options where by the clean signal passes through unaffected, while you can EQ the effected signal.
If this is possible with multiwave distortion, you could effectively cut any frequencies you don't want distorting by turning that frequency all the way to -12?

I may be barking up the wrong tree.

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  • 5 weeks later...

I've justbtaken delivery of a Hyperdrive but not had a chance to play with it properly yet. My 'band pass' distortion comes in the form of an Ampeg Billy Sheehan bass preamp. It's a hard one to beat as it has a full clean valve preamp and a seperate distortion channel that can be combined. I pull the lows and the highs of the distortion out and tune the mids to slot in the scoop of my clean signal thus giving me a nice rounded fat tone that is nice and distorted too. Clean bottom and top, dirty mids. Slap sounds great through it.

It's a rack unit, but i have thought about having a pedal version custom made several times. Its so good, i sold the first unit I had and then had to search to buy another!

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[quote name='dood' timestamp='1335827119' post='1636791']
I've justbtaken delivery of a Hyperdrive but not had a chance to play with it properly yet. My 'band pass' distortion comes in the form of an Ampeg Billy Sheehan bass preamp. It's a hard one to beat as it has a full clean valve preamp and a seperate distortion channel that can be combined. I pull the lows and the highs of the distortion out and tune the mids to slot in the scoop of my clean signal thus giving me a nice rounded fat tone that is nice and distorted too. Clean bottom and top, dirty mids. Slap sounds great through it.

It's a rack unit, but i have thought about having a pedal version custom made several times. Its so good, i sold the first unit I had and then had to search to buy another!
[/quote]

I really want to try somethinglike this but in pedal form! I never thought about actually removing the frequencies from the clean and replacing them with the distorted sound. Would this be more beneficial than having certain frequencies overlapping?

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Although not totally 'frequency' specific I can speak from experience that the FEA Labs Dual Band Distortion is a great tool for distorting only parts of the frequency spectrum via the variable crossover. You can select your crossover point and distort your highs and lows differently. Furthermore, you can tailor each of the bands a bit more with additional tone controls and features. Finally you can add back in a portion of your dry signal (only from the low band signal) to keep your bass sounds full and powerful no matter how much grind you dial in.

I also have the Triumvirate pedal and it's similar to the FEA in terms of being able to distort different bands independently. However, I find it's not as versital as the FEA.

Both are great pedals if you are serious about working in some distortion to your bass signal.

-Mark

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[quote name='chrismuzz' timestamp='1335830872' post='1636801']
I really want to try somethinglike this but in pedal form! I never thought about actually removing the frequencies from the clean and replacing them with the distorted sound. Would this be more beneficial than having certain frequencies overlapping?
[/quote]

Well, yes and no. I guess in some cases, those overlapping frequencies may accentuate the character of the instrument. Like the demo for the Lomenzo drive by James himself, he tunes the mids to sit on the 'bite' of the treble side of his tone. He doesn't push the distortion in to crazy territory either and the effect is very pleasing. I think I overlap mine similarly too, but roll the bottom off the distortion so it isn't mushy and the top off so it isn't fizzy sounding.

I think one of the most important functions on such a pedal is the ability to sculpt the clean and distorted tones together. An EQ on both the distortion path and clean path is very important. I wish my M80 had that ability as I find it limiting, unless it goes in the loop of say an EBS Microbass.

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