Adding dirt/distortion to acoustic guitar

Indiee

I'm starting to do some open mics with acoustic.  Right now just an octive pedal and looper.  Want to add a dirt pedal, to get a more electric (low gain dirt) sound for the 'heavier' songs I do.  I only have fuzz pedals and none sound good...

Any recommendations?  Bonus points if it can run on battery!

Ta!

Snags

I've done it with various pedals. It will not sound like an electric, it will sound like a distorted acoustic. 

With mine the trick was to use almost no gain at all on the pedal, and keep the volume close to unity. Any more was overwhelming and sounded a mess.

I've used a TC Dark Matter, MojoMojo and a Caline Orange Burst (??) before. The Caline was surprisingly good but needed the lightest touch on the gain. 

You will also feedback like a bastard if you're not careful. 

Jfingers

I'd suggest digging in harder with your picking fingers and adding some grit with your voice. Other opinions are available.

Winny_Pooh

Tc spark 4 knob or an MXR Timmy

LionAquaLooper

Winny_Pooh said:

Tc spark 4 knob or an MXR Timmy

+1 for the Timmy.
Was also gonna suggest a Boss OD3. 

EricTheWeary

Fender do the Smolder which is the only purpose built OD for acoustic that I’m aware of. Not sure it takes a battery. 

guitarcookie1

EricTheWeary said:

Fender do the Smolder which is the only purpose built OD for acoustic that I’m aware of. Not sure it takes a battery. 

I have recently picked up one of these so not used it out of the house yet, but it does run off a battery. 

EricTheWeary

guitarcookie1 said:

EricTheWeary said:

Fender do the Smolder which is the only purpose built OD for acoustic that I’m aware of. Not sure it takes a battery. 

I have recently picked up one of these so not used it out of the house yet, but it does run off a battery. 

I looked at the Fender product page and it didn't seem to say but looking again there is a photo of the battery compartment. 
I have some sense that plugging an acoustic into an overdrive pedal might be problematic (feedback,etc) and this would be an all in one solution to those problems. 
Although not the same thing I have memories of watching someone plug a strat into an overdrive pedal into an acoustic amp and creating possibly the most unpleasant guitar sound I have ever heard (this was a folk band playing Christmas carols). So this feels like an area where a few more knobs might help. 

Indiee

Thx all.  I have a dark matter on way and if no good will check out fender smolder.  The equivalent in that would be nice

ESBlonde

Nice and budget friendly, the Joyo American Sound is about £35 online. It can be used as an amp replacement for direct or wound up to a decent overdrive pedal. I’ve used it to dirty up and acoustic a few times. A great emergency “in your gig bag” get out of jail free as well as usable overdrive. Plenty of online reviews and demonstrations.

AntonHunter

Two of my mates have the Fender Smolder. Definitely better when set subtly. The blend is really useful, so it can sound like an augmented acoustic guitar rather than just distorting the whole thing, which can be a bit jarring. It gets a mixed reception from their bandmates, but I like it!

Indiee

I'm also gonna try out the acoustasonics...  

Caffeine_Vampire

Cassette player without a limiter.

maltingsaudio

ESBlonde said:

Nice and budget friendly, the Joyo American Sound is about £35 online. It can be used as an amp replacement for direct or wound up to a decent overdrive pedal. I’ve used it to dirty up and acoustic a few times. A great emergency “in your gig bag” get out of jail free as well as usable overdrive. Plenty of online reviews and demonstrations.

I was going to post exactly this, great little pedal

Indiee

Will check this out if dark matter insufficient!

horse

This thread has reminded me of Grant Lee Buffalo 

Jfingers

@horse myself and Mrs J saw Grant Lee Phillips at the Portland Arms in Cambridge a few years ago. It's a two hundred capacity venue. I was a huge fan of GLB, other half had only really heard them in passing so to speak. He didn't use any distortion at the solo acoustic gig.

It was mind blowingly good, Mrs J described it as almost a religious experience. After the lights came up and the pa was off, he couldn't get backstage as someone had locked the door. He did three more songs without amplification before someone let him in. 

One of the best gigs I've been to, he's absolutely still got it. (sorry for the derail)

horse

Jfingers said:

@horse myself and Mrs J saw Grant Lee Phillips at the Portland Arms in Cambridge a few years ago. It's a two hundred capacity venue. I was a huge fan of GLB, other half had only really heard them in passing so to speak. He didn't use any distortion at the solo acoustic gig.

It was mind blowingly good, Mrs J described it as almost a religious experience. After the lights came up and the pa was off, he couldn't get backstage as someone had locked the door. He did three more songs without amplification before someone let him in. 

One of the best gigs I've been to, he's absolutely still got it. (sorry for the derail)

 Reminds me of Trigger Happy TV when I hear the old "hits"! Also remember a more recent solo album I enjoyed - "The Narrows" I think

Trude

My advice - use a sound hole humbucker with a integrated volume control, and run that in parallel with your acoustic sound, through a dirty amp sim. I did this for years before getting my Cole Clark that has an onboard bridge humbucker.
Or, if there's an electric amp at the open mic, just plug the humbucker into that and run the acoustic pickup through the PA.

ICBM

horse said:

This thread has reminded me of Grant Lee Buffalo 

Trude said:

My advice - use a sound hole humbucker with a integrated volume control, and run that in parallel with your acoustic sound, through a dirty amp sim.

@Indiee - what type of pickup does your guitar have? In general, a typical undersaddle piezo won't sound good with any kind of distortion - a magnetic soundhole pickup will work a lot better. (Grant Lee Phillips used an old DiMarzio originally, later some other types.)

Even the more 'acoustic' soundhole pickups (eg Fishman Rare Earth) sound OK with overdrive.

EricTheWeary said:

Although not the same thing I have memories of watching someone plug a strat into an overdrive pedal into an acoustic amp and creating possibly the most unpleasant guitar sound I have ever heard (this was a folk band playing Christmas carols).

If you're going into an acoustic amp or a PA you absolutely need an amp/speaker simulator of some sort, or it will sound horrific. (And is a risk to the tweeters in the cabinets, at any real volume.) At an open mic this will be even more of a problem if the soundman isn't expecting or equipped to deal with an overdriven sound.

Given all that, I'd get a Boss GT-1 or a similar multi-FX - it's tiny (it will literally fit in a gig bag pocket), runs on batteries, has a wide variety of distortion, amp simulation, and every other effect you can think of, plus a basic looper.

Kebabkid

Another mention here for the Fender Smolder Acoustic OD pedal. Steve Stevens used it, particularly when doing his acoustic duo thing with Billy Idol and other demos show it being used with a dobro.

I don't know too much about it but it can remove some of the piezo-sound, if you want, when engaged and it also has a blend.

Scout around the demos to see if this might work for you and it's relatively inexpensive
https://uk.fender.com/products/smolder-acoustic-overdrive