Explanation of a few things...

[John D@508]

Searched it....

Can someone explain to me a few things....sorry if they are a little elementary.

What does gated mean?
What is difference between distortion and fuzz?
What is gain?
What is overdrive?

Thanks!

[bongomania]

Hi,
The FAQ to look in would be the one in the Effects forum.

Gated means the signal cuts on and off abruptly.
Fuzz is more clipped than distortion (look up "clipping").
Gain means the amount a signal is boosted--but in the context of distortion pedals and guitar amps, gain is used to mean "the amount of distortion". That's because turning up the levels (increasing the gain) going into the pedal/amp results in more distortion.
Overdrive is typically less clipped than distortion (and is usually meant to sound like a tube amp with the input gain turned up).

Note that "distortion" has other meanings outside the world of fx pedals.

[John D@508]

Thats just what I needed. Thanks!!!

[JTE]

Technically "gated" doesn't mean on and off abruptly, it means it's controlled by the gain of something else. A regular noise-gate works by shutting if the level is below a specified threshold. A common use is to kill a mic that's not getting input so it's less likely to cause phase cancellations, noise, or feedback. But people are fond of playing with things to see what they can do that the engineers never imagined. So someone hooked a gate's control to a kick drum mic, but put the bass' signal through the gate, not the kick. Now what happens is that the bass' signal doesn't get through until the kick drum hits. Makes the bass and kick sound very tight, because even if the bassist plays just ahead of the kick, nothing gets through to the ears until the kick drum hits.

It's also often used to control reverb- listen to that 20+ year old Phil Collins' stuff. I think the title of the record is "In The Air Tonight", where the drums enter- that's gated reverb (which I think is also reversed- instead of decaying it's opening).

So gating is using a signal level to control a level.

John

[bongomania]

...Except that he was talking about distortion and fuzz pedals, and in that context there is no gate, and no gate-controlling signal source! It's just the fuzz itself that cuts in and out sharply. "Gated fuzz" is a common expression in the fx forum, referring to specific sharp-choppy fuzzes.

[John D@508]

Originally Posted by bongomania

...Except that he was talking about distortion and fuzz pedals, and in that context there is no gate, and no gate-controlling signal source!

I was indeed talking about pedals, specfically the Fuzzrocious Momster, which does have a gate on it.

So,now Im a little confused.

[JTE]

OK- Noting indicates the questions are limited to distortion pedals, it looked like a request for definitions of terminology. I'd still suggest taking this to the Effects forum instead of the music theory one, and ask the question a bit more specifically - otherwise you'll get bombarded with technical definitions of all the terms, and discussions about the arcane details of those definitions. But it appears that you want to know less what does "gated" mean than "what does the maker of the Fuzzrocioius Momster mean when they say "gated"?

John

[John D@508]

Originally Posted by JTE

OK- Noting indicates the questions are limited to distortion pedals, it looked like a request for definitions of terminology. I'd still suggest taking this to the Effects forum instead of the music theory one, and ask the question a bit more specifically - otherwise you'll get bombarded with technical definitions of all the terms, and discussions about the arcane details of those definitions. But it appears that you want to know less what does "gated" mean than "what does the maker of the Fuzzrocioius Momster mean when they say "gated"?

John

No not at all...I am a student of Bass and want to learn the terminology of all aspects of music. Yours and Bongomanias post educated me enough, and steered me in the right direction so I could learn these things. Im not confused anymore and have a good grasp on my original questions. Thanks to you both!