Adding Crunch?

[BooHead]

Hey Everybody,

I am trying to find a pedal to add a good Crunchy Overdrive to my sound. Currently I am running a RAT Pedal which kills my low end and is too hot. I hear too much string noise and it isn't cutting it.

I want something that sounds Aggressive when I attack the bass, but won't kill my tone and something that won't doesn't sound like a dying cat in heat when I am not playing. I need it to be crunchy.

Any suggestions?

Thanks.

[MoBeach]

For me an aggressive attack gives me an aggressive sound

[rratajski]

I just got a Fulltone Bass Drive MOSFET and it can get Marshally crunchy for sure. It has a nice mids boost without killing the lows, so I know it will cut.
Vegas let me hear his Sansamp GT2 and that was DEFINITELY crunchy.

BTW, what RAT are you using? Have you modified it yet? Have you tried a blender with the RAT?

[Pitbull Growl]

English Muff'ns are pretty crunchy too. They're supposed to be Marshall JCM-ulators. You'll lose a li'l bass response, but if you do a search on here for "Modify Muff'n" there's a thread that shows you how to add more lows to the signal w/a simple input filter cap swap. (The board is silkscreened to so it's easy to identify)

[fishsticks]

Voodoo Labs Sparkle Drive.*
*Tube screamer with a clean blend

[Smurf-o-Deth]

I use a Zvex Box of Metal for heavy crunch, which has a silent-switchable gate to kill hiss and feedback built in. I posted some clips of it a month or two ago. It may be more gain than you want, but considering you are using a Rat, maybe not.

[Crunchy]

Pork Loin - Tons of low end retention and versatile, yet pricey...

[wetzelman1]

gonna be grabbin a Ibanez Pd-7 pretty soon, seems pretty versatile with many different settings. Check it on youtube.

[skulletwhip]

Fulltone ocd.

[Planet Boulder]

Originally Posted by skulletwhip

Fulltone ocd.

After MANY(!) trials and errors, that's the one I've settled on.

I'd also suggest the Digitech Bad Monkey (unmodded).

But before we go further, I would submit that "crunch" to one person is often not the same to someone else. Is there a specific bassist's tone that you are looking to achieve?