Effects Bay

Today’s pedal line is from James Hume. If you have a pedal line (doesn’t have to be in a board) for your rig, please email me a photo, bio, description of pedals and routing to Every Friday I’ll showcase a pedal line submission. Make sure you include any links to your band or music page.

Hi, I’m James Hume, and I played in the band Midnite Hobo for two years (for any of you that read Questionable Content: questionablecontent.net)

The lineup:  Right to Left
Korg PitchBlack Tuner -> Boss CS-3 Compressor -> Vox Standard Wah -> Custom modded Danelectro Pastrami Overdrive -> Dunlop High Gain Volume Pedal -> Electro Harmonix Little Big Muff Pi -> Danelectro Cool Cat Fuzz -> Boss DS-2 Turbo Distortion w/ turbo switch (beneath the dano overdrive, connected with the green cable) -> Electro Harmonix Memory Toy Analog Delay -> Boss BF-3 Flanger run in stereo to a Laney LX 20 and a Washburn BD 30 bass amp.  All these pedals are powered by a Godlyke Powerall wall wart adapter with an 11 point daisychain.

On the shelf/still being built:  Boss Os-2, Ibanez Weeping Demon Wah, Rebote 2.5 Digital Delay, Ibanez Tube Screamer with 808/9 toggle, as well as symmetrical/asymmetrical clipping, Ampeg Scrambler, Ross 4/8 Stage Phaser, Small Clone Chorus with depth knob.  I build and do most of my mods myself, for example the clipping mod on the Dano Pastrami is an LED clipping diode mod, swapping the original red LEDs that clipped symmetrically for a 1n914 and either a bright Blue LED poking through the first O in Distortion (like the ds-1 keeley mod) and a 1n4001, which switches between an open, more classic sounding breakup and a more modern, more compressed sounding distortion.  The turbo switch below the pastrami is also homebuilt, and the ultrabright blue LED is pretty blinding.

A couple of notes on my rig:
First things first, the pitchblack.  It’s a great tuner, haven’t had any problems since I bought it three months ago.  The strobe tuning mode is cool, and works a treat.
The CS-3 was bought at a similar time, and is great for just grabbing and holding the notes.  I keep the sustain wide open to just keep the notes going with whatever distortion I use, and it works a treat.  It also keeps the broken chords and arpeggios going long enough so you can go get a bite to eat and it’ll still be going.

The Vox is just standard.  The switch stopped working about a year after I got it so I got it fixed with true bypass and a decent switch.  Pot’s a bit scratchy, so that needs to get fixed, and the curve on the wah seems pretty off with distortion, like there’s a real edge on the filter… But no problems aside from that.

Like I explained above, the Dano is a lovely bit of open, tube-y grit that works well in front of everything else.  It goes all the way from clean boost to a light, crispy breakup, all the way to a top boosted , full on Crunch.  Nice little pedal when stock, even better with the mods.

Dunlop High-Gain Volume pedal is great for doing massive swells, and works perfectly behind the dirt.

The Little Big Muff is just what you’d expect.  Rock solid and reliable, sounds wonderful in conjunction with the flanger and delay to get those David Gilmour-esque tones.  Pulling back on the volume pedal means I can even get a nice, smooth overdrive sound out of if.  Again, wonderful pedal.

The Dano CC Fuzz is pretty basic, fuzz to flab to fizz, and I’m planning on replacing it with a zvex fuzz factory as soon as my local shop has one in.  Can’t wait to get ripping with that beast.

The Turbo Distortion is a pretty boring pedal, if I’m entirely honest.  Rather flat sounding, so it’s getting replaced soon as well, probably with an Xotic BB Plus Preamp.  Still, it works for now as my standard distortion, kicking the turbo switch for solos.  But still, not my first choice.

