Ever wondered how those crunch sounds come from the guitars of modern day Rock gods. Well, the answer to this is electronics. So let us go through the history of this “rock” sound. When electric guitars were invented, amplifiers in those days were tube amplifier which unlike today’s amplifiers used triodes or tube valve instead of transistors to amplify signal.

Ever wondered how those crunch sounds come from the guitars of modern day Rock gods. Well, the answer to this is electronics. So let us go through the history of this “rock” sound. When electric guitars were invented, amplifiers in those days were tube amplifier which unlike today’s amplifiers used triodes or tube valve instead of transistors to amplify signal. The amplifiers in those days were big and bulk. And when they were played at full volume, they produce a “distorted” sound because the guitar signal got too amplified and hence clipped. The great guitarist Jimi Hendrix was the first guitarist to recognise that guitar and the amplifier together can be used as an instrument and started using this distorted sound to produce music. Thus rock music was invented.But tube amplifiers were unreliable, consumed lot of power and were expensive. Thus electronic engineers started to develop circuits which produced the same effect as a fully driven tube amp but were a lot smaller, effective and reliable. This gave birth to distortion pedals with transistors.