More Wet/Dry Fodder for thought given all the delay ?'s.

[Kapo_Polenton]

So given my recent misfortune with a crappy supposed "zero loss effects" unit that I installed in my JCM800 combo, I'm back to thinking about wet/dry. I've done it before with one speaker wet and a 4 x 12 dry. Sounded really good. Line out from hotplate into effects into EH 44 magnum and then the speaker. That stereo sound really opens things up. Even side by side you get this big wall of sound. So here is my question, what is your fave small config of this setup?

1. Do you run one amp with distortion and split the send via a chorus or other and run a second amp CLEAN with effect on it? Clean Wet/Dry Dirty?
2. Do you run both amps with grit and just have the second one wet?
3. Do you do what I did above and use a separate power amp with a line out from the dry amp?

I'm interested because to me the simplest approach would be two combo amps. One as your dry tone and the other as a solid state / power amp unit. Seeing as you need two speakers anyway, having two combos is easier than a separate power amp and a cab and then also needing something like a hotplate for the line out. But that brings us to the big question.. this is all fine and dandy for home use or practice but what do you do live? Do you stick your mic on the wet side (solid state driven) or do you put it on the tube side dry? Solid state has the advantage of taking effects out front a lot better than tubes do and if you use a line out from a hotplate, you still end up going through a SS poweramp.

How do you guys do it? Use two mics live and bump them down to a blended signal or just have two mics in the mix and panned left and right for stereo image?

discuss!

 

[petejt]

I'm still trying to work out the best way.


At home I'm trying rather a big setup with two amps, a stereo poweramp and two stereo 4x12 cabs that are wired in an x-pattern.
It's quite elaborate. I haven't tried it live yet.

One amp head leads to a pair of speakers as one output (dry), but also has a Slave Out- which feeds a stereo chorus box and stereo poweramp.
The stereo poweramp feeds two pairs of speakers, one pair 100% wet, one pair 100% dry. The presence on the wet signal is set quite low.

The fourth pair of speakers is fed by the second amp head. Normally it is a dry signal too. But if I want I can through a chorus effect in front of it, so I end up with a 50:50 wet/dry signal.


I'm not sure whether it's best to run the chorusing effect on a cleaner signal that sits underneath the distorted amp sound, or to run it on an equally dirty sound, or to run it on a dirty sound while keeping a cleaner less distorted signal underneath it to keep the bottom end.



It's weird with Chorus because it's hard to prevent the phase shift muddying effect you get, the loss of focus and solid depth at the expense of getting a very wide stereo sound. It either gets a little muddy, noisy and swoopy, or it sounds shrill (like Van Hagar era EVH).

 

[Kapo_Polenton]

Holy $hit that sounds complicated and quite a ton of stuff to lug around isn't it?

 

[Zachman]

So given my recent misfortune with a crappy supposed "zero loss effects" unit that I installed in my JCM800 combo, I'm back to thinking about wet/dry. I've done it before with one speaker wet and a 4 x 12 dry. Sounded really good. Line out from hotplate into effects into EH 44 magnum and then the speaker. That stereo sound really opens things up. Even side by side you get this big wall of sound. So here is my question, what is your fave small config of this setup?

1. Do you run one amp with distortion and split the send via a chorus or other and run a second amp CLEAN with effect on it? Clean Wet/Dry Dirty?
2. Do you run both amps with grit and just have the second one wet?
3. Do you do what I did above and use a separate power amp with a line out from the dry amp?

I'm interested because to me the simplest approach would be two combo amps. One as your dry tone and the other as a solid state / power amp unit. Seeing as you need two speakers anyway, having two combos is easier than a separate power amp and a cab and then also needing something like a hotplate for the line out. But that brings us to the big question.. this is all fine and dandy for home use or practice but what do you do live? Do you stick your mic on the wet side (solid state driven) or do you put it on the tube side dry? Solid state has the advantage of taking effects out front a lot better than tubes do and if you use a line out from a hotplate, you still end up going through a SS poweramp.

How do you guys do it? Use two mics live and bump them down to a blended signal or just have two mics in the mix and panned left and right for stereo image?

discuss!

#3-- sort of My line out signal is taken from my amp selector (Running w/d/w, one amp at a time).

I mic all (3) cabs, and pan the wet cabs at 10 and 2 o'clock, Dry cab equal 12 o'clock

Back in the day I ran a stereo rig, not a dual mono w/d rig, and It was wonderful at the time. fwiw, I like tube power amps. My favorites are the Boogie Simul 395, and Strategy 500

 

[Zachman]

Holy $hit that sounds complicated and quite a ton of stuff to lug around isn't it?

Big tone generating rigs are usually going to require MORE than the others. The good news is that Dollys, hand trucks and casters on large racks, amps and cabs are fairly commonplace nowadays-- making life manageable.

The good news is-- it isn't as much to lug around as a drummer w/ a large kit, or the guy lugging the PA

 

[mentoneman]

one thing i try to focus on is that i'm using delay and verb to achieve a sense of space and not just a canyon echo effect or splashy reverb.

if start grandually you can better hear if the overall tone is getting bigger and fatter or phasey and skinny. i'll also pay close attention to the dry cab impact as i increase the wet cab.

i also try to slam the fx input to really make sure im not starving signal right off the bat, but i like to set up a clean tone first when setting levels so if i'm clipping an fx input i'll know pretty easily.

finally after i've settled on a sound, i'll usually kill the fx output level which is usually the wet cab master and then roll it back up to recalibrate the amount i really desire.

 

[petejt]

Holy $hit that sounds complicated and quite a ton of stuff to lug around isn't it?

It's definitely complicated. I don't play out as much currently so have just been using a small combo and a pedal for my rig. Nothing fancy. The big rig is at home.

It is 'big' but is basically just two 4x12 cabs, two amp heads and a stereo poweramp (which fits under the second amp head).
The chorus/splitter is pretty small itself- it's a Rockman Rockmodule.