Why don’t we see much about Multiband distortion for ERGs?

[Hollowway]

I’ve been reading a lot about bass tones, because I’ve been trying to figure out how to get the sound I like. In guitar, especially ERGs, I like “tight” distortion, which is usually Latin for cutting out boomy bass tones. But in bass, they don’t really cut the lower frequencies, since that’s kind of where the bass is supposed to be. Instead, lots of guys who use distortion only distort the higher frequencies.
So I started reading about doing that for guitar, and I kept coming across stuff from 10+ years ago - especially the Quadrafuzz that Craig Anderton designed. Apparently that had some cool benefits, like getting rid of “intermodulation with the higher strings” when playing a power chord.

But it doesn’t sound like anyone is using it for guitar. Why? Cuz they’re midrange instruments and we don’t really want to keep all the low stuff anyway?

 

[Rubbishplayer]

My two cents...

1. Most people have never heard of it (although I do remember Craig from way back).
2. Building on 2, most musicians' introduction to an amp/effect is "(so-and-so) uses it". In the 70s, that name would be some LA session musician (e.g. Tom Scholz), 80s Van Halen, 90s Vai, these days it might be Misha Mansoor or Matt Heafy.
3. Building on 3, that's because people listen to actual recordings and say "wow, how did she/he get that sound?"
4. Building on 4, they got that sound themselves usually trying to sound like someone they admire. Why?
5. Because most musicians are musicians first, recording engineers second - a very, very distant second. Why?
6. Most of us can't be arsed to meddle with equipment all day, instead just wanting to dial-in a great sound, then shut-up and play. Why do you think modellers are so popular? Indeed, there's one model (I forget the name) that has just one big "knob" to adjust its sound.
7. As such, effects like Quadrafuzz (a cool concept IMHO) don't get picked up as they are not recognised as a waypoint on the journey to get the sound people want (i.e. I want Misha's sound on "Letter Experiment"; ah, I need an AxeFX).

Now this is not a criticism of either the guitarist I cite here, or the engineering geek. I have deep respect for both schools of thought and, indeed, when they come together (as they did with Allan Holdsworth), the results can be magical.

It's just a matter of what your interests and goals are. Personally, I'm in the "dial it in quick" camp when it comes to effects, instead being more fascinated in guitar construction.

As soon as Steve Vai records with it, it'll pick up.

 

[l1ll1]

Everything multiband is hard to dial in/get right, especially when it's concerning transients / higher frequencies. There is a reason everyone is so picky with standard compressors, because you either know what you're doing and have the controls on the device to set the comp to your playing style/sound or the simpler compressors have to match that kind of by default. With multiband, you multiply that problem, especially when it comes to chords/single notes/clean/distortion/lead/chugs you get it. Much more complex then your regular bass playing.

 

[narad]

My two cents...

1. Most people have never heard of it (although I do remember Craig from way back).
2. Building on 2, most musicians' introduction to an amp/effect is "(so-and-so) uses it". In the 70s, that name would be some LA session musician (e.g. Tom Scholz), 80s Van Halen, 90s Vai, these days it might be Misha Mansoor or Matt Heafy.
3. Building on 3, that's because people listen to actual recordings and say "wow, how did she/he get that sound?"
4. Building on 4, they got that sound themselves usually trying to sound like someone they admire. Why?
5. Because most musicians are musicians first, recording engineers second - a very, very distant second. Why?
6. Most of us can't be arsed to meddle with equipment all day, instead just wanting to dial-in a great sound, then shut-up and play. Why do you think modellers are so popular? Indeed, there's one model (I forget the name) that has just one big "knob" to adjust its sound.
7. As such, effects like Quadrafuzz (a cool concept IMHO) don't get picked up as they are not recognised as a waypoint on the journey to get the sound people want (i.e. I want Misha's sound on "Letter Experiment"; ah, I need an AxeFX).

Now this is not a criticism of either the guitarist I cite here, or the engineering geek. I have deep respect for both schools of thought and, indeed, when they come together (as they did with Allan Holdsworth), the results can be magical.

It's just a matter of what your interests and goals are. Personally, I'm in the "dial it in quick" camp when it comes to effects, instead being more fascinated in guitar construction.