The Memory Toy is a beautiful piece of kit.  It’s currently replacing a busted Rockburn delay which I was trying to mod (stupid bloody surfacemount components) and has been working a treat. It does wonders for just layering your tone, but my only problem is the mix knob.  At noon your tone isn’t all there!  At 11, it’s almost there, but the delays aren’t strong enough to double your playing, and the further back you dial it, the more the clean signal is boosted!  It just makes things difficult to intuit as far as signal blend goes.  Anyway, it’s an awesome analog delay and I just love cranking the time and the repeats until just before it starts oscillating:  pure heaven.  I physically can’t live without a bit of delay in my line, because I would just miss the lovely fullness it gives.  It’s also great to play around with

And finally the flanger, which I love for splitting my signal and flanging the parts out of flanging phase with each other.  Lovely and lush when you run it stereo, but equally nice in mono.  Still need a gig with a stereo mix to try it out, but it should be awesome when I get that going.  I love all the modes on it, especially the Gate/Pan setting.  Mono signal with distortion and a bass guitar has an awesome gated, percussive feel, a lot like a sequenced synth which I love!

My guitars at the moment are an Epiphone Les Paul Special 2 and an American Standard Squier strat that’s been vintaged and scalloped from the 12th onwards.  Both are Fun guitars, but I’m looking at getting rid of the Epiphone and replacing it with a lovely Ibanez RG 470 with a Fernandez sustainer.  Sweet sweet sustain

My pedalboard is an Ikea Gorm covered in loopy Velcro, and I’ve got so much gear I’ll be expanding over into another one quite soon, not quite so Velcro covered.

A bit about myself:
I’ve played a couple of different instruments in a couple of different bands, from j-rock to metal covers of Lady Gaga, queen to The Rolling Stones.  My real passion, however, is mixing and getting everything to sound just right.  I love mixing everything, and generally do the set up for my bandmates gear if they don’t know that the hell they’re doing.  My most recent band was Midnite Hobo, an all-ages-of-rock band formed and based in Singapore.  We broke up three months ago with the end of school, as both our lead singer and other guitarist left.  Since then I’ve just been letting my G.A.S. Get to me, hoping I run out of things I want before I run out of money, but isn’t that the life of a musician?

Regards,
James Hume
A.k.a. Darth Achaeron
Follow me on twitter @darthachaeron

Popularity: 2%

Today’s pedal line is from Lamont Caldwell. If you have a pedal line (doesn’t have to be in a board) for your rig, please email me a photo, bio, description of pedals and routing to Every Friday I’ll showcase a pedal line submission. Make sure you include any links to your band or music page.

Here is my pedal board set up for playing with MACH22.

MXR dyna compression
Ibanez Soundtank Tube Screamer
Boss DS-1 Distortion
Morley Bad Horsie Wah
Korg Chromatic Tuner
Hughes and Kettner Reverb 100 Head stomp box.

All my pedals were bought from a pawn shop, one was from ebay! LOL I needed a wah and got the Morley from a friend in Philly.

I like to add the Tube Screamer to the gain 1 channel of my H&K for some extra buzzy fuzz. I’m still experiementing with the pedals but I like what I got so far.

Thanks,
Lamont

www.myspace.com/mach22
www.mach22music.com

Popularity: 2%

Today’s pedal line is from Stephen Briggs. If you have a pedal line (doesn’t have to be in a board) for your rig, please email me a photo, bio, description of pedals and routing to Every Friday I’ll showcase a pedal line submission. Make sure you include any links to your band or music page.

This pedalboard took many years to put together and has changed considerably and still continues to evolve as my musical style/taste changes. I play ambient, experimental, post rock. Looping phrases, reversing them, adding layers, and dropping the loop an octave whilst playing lead over the top.

Tone is where it’s at and hence I’m on the lookout for a mix of clean and dirty/heavy. The pedalboard is a tad light on the modulation front; hence a few changes are in the pipeline.
I play an American Strat loaded with Kinman Woodstock noiseless pickups.

The pedal chain goes: Korg pitchblack (tuner) into the Fat Fuzz side of the Foxrox Zim, a warm very sustainable fuzz particularly with the delay I use further up the chain, into the Buffer/Boost side of the pedal, which is on 99% of the time to boost the signal through the chain with a little extra bass added. Then to the Analogman DS-1 pro and the Boss SD-1 for a variety of distortion/overdrive tone.

