Scott Henderson Discussion

Chickentonight · Joined: 16 Nov 2018 Posts: 72

https://www.premierguitar.com/articles/31193-maxon-custom-shop-releases-the-ssd-9-super-sonic-distortion

And, of course, couple of bonus questions to harass you even more:

1. Does matter to you much how an amp is biased? I put my JCM2000 to 72 mV per side which seems to be okay when marshall recommends 90mV. Am I completely off the charts here tonewise?

2. Have you tried the York audio impulse responses yet? Do you feel that they're much better than the celestion ones which you kinda liked if I remember correctly.

Thanks for answering and happy holidays.

Scott Henderson · The Man Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 2135

The guys at Maxon are my friends and I hope what I say doesn't cause any bad feelings, but I'm always honest and transparent about what I write here, so this is my comment from Facebook.

Maxon's plan to make an SH model of the SD-9 has been going on for over a year. They've sent me 3 modded SD-9's, which I didn't like as much as the original. I thought they were going to send me a 4th one, but instead they released this, probably because they realize it might be a lost cause with me. I've heard many mods of this pedal, including the most popular ones, but none of them were even close to sounding as good as the original. It's possible that Maxon finally did it, but I don't want my personal opinion to affect their sales, so I won't be trying this one.

About biasing, it's extremely important, both for the tone of the amp and the condition of the tubes, so I'd go with whatever the Marshall techs say.

I don't think York Audio is globally better than Celestion, but I do like their #1 4x12 Greenback much more than the Celestion Balanced 4x12, which is too dark for me. Not only is the York Audio 4x12 Greenback brighter, but it has much more depth, bass, and is extremely real and 3D sounding. It's the closest thing I've found to my actual cabinet. I'm only using IR's captured using a 57 - I hate all the other ones, unless I'm looking for something completely different for layering.

Chickentonight · Joined: 16 Nov 2018 Posts: 72

Thanks.

Good to know about the sd-9. I'll stick to the older one too.

Some say that it's biased too hot for the tubes if done the Marshall way and since it's mostly preamp gain it doesn't matter as much. Seems I get a clearer sound too if little underbiased. Gotta experiment some more.