Mostly for Metal

[[THANATOS].Shiver-]

Sweet ass version of "Fields of Desolation" as an outro to an Arch Enemy concert at 4:54 in this. 6:14 makes my balls tingle a little bit. Oh... and "We Will Rise" is good too, but overplayed.

Any idea how to get a lead tone that articulate and clean? I don't really know what to put on for leads effects-wise. I know pickup selection is a preference and situational thing, but all I've used in leads/solos is the same thing I use for my riff/rhythm stuff (which is bad haha). I'm planning on getting a Boss NS-2 soon, as well as a compressor. Thought those might help shape my sound more. Thoughts?

[[THANATOS].Metal]

Fuck, where do I start on answering something like this? There's so much information on tone building it's insane. If there were a book written on it, it would be 40 feet thick.

Literally everything affects how you sound. If you're gonna be a tone nazi, everything from what amp you use, strings, pickups/pickup wiring (in phase, out of phase, etc), to the order of appearance for your pedals. That being said, let's take a look at Ammott's signal chain:
Guitar ---->
* Jim Dunlop Custom Rack Wah DCR-2SR
* Rocktron Hush Super C Noise Gate
* Roland SDE-3000 Digital Delay
* Ibanez AD-9 Analog Delay
* Boss OC-2 Octave Pedal
* MXR Phase 90
* Ibanez TS-808 Tube Screamer Reissue
* Boss TU-2 Chromatic Tuner
----> Amp

I don't know how current this is, or if it's the same exact shit he used for THAT particular performance, but I'm going to assume it hasn't changed much.

So what immediately sticks out is the fact that he has 2 delays, but you don't hear delay commin' from him very often. This leads me to believe that he has the delay set to a short enough time to where it sounds like the note doesn't get repeated, but far enough back to fatten things up.

Also, the tubescreamer OD box. TONS of players use these or a variant of for their lead stuff. Just saturates the sound a little more, adds a little more sustain because of the extra overdrive. OD pedals are a game of inches. Too much, and it's going to cause nasty things to happen with the chain that degrade articulation (hence why it's at the end). You wanna squeeze every last bit out of it without making things muddy.

If he were to re-arrange the order of pedals, even switching the places of 2 things in the line, it could change the whole character of his sound.

There's two schools of thought on rig building. One, just use the amp for power, and let 100% of your sound come from pedals. Two, Dial in a tone you really like from the amp, and play mad scientist with pedal settings and combinations until it becomes a tone you love.

Where to start with your pedals then? I'd say run the pedals you have that are similar in the same order and omit the ones you don't. Example: Wah, Gate, OD.

What I think about the pedals you're looking at buying:

The shut the hell up device you're looking at wouldn't be a bad investment if you're on a rig that gives a lot of hum and hissy fits. Keep in mind, it's not a replacement for a proper noise gate. You'll know when you need a noise gate (Hint: its a 2 million letter word, starts with SKR and ends with EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE). A compressor will make you sound more dry, which is good if you're going for articulation as the result of the dryness is a more even sounding attack. The problem with that is, dry and creamy, are direct opposites -- yes, life lessons elsewhere apply here. Dry up the sound too much, and it's gonna be thin and lack sustain, so find the balance through knob turning.

If you're looking to shape your sound in the literal sense, get a decent EQ pedal, more bands the better.

[[THANATOS].Shiver-]

This'll be good advice/info to start with. Yeah, I know tone questions can go a longggg way haha. I'm just looking for at least a generic lead to start with so I'm not just using my rhythm distortion all the time like I am now... it sounds awful. Probably a dumb question, but do overdrives and/or tube screamers even do anything for solid state amps? All I have to work with are the following:

Pedals:
Boss Metal Zone MT-2 (don't use it because I use the distortion from the amp. Have a use for it, though?)
Boss Digital Delay DD-3
Boss Distortion DS-1 (cheap pedal I got for free... don't know if it has any application, sounds shitty alone)
Zoom 607 (actually a bass pedal, and a little too complicated and "electronic" sounding to me)

Amp:
Crate VTX 212, which has a few effects on board that you could say are "pedals"... reverb, etc. Not my ideal from the sound I've got so far... it's got a good rhythm, but all the leads sound weak. I've been using my distortion from the amp and haven't been using any pedals of mine yet. The foot pedal has clean when all LEDs are off, crunch on yellow, the good distortion with red & yellow on, and then the blue LED button is for effects.

I also have a Peavey Supreme 160 that may or may not work still. I'm not sure because I don't have a cab, and my other guitarist used it for a little while and said it "fades out" after a half hour of playing or something. I think it maybe was the cab he was playing through? I don't know anything about half stacks, really...

Guitar:
I've got my ESP LTD Eclipse 100-QM that I've done some post-production work on recently in February or March, I'd say:
- Added a Duncan Distortion in the bridge and a Duncan Jazz in the neck (<3 passives)
- Got push-pull knobs for both pickups -> pull out goes to parallel wiring, push in goes to series wiring. Each goes to their own volume pot for push-pull, the tone knob is unaltered. Plenty of combinations with the switch between pickups, it's nice.
- Got a set up done on my guitar to fix intonation issues and such for 11-49 strings set for D standard tuning

I think I'm going for the 2nd school of thought, considering it's more cost efficient.

[[THANATOS].Shiver-]

New song from one of my newer favorite bands in the past couple years, The Absence. Whatcha think? I hear a saturation of old school In Flames, At The Gates, and Arch Enemy throughout all of their stuff - it's glorious (song starts at 1:25).

And as far as the set up above goes, I'm totally open to suggestions haha.

[[THANATOS].Metal]

Influences a plenty. Bigtime on the In Flames with that track. Good ol' Sweden.

A band I've been listening to a lot recently is BoltThrower. Riffs make me want to crush boulders.

Suggestions, eh?

There isn't a whole lot to suggest short of, "Save money, and buy an amp you like better."

Throwing pedals into something you're not really pleased with is like putting BBQ sauce on saltines to give them taste. Maybe you'd be better off finding a tone that works well in both rhythm and lead situations. If you plan on using the amp distortion at all, step 1 is dialing in a tone that is as close to what you want as you can get from the amp.

That being said, I own a late 90s/early 2000s Gx212, and get some gnarly tones out of it by itself. One of the better sounding solid states IMO. The shape knob is the key to those amps. My only gripe about the 2x12, is you NEED to be micd up to be heard over a drummer that wails.

If you want something along the same lines, but with more balls, look into a GT3500H aka Shockwave. Those things sound amazing, and for the price, you can't beat it.

Shockwave review I found:

Not the best player in the world, but you get an idea of what those things can do.

[[THANATOS].Killing4aliving]

Shiver, I highly recommend a BBE 362. It's a sonic maximizer. Comes in either the rack mount style or pedal.

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