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Re: The sound of NOFX with THE RAT?

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5/5/2000 8:43 PM

Re: The sound of NOFX with THE RAT?

For Lagwagon, NUFAN, and most Fat Wreck stuff I'd go with one of those MXR Hot Tubes - I 'think' that's what the schematic I built was - the one that's basically Craig Anderton's tube-sound fuzz, but with added filtering.

I thought it was a *really* great sounding distortion unit. The only problem mine had was that there was a sort of static fizzing as the note died away, but if you could get rid of that, it would be killer for your application IMO - very cranked-up Marshall sounding to my ears.

For a change, you could also try a Colorsound overdriver which I rate really highly for some of Lagwagon's fuzzier strummed rhythms like 'Smile' off 'Triple Plaidinum'.

I also like my Electro Harmonix Hot Tubes overdrive as it's really crunchy for stagework but sucks pretty bad at low volumes - you really need the amp to help you out with this pedal, so add a little of the amp's own gain.

oops! I'm rambling, anyway, hope this helps a little.

... Ian

5/8/2000 2:21 PM

Well I've allready build the MXR-Distortion + (not the same circuit as the MXR Hot-Tubes-Distortion), but this unit, in my opinion, has a worse tone, you need to put an EQ after it.
But when I look at the circuit of the MXR-Hot-Tubes, this looks better(maybe because it's bigger). I think I will try it one time.
Do you know how the Ibanez Tube Screamer is sounding? I promiss that it has nearly the same sound,but I don't know. There are so many effects...
But thanks a lot for your help.
Ah, I forgot something: Do you know on which page I can find the Colorsound Overdrive? Because I like the song smile from Lagwagon. It's one of my favourite songs.
But the best sounding guitar in a song, is the one in Linoleum from NOFX. Do you know how I can get this sound without a tube-amp?

Thanks for your help!
Holger

5/8/2000 10:36 PM

If you're going for punk I'd stay clear of the Ibanez Tube Screamer, don't get me wrong, it's good for some things, just not punk IMO.

The MXR-Hot-Tubes is nothing like the TS9, and sounds really cool as a lone source of distortion. I just dug it out again today following this thread.

I can't remember where I got the Colorsound overdriver schematic from, but I do recommend building it if you can find the schem - try Aron Nelson's or RG's website.

Can't help with the NOFX - don't dig them much.

... Ian

5/11/2000 11:33 PM

I just finished building The Rat, and I got a very "thin" sound if the filter(tone)-pot is turned counter clock-wise and "full"-sound on the other end, and I like it very much. I used a 100K log-pot, 1N4148-diodes and LM308N-IC, I couldn´t find any 2N5458-fets, so I used BF245A instead: they should be quite a close match - you just have to turn the fets around as the pins are "mirrored" (g-s-d -> d-s-g).
Try these if you used different parts - I compared this with original Rat, and I think this is a very close match.

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