amp growl

  • Thread starter Thread starter Anonymous
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I think with Bogner he may use some lower voltage ,and a looser low end.
The clip of the 20th is KT88 so I think its more in his preamp ,XTC blue does it as well less gain but similar tonality IMO ,
 
i wanna hear a clip of steve k's mesa 2c+, or, any of you that might have one for that matter.

a good clip..not a shitty one like a lot of the youtube 240/360p ones....blech.
i want a nice clean, clear clip! i DEMAND it LOL!

anyone?
 
mightywarlock":bj1bbibt said:
THIS is what I get out of my Original Krankenstein with a Maxon boosting it.
The Krankenstein+ seems smoother....
but the GROWL that is in the original amp is making me go bananas for these amps lately.
That, and the combination of my Bare Knuckle Warpigs (now those indeed have a Mid Growl in them that is awesome).
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Lol, I knew that was Universal bar and grill just looking at that vid!
 
the sound is caused in my opinion by a more low mid focus in the pre ,slightly reduced and smoothed high end
but most important a metric crap ton of compression and saturation in the gainstaging..
but I am not an amp builder .

Egnater stuff will do this as well
 
gtr31":2ukftxdp said:
the sound is caused in my opinion by a more low mid focus in the pre ,slightly reduced and smoothed high end
but most important a metric crap ton of compression and saturation in the gainstaging..
but I am not an amp builder .

Egnater stuff will do this as well
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I don't think it has anything to do with compression or EQ.

If we think of a Sine Wave as the smoothest form of a note — the most un-growly — then the flutter/vibration that a growl has would be caused by the actual shape of the waveform, itself. And that is regardless of compression or frequency emphasis. But of course, those two things can help shape the waveform and response of an amp.
 
FourT6and2":32y3cqis said:
gtr31":32y3cqis said:
the sound is caused in my opinion by a more low mid focus in the pre ,slightly reduced and smoothed high end
but most important a metric crap ton of compression and saturation in the gainstaging..
but I am not an amp builder .

Egnater stuff will do this as well
Click to expand...

I don't think it has anything to do with compression or EQ.

If we think of a SIN Wave as the smoothest form or a note — the most un-growly — then the flutter/vibration that a growl has would be caused by the actual shape of the waveform, itself. And that is regardless of compression or frequency emphasis. But of course, those two things can help shape the waveform and response of an amp.
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See you are a builder or understand way more than me .lol
 
my opinion is that a sine wave doesn't growl. growl is a function of the low mid frequencies hitting the distortion stage. many amps roll off highs and lows before the gain/distortion stages to give a certain type of tone or feel. depending on how much lows and highs they roll off, and at what frequency they roll it off, it will change the amount or type of growl.

back in the day when i used Rocktron preamps, i would manipulate the eq before the distortion to change the distortion shape or feel. by adding more mids between 650-1200hz you increase the sustain and compression, but totally kill the growl....which plays fine for legato leads. the growl was down around 225-300hz; by boosting that area i could greatly increase the apparent distortion and growl...but at the expense of legato sustain. there is always a trade off.....absolute chunk. or smooth lead.

many amps that provide tons of chunk and growl "need" a tube screamer to smooth it out for leads....hence the reason many recto users also employ a tube screamer. they don't use a tube screamer for distortion mind you (as can be noted by their settings) but the tube screamer acts like a filter or eq to clean up certain low frequencies and tighten the mix.

another way around the tube screamer is by choice of pickups and guitar. a bright sounding guitar with tons of high mids will naturally kill off some growl and lend itself to a smoother lead feel.

try an eq before your amp and play around with the frequencies i talked about and see if you can't change the growl/distortion of your amp.
 
Was playing along with AIC's "Rooster" last night and the word "growl" definitely slammed into my mind about the time Staley sings "You know, he ain't gonna die". Cantrell is a tone kind! Love that stuff.

