What's a great boost to get 90s and later metal out of a higher gain marshall style amp.

  • Thread starter Thread starter motorboy1
  • Start date Start date
Yesterday was trying a rat clone in front a Jubilee; very tight and percussive, without cut the low ends so much. More modern then TS and SD1. The filter knob is tricky and work at reverse.
 
braintheory said:
Was gonna recommend it here too, but Jeff beat me to it lol

I like the Dino much more than the Savage, Mud Killer, Duality DX, Fortin’s, Precision Drive, KSR Eros and others I’ve had if you’re looking for a tight, modern flavored boost. Didn’t actually like the other Protone’s I had as much (2 versions of misha mansoor overdrive and Keith merrow overdrive)
Click to expand...
Sam actually recommended the Dino to me, he’s had them all, and he’s never steered me wrong.
Another pedal worth considering is the Rimrock Lil Mo. The LM is a beast of a pedal that’s extremely raw, rude, and aggressive sounding. It sounds huge, and doesn’t cut any low end whatsoever. It takes my Naylor and Triple next level with gritty, nasty, aggression. Being a Klone with germanium and Telefunken diodes, it’s not the tightest, most modern sounding pedal, but it’s the rudest, most beastly boost I’ve tried.
 
Some type of PEQ.

I've used the Axe FX PEQ block to boost an amp model and also just to boost my actual amp, and it turns a 2204 into something like a 5153.
 
"90's Marshall" is curious because the 90s was arguable the era of Mesa amps and the Dual Rectifier sound.

For a 90s Marshall, a JCM900(?) kinda tone, that relies heavier on diode clipping and power amp compression than in earlier decades.

Lots of 90s grunge or post-grunge guitars (again, made with Mesa mostly) also had a very "scooped" tone to the guitars. Look for a pedal that can have that effect if you want that sound without the aid of a recording console.

Left field suggestion - Bogner Harlow. They will give you that chalkier, drier, heavier EL34 Marshall-esque tone pretty quickly and have some versatility to spare for other styles too.

Bogner arguably had peak popularity in the 90s with the hotrodded Marshall sound before the modern boutique ear really kicked in so it's not totally far off at all for consideration
 
Okay so basically you mean later than JCM800 boosted amps. What Marshall players did was to use a solid-state Marshall Valvestate first for higher gain death metal. However because Marshall PTs are EL34s many death metal players opted for 6L6 so they went off to other heads. Marshall released some signature heads with different PTs in them but ultimately they designed the DSL for their high gain amps and the JVM series. They don't need boosting which is pretty much how 90s metal outside of Marshall was done. Direct to high-gain channel, no boost.
 
TheToneDig said:
Okay so basically you mean later than JCM800 boosted amps. What Marshall players did was to use a solid-state Marshall Valvestate first for higher gain death metal. However because Marshall PTs are EL34s many death metal players opted for 6L6 so they went off to other heads. Marshall released some signature heads with different PTs in them but ultimately they designed the DSL for their high gain amps and the JVM series. They don't need boosting which is pretty much how 90s metal outside of Marshall was done. Direct to high-gain channel, no boost.
Click to expand...
Forgot about the DSL but that was released 1998 and wasn't really popular until early/mid 2000s. Arguably a better, superior amp than the 90s JCM900 ever was.

Then again, seems with every new Marshall head released it does a superb job with emulating the amps of previous eras before it.

Picking up a used DSL40 might actually be the smartest suggestion as opposed getting a crazy expensive boost pedal that won't really get you there.

Understand that to get the sound you want you have to increase headroom and distort the lows and pedals do the opposite of that - they agressively cut the lows and decrease headroom. Only modern amplifiers 50w+ will get you that fuller distorted sound and 6L6 tubes do it better at that.
 
If you’re looking for 90’s metal tones with a Marshall, a Boss Metalzone is worth a look. It’s definitely not a “cool” pedal and can sound like crap if set up wrong, but it can do what you’re asking really well. Just set it up more like a boost, so keep the gain really low. The eq also really gives a lot of range to dial in your tone. In the late 90’s I used to gig a Marshall JCM900SLX boosted with one and routinely got compliments on my tone. Lot’s of guys used a Boss DS-1 back then as well too, so it maybe worth looking in one of those as well.
 
motorboy1 said:
Trying a savage drive currently but its noisy and not quite the sound I'm looking for. So I have an SD1, JHS bonzai and ZW44. Covers the 80s metal tones great. Im looking for 90s and later metal tones with some grind. Dropped D chugga stuff. What are you guys using that gives that wall of sound. I want to try a

Duality DX - Deadweald Audio​

but they are way on backorder.
Click to expand...
VFE Standout... I also thought the Empress ParaEQ was decent as well, both can get Dime like tight tones on a Marshall 2203.

The VFE dragon also has the same type of EQ as the Standout I believe.
 
MetalHeadMike said:
I'd also say the Dragon. Used one with a Wizard MCII, which is not a Marshall but not worlds apart, and it can be set to add a lot of that thick, saturated, compressed wall of sound type gain and voicing.
I'd also look at the Mesa Goldmine. It kind of adds a touch of that Mesa Recto thing IMO...Low mids, not super tight, thick, big sound.
Click to expand...
Is the mesa goldmine something I should pick up for adding a little low mid grind?
 
DragonCrestPC said:
Have you tried it with other amps, if so, how did it sound?
Click to expand...

I probably did but honestly can't remember what it was like. It's not the tightest boost hence why it works so good with the Wizard...adds some give. I'll try it with a couple Fryettes here next week.
 
MetalHeadMike said:
I probably did but honestly can't remember what it was like. It's not the tightest boost hence why it works so good with the Wizard...adds some give. I'll try it with a couple Fryettes here next week.
Click to expand...
Awesome, thanks Mike.
 
IF its an jcm800 or before, double boost it with the pedals you have. Anything later than that, as far as master volume amps, just boost it with the sd1 or any of the ones you have.
 
I've recently swapped back to low output pickups so have been following my SD-1 with a few dBs of clean boost (from a CAE Booster), which really saturates the sound and adds a ton of low end.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top