Re: Ethos Overdrive for sale

[Richard Sales <richard@glasswing.com>]

Well, tell you the truth Bill, I have only used the overdrive a couple times.  That's because of the sound I love - clean, lush, very fat, clear no ice pick nice top end, single coils.  And I do use it in front of tube amps - mostly the blackface Vibrolux and Victoria 45410.  

Used it a lot when touring with a Collings acoustic with K&K 3 way pup into the Magnatone 213.  Ethos saved my butt in Japan when backline only had AC30s.  Got rave reviews in the papers and magazines there for the tone and power.

Sometimes I used the overdrive channel for a touch of extra stuff, but not often. 

My only complaint is the knobs move so easily it's easy to lose a setting if, say, a butterfly passes by the studio and blows the knobs off point!

I've never really heard an overdrive I like.  The Creation Audio Mk.4.23 is nice, but I'm so conservative... what do I know?  It's still on my pedal board and always pushing.  It adds just a touch of oomph... downy angel hair to the tone.  It's driving my beloved Ethos.

I wonder if it was YOU who inspired me to get mine?  The memory is lost in the exhaust fumes and rear view mirror of old age.

Don't like the Analogman King Of Tone.  Sort of like the Hip Kitty thingy, but only used sparingly.  Durham Sex Drive is cool but it's wandered off the pedalboard.  Lots of pedals in my trunk of rejected pedals.  Should probably sell them but ya never know when you're going to need that specific thing.

I still think the best overdrive is an amp approaching death and crying for help.  Am hoping to build some kind of box for doing that in the studio here.  When the music gets way loud, the bees, turkeys, chickens, grand kids and neighbors all start stuttering and walking in circles.  The wife files for divorce.

Recently heard and liked the Wampler Velvet (fuzz).  Will have to buy it and see if I'm finally getting REALLY old.

Will check out Zendrive.  Anything Bill likes Richard likes.

What are folks thinking of that new Eventide box?   Is it called an H9 or something?  I've liked SOME of what I've heard from it.

R

On Tue, May 27, 2014 at 9:50 AM, bill walker <wildbillwalker@icloud.com> wrote:

As Bill Walker will tell you, the Ethos is a totally magic box.  Takes tweaking but it's the one gizmo that's always on!

Its funny you say that Richard, I've had a few people buy these on my recommendation, and I'm surprised that a few of them took me to task, because they weren't able to make the overdrive channel work for them.  Which is odd because i didn't design or build it. I think its harder to get a consensus on what constitutes good overdrive, than good clean tone, and most everyone is enamored of its clean voice both direct and in front of a tube amp. In fact its the one piece of gear Ive used in the last 6 years that has remained a constant. Though my Zendrive gets plenty of use flitting from board to board.  I find it interesting that Custom Tones (Ethos) will be unveiling a clean channel only version of the Ethos this summer, for peeps who love the clean channel and love other drives pushing it, which I do. I think for some, the dirty channel simply doesn't saturate as much as other drives they are used to. For me, because I switch from instruments with thick strings and humbucking pickups to ones with thin strings and single coil pickups I appreciate the more dynamic, less distorted response of the dirty channel because it doesn't get too compressed and muddy with the former, and I can always push it harder with another drive, clean boost, or compressor to get the extra saturation with the later. When I bought the Ethos, I was tired of messing with modeled amps and I didn't need 57 varieties of amplifiers, just one really good one. I have definitely gotten my monies worth.

 Bill

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richard sales
www.glasswing.com