Effects Bay

Today’s pedal line is from Al Oomens. 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 pedallineeffectsbaycom. Every Friday I’ll showcase a pedal line submission. Make sure you include any links to your band or music page.

Greetings! I’ve been following Effects Bay on Twitter for a while now, and pedal line Friday  as well as your give-aways. I though I’d send you a picture and description of my pedal board. It’s rather small, but that’s because it was built to be exactly what I needed, and no more. It’s actually quit functional. Below, I describe not only the pedals I use, but also a little bit about why I chose them, and how they are used together. Hope you find it interesting and/or useful.

My pedalboard consists of:
- Strymon OB.1 – optical compressor and boost
- Ibanez PQ9 – semi-parametric EQ
- Earthquaker Devices Speaker Cranker – overdrive
- Earthquaker Devices Dispatch Master – reverb and delay
- A/DA GCS-2 – speaker cabinet simulator/direct box
- Pedaltrain Mini pedalboard
- Visual Sound OneSpot & small transformer based power supply

This board was put together for (mostly) clean sounds with the ability to run directly into the board and maintain the tone and feel of playing through a miked amp. While at first glance it may seem like a fairly simple board, a lot of thought went into each pedal used. All the features of each pedal are useful, and work well together with no duplication of features.

The OB.1 is the most transparent guitar compressor I have heard so far. When you switch it on there virtually no change in the perceived tone of the guitar. I leave it on almost all the time. It also features a separate foot switch for boost. You can select treble boost,  mid boost or flat boost. The treble boost gives me a nice bright sound without sounding thin.

The Ibanez PQ9 is the only vintage pedal in my board. It is from the Ibanez ’9′ series of the early 80′s (the TS9 was from this series). I use it to duplicate the sound of the tonestack of a Fender amp. With the sweep-ablemid, I found it very easy to do. If I am running only into my amp, I just switch this off. This is a real nice, musical EQ.

For overdrive I chose the EQD Speaker Cranker. It is a dead simple (one knob!), great sounding overdrive. I already have the tone I like so I don’t need tone controls. At the lowest setting it adds just a bit of breakup for chords without drastically changing my tone. At higher levels it automatically increases the volume so the perceived volume remains the same. Still without drastically changing the tone of my guitar. If I want that mid-boosted overdrive sound, I just click on the mid boost on the OB.1.

I’m one of those players that can’t live without reverb. For that I chose the EQD Dispatch Master. This pedal combines reverb and delay. The reverb is not a spring type,  but again, it really lets the natural tone of the guitar through, even at pretty drastic settings. I keep this on all the time, usually with a little delay.

The last item is the A/DA GCS-2. This is a superb direct box. It is switchable to emulate both modern and vintage speakers, closed and open back cabinets, as well as 10 or 12 inch speakers. There is also a control to simulate different mic placement. I use the through output to go to my amp and the mic output direct to the board. It really does a great job of emulating the sound and feel of a mic’d cabinet.

The first four pedals are powered by a Visual Sound OneSpot, daisy chained. The GCS-2 uses its own transformer based wall wart supply. The pedals are mounted to a Pedaltrain Mini pedalboard and connected using Monster Cable interconnects.

It all ends up being a fairly small board, but more versatile than it would first appear. And, most importantly, gives me all the sounds I want, whether plugged into my amp or going directly into the board (or both)!

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Evert Zeevalkink is starting to be one of my favorite “looping” artists out there. I came across a video a while back in March (you can read the post here), but today, he contacted me letting me know about a recent video. What really caught my attention in the email, he mentioned he was doing some looping, but without a guitar. He’s literally ‘playing’ the pedals. Basically, he’s using a ZVex Fuzz Probe to generate a oscillating signal/note into his pedal chain, and then he manipulates the signal – primarily with an Eventide Pitchfactor. Pretty cool!

For this video, he used the following effects:

Zvex Fuzz Probe
Digitech Whammy
MSD Silvermachine Wah
Boss Blues Driver – Keeley Mod
Keeley 4Knob Compressor
Carl Martin Trem’O Vibe vibrato
Ernie Ball VP JR
Strymon Blue Sky
Eventide Pitchfactor
TC Electronic Nova Delay
Digitech JamMan Stereo

If you want to hear some great stuff, be sure to subscribe to his YouTube channel. Awesome stuff! Let me know what you think by commenting below!

