What if I put a tube mic pre in my guitar chain before sending it to the amp?

[AASteveo]

Tube Mic Pre

Distortion Pedal

So I got to use a Presonus TubePre on a project the other day and I noticed it has a 1/4" instrument input. This made me wonder about using it for guitar. I've never done this before, nor have I seen anyone else do it. But I'm very curious as to how different it would sound if I colored the guitar signal before sending it to the distortion pedal. Has anyone here tried this before?

GUITAR > TUBE PRE > DISTORTION PEDAL > AMP

But I'm thinking I could set the tube drive pretty high and set the tube output pretty low, then use the gain stage on the distortion pedal to get the line level signal from the tube pre back to instrument level before reaching the amp.


Also, I think I could use this Tube Pre like a DI box and send the clean guitar signal out of the tube pre (through the balanced XLR output) to pro tools, so I could re-amp the clean guitar signal later through different amps.
The ad says you can simultaneously send the signal to both an amp and to a console.

Hopefully I can get my hands on this tube pre again so I can try it out and see how it sounds!

[theblackpage]

or you could buy a tube amp haha. nothing compares to a tube amp. no modeling, reamping, hybrids, nothing...but to answer your question. what that is... is not actually full tube. it has one tube that get used very little. its a hybrid between solid state and a tube. the electroharmonix aty7 (i think thats the name). is actually a full tube mic pre and not bad on price. but this isnt a very good idea in the first place. buying a tube amp and an sm57 would be the ideal choice

[AASteveo]

Well I was already planning on sending it to a tube amp. But the guitar signal is completely dry before going into the distortion box and the amp's tube would alter the resulting distorted signal. So before it even reaches the tube from the amp, it's going through two different EQ circuits.

My question is about what it would sound like if the guitar signal went through a tube BEFORE being distorted.
Wouldn't the end result sound better if the signal was cleaned up before being processed?

Is THIS the tube pre you were talking about?

[qsblues]

Basically, what you're doing is adding another gain stage. While in theory, to guitarists at least, this sounds like a good idea. But in reality, you would also be raising the noise floor. What you want, ideally, is as little coloration between your guitar and the natural sound of it, tube amp or not.

I'm a guitarist, and I got caught up in the rack craze of the 80's, the grunge sound of the 90's, and the fizzy preamp on 11 sound of the early 21st century as well. What I found out though, is nothing compares to the sound of a guitar and a good cable going straight into an amp. Period. But, that's just my opinion.

Just because you HAVE something doesn't mean it should be used ALL THE TIME. Use it for sweetening up vocals or a keyboard before going to the mixer. Use it as a D.I. if you wish, but if you want another gain stage in front of your amp just for the sake of having it, I wouldn't recommend it. It really depends on what kind of sound you're looking for. If you want a fizzy preamp heavy sound, this would do the trick. If you want some more beef, then crank the amp and make the power tubes sweat. But, if you have a solid state amp, you're more or less screwed no matter what you do.

Peace.

[donsolo]

The tube pre will do nothing for you.

Not a thing

Your amp already has a tube pre built into it if it's a full-tube amp.

Unless you were going to use it for tube distortions but if you have a good tube amp, why would you use a distortion as well?

[second skin]

Originally Posted by donsolo

Unless you were going to use it for tube distortions but if you have a good tube amp, why would you use a distortion as well?

maybe it is a semi hijack but just because you use a tube amp doesn't mean you would not use a distortion/overdrive box in front of it.

my live rig consists of both a fender concert II and a marshall JCM800 2204 and i use an overdrive, RAT and Big Muff in front of them.



and to be back on topic. what kind of amp do you have and what are you really trying to accomplish with this?

i would probably not do the tube pre mostly because the tube in that pre isn't getting much voltage anyway. of course if it's just for experimentation then why not try it if you have the stuff laying around or that you can try. it may just sound awesome. if you don't have the gear already i would suggest figuring out what it is that you want to accomplish and do some research to find your options.