What is the best way to utilise a preamp pedal?

relinquish69

relinquish69

New member
I'm currently feeding an Xotic BB Preamp Plus into a Vox Ac30cc1. I find this a terrible combination. There is no way I could dial a nice tone out of this. I find it has too much gain despite the BB's volume and gain knobs being at 9 O'clock.

The EQs make it a really tweakable pedal but I'm just not getting anything good out of it. I've set my amp's volume to make it slightly saturated so that attain a nice boosted overdrive with the help of a pedal pushing the amp (if you guys get what I mean). I find that it would make no sense to just feed the BB into the amp's clean settings.

My plan is to ditch the amp for a sparkly clean amp like maybe a Fender Princeton. I love the AC30's tone, especially the overdriven one. Too bad it's just not mixing well with the BB. I find it stupid not to utilise the great overdriven tone of the Vox just because there is too much gain being fed into it.

Guys, I need opinions. Get rid of the amp or the pedal? Basically what I want is a nice classic overdriven tone but not being too reliant on the amp in a case where I have to bring the board around and using other amps.

Many thanks in advanced.
 
Set the amp just before it breaks up or barely breaking up then hit it with the BB set for less gain and more vol. That should push the amp into overdrive without it being too saturated. The BB isn't really a preamp to me, more like a boost pedal.. If you find that you really don't like the combination then I think selling the pedal would be easier haha.

Treble boosters and a crowther hotcake are said to be great for AC30s.. Haven't tried the hotcake tho.
 
1) Efx loop of amp, totally bypassing internal preamp of amp

2) Change another amp with efx loop

3) Change pedal

Hehe, theres only 3 directions in the context. At least 1 out of the 3 should work. If all 3 doesnt work, then we can look further for satisfactory outcome
 
wck said:
Set the amp just before it breaks up or barely breaking up then hit it with the BB set for less gain and more vol. That should push the amp into overdrive without it being too saturated. The BB isn't really a preamp to me, more like a boost pedal.. If you find that you really don't like the combination then I think selling the pedal would be easier haha.

Treble boosters and a crowther hotcake are said to be great for AC30s.. Haven't tried the hotcake tho.
Click to expand...

I'm doing just that. I did the opposite too by under powering the amp and boosting the pedal. In both cases, I'm going to leave either one underpowered which I don't feel too good. Makes me feel that I'm not getting the best out of them.

In your opinion, do you think the BB has too much gain?
 
PatheinRaindropMoe said:
1) Efx loop of amp, totally bypassing internal preamp of amp

2) Change another amp with efx loop

3) Change pedal

Hehe, theres only 3 directions in the context. At least 1 out of the 3 should work. If all 3 doesnt work, then we can look further for satisfactory outcome
Click to expand...

To me bypassing the amp's preamp is not an option. I personally feel that if I were to like an amp, I should like it for it's preamp section. since the amp would be more for home use, I don't think I would want to do that.

I used to own a solid state amp Yamaha DG-60 and I liked the way it sounded when I fed the pedal through it's clean channel. I love the dirt on the AC 30 but I also liked the tone when the BB was still going through the Yamaha amp. I would be satisfied with something in between but there is nothing like that. Worst case scenario I'll just sell both items. I don't like a either or situation.
 
relinquish69 said:
I'm doing just that. I did the opposite too by under powering the amp and boosting the pedal. In both cases, I'm going to leave either one underpowered which I don't feel too good. Makes me feel that I'm not getting the best out of them.

In your opinion, do you think the BB has too much gain?
Click to expand...

Well I guess that depends on what you're playing, too much gain for what? IMO, the BB is no doubt an excellent OD pedal, but there's not a big increment of gain from about 1 o clock to full.
 
J.custom said:
Well I guess that depends on what you're playing, too much gain for what? IMO, the BB is no doubt an excellent OD pedal, but there's not a big increment of gain from about 1 o clock to full.
Click to expand...

