Distortion Exploration

After nearly a year with the MiniBrute 2S, I felt sure I wanted to pair it with a distortion pedal. Perhaps, I thought, this would finally get me closer to that screaming sound I associated with acid classics like Josh Wink’s Higher State of Consciousness. Guitar pedals are a gigantic rabbit hole I didn’t particularly want to fall into, so I limited my shopping and predictably settled on the iconic Pro Co RAT. Its claim to fame is in the realm of guitars and rock music, but there’s no reason it can’t also work with a synthesizer.

This jam is lukewarm in my estimation, and is being carried by the keys part I layered on top of it afterward; but because it’s the first one I recorded with the pedal, it gets to survive as a minor landmark in my synth journey.

With just three knobs and an on/off switch, the RAT is an extremely straightforward pedal, yet it is remarkable how much there is to explore in the realm of distortion — and would be even without a single control parameter.

How source material interacts with distortion is heavily dependent not only upon its timbre but also upon whatever part of the signal peaks first. Consequently, you can play with the distortion using any filter, EQ, or other prior parameter — particularly those impacting amplitude — without ever even touching the pedal. And when you do, something as simple as a drive or filter knob then interacts with all the other settings in multi-faceted ways.

Before you know it, the evening is gone.

Also, the filter on the RAT is quite nice. Sometimes I leave the distortion fully counterclockwise and use the pedal for the filter alone.