Smells Like Teen Spirit

Cobain used a Boss DS-1 into a Mesa Boogie Studio preamp. Simple but aggressive. High gain, slightly scooped.

Guitar World documents an early-1990s Japanese Fender Stratocaster with a Seymour Duncan JB, a Mesa/Boogie Studio preamp into a Crown power amp and Marshall 4x12, plus a Boss DS-1 and Electro-Harmonix Small Clone. It also publishes control positions for that reconstruction: the Small Clone is clean on the verses, the DS-1 supplies the dirty channel, and both effects are combined for the pre-choruses and solo. The values below follow those published settings rather than inventing a Bassman-only approximation. Source: Guitar World’s “Secrets Behind the Sound” feature (2021).