The modulation begins with the EMMA DiscumBOBulator envelope filter, it makes life easier and takes less space than a Wah pedal, just press the switch and leave it to do its thing, equally good with Bass or Guitar. I use the SD-1 with this to get the right effect.

Next the Roger Mayer Voodoo vibe, my favorite pedal, so many cool sounds, I tend to use the vibe/chorus setting for a long/slow warbling effect, very deep and alive! Into the 1970′s BOSS CE-2, long dash, if that makes any difference? A touch more treble and a few decibels more volume.

Time for some delayz. BOSS DD-20, I’ve set up five useful delays in one pedal with tap tempo via the small black box with the red switch. To the Akai Head Rush, originally my looper pedal now the second tap tempo delay either digital or four head tape delay. To the BOSS PS-3, short delay at the moment to the BOSS DD-6 long delay. Setting the Delays to work together takes some effort but the sound that comes through is worth it! So, sometimes all four delays are running at the same time to get violin or organ type effects with huge gain available with the feedback.

To the BOSS RV-5 reverb set on modulation. Slightly different to the modulation on the DD-20 and the CE-2 chorus. I like having the options to experiment.

Finally to the piece de resistance – the Boomerang lll Phrase Sampler; what a superb unit from those fine gentlemen, Mike and Lee in Texas. The best looper by far in my humble opinion. Check out the website for what it can do….four loops at the same time synched or not, reverse, octave down to name but a few. Then to the amp a 1980′s Fender Dual Showman reverb, full, deep and with plenty of headroom, able to handle the sounds it receives with ease.

Popularity: 3%

Today’s pedal line is from Derek de Beurs. If you have a pedal line (doesn’t have to be in a board) for your rig, please email me a photo, bio, description of pedals and routing to Every Friday I’ll showcase a pedal line submission. Make sure you include any links to your band or music page.

This is my current setup: Guitar > Fulltone fulldrive 2 > Ibanez tubescreamer analog man > Electro Harmonix Pog2 > Electro harmonix memory boy deluxe > Morley Wah > Electro harmonix Worm > Korg tuner DT-10

I do not use the worm and the wah all the time so thats why they are not on the “basis” pedalboard.

Derek de Beurs is the Lead guitarist in Indie band Milkbar and in an Elvis tribute band. Check out Milkbar on Twitter!

Popularity: 3%

Today’s pedal line is from Ben Hutcherson. If you have a pedal line (doesn’t have to be in a board) for your rig, please email me a photo, bio, description of pedals and routing to Every Friday I’ll showcase a pedal line submission. Make sure you include any links to your band or music page.

From L to R:

Top Row: Boss DD3, Eventide Pitchfactor, Barber Dirty Bomb

Bottom Row: EHX Stereo Memory with Hazarai, Whirlwind ABY, Catalinbread Pareidolia Harmonic Mesmerizer, Korg Pitchblack, Dunlop 95q wah, Morley Little Alligator volume pedal (EffectsBay note.. I see a MXR Carbon Copy Delay on that bottom row)

All of this is housed on a Pedal Pad XL.

I run two rigs live in my psychadelic doom/sludge band Galaxicon (www.myspace.com/galaxicon, http://listn.to/galaxicon). Rig A (Sunn Beta Bass Lead into a Vader 4×12) comes from the SMMH into the amp, while rig B (Engl Straight 100) has the DD3 in the signal path. I have the settings cranked on the DD3 for a long delay with lots of repeats for transition parts where a note (or feedback) will repeat on Rig B while I am playing on Rig A. Yes, lots of tapdancing happens with this board. And yes, I love delay. The Dirty Bomb satisfied my dirt needs after experimenting with lots of different pedals. It’s an affordable semi-boutique (did I just make that up? Maybe.) pedal with a really neat feature: a switch that controls the mid voicing. Adding that mid boost makes the sound so much fuller, and I love it.