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A lot of you already know I’m a big Foals fan. For those of you didn’t know, I’ve been a big fan of the English band – Foals for a few years now. Absolutely love what they’re all about. Yannis Philippakis is the lead singer and guitarist for the band. He’s always seen playing a variety of Travis Bean guitars (which I’m also a big fan of). But what I absolutely love is the guitar inter play between Yannis and the other guitarist – Jimmy Smith (who plays a Fender Jazzmaster, which I absolutely love playing now-a-days). The inter play and tension and build up these guys can pull off is amazing, and definitely hooks me in.

I’ve featured Yannis’ board in the past, but for their current tour (supporting their new album Holy Fire) he’s changed things up. There is one pedal on there I could really use your help IDing as well. A reader of EffectsBay let me know about this – so thank you Simon!

Here is the photo of Yannis’ pedal board:

Here is the breakdown of pedals:

Boss TU-3 Tuner
Strymon blueSky Reverberator
Boss RV-5 Reverb
Fuzzrocious Rat King
Klon Centaur
MXR Phase 100
EarthQuaker Devices Ghost Echo
Telenordia TK-23 Kompressor
EHX Micro Pog
Boss RC-30 Loop Station
True Bypass Loop Strip

As you can see, there is one unidentified pedal between the Boss RV-5 and the Klon Centaur. If you know what it is.. please let me know by commenting below. My guess its a delay of some sort. He use to run two delays in the past (Boss DD-3 and Empress SuperDelay) so this would make sense for it to be a secondary delay.

UPDATE: Unidentified pedal is a Fuzzrocious Rat King! Thanks Patrick!

So not familiar with Foals? Check this out. Coachella 2013:

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Today’s pedal line is from Ricky Wilson. 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 pedallineeffectsbaycom. Every Friday I’ll showcase a pedal line submission. Make sure you include any links to your band or music page.

Hi, my name is Ricky Wilson and I am a bass player and I occasionally play guitar for my own projects. I play a Peavey T40 bass, with an Ampeg 8×10 cab and a T.C. Electronic Staccato 51′ amp.  I recently put this pedal board together in order to make it more efficient for me to set up for shows.  I built the pedal board within a two week period.  It has 8 outlets wired into it as well as a power switch and an IEC power inlet for a C19 connector (which delivers the power from an outside source).  The pedals on the left pedal board are mostly powered by the light blue power strip at the top and the pedals on the right pedal board are powered by their own adapter.

My main pedal board (The one on the left hand side) is as follows:

1. Morley Volume Pedal:  I use this pedal mostly with my delay to make swells or if we end a song by letting the note ring out I will usually use this pedal to drop out a bit quicker.

2. Digitech Whammy: I use this pedal mostly for the detuned effect when I play with my band.  When recording my own stuff I use this pedal on the 4th/5th setting alot. All around great pedal.

3. Dunlop 105Q Bass Wah: I use this for typical wah effects.  I like to use this pedal with my Boss Flanger on the Gate/Pan effect with a high depth.

4. Source Audio Soundblox Bass Envelope Filter: I use this pedal if a few songs of ours to get a bass funk vibe.

5. Digitech Bass Synth Wah: This pedal has some really cool options.  I use this pedal mostly for more sustained parts that I want to sound really weird.  It drops the volume a bit but not enough to worry about.

6. Ibanez PD7 Phat-Hed Overdrive:  I have tried a few overdrive pedals (not a lot) but I always come back to this one for some reason. Sounds great

7. Boss OC-2: Sounds great with the PD7 pedal. Custom paint job on this one

8. Boss Temolo/Pan: I use this pedal with the depth all the way down and on the tremolo setting with the rate going fairly fast.  I only use this pedal in a couple of songs.  Sounds amazing

9. Boss Flanger BF-3: I mostly use this pedal on the Gate/Pan mode with a high depth and a somewhat quick rate.

10. Behringer Ultra Vibrato UV300: This pedal is pretty cheap but the sounds you can get out of it sound really cool.

11. Strymon Timeline Delay:  Just recently bought this pedal and it is an amazing delay.

Pedal Board on the right hand side is plugged into my amp as an FX Loop

1. Boss Bass Chorus CEB-3: I use this pedal on a lot of our songs

2. MXR Blowtorch: This pedal is used to give my signal extra overdrive

3. Way Huge Swollen Pickle (fuzz): Used in some heavier parts of our set

4. Moogerfooger Lowpass Filter:  Used throughout most of our set.  Has a smooth quality to it.

5. Moogerfooger Bass Murf : I use this pedal mostly for the Modular synth type sounds you can get out of this pedal.  Usually during a weird Jam session.