My old EL34 Shiva and XTC Classic on the blue channel definitely nailed that type of growl. I've been jonesing for another Shiva and will have one again one day.
 
singtall":29n9wtis said:
my opinion is that a sine wave doesn't growl.
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Of course not. That's why I used it as an example, broseph.

I may not remember everything perfectly from my college acoustical engineering classes (I majored in business after all), and I'm no expert. But a sine wave is a pure tone. Combine multiple sine waves and you magically have a new sound with tone, timbre, and harmonic content. That harmonic content can change the shape of the wave. And all those different waves combine to form overtones (both harmonic and non-harmonic). The right shapes and harmonic content, when combined, form a sort of "doppler effect" that you hear as "growl." The same thing happens when you tune a guitar using natural harmonics. You listen for the "beats" (doppler effect) between your reference note and the string you are tuning. The slower the beats, the more in-tune your string is, right?

Well, when you play a chord (like a perfect 5th - a power chord) with a gained-out amp, you have a sound with lots of harmonic content, and all its individual sine waves (because the building block of any sound can be broken down into its fundamental and individual sine waves) combine to create a pulsing/beating effect if the fundamental is low enough for your ear to perceive the distance (read: time) between each pulse.

While you maybe can perceive a 20,000 Hz tone, you can't perceive the time (pulse width) between each cycle of even a 1,000 Hz tone. But you can perceive the pulse width of a 100 Hertz note. All of that is why it's easier to get an amp to growl when you're hitting some gained-out power chord with a low fundamental. And some chords will growl (like a 5th) and others will not (an octave).

I don't know if compression and EQ and all that matter. Maybe they do. All I'm attempting to do is explain what "growl" is to begin with.

Here's a good example. In this video, the synth is playing pure tones. But the waveform maybe be square, sawtooth, sine, whatever. On the lower notes you can definitely hear a growl. Because you can perceive the pulse width of each cycle in the note because they are slow enough. Same thing happens with a guitar amp. Lots of gain + the right chords = growl.



And in this one, you can both hear and see "growl" starting at 1:10. Although it's at a much higher frequency than you'd hear on a guitar amp. But same principle.

 
i'm with you bro. i went back and reread what you said and what i posted and almost slapped myself in the head. duh!

i was attempting to explain it in a way that guitar players could understand and even maybe help them to get more/less of using an eq.

but what you said was correct and technically direct to the point.
 
so, back to it, what in the circuit is the main factor to get growl in an amp?
 
yeti":323wyc4j said:
so, back to it, what in the circuit is the main factor to get growl in an amp?
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I don't think there's any one thing. It's the sum of the circuit, itself. It's how an amp is voiced + how the amp is dialed in.
 
ronjhoser":u6aq75uk said:
This is my growl reference:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_3TlrZLpQ0
Marshalls can do it, but I wouldn't call it a typical Marshall sound. This guitar tone just haunts me, so I understand your quest. :rawk:
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I agree Killer tone just reading some back ground ,that amp appears to have been a Custom Marshall with 8 El34s :shocked:
 
cujo":2yk0aoxh said:
Diezel Hagen growls more than any diezel !
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+1

And this ain't no competition - but I've tried explaining this "sonic attribute" as a "gnawing, chewing, burbling, lengthy decaying" sound, particular to chords but sometimes lower register single notes/strings too.

It's a tasty sound for sure :yes:
 
AND!!! As there's a lot of Bogner speak throughout this thread - there's a reason I own 'em. They do this "gnawing, chewing, growling, burbling" thing REAL well.
 
Ventura":1nw9tgnz said:
AND!!! As there's a lot of Bogner speak throughout this thread - there's a reason I own 'em. They do this "gnawing, chewing, growling, burbling" thing REAL well.
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He is probably one of the most known for that IMO .Its in the 20th Shiva clip I posted KT88 ,Its in the XTC el34 .Its actually even in the pedals to some extent , the one he is into a fender deluxe and at one point it has that growl ..
 
this "gnawing, chewing, growling, burbling" thing is exactly what im after.

that accept tone has always been one of my favorites...even back in the day i knew it was something unattainable by mere mortal gear!
 
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