Popularity: 3%

Today’s pedal line is from Bobby Morelli (@drewstreetmary). If you have a pedal line (doesn’t have to be in a board) for your rig, please email me a photo, bio, description of pedals and routing to Every Friday I’ll showcase a pedal line submission. Make sure you include any links to your band or music page.

Here’s my current set up!  The signal flow is as follows – Guitar > Bad Cat 2 Tone > Electro Harmonix POG 2 > Mojo Hand Analogue Filter 442 > Dr. Scientist The Tremolessence > Marshall Regenerator > Boss DD3 > Line 6 Verbzilla > Peterson StroboStomp V-1 (with Analogman upgraded jacks) all this sit atop a PedalTrain 2 with a VooDoo Lab PedalPower 2+ underneath!

Bobby Morelli is the lead guitarist in the Tampa, FL based rock band Drew Street Mary.  He’s a tone whore and spends time worrying about gear when he should be practicing.

www.drewstreetmary.com
www.facebook.com/drewstreetmary
@drewstreetmary

Popularity: 3%

Today’s pedal line is from Lee Lundgren. If you have a pedal line (doesn’t have to be in a board) for your rig, please email me a photo, bio, description of pedals and routing to Every Friday I’ll showcase a pedal line submission. Make sure you include any links to your band or music page.

Digitech Hardwire Distortion, Visual Sound Jekyll & Hyde, Tech 21 MIDI Switcher, Custom Loop Box, Rockett Flex Drive, Line 6 Echo Park, GigRig Virtual Battery, Digitech Hardwire Delay, Custom Loop Box, Radial SGI & PB-1, Hughes & Kettner Zentera Controller, Hughes & Kettner Replex Delay

Delays a distortions are what I’m into right now.  I control them with some old loop boxes I made ages ago.  My kids helped me paint them a couple years back, to snaz them up a bit.

The H & K Replex has been a favorite for years.  I use it in place verb most of the time.  Most of the time i run my delays into a comp so they duck a bit.

The Hardwire distortion and Dr J. go into clean amps, Fender or Vox.  I use the Flexdrive to clean up a distorted amp, usually a Marshall.

I like modulation too, just no pedals.  One of the loop boxes turns a send to a Korg a3 on and off, where I have some mod patches.

Cool site!

Lee Lundgren

Popularity: 2%

Today’s pedal line is from Louis DiFlorio. If you have a pedal line (doesn’t have to be in a board) for your rig, please email me a photo, bio, description of pedals and routing to Every Friday I’ll showcase a pedal line submission. Make sure you include any links to your band or music page.

Hi There,

My name is Louis DiFlorio.  I’ve been playing guitar for 20 years in various bands.  These days, I play in a band called the Sherbourne Canons.  We play classic rock influenced original music.  I play a 52 USRI telecaster (1986) and an American standard strat (1986) as my main guitars.  I also have an Epiphone 335 and Les Paul gold top (both 90′s models Made in Korea).  My main amp is a Fender Hot Rod Deluxe Limited Edition White Lightning, and at home I use a Fender Champ 600.

My pedals currently are:

1. Into the front of the amp:

Boss TU-2:  pretty standard.  I find it to be reliable, and the tone suck doesn’t seem to bother me especially in a two guitar band such as the Canons.

VS Comp-66:  I’ve been through a few compressors, and I find this to be very quiet and with a great buffer.  I use it for clean tones mainly, and the odd bit off chicken pickin.

Lovepedal Pickle vibe:  I’ve been through the micro vibe and I have a cool cat CV-1.  This little guy is pretty good.  Solid, and I really like the small size for my board.

Xotic AC Plus: I quite like this pedal.  Great low/med drive options.  I wouldn’t mind checking out the BB plus, but this pedal seems to work well with my set-up.

MXR Micro Amp:  mainly used for lead boosts.