If possible, I can dial a moderately heavy gain which doesn't mud up the overall tone while stacking the 2 channels & feeding through the amp's slightly over driven tone. Too much gain (for obvious reasons).

The only solution I can come up with is get a super clean amp.
 
Haha, as long as you don't use the AC30 like Brian May (aka fully cranked) you're underpowering it already. But seriously, by lowering the amp volume and gain and then boosting it with the pedal you're not exactly underpowering the amp cos you're still hitting the preamp of your vox with the BB.

I don't find it to have too much gain esp if you set it at 0 gain and higher volume, might be abit too compressed if you want it as an almost clean boost. Maybe the RC/ AC would suit you better. I gotta ask, do you mean too much gain or saturation/ compression?
 
So you're mixing both channels? I personally would have done what wck suggested, turning down the gain, and increasing the volume. But if that still does not give you the right amount of gain you want, then maybe you might want to get a pedal that works solely as a booster eg. RC, EP Booster etc.

OR

You could go with a super clean amp and feed your BB into it. That's what I'm doing now. Running my pedals thru my VHT Special 6 head which sounds pretty Fender-ish to me.
 
I'll try the volume thing but if that is going to be the case, I might as well sell the BB away. I would want to try the super clean amp + BB preamp plus combo.

By too much gain, I meant all you can hear from your amp is a bunch of distortion without sustain. Too little volume, too much saturation you know what I mean?

@CyanideJunkie
Stock. No idea what they are. Didn't check.
 
Hi bro, rather than dumping the amp why not dump the pedal? The BB's inherent tone isn't that good with a Vox's EQ.

Why not go for tried and tested circuits with the Vox? I find these the best:
ProCo Rat (best biggest sound EVER)
Skreddy Screwdriver (same as above, but no need to goose up the volume of the Rat)
T-Rex Mudhoney (same as Rat but without honky/flabby bass)

Other circuits:
Timmy (unchanged EQ)
Hotcake (best with Vox only IMO)
DLS

Otherwise, change your approach as others have stated. The thing with tube amps is it has a longer learning curve for us Singaporeans. Normally we'd set the volume at unity and goose the gain since we are so accustomed to solid state amps. But with, tube, after a certain threshold the natural tube break-up, sag and compression comes into play. I find that (if you can play loud) the idea is to back up the gain and GOOSE the volume of the pedal. The objective is to blend the tone of the dirt with the tube amp's distortion (hence pedals like TS is a world's difference with a tube vs a solid state).
In the same vein, if you LIKE the inherent tone of the pedal (eg. you want a straight-up Big Muff sound), it's best if the amp is set very clean and the pedal provides all the gain. This method depends on clean headroom of the amp and is most successful with solid state amps.
Hence the saying, you've never truly heard a pedal until you put it through a solid state amplifier.
 
I see. Thats probably the BB, I would understand if some find it too compressed. Maybe you can try a more open OD like a modded BD-2 or sth, those are really great for boosting an amp. Opens it up quite and has a nice character, I'm using a goose modded BD-2.. Not sure if others have the same effect..
 
Maybe the Andy Timmons BB may work better? Apparently it's less compressed and sounds more open. Never tried it before though:/
 
Whew, that is a heap load of good information! I have to try all those mentioned methods before finally coming to a conclusion. More complicated then I thought.

I had this thinking that I get a good clean amp, feed a pedal I like through it and that was the end of story. I didn't expect the combination to be so horrible. I like tweaking but it seemed like no matter how I tweaked it, I will still get a pile of mud. I tried boosting the amp with less gain more volume and it sounds better already! still, not exactly what I am looking for but a big improvement.

Time for some bonding!
 
I think you got it mixed up. AT BB is more compressed, better for a lead boost but definitely not what he wants. Give some open sounding ODs or a treble booster a try, sounds like what you are looking for.. If you stay near my place you can give the goose BD-2 a go too haha.
 
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