Distortion: Means to an end (Part 1)

We definitely love heavy distortion; imagine letting that heavy bass notes propel doom & apocalypse, it's one of the highs of guitar playing. For that to happen, we have those intense distortion effects types to see us through, if you are a serious heavy distortion monger, you'd know BOSS' Metal Zone, at the very least. But heavy distortion is not about those pedals exclusively, we can achieve heavy tones just by utilizing the amp's default drive channel. If that's not earth-shaking enough for us, we know there are supplementary pedals which could be used in conjunction with what the amp has to offer; it's like knowing you can go fast but what the heck, Red Bull's there to make you go faster (subjective, this one...). 

This is one of the reasons why we should not exclude the mild-mannered pedals when we think 'heavy'. As there are many ways to achieve heaviness, there is therefore no exclusive manifestation of what we use to achieve that end- rack effects, straight-through plug in, single effects pedal, stacking soft distortion units- it's the art of knowing what you can use that works for you. There are some people out there who were taken aback upon knowing that Jeff Loomis has a TS9 in his effects chain & that Chuck Shuldiner (RIP) lives on his orange DS1 to death-up his Death outfit. They are merely using what works for them in beefing up their tone so there's nothing too amazing about it. What we lack sometimes, is gear exposure & knowledge which would be addressed, as it was with me, through time. As we move on, grow older (& become wiser, hopefully), it's a matter of time before we expand our gear knowledge. The only factor retarding this education is our attitude towards acceptability which should not happen especially in today's age of information acquisition.