Valvecaster to improve Pod's tone?

[Jamforthelamb]

Hey All,
Do you guys think that using a Valvecaster after my POD would help improve it's tone?
I play at my church going direct in to the board (hence why I use the POD), and I've never been 100% satisfied with it's sound.
If so, where are you guys getting your tubes ?
Here's where I got the idea of using a tube pedal for this http://www.redironamps.com/buff.html


Thanks!
-jftl

[Renegadrian]

It's a good cleanish sound booster with the gain at the minimum, so why not? Give it a try...
Else thow the POD and get a Zoom.

[frequencycentral]

You might find the output of your POD is a little HOT for the Valvecaster - effectively anything louder than just your guitar will overdrive the Valvecaster - I guess the POD would work as a boost in this case  -maybe keep the volume down a bit?

[jasonsmusicgear]

I don't mean to hijack your thread but I have also been wondering about this.  I play at church too and currently run through a Condor Cab sim straight to the board.  My tone when playing chords is just way too sterile, not warm enough.  What do you guys think, would a valvecaster improve the tone in my case?

Here's my usual signal path when playing chords - Guitar -> TubeScreamer -> Condor CabSim -> Mixer Board
Jason

[dschwartz]

i think both of you should use a eq pedal after the condor/POD..

Puting a valvecaster after all that processing smells like ugly distortion to me..

tubes are not, and will never be "magic instant sound improvers"..if tubes are chocolate and SS is crap...will chocolate chip crap cookies taste better? no sir...

i insist, try a nice 7 band eq before the mixing board, and tinker with values, you´ll be surprised how many variations and improvements you can get.

[frequencycentral]

..if tubes are chocolate and SS is crap...will chocolate chip crap cookies taste better? no sir...

What? You can buy those things? You've tasted my ex-wife's cooking right?

Quote of the year award goes to dschwartz!!

[MikeH]

..if tubes are chocolate and SS is crap...will chocolate chip crap cookies taste better? no sir...

Ha ha!  Classic! Indeed, quote of the year...

[sleepybrighteyez]

The best way (in my opinion) to make your POD sound better is to plug it into an amp, instead of DI to the board. Sorry, I'm not trying to sound snobby, but this comes after much experimentation with my band mate's POD. When we recorded, we went DI with the POD. I was never satisfied with the DI signal no matter what settings on the POD I tried, nor things I did in my DAW with EQ, even amp sims, etc. I did find a nice trick though. After we recorded, I would re-amp his DI track done with the POD, out to a Fender Chorus 2x12 and set up a stereo pair of room mics. I mixed those room mics with the DI track and it sounded really great. The DI track kept it's clarity and detail, while the room mics captured that magic that happens, well in the room.

I don't mean to sound like a purist, but in my opinion there is really no substitute for a speaker pushing air. That's what the POD, and all the other amp sims are missing. To me, going DI out of any of those things always sounds flat and a bit lifeless- despite the plethora of cool sounds you can get from them. You don't need a big amp. Since you are already playing through a PA, just pick up a small practice amp and mic it.

I deal with the same issue with my bass. I own a Bass Pod, and while I've found some cool sounds on it, it still lacks that 'life' going DI- despite the fact that many times bass is recorded direct. I'm sure that once I find the right pre to prelude my recording i/o for bass, it will be great.

P.S. the amp you plug into need not be a tube amp either. Just get some air movement going on. And, there is a difference between a PA speaker and a guitar amp. My band mate tried playing the POD through my PA many times, and it still lacked life. It needs a guitar amp.

[dschwartz]

..if tubes are chocolate and SS is crap...will chocolate chip crap cookies taste better? no sir...

What? You can buy those things? You've tasted my ex-wife's cooking right?

Quote of the year award goes to dschwartz!!

well..her cookies were terrible, but her muffin was really good!!  kidding

sorry i forgot there were church players here....

[Jamforthelamb]

Wow  a lot to consider.

dschwartz: Don't worry about. I work in an automotive shop, and even though I choose to not talk like my techs do, you'd be hard pressed to make me blush.

I've considered the amp thing, and at my old church we ran my pod into a Marshall that was miked, but the tone still wasn't there. The pod has it's own EQ, and then it would be running through the amps EQ, which I think is why it sounded bad. The EQ pedal isn't a bad idea, but I tend to custom tailor a patch for each song that I play also, so that might make it a little complicated. Playing at church (at least my church) is kind of like playing in a cover band that does several artist, each song calls for a different sound generally speaking, which again makes the POD very useful.

-jftl

[jayp5150]

Wow  a lot to consider.

dschwartz: Don't worry about. I work in an automotive shop, and even though I choose to not talk like my techs do, you'd be hard pressed to make me blush.

