Fuzz vs a Distortion Sustainer

I ran into that too with TH3. Speaking of, today is a good day to add a distortion to my Marshall univibe set up. I found the sound in Line 6 X3 Pod but I don't use it anymore. TH3 is the plugin I have now

batsbrew
get a real fuzz...
and a real distortion unit, probably run into a real compressor.
 

But if I was to, is the Fuzzface a Fuzz or a Distortion, and why?

For practical purposes, Fuzz = Distortion.
 
The difference is that "distortion" is a broad term that includes a wide range of effects, while "fuzz" specifically means one kind of distortion: heavy clipping and the addition of odd-order harmonics. A good distortion plugin can do fuzz, along with many other types of distortion.
 
Distortion does not always result in sustain. Sustain is achieved by greatly amplifying the signal and then chopping it off on the peaks. That's "fuzz", also described as "overdrive". Same concept. Other types of distortion may provide little or no added sustain.
 
 

a fuzz pedal,
and a distortion pedal,
sound nothing alike.
 

batsbrew
http://lifestyle.jimdunlo...nlop-distortion-guide/

Thanks that's great. I had suspected it was more to do with circuitry than just tone. I knew that Fuzzes used germanium and silicon transistors after looking into Dan Auerbach's tone and Earthquaker devices a few years ago. But I didn't know overdrives and distortions didn't.
 
So the fuzzface is a Fuzz as it has transistors. I believe originally Germanium and later Siicon
 

jpetersen
Sheesh. 4th time my post got swallowed...

Akismet, the forums’s spam filter from hell, seems to be getting more and more enthusiastic about deciding posts are spam as time goes on. It seems particularly sensitive to posts that are edited after first posting.

jpetersen
There's far more to it than that.

There always is where fuzz/overdrive/distortion is concerned, starting with what each term means.....

Taking the output from an instrument and clipping, compressing and boosting it in a musically pleasant way sounds like it ought to be easy but the sheer number of pedals and different amp configurations all aiming at doing it proves it’s not simple.

jpetersen
Or you can have long-sustaining, smooth distortion by feeding one distortion into another. The Boss MD-2 and JB-2 can be set up like this. The configuration Tube Screamer -> WaaWaa -> Distorting amp achieves the same thing with the added bonus of being able to set the wah pedal to boost the note you want to sustain.

The 1960s/70s trick of running a bass-heavy fuzz into a treble booster to even out the frequencies that reached the amp was an early version of the same idea of course. Interesting that you put the Tube Screamer before the wah - “conventional wisdom” all over the web says it’s “wah before distortion”. Putting a distortion before the fuzz is the way I do things as well, otherwise the wah’s frequency boosting effect can get squished by what follows it and disappear while any noise being generated in the wah circuit gets massively amplified.

The EHX Cock Fight does a pretty good job of the fuzz-wah thing in a single pedal and has a few other interesting tricks as well, especially if you have a hardware sequencer that sends control voltages.

jpetersen
My favorite fuzz is the Boss FZ-5 which simulates the Maestro FZ-1a, FuzzFace and the Hendrix Octavia.
I particularly like the FZ-1 sound. I have built several clones using NOS germanium transistors and not only is the Boss accurate, it is reliable and consistent.

I’ve owned and used quite a number of Boss pedals (who hasn’t) but over the last few years I’ve grown to dislike something about a signature Boss sound they all seem to share, though I’m still quite attached to my unmodified SD-1. I will say Boss pedals do tend to last a very long time - they can get a bit hissy after a decade or two but they don’t just break and die very often. Their silent switching is good as well.

My first fuzz pedal, back in the fabulous 1970s, was a very cheap Italian thing. Can’t remember what it was called but I traded it against something or other over 30 years ago. Sometimes wish I still had it. Maybe one day someone will again make a pedal that not only turns a guitar into a fizzing, hissing buzz-saw but also picks up the local BBC radio station, police and ambulance radios, taxis.....

I’ve been through quite a lot of fuzzes/distortions/overdrives since then, nowadays I’m using Dunlop (mini) Fuzz Faces, an EHX Nano-Muff for humbuckers, a Barber Trifecta for the early Big Muff/3 knob Tone Bender stuff and an EHX Octavix I got a few months ago which I think is the best of the several octave-up fuzzes I’ve had. It’s replaced a Foxx Tone Machine clone that sat on my pedal-board for a very long time - the EHX simply sounds much better and is far less noisy.

With all things fuzz/distortion a lot depends on the guitar and amp that’s being used of course. Some pedals work better with some setups than others, and no two people will ever fully agree on what the “best” version of any effect is either. Which is how it should be - the world would be a boring place if we all chose the same thing.