Official Joyo Club Part 2: Beyond Thunderclone

[Crystalman85]

Okay I've recently purchased the joyo california sound and it quite versatile for a $40 amp simulation/distortion pedal. at certain settings, it's quite useful for bass. I can go from a warm tube sound to a heavy grind. speaking of which, I was able to duplicate the warm grinding distortion sound from get born again by alice in chains. here's the song in case no one is familiar with the tune.



I was inspired to get one from jo bass. originally I was gonna get the british sounds mainly cause I was a fan of marshall type distortions on bass, but after checking out his demo of the california sound on bass, I've decided to get that pedal instead. for the price, it's pretty decent. the other joyo pedal I was think of getting is the joyo golden face. I was interested in getting that pedal from marcobella. I do like the metallic grind that it provides. here's his clip.


golden face demoed at 1:21

 

[Shadowkast]

Can I join?

I have the following Joyo Gear:

• U.S. Dream
  
• Classic Flanger
• Orange Juice
• California
• Zombie Amp

 

[jdch28]

Well, just ordered my first Joyo pedal: an American Sound. Can't wait to test it out!

 

[cheechi]

have any of the clones of clones of clones made a mini version of the Joyo (based on the Boss or Ibanez?) classic flanger? It's a great pedal but it's one I use infrequently enough to want some of that space back.

I do have a mini (monoprice) based on the EHX but it's not the same, it makes a better guitar pedal than bass just because of the sounds it does vs doesn't get.

I was considering the Eno clone of the Boss BF-2, but isn't the Joyo based on the original (better?) flanger? The controls aren't labeled the same between these two, which doesn't always matter, my approach with flangers is to turn the knobs to find the one flanged bass sound I'm looking for.

 

[Karlson541]

Following is the rather long story about how I rediscovered a couple of my Joyo pedals that I initially had written off and how I even eventually ended up being positively surprised and really satisfied with the result they gave me:

Bought a Joyo California Sound and a Joyo Orange Juice awhile back.
I found the Orange Juice overdrive tone to be a little too clanky for me to have any real use of it, even if the clanky character of it was actually exactly what had caught my interest originally, and while I found the California Sound to be capable of a really great fat meaty heavy distortion tone, I really had no actual use for that either. Additionally I found the clean tone of the California Sound to sound somewhat muffled.
However recently at a whim I decided to mess a bit with the California Sound once again to see if I after all was capable of squeezing a usable preamp tone out of it, with the intention of perhaps being able to use it in my home practice setup placing it in front of my headphone preamp.
To my surprise with some knob twisting I actually managed eventually to get a really nice meaty and punchy tone out of it with just a bit of hair added from the drive knob.
At low gain I even found the overdrive to sit really nicely, like it just adds a slight hairy edge to the clean tone, without the tone loosing definition or the drive taking over the signal, and without for that reason sounding like the drive is something that is added on top of the clean tone. The overdrive just kind of blends in naturally with the signal without being intrusive and acts in a really dynamic way to your play.
Anyway, even if I was pretty satisfied with what I got out of just my California Sound pedal I decided to experiment with adding the Orange Juice in front of it.
After some knob fiddling I dialed in the Orange Juice to produce a fairly clean tone that was actually pretty close to the tone of my direct signal, just sounding ever so slightly more defined, articulated and focused. Luckily those rather subtle nuances translated to the California Sound that the Orange Juice was stacked in front of, perfecting the already good tone I got from the California Sound alone, taking it from good to great sounding.

Edit: Note that I also got a simple tube preamp (without any EQ options) and an optical compressor in my chain, after the California Sound, before the headphones preamp.

 

[MtManiac]

Following is the rather long story about how I rediscovered a couple of my Joyo pedals that I initially had written off and how I even eventually ended up being positively surprised and really satisfied with the result they gave me:

Bought a Joyo California Sound and a Joyo Orange Juice awhile back.
I found the Orange Juice overdrive tone to be a little too clanky for me to have any real use of it, even if the clanky character of it was actually exactly what had caught my interest originally, and while I found the California Sound to be capable of a really great fat meaty heavy distortion tone, I really had no actual use for that either. Additionally I found the clean tone of the California Sound to sound somewhat muffled.
However recently at a whim I decided to mess a bit with the California Sound once again to see if I after all was capable of squeezing a usable preamp tone out of it with the intention of perhaps being able to use it in my home practice setup placing it in front of my headphone preamp.
To my surprise with some knob twisting I actually managed eventually to get a really nice meaty and punchy tone out of it with just a bit of hair added from the drive knob.
At low gain I even found the overdrive to sit really nicely, like it just adds a slight hairy edge to the clean tone, without the tone loosing definition or taking over the signal, and without for that reason sounding like it is something that is added on top of the clean tone. The overdrive just kind of blends in naturally with the signal and acts in a really dynamic way to your play.
Anyway, even if I was pretty satisfied with what I got out of just my California Sound pedal I decided to experiment with adding the Orange Juice in front of it.
After some knob fiddling I dialed in the Orange Juice to produce a fairly clean tone that was actually pretty close to the tone of my direct signal, just sounding ever so slightly more defined, articulated and focused. Luckily those rather subtle nuances translated to the California Sound that the Orange Juice was stacked in front of, perfecting the already good tone I got from the California Sound alone, taking it from good to great sounding.

What were your OJ settings?

 

[Karlson541]

What were your OJ settings?

Orange Juice settings:
Volume 2 o'clock (set to unity level)
Voice 1 o'clock, perhaps just a hair less
Tone 11 o'clock
Drive 9 o'clock (set to max before it starts to enter the to break up zone, so that the signal still remains clean)

Note though that your result might vary from mine depending on what kind of signal you feed the Orange Juice with coming from your bass (tone and signal strength) as well as what you use to amplify your signal with in the end (voice of the amplifier and response of your speakers/headphones).

