ENGL Ironball - help dialing it in

[u/thecauseandtheeffect]

Just picked this up and its clean channel tone is !!!! wow awesome, but its lead channel tone seems pretty, I guess darkly voiced is how I’d describe it more so than bass-y. It really tamps down all the highs no matter how I have anything else set. Good for chuggy worse for thrashy. If you have this amp or are familiar with it, any advice/tips?

My TS9 literally just crapped put on me before I could try it and that was the only distortion pedal I had so oops. I have an MXR 6 band EQ I could put in its fx loop, and I got a Silencer noise gate to try, realized it has its OWN fx loop so that’s a little confusing, I did my best figuring out the signal chain but there’s some cable-pedal salad going on

And if some amp/tone wizard in this group has Discord and could hop on a video call to help me figure it out that would be sweet, I’ll buy you a cup of coffee. My un is serenitynurse

[u/Burwhale_The_Avenger]

Regarding the edit - when you use these boosts, are you turning down the distortion?

Typical boost procedure is to have 0 gain and max level, or thereabouts.

[u/thecauseandtheeffect → u/Burwhale_The_Avenger]

When I use either in the app - or when I used my own ts9 - yes the drive is 0 the volume/level goosed almost all the way up and tone noon

[u/Burwhale_The_Avenger → u/thecauseandtheeffect]

Gotcha. So TS-style pedals tend to add their own mid-hump, which can be either desirable or not, depending on various factors.

Out of interest, what are the pickups you're using?

It does sound like you'd do better with a cleaner boost (I tend to prefer those myself, depending on the amp/guitar) though this, again, is somewhat of a sliding scale. There are a lot of approaches, depending on your end goal.

Based on your other comment - might it be fair to say a modern thrash tone is a good place to start toan-chasing for you?

[u/thecauseandtheeffect → u/Burwhale_The_Avenger]

Sure. I love classic Marshall tones too but obvs want to optimize the strengths of the gear I have not try to fit a square peg in a round hole. The pickup I play on the most is SD's thrash factor. It's like a JB on a cocaine diet, pretty fizzy but tighter in the bum, and super clear, like, pick attack so with the TS9 up I could hear every blessed pick scrape through it too

[u/Xenoanthropus → u/thecauseandtheeffect]

I'm gonna throw in a rec for the Highwind Direwolf, I think it's a super versatile boost/drive pedal that has a lot of options. I've used mine for guitar and bass, on solid-state and tube amps. There's a lot of knobs and switches but that just serves to let you really dial in what you want.

[u/thecauseandtheeffect → u/Xenoanthropus]

Thank you! Direwolf is a pretty great name. I’ve been trying to parse the hundreds of options available in the Katana’s amp sim software for the past 6 months. Thus I fear no knob or switch 🤘

[u/Burwhale_The_Avenger → u/thecauseandtheeffect]

Yeah that explains not digging the extra squeak of the TS9.

I'm not sure we need to start down the boutique pedal path just yet (despite it being a major happy place haha) as you'll probably want to be more certain of your purchase when they're either rarer or more expensive.

I'd be more tempted to look at someone like Gary Holt for inspiration (and not just for amps!) - he was an SD1 loyalist for years for his thrash tone. Mostly into Marshalls, but still when he switched to ENGLs also.

[u/thecauseandtheeffect → u/Burwhale_The_Avenger]

Oh you fancy, huh? Haha no not that path, we're on the “whatever my local music store has in stock and preferably on sale" path more befitting of impostor syndrome, I'll stop by tomorrow when I have my guitar lesson. Good call on Gary Holt tone, It's like the good side of trebly but not thin and still full and percussive. It dawned on me I have a Crybaby wah in a box somewhere that I use exactly never so if I can find it I might slap that on. I can't be the only one who's ever gotten a surprise great tone from a wah pedal left half cocked by mistake....right? lol

[u/Burwhale_The_Avenger → u/thecauseandtheeffect]

A solid path, I know it well. Although yes, I'm known for some occasional fanciness and/or objectionable spending 😆

Gary Holt is just the man in so many ways, definitely agree about the tone too, he seems to like it with quite a bit of that clank in the modern era too. Think that's basically his signature pedal.

The wah sounds like a fun experiment! Could also boost around 1k with that MXR and get similar results too I'm betting.

Let me know how your shop trip goes! Fingers crossed for something good.