Can you Marshall-ise a Lazy J?

mattdavis

Have had one of those horrible gear weeks where I start questioning why I bought certain things and start contemplating selling them.

Bought a J20 partly because I wanted a powerful, portable combo with power scaling for our rock-oriented covers band. The band then imploded and since then it’s had limited use. 

Finally had some time to play this week and played the Les Paul through my old jcm800 combo and got lost in GnR-influenced saturated loveliness. Plugged the LP into the J20 and was a little underwhelmed. Right - it’s being sold methinks. Can’t have £2k tied up for no reason. 

Then tonight played my Tele through it. V low volume with copious reverb and got lost. Just mesmerising and inspiring full bodied loveliness. 
Just stunning and I think maybe I understand the term ‘harmonic richness’ now. Fender through a fender just seems to work, (as does a LP into a Marshall(. So just can’t part with it at the moment even though it’s a lot of money. 

So - is there a pedal, or a way of setting up that I’m missing, that can make my Les Paul sound less over powering of the amp. And is there a better pedal than my OD3 that will blend with the J20 and the Les Paul to approximate a Jcm 800 growl?. I’m guessing something that has quite a tweekable eq to deal with the J20s mids and bass. 

Cheers for any advice. 

Winny_Pooh

The od-3 has a fairly full low mid, something like an sd-1 will be much better as its less boosted in the lows. If you want more grit & less lows than that you should try a liquid sunshine mkii (the orange version, one in the classifieds recently) perfect for a bass heavy setup.

mattdavis

Cheers mate. I remember tryjng an sd1 through a cleanish Marshall a few years ago thinking it sounds horrible (clearly not the right context). Good shout - maybe this is where it could work. Do you think it would have enough gain for that saturated 800 kind of tone? 

Wazmeister

Id say change your amp myself, but if you do need a Marshall pedal, the best is probably the Origin Revival Drive 

RiftAmps

A Thorpy Peacekeeper can make any of my Tweeds do an exceptional Plexi impression.

I’m currently running a V-Front and an 18w Plexi in an ABY setup and the Peacekeeper has enough EQ range to make the Vee sound almost indentical to the Plexi. 

mattdavis

Wazmeister said:

Id say change your amp myself, but if you do need a Marshall pedal, the best is probably the Origin Revival Drive 

That’s the logical solution. But when you hit the sweet spot of that amp- crikey - it’s just such a sound... just reinforces how most amps do one specific thing brilliantly..  Not sure I can let it go

mattdavis

RiftAmps said:

A Thorpy Peacekeeper can make any of my Tweeds do an exceptional Plexi impression.

I’m currently running a V-Front and an 18w Plexi in an ABY setup and the Peacekeeper has enough EQ range to make the Vee sound almost indentical to the Plexi. 

That’s interesting - I wonder if maybe the Gunshot with a bit more gain might push it that bit further into later-Marshall- land..

Winny_Pooh

mattdavis said:

RiftAmps said:

A Thorpy Peacekeeper can make any of my Tweeds do an exceptional Plexi impression.

I’m currently running a V-Front and an 18w Plexi in an ABY setup and the Peacekeeper has enough EQ range to make the Vee sound almost indentical to the Plexi. 

That’s interesting - I wonder if maybe the Gunshot with a bit more gain might push it that bit further into later-Marshall- land..

A gunshot is marshally, but full on the low end. Unless it has bass eq most MIAB pedals will be like this. 

Winny_Pooh

BTW, what part of London are you in? If West and you drive I have a Marshall SL and a bunch of pedals you can try into the lazy J alongside it. 

mattdavis

Cheers mate. V kind. Am in SW so v possible. My reference would be my JCM 800 really (I grew up on GnR). This conversation has got me looking at the Gunshot actually. With the two different gain knobs I suspect it could be made to blend nicely. Hmmm..

octatonic

I use a Gunshot on my Louis Electric (Princeton style) amp and it sounds mighty.

scovell001

It’s quite hard to describe this one on a forum - however:

lazy j everything on 10 goes extremely J45 - with the cruiser deuce in the down maximum compression mode it sounds utterly unreal but I would say still early Marshall rather than jcm800/2525.

had the gunshot before I had the j so haven’t tried this combo. It has a slight bass cut rather than a bass increase from memory & sounded more 70s, think classic Free sound. The guy who sold me my J said he preferred the gunshot into the J over the deuce!

have the peace keeper- tried it after the deuce the other day, but still have to try it before.