Hope you manage to get something useful out of it still though.
Would be interesting to hear what kind of results you get if your plan was to try it out yourself.

 

[MtManiac]

Orange Juice settings:
Volume 2 o'clock (set to unity level)
Voice 1 o'clock, perhaps just a hair less
Tone 11 o'clock
Drive 9 o'clock (set to max before it starts to enter the to break up zone, so that the signal still remains clean)

Note though that your result might vary from mine depending on what kind of signal you feed the Orange Juice with coming from your bass (tone and signal strength) as well as what you use to amplify your signal with in the end (voice of the amplifier and response of your speakers/headphones).

Hope you manage to get something useful out of it still though.
Would be interesting to hear what kind of results you get if your plan was to try it out yourself.

I’m eager to try it out - I have a P bass with SD SPB-1 pickups. Not sure how hot they are relative to yours, but what you described is what I’m mostly trying to achieve with all three of those pedals, and your description of all three matches how I’d describe them too.

 

[Karlson541]

I’m eager to try it out - I have a P bass with SD SPB-1 pickups. Not sure how hot they are relative to yours, but what you described is what I’m mostly trying to achieve with all three of those pedals, and your description of all three matches how I’d describe them too.

Perhaps you should know that the tone of my bass run direct without any pedals is rather bity and punchy with a lot of top end, so I guess one of the reasons why the slightly muffled character of the California Sound doesn't bother me could be that it might actually help round off and tame the tone of my bass a bit.
Also you should properly know that while the main tone shaping in my chain is in fact taking care of by the California Sound with the Orange Juice just refining it a slight bit I do also have a tube preamp in the chain after the California Sound as well as an optical compressor (though set to relatively low compression with a rather long attack) after the tube preamp before the headphone preamp.
And while the tube preamp is pretty basic and doesn't really have any tone shaping options it does color the signal with a little tube warmth and compression as well as it is set up to slightly break up when I dig in hard, complementing the mild overdrive from the California Sound.

Mind that what the tube preamp and compressor adds to the tone is fairly subtle nuances, but it still all adds up, so without those two additional pedals it will take you one step further away from being able to replicate what I achieved.

Sorry if my initial post was slightly misleading in that regard, wasn't the intention.

Still wish you good luck and still hope you can use my information to get closer to dialing in the tone you are looking for on your Joyo pedals, and if you do happen to have a tube preamp and an optical compressor try adding those at the end of your chain like I did.

 

[jdch28]

It's here! Can't wait to get home to try it out

 

[basst scho]

just posted these days on 2 other threads too, but since i´ve read this whole thread a few weeks ago (whyever...) when looking for cheap pedals, i´ll spam it here too:

great pedals

 

[boristhespider7]

Anyone tried the Space verb reverb? I'm looking for a budget reverb for some ambient type music, how is it?

BTW, also own the Dyna Comp, American Sound, Ultimate drive and Digi delay...all are keepers although i use some more than others. Have owned the OJ as well but returned it as too hissy and scooped for me

 

[jdch28]

I'm still trying out my new American Sound, so far I like it a lot. I'll share my thoughts when I've had more time to play with it.

I know the answer to the following question is already somewhere in this thread, but I'm slowly going through 92 pages, so I might as well ask away (Still gonna check the whole thing, tho):

Besides the AmSound & Ultimate Drive (which seems to be another favorite around here) which pedals do you guys recommend to check out? Which ones should I avoid like the plague? lol

 

[cheechi]

california, flanger, phaser.

 

[boristhespider7]

Anyone tried the Space verb reverb? I'm looking for a budget reverb for some ambient type music, how is it?

BTW, also own the Dyna Comp, American Sound, Ultimate drive and Digi delay...all are keepers although i use some more than others. Have owned the OJ as well but returned it as too hissy and scooped for me

No takers for the space verb?...maybe i'll start another thread

Besides the AmSound & Ultimate Drive (which seems to be another favorite around here) which pedals do you guys recommend to check out? Which ones should I avoid like the plague? lol

I haven't found any that i'd avoid. Depends on your taste. Personally i wasn't as impressed with the orange juice as i thought i would be, others rave about it though (prefer the American sound myself).
All the other pedals (listed 3 posts above) were keepers

 

[4StringAxe]

I have,

• Ultimate Drive.
• Ultimate Octave.
• California Sound.
• Tremolo.

 

[JustSomeDude]

Two American Sounds
Ultimate Drive
Tremolo

 

[Rocksolid]

British Sounds is worth a look. Like the American, but a different flavor.

 

[bassbrad]

I have the California Sound for all the boogie tones from bass 400 through triple rectifier.

American Sound does Fender and goosed fender circuits well but I had that covered so I sold it.
British Sound does the Marshall thing well but I have a modded Daddy-O so I sold it too.

 

[cheechi]

true, all four really are worth a try as they're cheap enough and you will find a buyer if it turns out you don't like it. My experience mirrored what I expected with the AC, I couldn't find a Vox bass sound I liked enough to warrant keeping it on my board. There are other (better is debatable of course) Marshall pedals than the British, and again it's just a matter of real estate for me. My miniscule guitar board was grateful to have the two of these added though.

Neither the British nor the Joyo Plexi (based on the Wampler Plexi) really gave me the Marshall sound that I want. If you would be willing to share your settings with it I'd like to give it another go; while I'd like to have a vintage Super Bass one of these days I'd still like to have a closer early Entwistle tone. I sold the plexi but put the British on my guitar board too.