How Clean/Overdriven Is Your Basic "Clean" Tone?

[DTB]

I don’t know how I would describe my tone. I guess it’s clean until I dig in and then I get a bit of grit. I strived to get the tone from ‘When Love Comes To Town’ by Herbie Hancock Jonny Lang and Joss Stone. I use a Digbeth pre pedal straight into my mixer and monitors. I have the FET drive on max and the Tube drive on just over half way mixed together. 
I also have a .5 watt Kowalski guitar amp which is all valve. It doesn’t need a speaker load, and has a preamp out. It sounds similar to the above and I sometimes use that. 
I don’t gig anymore due to ill health. Took me a while to realise that playing at home for my own pleasure was infinitely better than not playing at all. 
I really really miss gigging though.  

[tauzero]

I use either a Zoom MS-60B or an HX Stomp amp emulator (SVT on the Zoom, can't remember on the Stomp) which has a tiny bit of drive on it. I dislike excessive distortion - for a dirty sound I use the tape saturation effect on the Stomp.

[SimonK]

There's a huge difference between what sounds great on it's own and what works in the mix.

 

My current approach is to dial in just enough crunch using the drive control on the Aguilar to be aware of in isolation. Then I give the desk the "post" signal on the DI, which some sound engineers don't like - I'm always in two minds as one part of me thinks that the preamp is only really there to shape the tone coming out of the cabs so yes the desk should get a "clean" signal, but then again the Agi preamp sounds so good with a touch of drive!

 

I should say I also have an EHX Big Muff for proper hit the dirt moments.

[Dad3353]

[Jeffb28451]

Enough to bring out my highs, but not close to the current "ideal" of the Darkglass boys who seem to dominate YouTube these days.

[Baloney Balderdash]

On 17/02/2024 at 16:24, Dad3353 said:

[bassbiscuits]

Up until now I’ve played cleaner than a Nashville cat, using Markbass heads and cabs and little or no effects. 
 

But lately I’ve been seduced by the dark side, dabbling with valve amps and hybrid amps with valve preamps.
 

To make matters worse, I’ve bought two overdrive pedals. I feel like this is a confession….

 

forgive me.  

[TimR]

Always clean. But if needed I've dug in to overdrive the amp.

 

Recently bought a Boss Blues Driver, but haven't had time to set it up or use at a gig yet. Just wanted something to kick in some drive rather than destroy my fingers. It may not be the best option. 

[Baloney Balderdash]

8 minutes ago, TimR said:

Always clean. But if needed I've dug in to overdrive the amp.

 

Recently bought a Boss Blues Driver, but haven't had time to set it up or use at a gig yet. Just wanted something to kick in some drive rather than destroy my fingers. It may not be the best option. 

The Boss BD-2 Blues Driver works great for bass, and have a surprisingly wide range, from just on the edge of breakup, to a really grindy sort of high gain overdrive, and everything in between.

 

Edited April 12 by Baloney Balderdash

[JellyKnees]

Depends entirely on the band, but I'm currently doing some post-punky new wave meets Hawkwind meets King Crimson-ish prog type stuff, and I'm using my Origin BassRig Super Vintage for the basic sound to give me just a bit of JJ-esque type grunt, and it works brilliantly in the mix. We're currently doing some studio recording and I couldn't be happier with the DI'd bass sound...

[BigRedX]

Depends on the band, music and the individual song. There is no right or wrong answer.

[TimR]

1 hour ago, Baloney Balderdash said:

The Boss BD-2 Blues Driver works great for bass, and have a surprisingly wide range, from just on the edge of breakup, to a really grindy sort of high gain overdrive, and everything in between.

 

 

Thanks. A basic play at home I think gets to what I want but will take a bit of fiddling. I was hoping even with it on I should get a clean tone that drives into breakup earlier with the option to just tweak the gain up to have always on for songs that require it. 

[Downunderwonder]

I put verge of breakup because it's only a matter of digging in and and I get some choice wild hair on. But it's clean if I don't dig in. Such is the joy of preamps that can do that thing with ease these days.

 

Maybe I should have put clean as a clean thing? 

[diskwave]

A good mid heavy tone will naturally sound grindy.  Never used pedals pre amps or anything, always cut thru.

[joeystrange]

My ‘clean’ sound varies depending on what I’m doing but it always has a bit of dirt so it’s never super clean.

 

It sometimes amazes me how just much dirt you can get away with and still sound clean in the mix.

[Beer of the Bass]

Since I changed to roundwounds last year I've been embracing a bit of grit from pushing the front end of my Ampeg PF50T a little harder than previously. Not full-on filthy, but just getting some hair at the louder end of my playing, and a slightly grindy character on harder hit low notes. In a mix you can barely pick out that it's distorted, but it gets some extra midrange presence and a compressed character. We're working on some new album tracks at the moment, I pushed it a little more on some songs than others, but I feel like it does add something interesting for what we're doing.

Edited April 13 by Beer of the Bass