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

[Hollowway]

I thought this was the reason why, though.
Most guitarists don't want to distort the lower frequencies hence a multiband distortion isn't something many companies make, I would think.

By the way, I hate hate hate hate how so many amps/pedals/etc try to cut the lows or do things so the lower frequencies don't distort as much. Distorting the low sounds for a smeary/muddy/boomy/saggy sound is all I want lol

That’s exactly right - most guitarists don’t want to distort the lower frequencies. Multiband distortion allows you to select how much distortion occurs at each “band.” So you could keep the lows completely clean, and only distort the mods/highs, and that keeps the tone tight. That’s what a lot of bass players do.

If you wanted to fuzz out the low end, like you were saying, you could add more distortion on the lows than highs or mids.

The signal splitting is a good idea, and that’s actually how dug pinnick used to run his bass. He split it, and sent the highs to a guitar amp with distortion, and the lows to a bass amp kept clean.

It’s very possible I’ll just have to file this under the “stuff Hollowway thinks is cool, but everyone else doesn’t,” along with 8 string Floyds and reverse slant pickups.

 

[col]

I thought about this the other day. A distortion that had a 6 band eq except it wasn't an eq but the faders controlled the distortion mix for each frequency band would be cool.

Doesn't the Sansamp PSA-1 eq work like this? And I think the Recto eq does this as well iirc. (Don't quote me on that)

 

[budda]

Ya boy pete thorn has a video on the pinnick bi-amp thing. This has been discussed.

Guitarists are more worried about which boutique pickup into bespoke guitar into hand built amp into $400 cab to worry about it though.

Let the bassist make your tones incredible, if you are in a band. If you are playing alone, rabbit hole the shit out of this and come out with a better tone and better understanding .

Definitely not a new or novel concept and theres resources on it. Same as clean blend in drive pedals.

 

[Sacha]

You already sort of are in a modern metal mix, it's just being done on the guitar + bass together. The guitar is filtered so you're only distorting mids + highs while the bass covers the clean (sometimes) lows + distorted mids highs to glue with the guitars. The lower you tune the LESS lows and low mids you want in the guitar tone to keep it clear in my experience.

But give it a shot maybe you could come up with some new and different tones! There is something percussive with cleans that you definitely don't get with distortion and that can be pretty cool.

 

[Hollowway]

Doesn't the Sansamp PSA-1 eq work like this? And I think the Recto eq does this as well iirc. (Don't quote me on that)

The PSA-1 definitely does that. 3 bands. IDK about the recto, though.

And I'm not saying there aren't pedals out there that do this. There are some. A decent number. What I'm saying is that I'm on here and a couple of FB groups for ERGs, and I just never hear people talking about it. I would think that this stuff would be way more useful to an 8 or 9 string player than a 6 string player, but instead of reducing the distortion on the low end, we just cut the low end out of our signal in an attempt to keep things tight, and not wooly. The Source Audio Ultra Wave has a lot of cool functions for this, but I only see six string players using it for synthy type sounds. I just wasn't sure if there's a specific reason people avoid the pedal, or if it isn't audibly different, or what. I think I might pick up the ultra wave and play around with it, just for kicks, and see if anything cool happens. I'm not interested in all the weird distortion - just the standard one - but on higher freqs only.

 

[Gator]

Honestly I think they all sound too synthy, and while I agree it can be a cool thing to do, it changes the timbre of the guitar enough to sound off. But a mix can really be different.


However distortion is essentially harmonics and compression, with less harmonics and compression on the low string it won’t blend as well, and while the fundamental can sound clearer, it might end up sounding dull. So different mixing techniques might be needed. I hate drive blend knobs because I can hear the clean like a sharp tack of a dull dry stain in the sound, no matter how low unless off.

To your point, cutting the eq though doesn’t cut out the fundamental and harmonics on the note, just the sub frequencies. So you still have the same sound for every string. As long as you’re not cutting out the lowest notes fundamental note. Make sure to note what freq it is, especially with ergs.

Of course you can tweak and make something awesome! And I’m all for it. But the average players think guitars are ancient black magic and going against the standard norm is heresy. Even for 8+ string guitars haha

 

[74n4LL0]

Jumped in as I have both the Source Audio Ultra Wave and the Multiwave before that for like 15 years.
These pedals are incredibly versatile, yes you can craft synth-like sounds.
The Multiwave allowed me to achieve heavy distortion while maintaining clarity. It allowed me to play complex chords without them turning into a mushy mess, keeping each note distinct and clean.
The Ultra Wave I bought a couple of years ago it's so flexible that you can even use it as a compressor or a harmonic tremolo
It lets you tailor each frequency band to your liking, adjust both the gain and volume for each of the 10 bands and choose between two different types of drive running at the same time for each band, such as distortion, fuzz, or overdrive. One of my favorite setups with the Ultra Wave is having a fuzzy effect on just the top three strings while keeping the lower strings clean.

 

[GunpointMetal]

Bass is usually trying to be fit into subs and highs, leaving the middle for everything else. Guitar is the exact opposite in most use cases. I've tried it with my really low-tuned guitars by frequency splitting and using a tighter distortion on the lows and a looser one on the highs. In my experiments it didn't make enough of a sonic improvement other than a few special FX cases to be worth the hassle.