Clean/Crunch

Keep in mind that modifications may have been made since these notes were written.

Spankin' Clean
John Petrucci
Fender Twin Reverb

Ambient
Meshuggah
Periphery
Chimp Spanner/Tesseract

Crunch/Lead
Until We Say Goodbye (Satriani)
Marshall Crunch
Deluxe Reverb Lead
 Spankin' Clean

John Petrucci

CL_DT-Cln_L

The cleanest tone you can get from the Pod HD is to not use any amp models at all, but
to use a compressor and EQ to simulate one. I use this approach, but I also want some
warmth to the tone. So I use a dual amp patch, but use a Blackface Dbl on one side
and no amp on the other. I really thicken up the tone by using a little chorus. A little
reverb to add ambiance. You get thickness and sparkling clean at the same time.
Works for strumming chords and single-note leads.

Fender Twin Reverb

CL_SpnkCln_L

A lot of people have complained about getting a good tone from the Blackface Dbl
without getting clipping. Here it is. Use Input 2 Variax to hit the front with less
volume. I turn the Master Volume DEP down from 100 to 20%. This is essentially like
modding the amp and sticking a master volume knob after the pre-amp, but I find it
has basically no impact on tone. I also turn up Bias X, which lets the hard strums go
through the amp without causing crossover distortion. I add a little reverb and have a
classic 60's Fender clean tone, even with high output modern pickups.
 Ambient

Meshuggah

CL_Mshg-Cln_L

Meshuggah's cleans stand out to me as THE pristine, ambient super-clean tone, even
though they rarely use them. Very compressed, lots of reverb, and quite bright. A bit
of tremelo and modulation as well. I find this tone works poorly for strumming but is
good for arpeggios.

Periphery

CL_Prph-Cln_L

Similar as above, but more warm and midsy. Also a bit close to breaking up, which can
be done by turning on the Studio EQ to boost the signal going into the amp.

Chimp Spanner/Tesseract

CL_ChmpCln_L

All credit to Paul Ortiz for showing us how to dial this one in. See this youtube vid. It
sounds almost identical to some of the clean tones on Tesseract's album. Basically
you've got octaves above and below, compression, delay, and reverb. Phaser or
tremelo to make it more interesting.
 Crunch/Lead

Until We Say Goodbye (Satriani)

CL_StchCrn_1113

A cleaned up Park 75 tone with a Tube Drive pedal in front to warm up the tone and
some reverb behind. This is one of my favorite clean lead tones - a very fat tone just
hitting break-up and very responsive to dynamics but still offering plenty of sustain.

Marshall Crunch

CL_MrshCrn_L

I wanted a generic yet classic Marshall crunch tone, mainly for rhythms. Nothing too
special as far as tweaking goes here, other than using dual cabs to get a rich
frequency response.

Deluxe Reverb Lead

CL_DelRev_L

I really wanted a slightly broken up Fender tone, as though I was just pushing the
amp really hard. Just doing that by itself seemed a bit too harsh, so I use some
different cab/mic choices and EQ'ing to make the breakup a bit sweeter.