I've considered the amp thing, and at my old church we ran my pod into a Marshall that was miked, but the tone still wasn't there. The pod has it's own EQ, and then it would be running through the amps EQ, which I think is why it sounded bad. The EQ pedal isn't a bad idea, but I tend to custom tailor a patch for each song that I play also, so that might make it a little complicated. Playing at church (at least my church) is kind of like playing in a cover band that does several artist, each song calls for a different sound generally speaking, which again makes the POD very useful.

-jftl

I've heard that an amp needs to be set tonally flat to sound right with a POD. On most amps, this is with the mids maxed and the treble and bass at 0, IIRC. That might be a consideration.

[dschwartz]

other thing to consider is that when goping through PA, the speakers are usually far from the player, so the percieved sound is kind of sterile..nothing like having a loud amp behind you, feeling the air moving...

[sleepybrighteyez]

Try putting the POD into the amp's effects loop, and not plugged directly to the front input. To me it sounds better than the POD DI, but still, I prefer not to use a POD at all. I agree that there is still a bit of a flat sound even with an amp, but personally, I think that is just the sound of the POD. No matter what it tries to emulate, it doesn't have the power to push the circuitry which is how all those great amps get their original tone. I'm usually pretty happy with just the clean and drive channels of an amp. I'm willing to sacrifice the choice of a bunch of tones for a couple of really nice tones. I understand why you want the choices (since you said your church band is kind of like a cover band), but there is absolutely nothing wrong with playing those songs with your own tone.

Over the last few years I have become bitter at PODs (LOL). My band mate swears by his, and I swear at him for not investing in a decent amp.

[bdevlin]

I read a tip from some sound pro that putting a tube pre-amp after the POD was the way to go.  Something along the lines of an ART Tube MP or a Presonus Tube preamp.  I think I recall the article correctly.  Perhaps it was before the POD......but I seem to recall it recommended to place it after.

[Ben N]

Not exactly a Pod, but I used a Vox V941 ( a rack-mount 12ax7 fx loop buffer unit, similar to a Dumbleizer) in the fx loop of a hybrid amp to warm things up for both the clean channel (the amp's) and what I was using for a distortion channel, a Sansamp GT2. A lot of gear to putz with, but it sounded better. In my experience, a Pod is better through a PA than through an amp, unless you disable the cab sims, but sticking a low-distortion tube preamp stage inbetween ought be good either way--not a low voltage tube booster/overdrive, though.

[seibertdr]

Try putting the POD into the amp's effects loop, and not plugged directly to the front input. To me it sounds better than the POD DI, but still, I prefer not to use a POD at all. I agree that there is still a bit of a flat sound even with an amp, but personally, I think that is just the sound of the POD. No matter what it tries to emulate, it doesn't have the power to push the circuitry which is how all those great amps get their original tone. I'm usually pretty happy with just the clean and drive channels of an amp. I'm willing to sacrifice the choice of a bunch of tones for a couple of really nice tones. I understand why you want the choices (since you said your church band is kind of like a cover band), but there is absolutely nothing wrong with playing those songs with your own tone.

Over the last few years I have become bitter at PODs (LOL). My band mate swears by his, and I swear at him for not investing in a decent amp.

I bougth a POD XT with the ShortBoard and thought I was going to sound like all my guitar heros even after downloading those particular patches from the ToneLocker. I was very disappointed. I agree, there is no life, very flat and too much fiddling to get a halfway decent sound. I just found out that one of my biggest heros (Buck Dharma) uses a POD into the effects loop of a Crate Red Voodoo amp. Huh!. I tried that and was still disappointed. I have a 50-watt Laney tube amp. It sounds great in its own right but sucks with the POD. I have been building up a pedalboard with effects bought from eBay and DIY and I am very happy. Like one of the other blokes said, play the songs with your own tone. There is no law that says you need to play exactly like the song or person. It took me a long time to figure that out. Now I play for the pure joy of playing. I also play in a church band doing covers. 

[jasonsmusicgear]

The Art Tube MP would be a very cheap fix to this problem, does anyone have an opinion on the sound of this device?

I also found the SSS Speaker Saturation Simulator project that some people have combined with their Condor for good results, might have to try that.

[MikeH]

+1 on the "pod into an amp" advice.  Any amp will do as long as it's reasonably clean.  The thing to be aware of here, and the reason a real amp will always sound better than a pod, is that when you put a mic up to an amp, you're not actually recording the sound the amp makes; you're recording it's effect on the air around it.  This is an aspect that emulators like the pod will never capture