Good morning, everyone!
This morning - as previously promised - I'm going to do my first live #CoffeeAndKlon on here.
Today, I'm going to be talking about my favourite overdrive pedal: the #PRS #Horsemeat.
PRS have marketed this as a #Klon killer. Why has it become my favourite pedal, and can it replace the Klon #KTR on my board?
But first, #coffee!
This morning, I'm finishing off the last of the #Lavazza Gold that we have.
I normally prefer single-origin coffee, darkly roasted. It's nice to mix it up, though, and to take a break from them at times.
I find most high-street coffee blends a bit sickly, if I'm honest, and I can't drink them at home. That's one reason why I like the Lavazza Gold: it's very drinkable.
What's your favourite coffee?
While I'm setting up the board and #UAD #LUNA updates itself, a bit about me:
I'm a home hobbyist player. I play at home for my personal enjoyment and sanity.
I'm not a professional musician. I don't work in the music industry at all.
If the Mediocre Guitar Player magazine actually existed, I'd make the front cover no problem.
What I share here - and on the #HomeToneBlog http://hometoneblog.com - is just my personal experience as a home hobbyist.
I don't claim any expertise or skill with this stuff at all. If you want great advice, ask a pro, not me 🙂
(#LUNA is still updating ...)
So why do I blog and post on social media about #guitar gear?
First off, because I've got access to the gear that I talk about.
Unfortunately, there's a lot of folks out there (especially on the usual guitar-related forums) who love to BS about gear that they don't have - and sometimes have never even tried.
That's why you'll see photos as I go, and over on the blog I'll post actual audio too when I can.
(I'm starting to think #LUNA has crashed while self-updating ...)
Here's what I'm starting with on the board:
* #Klon #KTR
* #PRS #Horsemeat
* #MadProfessor #SHOD
All three pedals are in separate loops on my trusty old #Gigrig G2, so they can't interfere with the overall tone when they're not in use.
In the Axe-FX, I'm running:
* one amp (a Princeton model that I've tweaked the crap out of, to get me closer to the clean tone of my Marshall DSL20HR)
*two cabs (IRs that sound like my two 1x12 cabs I have here, fitted with Celestion A-Type and Blue speakers)
* digital delay
* digital spring reverb
It's basically setup to emulate my favourite valve amp + FX loop home rig, just with the added convenience of sounding better and being much easier to record!
For #guitar, I'm mostly going to use Smokey: my 2012 Gibson #LesPaul Classic Plus.
This model is the one with the baked maple fretboard, because the US Government had seized all of Gibson's rosewood at the time.
It's got a set of OX4 Hot Duane humbuckers, giving it a nice amount of punch and power.
Plus, just look at those mineral streaks 😍
Hopefully that's enough introductions / explanations 🙂
To start with, I'm running the #Klon #KTR into the #SHOD.
The KTR is setup in the classic clean-boost role:
* Gain around 8 o'clock
* Treble at 1 o'clock
* Volume round about unity or so
This is home for me. It's not my desert island tone: it's my last-day-on-earth tone.
There'll be an audio demo of this when the blog post comes out.
For comparison, I'm going to take the #KTR out of the circuit, and recording the same piece just using the #SHOD on its own.
There's a good reason why (AFAIK) the #SHOD is the tweed-tone pedal that's been in continuous production the longest. I love this pedal so much.
Definitely sounds better when boosted by the #Klon #KTR though!
So now we get onto the main topic for this instalment of #CoffeeAndKlon: is the #PRS #Horsemeat the Klon-killer that it's been marketed to be?
In my rig, that translates to: can the Horsemeat replace my Klon KTR in the clean-boost role?
Let me go and fiddle some knobs and find out! I'll be right back 🙂
No matter what I try, I can't make the #PRS #Horsemeat provide the same kind of clean boost that my #Klon #KTR does.
The Horsemeat just doesn't seem to have the same kind of mid-boost that the Klon does.
To be honest, that makes sense: the Horsemeat's full name is the Horsemeat Transparent Overdrive. It's hard to be 'transparent' if a pedal brings a serious mid-boost to the table.
For reference, this photo shows the settings on all three pedals.
I tried turning down the Treble and Bass on the Horsemeat to boost the mids a bit.
It's a nice sound ... but I don't think it matches what a clean-boosting Klon does for the SHOD.
It's not just my ears telling you that there's a difference.
Here's a screenshot of the three takes I've recorded so far.
* Top is #Klon #KTR + #SHOD
* Middle is the SHOD on its own
* Bottom is #Horsemeat + SHOD
The Horsemeat brings a *lot* of compression to the table.
Not saying it's a bad thing, just that it's another way that the Horsemeat is different to a clean-boosting Klon.
Has to be said: it's always possible the compression is happening in the #SHOD, because I could be slamming it too hard with the #Horsemeat.
I don't that's what's happening, but do keep it in mind, in case I've got that wrong.
Quick pause to second #coffee, and I'm back 🙂
I really shouldn't drink two cups of coffee a day. One is enough.
I got into the habit after a trip to Portugal at the start of the month. For various reasons, decent coffee was a bit scarce during the trip, and I'm more than making up for it now that I'm back!
I've just tweaked the Horsemeat settings, just to see if I can dial back that overall compression effect. Settings shown in the photo.
The end result is a lot better - as in, far less compressed.
Rightly or wrongly, it looks to me that the Gain control on the Horsemeat directly affects the amount of compression that the Horsemeat adds.
I'm not going to test the #PRS #Horsemeat as a cranked boost into a cranked amp today.
It's simply not what I use my #Klon for.
It's not my world, and I don't know enough about it to say anything really about that.
I'm sure you can find plenty of folks on YouTube who have done exactly that. Go and listen to them on that use case!
Even though PRS have marketed the #Horsemeat as a #Klon killer, they've always been clear that it isn't based on the Klon circuit.
And that leads me onto the second - and final - part of today's #CoffeeAndKlon ...
... and the other reason I've got the #SHOD on my board for this 🙂
Followers from the BirdSite, and regular readers of my blog, will probably recall that I am a lover of all things tweed-tone.
It turns out that the #PRS #Horsemeat is an excellent tweed-tone pedal. It might even be the best-sounding one that's currently on the market.
Stuart Herbert
Nikki Bayley
Who me?