2.  Into the effects loop of the HRDLX:

Lovepedal Babyface tremolo:  great little trem pedal.  It sounds terrific and I like the three settings that range from Fender amp vibrato to intense chop city.  The internal pots are a pain to access, but I find I set those and leave them.

MXR Carbon Copy:  Use this as my main delay.  I have a big box Deluxe Memory Man and I must say it sounds fantastic, but this guy is great as well.  The modulation is pretty nice and it fits on the board!

Boss DD-20:  Great delay box.  This thing can do just about everything.  I use the reverse mode, the loop function, and I use it for longer digital delay sounds when I need them.

Not pictured:

I usually start my chain with a Zoom UF-1 Ultra Fuzz.  This thing is a really versatile analog fuzz box.  It’s no longer made, and some say it’s closely related to the Zvex Fuzz Factory.  It has a gate, and res dials that allow to get some pretty wild sounds.

Voodoo Labs Proctavia:  Just got this guy used for a good deal.  Not sure if it will be a main stay or not.

That’s it.  Cheers and Thanks.  I really enjoy effects bay.  I find it to be a great source of information and entertainment.

Lou DiFlorio

Popularity: 3%

Today’s pedal line is from Olberg Sanz @NICTOFOBIA. If you have a pedal line (doesn’t have to be in a board) for your rig, please email me a photo, bio, description of pedals and routing to Every Friday I’ll showcase a pedal line submission. Make sure you include any links to your band or music page.

Nictofobia Bass Pedalboard Setting
Olberg Sanz – Bass & Lead Vocals.

It’s hard to find your own sound when you’re playing fusion music on a powertrio band, like Nictofobia wich plays Ska-Punk-Hardcore songs since 2003, from Caracas, Venezuela.I was looking for a perfect marriage between bass drum punch and the bass guitar tone, so I started to test different stompboxes.

First I needed three basic settings: a fat powerfull tone for ska, reggae and rocksteady, a metallic brighty sound for punk hardcore and hard rock, and clear overdrive sound to make chords while the guitar makes the solos on the songs.

I founded the first setting cutting the high frecuencies on the bass EQ, using an standard compression on Boss CS-3 and the Electro-Harmonix KnockOut like *booster*. In the Peavey amp, I turned to 4 the bass knob. In the bass playing, just fingering sound. Result? Awesome dimension to play long notes with a rich sustain.

The second one is similar, but I opened to 75% the treble knob on the Stingray, using an standard compression on Boss CS-3 and the Electro-Harmonix KnockOut like *booster*, but in the Peavey amp, I turned to 2 the bass knob. In the bass playing, I used pick to find that metallic sound. Wow, that’s my tone to play faster hardcore including palm-muting techinque also.

The last setting, is very important in many songs to avoid the base of the guitar in a solo. In this bars, I transform the bass in to guitar distortion using *powerchords.* Here, I turned on the Boss ODB-3, leveling the clean bass sound with the Dist sound, and opening the treble knob on the MusicMan. This option is very interesting when the guitar makes its jamming and you need the distortion bass of a riff and you don’t have a rythm guitar.

Additional effects:
On Nictofobia’s new album, I needed weird effects for interludes, intros and outros. So, added to my pedalboard the Boss SYB-5 to generate saw and square waves synth like. For pyschodelic ambience, the stereo gate flanger of is a cool option mixed with overdrive of Boss BF-3Boss ODB-3 too.

Equipment:
- MusicMan Stingray 4 Strings Active Hambucker.
- Dunlop Scotty Pick Holder.
- Dunlop Strap Lock.
- Planet Waves Strap.
- Peavey TNT-115 Bass Amplifier.
- Planet Waves 1/4 plug cables.
- Planet Waves Bass Picks.

