Another great, cheapish pedal for bass: EHX Hot Tubes

man EHX is killing it lately,,,, wish they could get the muff right though,,.... they did invent that one,,,, right??

 

+1 for the Hot Tubes. I picked it up recently. The gain is not bad at all... kind of typical CMOS dirt similar to a B3k or Red Llama at low levels.

 

I agree jumble, the hot tubes is awesome with bass. It really does pushed tubes very well. And the tone bypass is killer on it. I really enjoyed mine while I had it. The only reason I sold it was because I had other OD's that fit my needs better right now. I could totally see myself getting this pedal again down the line. Great pedal. This coupled with the glove, you've got your tubey grit and od fully covered.

 

I've been wanting one for guitar for a while. Never thought it would be useable on bass as well but I like what I hear until 0:55 where it becomes too much.

 

How did you find the bass loss? Was there any with the tone engaged or disengaged?

 

Does the hardwire cm2 sound more "tube-like" than this Hot tubes?

 

The Hot Tubes is the same circuit as the Way Huge Red Llama, just some different values. Personally, I thought the EHX was fizzy. I like the Way Huge a lot more.

None of these pedals sound like tube amps though. They’re meant to overdrive tubes. So the question becomes, what are you looking for?

 

They both have a generic "tube warmth" to my ear but those terms are so relative these days because there are so many differing reference points. I take my reference point from my 1967 Fender Bassman head that I keep in my studio. Both of those pedals have the same saturation characteristics because of the circuit design as the Fender Bassman Circuit. Hot Tubes has a simple tone control that can be bypassed for a full range tone a bit more bass but can be a bit strident with a bright or active bass. The CM10 is a really nice pedal because it has two gain stagings and tone sections one more vintage and the other more modern, to my ear there is less bass loss more of a tightening unless you are a real boom junkie.

There are other budget pedals that do a more comprehensive job of tube emulation but you will need to pick your flavor. The Joyo "Soound" series are very good based on the Tech 21 series that is all but discontinued.

 

No matter what low gain OD or dirty boost tube emulation pedal I use, it never sounds like a tube amp.

 

It all depends on your reference point for "tube amp" that good old Fender Bassman/Showman/Twin clean tube amp "pickup truck" tone or some souped up hot rodded tube monsterized gain stacked Marshall/Boogie/Bogner freakazoid tube amp?

 

actually the hot tubes uses a 4558 dual opamp going into 4 of the 4049UBE CMOS stages, whereas a red llama just uses two of the 4049UBE stages and no 4558. while they're both CMOS based, the red llama is a much simpler circuit and, IMO, the two don't sound anything like

 

Thanks for the explanation. I found a lot of similarities feel-wise, but just couldn't get over the high end response on the Hot Tubes.

 

Is the Red Llama still produced?

 

you can still get them brand new:
Way Huge WHE206 25th Anniversary Red Llama Overdrive | Reverb

Way HUGE Electronics WHE206 Red Llama 25th Anniversary Overdrive for sale online | eBay