I ‘reckon’ you won’t be quite able to get the 80s hairdryer rock sound out of the J, it’s more 70s.

its very hard to describe on here as we’d need to get a j & a deuce, gunshot & peacekeeper together & try it all out.

Moe_Zambeek

Why do you want to make your J20 more like your Marshall, when you still have the Marshall? Why not just play the Marshall? It might even be easier to make your Marshall more tweedy, rather than your tweed more Marshally....

Wazmeister

I always believe that you start with the ‘source’, and as good as the LJ is, it is a ‘wrong amp - wrong sound’ syndrome here Matt, imho...

mattdavis

scovell001 said:

It’s quite hard to describe this one on a forum - however:

lazy j everything on 10 goes extremely J45 - with the cruiser deuce in the down maximum compression mode it sounds utterly unreal but I would say still early Marshall rather than jcm800/2525.

Having tried the Deuce with previous amps I reckon you’re right. Loved it but it kept that very tweed character - as it should!

mattdavis

Moe_Zambeek said:

Why do you want to make your J20 more like your Marshall, when you still have the Marshall? Why not just play the Marshall? It might even be easier to make your Marshall more tweedy, rather than your tweed more Marshally....

Hi mate. It’s more about trying to make the J20s a bit more versatile for when I join another band. My 800 combo weighs an absolute tonne (as in in fairy sure it’s the main reason for a back operation I needed!). The J20s is just brilliant as a grab and go with built in reverb, power scaling and a brilliant controllable break up for old school bluesy rock. Just want to see if it’s possible to emulate an approximation of the 800 tone so I have a fairly compact set up. 
I take your point though. The only real 800 tone is an 800 :-)
Cheers

mattdavis

Wazmeister said:

I always believe that you start with the ‘source’, and as good as the LJ is, it is a ‘wrong amp - wrong sound’ syndrome here Matt, imho...

You are of course right - but it’s fun trying :-)

thermionic

Buy a used Marshall Guv’nor II for £25.

mattdavis

Was actually looking at them. Have you used one in this set up mate? Edit - although it would not be the worlds most expensive mistake compared to others I have made 

RiftAmps

mattdavis said:

RiftAmps said:

A Thorpy Peacekeeper can make any of my Tweeds do an exceptional Plexi impression.

I’m currently running a V-Front and an 18w Plexi in an ABY setup and the Peacekeeper has enough EQ range to make the Vee sound almost indentical to the Plexi. 

That’s interesting - I wonder if maybe the Gunshot with a bit more gain might push it that bit further into later-Marshall- land..

The Peacekeeper certainly gets it into late JMP territory (although that's not how I run it), so the Gunshot should take it into JCM800 mode. Maybe @ThorpyFX can wade in?

Moe_Zambeek

mattdavis said:

Moe_Zambeek said:

Why do you want to make your J20 more like your Marshall, when you still have the Marshall? Why not just play the Marshall? It might even be easier to make your Marshall more tweedy, rather than your tweed more Marshally....

Hi mate. It’s more about trying to make the J20s a bit more versatile for when I join another band. My 800 combo weighs an absolute tonne (as in in fairy sure it’s the main reason for a back operation I needed!). The J20s is just brilliant as a grab and go with built in reverb, power scaling and a brilliant controllable break up for old school bluesy rock. Just want to see if it’s possible to emulate an approximation of the 800 tone so I have a fairly compact set up. 
I take your point though. The only real 800 tone is an 800 :-)
Cheers

Sorry. Wasn’t trying to be snarky with that comment The Marshall Origins are quite light as I understand it, if you want a small combo with Marshall tones. About the same price as a couple of boutique pedals!