Last setting on pedalboard:
- Boss TU-2 Chromatic Tuner.
- Boss CS-3 Compression Sustainer
- Electro-Harmonix KnockOut Attack Equalizer
- Boss ODB-3 Bass Overdrive
- Boss SYB-5 Bass Synthesizer
- Boss BF-3 Flanger

More about Nictofobia:
WEB: www.nictofobia.com
MYSPACE: www.myspace.com/nictofobia
TWITTER: www.twitter.com/nictofobia
BLOG: www.nictofobia.blogspot.com

Popularity: 3%

Today’s pedal line is from Bennie Kendrick. If you have a pedal line (doesn’t have to be in a board) for your rig, please email me a photo, bio, description of pedals and routing to Every Friday I’ll showcase a pedal line submission. Make sure you include any links to your band or music page.

My name is Bennie Kendrick.  I’m a worship pastor at a EastPoint Church in Midwest City, OK.  I also play guitar (and bass) for hire a few times a month, and do an occasional recording session.  I love collecting music gear, and have a wonderful wife who is also willing to help contribute to the collection on birthdays and other gift-giving occasions.  I have a ton of pedals, amp modelers, rack effects, and even a guitar synth, but I am submitting a pedal line for my only “complete” board; this is my new go-to setup for most gigs.

My pedal line is as follows:   TC Electronic Poly Tune —> EHX Little Big Muff Pi Fuzz —> EHX Small Stone Nano Phaser —> Fulltone Clyde Deluxe Wah —> MI Audio Boost N Buff —> Fulltone Full Drive 2 Mosfet Overdrive —> Fulltone GT-500 Distortion/Booster —> Pro Co Rat2 —> Pro Co Ltd Edition Reissue ’85 Whiteface RAT —> Bixonic Expandora 2000R Reissue —> Ernie Ball VP Jr Volume —> Voodoo Lab Tremolo —> Line 6 DL4 Delay —> EHX Holy Grail Plus Reverb. All powered by a couple of Voodoo Lab Pedal Power 2 pluses, which are located under the hinged riser.  As far as amps, I generally play through either a Blackheart BH5-112 or a Fender 65 Deluxe Reverb, depending on the size of the room.  My favorite electric guitar is probably my thin body, set-neck Fender Telecaster Special with dual Dimarzio Humbuckers (completely stock).  I have more expensive guitars, but I just love the sound of this one.

TC Electronic Poly Tune – Tuner that handles single or multiple string tuning.

EHX Little Big Muff Pi – Fuzz.  “Violin-like sustain and creamy tone”

EHX Small Stone Nano – Analog Phase Shifter with rate knob and color switch

Fulltone Clyde Deluxe Wah – Tri-mode Wah with 10 step variable input level control

MI Audio Boost N Buff – Ultra high input impedance buffer / volume booster

Fulltone Full Drive 2 Mosfet – Overdrive or Clean Boost.  Boost switch adds more gain and sustain

Fulltone GT-500 Distortion/Booster – Two-stage (or two-bank) Overdrive/Boost and Distortion

Pro Co Rat2 – OD/Distortion/Fuzz box.  What’s your preference?

Pro Co Ltd Edition Reissue ’85 Whiteface RAT – Reissue of the original RAT. Surprisingly different sounding than the Rat2.  I like them both.

Bixonic Expandora 2000R Reissue – Also an OD/Distortion/Fuzz box.  I played an original Expandora a few years back on another guitarist’s board and was super excited when Bixonic offered a reissue for a limited time.  The reissue put the internal dip switches on the outside of the box for easier access.

Ernie Ball VP Jr Volume – Smaller footprint than the standard EB volume pedal

Voodoo Lab Tremolo – Tube-amp-like tremolo

Line 6 DL4 DelayX – Delay modeler with three banks and tap tempo

EHX Holy Grail Plus Reverb – Reverb with four different model options

Voodoo Lab Pedal Power 2 plus – qty2 – Isolated power supply with toroidal transformer and switchable voltages

The board was built by a buddy of mine to fit inside a soft keyboard bag (61 key, I believe).  In the picture you may be able to see random screw holes in the board; that’s because I’ve swapped pedals around on that board more times than I want to think about.  That’s also the reason a few of the patch cables are too long (I soldered these myself, but most were for a totally different pedal arrangement).

Popularity: 3%