Why use distortion

It smoothens transients, adds a bit of compression and finishes it off with some gentle distortion. Valve Saturation is a lot like Tape Saturation. It also adds warmth and cohesion to the audio signal, but just works a bit differently compared to Tape Saturation.

Both are good options, so which you pick is entirely up to you. It all depends on what suits your mix and personal flavor best. Of course, the sound changes per plugin as well, so you may want to try out several to find the right one for you. Clipping is what you get when your audio is louder than what a sound system can handle.

Speaking in metaphors, Clipping is like your high-school bully. We are not joking. Clipping sounds horrendous. You get clicks and scratches and all sorts of unwanted sound bites.

So why would you even want to use it? Good question. An advanced way to add punch to drums is to force those transients up into a stage of clipping. For example, add attack to a snare with an attack-boosting transient shaper, followed by a limiter or clipper.

Adding a splash of distortion before or after auxiliary return effects such as delay or reverb is a superb hack for giving those spatial effects some character. Step 2: To bulk up the midrange of the drums, call up three bands in a new Saturn, then Bypass bands 1 and 3. There are few better tools for shaping the sound of a drum mix than saturation or distortion. If your percussion bus is sounding too spiky, for example, try applying some moderate tape saturation: the emulated effect of magnetic tape will naturally smooth harsh transients, giving the overall drum sound a less brittle, digital feel.

Ramming a drum through this kind of processing will instantly give you a tough, smashed sound that is superb for harder music styles. Although this can sometimes work on entire busses, you may bring out extreme artefacts that can spoil the effect — instead, for more control, process individual hits first, then edit out any overlapping artefacts afterwards. In these scenarios, you can improve mono compatibility by sending the original signal to a mono aux return containing a distortion plugin.

Distortion adds an immense amount of sustain to your notes at the cost of some definition to more complex chords. Power chords sound just what they're named for, octave chords sound grand. Though with increasing amounts of clipping and distortion, you also bring the noise floor up.

For precise metal tones, you may need a noise gate. Distortion pedals are usually designed to work well on their own unlike overdrive pedals. Boosting an already high gain pedal will only bring about more noise into your signal and will make muting unintended notes more difficult.

Most distortion pedals work better with clean amps, which is nearly the opposite of overdrive pedals where a slightly more gritty tone is needed for the overdrive pedal to work its magic. A distortion pedal gets you a high gain tone at any volume. For a better look at different models, check out our guide to The Best Distortion Pedals.

You may think that high gain pedals are a newer invention when in fact, the highest gain and saturation was achieved earlier in the form of fuzz pedals. Fuzz was originally achieved either by accident with failing electronic components or taking a razor and slicing some slits onto a speaker cone. Then on the latter, slits would flap around creating a "buzzing" or "fuzzy" sound.

In , a sound engineer by the name of Glenn Snoddy invented a circuit to replicate the sound of a channel strip with malfunctioning components. A hit song called "Don't Worry" by Marty Robbins had a guitar or bass solo that was recorded on a malfunctioning console strip. He was asked to replicate that sound in what would be known as the first Fuzz box: The Maestro Fuzz Tone. When you look at the way fuzzes are designed, they are made so to to actually -destroy- your signal.

Fidelity goes out the window in favor of a thick, gooey, oftentimes splattery mess of a tone. But this distinct characterization of an otherwise "broken" and "ugly" tone has found it's way into the hearts and feet! This design process and approach to tone are what makes fuzzes distinct from their overdrive and distortion bretheren.

That being said, Fuzz is an acquired taste. You can't chug metal riffs with it. You cant play lovely clean ballads with it. You, can however, have a great time just playing the most simple chords and let the flawed majesty of fuzz take you to new creative heights. These are just some examples of uses of fuzz tones.

For recording, a fuzzy power chord layer might just be what your song needs! The great thing is, fuzzes tend to be more affordable than overdrive and distortion pedals. If you want jangle, chime, grit, something that will make your clean tone sparkle, or something to push your high gain monster, an overdrive would do the trick. Do you use a clean amp and need something for higher gain from a standalone pedal?

A distortion pedal is your bet. Want fat, all out tones and don't concern yourself with words like "tight", "precise" or "transparent"? Get a fuzz. Ultimately, these are all just different brushes to make different kinds of art. For example, many musicians use their distortion pedal as soon as the chorus kicks in to try and provide a more exciting and fresh tone. As well as the control over when the distortion kicks in, pedals can give control over the distortion sound itself.

As guitar equipment goes, distortion pedals can also be relatively inexpensive, so there is no real reason not to buy a distortion pedal if you want to allow yourself to experiment with a lot more sounds.

A lot of people get confused between the two, as they do similar things and have a similar fuzzy, dark sound quality. However, overdrive and distortion pedals are two totally different things. It simply takes the sound you already have and cranks it, giving it a fuzzy, saturated sound.

The harder you play, the more the overdrive can be heard doing its thing. Though some of the tones created could be similar, overdrive is doing something quite different to distortion.

A distortion pedal takes the original sound and turns it into something totally new by…well, distorting it. Distortion saturates the signal and changes it altogether. Plus, you will achieve the same level of distortion whether you are playing hard or soft.

Genre definitely plays a part here. You can choose a distortion pedal that has a really heavy impact and gives dark, gritty tones if you are looking to play Heavy Metal music. If you are just looking to add a little bit of fuzz to a pop or rock song then this might be overkill. Many distortion pedals are marketed based on genre.

It is pretty clear from the names and the manufacturer descriptions what the pedal is designed for. However, if you are unsure, you can always look at YouTube videos for an example of the audio that can be produced.