We're renting one rehearsal studio, they have JCM800 and 900 over there. Those amps are in pretty good shape. So, at one rehearsal, I've tried to use just my Bad Monkey with 800, boosted it by putting Monkey's Level pot on max, gain on min, and adjusting sound with Low And high pots. But distortion is too weak even for Metal, not to mention some Death Metal tone. Am I missing something or what? What am I doing wrong, or it's just that JCM800 ain't good enough with just booster pedal?

Are you running the pedal into the high gain channel or clean? You're supposed to run it into the high gain channel.

__________________

When i took my 900 over to some rehersal studio, i didn't even need my ProCo RAT, there was plenty of gain when it was cranked (50W, about 6 on the master volume)... perhaps the 800 has a bad tube?

__________________

im no expert but i assume that if gain is on min. you might not get much distortion

I believe I've ran it into high gain one, yes.



hmmm....maybe.



That's why I said "boosting". Level max, gain min, so pedal which I'm using as a boost does not color the sound. Bad Monkey is said to be transparent, and after all, it's purpose is - boosting.

Um, make sure you are running it into the high gain channel then let us know. :huh: Btw you are using the AMP output, not the mixer output right?

It is a good idea to use some of the gain on the pedal too btw, just so you can get some extra saturation out of it. A simple level boost isn't going to add THAT much grind, use a little bit of the gain knob. Also crank your amp's gain of course.

I'm almost positive you're just using the clean input. 800's should have enough gain for thrash metal and stuff.

__________________

:huh: :redneck:
Yeah, amp output of course, I use mixer one just when I need modeling and that is - when going straight to the PC, for recording, duh
But I didn't use Monkey for any recording yet.

As for high gain channel, hmm, I think I've used it, but now when you're insisting, I am not sure anymore.
Definitely will do it on the next rehearsal in that studio, then I'll report.

I use the BM on my JCM900 and I can see why you might think it doesn't have enough gain, it only just about gives me enough boost on that. The 800 has less gain so.... Maybe using a bit of the BM's Gain might help, I always found it just gave me a more grungy tone though. Tubes make all the difference here, if its running old or high-headroom tubes it may not have the gain on tap.

__________________