Home › Forums › Help/Technical Questions › Sax Fuzz or Distortion

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  • February 22, 2010 at 8:48 pm #79917
    bluehevy75
    Participant

    This is my first posting. I currently have EHX: Micro-Pog, LPB-1, Pulsar, and Q-Tron.

    My issue:
    I play in a band and am trying to help the sax player set up a pedal board. Some things have worked and some things haven’t. Mostly I’m trying to get distortion or fuzz to work with his sax tone and am having serious issues. We have a noise-gate for feedback. Mostly the issue is that the fuzz or distortion isn’t effecting the tone that much. It simply sounds “hotter” but the tone is relatively the same. I’ve posted on diystompboxes and talkbass. They’ve suggested lots of stuff but so far nothing is really working.

    We are using a 125 ohm “pickup” that is attached to the mouthpiece much like Eddie Harris had in the 60’s. We have tried using a mixer before the effects but it didn’t help the distortion/fuzz any. I’ve got plenty more details if you need them.

    Thanks.

    February 23, 2010 at 1:01 am #107817
    julian
    Moderator

    Well remember that a Saxophone’s harmonic content is very different than that of a guitar and a fuzz/distortion is going to work differently with it.

    What distortions/fuzzes have you tried?

    A few things I’d try:

    Take your Q-tron and put it before the distortion. Put it in lowpass filter mode, with the resonance set kind of low.

    Try your Micro POG in front of the distortion with the dry all the way up, and slowly inch up the octaves and see how that effects the sound.

    These are just things that would help in altering the Sax’s harmonic content to maybe give the fuzz something a bit more to play with.

    February 23, 2010 at 1:40 pm #107846
    bluehevy75
    Participant
    Quote:
    Well remember that a Saxophone’s harmonic content is very different than that of a guitar and a fuzz/distortion is going to work differently with it.

    What distortions/fuzzes have you tried?

    A few things I’d try:

    Take your Q-tron and put it before the distortion. Put it in lowpass filter mode, with the resonance set kind of low.

    Try your Micro POG in front of the distortion with the dry all the way up, and slowly inch up the octaves and see how that effects the sound.

    These are just things that would help in altering the Sax’s harmonic content to maybe give the fuzz something a bit more to play with.

    We’ve tried a DOD American Metal (I know it’s cheesy but we are trying different stuff). We also tried a clone Fulltone Fuzz ’69 pedal (We tried it with all different settings on the four control knobs and even played with the trim knob on the back). We tried a few boosts too to see if we could overdrive the signal and get some grit that way.

    We did play with the Micro Pog and while that gave us some cool sounds it did not help us when used in conjunction with fuzz/distortion.

    We did not try using the Q-tron before the fuzz but we did try the reverse.

    We tried using a mixer before the effects to help correct for impedance and leveling problems. It didn’t help the sax to interact better with fuzz or distortion but we were able to make the mixer clip. The clipped sound wasn’t super usable but it reaffirmed my thinking that sax fuzz is possible. If we could get grit/distortion out of the mixer there should be some way to get a usable grit/distortion/fuzz out of a pedal.

    February 23, 2010 at 2:09 pm #107848
    bluehevy75
    Participant

    One sax player that is making these kinds of sounds is Dana Colley from Morphine. He is now with AKACOD. The sax player in our band isn’t trying to ape him but there are definitely some effects being used with his tone. Check him out and see if it is something besides fuzz maybe my ears are tricking me.

    For a sample listen to these:
    The album is “Hapiness.” The band is AKACOD. Songs are below. I’m sure you can find them online:
    “Happiness” 2:45-3:10 Sax break
    “Spanish Fly” Sax Solos start at 3:50
    “Bad Weather” Sax Solo 2:45-3:55

    You get a look at his pedal boards here:
    http://www.akacod.com/sounds.html
    copy and paste the link bellow as the hyperlink didn’t work
    http://www.arguedasphotography.com/images/08 Rumble/080419/13.jpg

    Thanks for the help.

    February 23, 2010 at 5:47 pm #107860
    bluehevy75
    Participant
    Quote:
    my guess, put heavy eq on it (heavy meaning cutting out a lot and putting in only what you want) so that you get certain Hz and then try it.

    if that that doesnt work, i dont know but you should play money if you havent already

    We tried heavy eq’ing and it didn’t effect the way the sax interacted with fuzz/distortion that much…
    Refreshed myself on money the sax sounded good but there wasn’t a lot of effect on it was there?