As soon as Steve Vai records with it, it'll pick up.

Yea, Misha should put out a multiband distortion under the Horizon Devices moniker and ask a couple friends to slip it into their socials and then suddenly it'd be a thing again.

 

[ExMachina]

I don't really know anything about bass amps, but assuming they're mostly clean, I'd say it's because of the difference in the amp designs.

One way to characterize a guitar amp is it's headroom curve, or headroom vs frequency, so how much more gain could you apply to a test signal at each frequency until it would enter the nonlinear/clipping part. Probably what youd find is the amp is designed with more headroom in the lower frequencies to begin with, and if it's not we add a boost that filters the low end more to get more headroom.

So I guess I'm saying that in many guitar applications you just don't need to split the signal it's already kinda there.

 

[Chrome Dinette]

Source Audio used to make multi-band distortions (Soundbox Multiwave) but I don't remember them being very popular with anyone.




manuals are still online:

https://www.sourceaudio.net/uploads/1/1/5/1/115104065/sb_pro_multiwave_distortion_manual.pdf

 

[budda]

Modellers: run a filter to a second line and put a drive there. There’s also bi-amping and the one with the treble gets more of the dirt.

This is also why more bass distortion pedals have a clean blend compared to guitar, no?

 

[Chrome Dinette]

I used to have an Eventide Eclipse that had multi band distortions in it. I'm pretty sure the H9 & 90 have some.

 

[profwoot]

I don't buy that it would actually be better to split the signal but that nobody can be arsed to do it. I think the reason is that guitar simply doesn't have the responsibility of holding down the low end so it's pointless to process the signal like it does.

In a hypothetical bassless 8-string band it might make some sense, I guess. But even Animals as Leaders just use a real bass (possibly a guitar processed like a bass on their first album; I've never been clear on that).

 

[Jotun@]

This sort of reminds me of the old Novak guitars that Charlie Hunter used to play where there was a bass pickup with outputs and the guitar strings had their own pickups with outputs. I saw him live with this setup and it blew my mind. The bass ent to its own amp and the guitar had its own path. In that live situation it made a lot of sense. Flash forward to when eights hit a mainstream market and no one did this design for the pickups in production models. I feel that it has use cases but is generally too niche and complex for most of us to be bothered with. I do have a guitar with pickup and piezo outs and I’ll run a parallel signal chain occasionally to mess around with different bands on each or split it to stereo. It’s not always useful or practical but it can add depth and pull my guitar into a better spot in the mix.

 

[gunch]

The only example off the top of my head is the dude from secret cutter, cuts his signal three ways and has two marshalls with cabs and a bass ampeg head with a bass cab. I dont know what kind of wizardry he's doing at the A/B/Y stage

 

[Hollowway]

Yeah, I mean, there ARE pedals out there, designed for bass and guitar, that do the multiband distortion thing. I came across a few of them when deciding what bass distortion to get.

And, even in the bass world, it’s not what I’d call “common.” But there are those that like to do it. I just don’t hear about it with guitar.

I kinda feel like I should pick up a pedal, just to mess with it on guitar. Given that I play 8s, it might be cool.

 

[Romeo Knight]

Nowadays, it'll be pretty easy to build your own multiband distortion patches in most of the modern modeling amps (those that support parallel signal paths like the Quad Cortex), no need for dedicated devices.

 

[Emperoff]

Source Audio used to make multi-band distortions (Soundbox Multiwave) but I don't remember them being very popular with anyone.




manuals are still online:

https://www.sourceaudio.net/uploads/1/1/5/1/115104065/sb_pro_multiwave_distortion_manual.pdf

I have one for sale for peanuts and it's not moving, so you are right.

 

[gh0styboi]

Honestly, I could see it being useful if you don't have/want a bassist. But for me personally, I want the bass to be that frequency range accentuation there, and I want it to be clearly differentiated from the guitar, because that allows for a lot of cool interplay in terms of playing and mixing. The idea that I could accomplish both on guitar sounds cool until I think of sitting down in front of my DAW to mix a bass track in with it, and all the boost/cut I'd have to do to make them sit well without crapping all over each other, and I get a headache just thinking about it

But that's from a mixing/production standpoint. From a purely player standpoint, could be fun/interesting to mess around with.