Tube distortion pedals, part I
I'm looking for a good lead tone and I'm not sure if it should come through pedals before my Studio preamp, or if I should just get a different preamp and sell the Boogie. There's lots of good preamps to be had, both new and used, some of them for cheap too.
The case is that I like my clean sound very much. It has the right balance of brightness and midrange punch and the singing high-end harmonics that I love. Combined with a BJF Baby Blue OD I get a good, slighty overdriven tone too.
With those tones as my base I've decided to go looking for a distortion pedal that'll hopefully give me a lead sound I like. I've started out testing tube-based pedals. First out was the BadCat 2-tone, which I tested and then posted some comments about on the Huge Racks Inc. message board. As my comments show I didn't fancy it in the kind of setup I have, while it might sound great with a darker amp, and perhaps a guitar different from mine.
So my search continues. I've made contacts about testing the Soldano G.T.O. The Budda Zenman (or Phatman) are also interesting pedals. I've given the Zenman a short test with the same Carvin Legacy, and there's one on its way to me that I'll test more thoroughly. Once tested I'll post part II. Lastly there's the Tonebone pedals, of which the Hot British might be the thing to have. I'm on the lookout and will update the site should I find one.