    There is nothing “wrong” about the fuzz/distortion tone but there really isn’t anything “right” either. When ran through the fuzz/distortion pedal the sax is just “hotter” it isn’t like there is any kind of real “dirt” or fuzz in the tone.

    February 23, 2010 at 8:50 pm #107867
    julian
    Moderator

    well if EQ’ing it didn’t effect it and overdriving the pre-amp did, I’m thinking it’s one of two things:

    1. you need more gain
    2. You need a more complex distortion

    February 24, 2010 at 1:49 am #107882
    bluehevy75
    Participant

    1. We will try a pre-amp on Thursday to try and add gain.
    2. People on diystompboxes said a “gated fuzz” could work. Does that sound right?

    February 24, 2010 at 1:09 pm #107895
    bluehevy75
    Participant
    Quote:
    compressor?

    we don’t have one….how will it help with the fuzz?

    February 24, 2010 at 5:11 pm #107898
    SanquiFlerb
    Member

    It would bring up the sax level up, and the fuzz will capture it. Maybe won’t work, maybe it will. Do it, it is a good a idea.

    February 25, 2010 at 6:22 pm #107936
    bluehevy75
    Participant

    we will try some compression tonight as well…I’ve dug up an old alesis compression unit we will try out…

    kh

    February 26, 2010 at 5:16 pm #107958
    bluehevy75
    Participant

    SUCCESS!!!!
    Last night we played around with pre-amps, compression, mixers, pickups vs. mics etc…some stuff sounded good but nothing triggered the distortion.
    What finally did it was running a Flange and (or) the Q-Tron before the distortion.–Thanks Julian. If anyone has any ideas why these kind of effect triggered the fuzz I’d love to hear it so we can try other stuff.
    We will need to some work to keep the feedback from going crazy but it was difinetly working, usable, and sounding exactly like we hoped it would.
    Thanks for all or your time peeps.

    February 26, 2010 at 5:57 pm #107961
    SanquiFlerb
    Member

    Good to hear! Was the flanger and qtron on when it worked? or just by adding them to the chain was enough? Maybe it had to do with impedances, idk really.

    February 26, 2010 at 7:20 pm #107967
    julian
    Moderator
    Quote:
    SUCCESS!!!!
    Last night we played around with pre-amps, compression, mixers, pickups vs. mics etc…some stuff sounded good but nothing triggered the distortion.
    What finally did it was running a Flange and (or) the Q-Tron before the distortion.–Thanks Julian. If anyone has any ideas why these kind of effect triggered the fuzz I’d love to hear it so we can try other stuff.
    We will need to some work to keep the feedback from going crazy but it was difinetly working, usable, and sounding exactly like we hoped it would.
    Thanks for all or your time peeps.

    A square wave is a signal full of harmonics, a sine wave is one devoid of harmonics.

    Distortion adds harmonics, making a signal closer to a square wave. (additive synthesis)

    Filtering removes harmonics, making a signal closer to a sine wave. (subtractive synthesis)

    A saxophone is already very close to a square wave, so I didn’t think distortion would effect it very much. So if you make it less like a square wave, the distortion will have a better effect on it.

    February 26, 2010 at 7:47 pm #107969
    bluehevy75
    Participant
    Quote:
    Good to hear! Was the flanger and qtron on when it worked? or just by adding them to the chain was enough? Maybe it had to do with impedances, idk really.

    They had to be on. Julian comment is right on.

    February 26, 2010 at 8:52 pm #107972
    bluehevy75
    Participant
    Quote:
    Quote:
    SUCCESS!!!!
    Last night we played around with pre-amps, compression, mixers, pickups vs. mics etc…some stuff sounded good but nothing triggered the distortion.
    What finally did it was running a Flange and (or) the Q-Tron before the distortion.–Thanks Julian. If anyone has any ideas why these kind of effect triggered the fuzz I’d love to hear it so we can try other stuff.
    We will need to some work to keep the feedback from going crazy but it was difinetly working, usable, and sounding exactly like we hoped it would.
    Thanks for all or your time peeps.

    A square wave is a signal full of harmonics, a sine wave is one devoid of harmonics.

    Distortion adds harmonics, making a signal closer to a square wave. (additive synthesis)

    Filtering removes harmonics, making a signal closer to a sine wave. (subtractive synthesis)

    A saxophone is already very close to a square wave, so I didn’t think distortion would effect it very much. So if you make it less like a square wave, the distortion will have a better effect on it.

    That makes perfect sense. Thanks so much. I found plans for a Simple Square Wave Shaper pedal I think I will make.

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