6. Boss Slicer: This is another pedal like the Bass Murf that is used during jam sessions that just sounds really trippy.

Here are my current projects:
www.facebook.com/musclebeachwreckingcrew
www.soundcloud.com/musclebeachwreckingcrew
www.soundcloud.com/Ricky-Wilson

Past Projects:
www.myspace.com/sigmoidargonaut

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Today’s pedal line is from Bartow Mills. 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 pedallineeffectsbaycom. 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 set up for bass guitar.  With this board I can easily and endlessly dial in psychedelic soundscapes, synth tones, wet slurpy filters, dub sub bass, and everything in between.  My 1 rack unit which goes into my amps loop is the Aphex 204 Aural Exciter w/ big bottom.  My pedal chain goes like this:

Bass > MXR Bass Compressor > Iron Ether Oxide Fuzz >  Pigtronix Mothership (18v version modified for low end tracking) > Aguilar Octamizer > Iron Ether Xerograph Deluxe > Jacques Trinity > Strymon Mobius > Eventide Space >  SFX Thumpinator  >  Fuzzrocious BDPG  > 3Leaf Audio Enabler >  Amp *Genz Benz Shuttle Max 6.0 (with the Aphex 204 in the Amps loop).

I currently play a Lakland 55-01 bass guitar.  Listed next is a information about each pedal in the line and some possibilities of how they interact:

MXR M87 Bass Compressor -  This compressor is extremely transparent. I use it to roll off dynamic peaks in my playing while still maintaining dynamics in technique.  Mostly the only time it is squashing anything is when I play too hard on the low B string. Ensures that I don’t spike hard using some of the more extreme effects that use sub frequenices (Octamizer and Mothership).

Iron Ether Oxide -  Fantastic gated fuzz.  I’m considering switching this out for a Chunk Systems Brown Dog, but for now it stays.  I usually keep a tight fuzz on the very top of the frequency range to get a saw wave synthesizer energy.  I also use it to “check” all of my modulation options in the other pedals.  If I have even the most subtle phase for instance I can kick on the fuzz and get a clear idea of how the tone is being modulated.  It’s also a great way to accentuate any modulation and filter sweeps using a bit of fuzz on top.

Pigtronix Mothership – Analog synthesizer that has a clean blend, sub octave, vco, and ring mod.  Lots of options on this pedal including whammy expression, sub octave out, and glide.  Very tweakable and a wide range of synth tones can be dialed in with this unit.  It can be somewhat wild and taming tones to a nice unity gain can be tricky but in my opinion it’s the best stompbox style synth that exists.

Aguilar Octamizer -  An analog octave pedal with a clean blend.  This pedal tracks really well and there are some really deep synth tones that can be pulled from it and is mainly what I use it for.  Yes, I like synth.

Iron Ether Xerograph Deluxe – Low pass and envelope filter of the gods.  I use this pedal mainly as a low pass and pull a really specific sub/dub bass range with it.  The clean knob allows me to blend back in my bass’s flat eq and add some bright mids/highs to a nice thick dub background.  Very cool and tweak-able pedal.

Jacques Trinity -  Envelope wah pedal.  I use it mainly for filter sweeps with a fuzz or synth by pressing/depressing it’s unique expression pedal/pump.  I’ve always found typical expression/wahs to be awkward to use by having to lift my foot off the ground and adjust the pedal back and forth.  The pedal that comes with the Trinity is a small pump that has a pretty great range.  I just sit my toe on the pump and rock it back and forth to get quacky envelope sounds or wide filter sweeps.

Strymon Mobius -  A universe of modulation that is vast and deep.  The 100 presets alone are enough to explore for a very long time.  Mostly I use it for psychedelic modulation effects that include chorus, flangers, bubbly filters, autoswells, bit crushed synth sounds, etc, etc.  This is a very diverse pedal and an end all to modulation for anyone’s pedalboard.

Eventide Space  -  Like the name implies, this is where the soundscapes happen.  Lush fields of reverbs/delays that shape all of the pedals in front into endless voids or distant sirens. With 100 legit factory presets it is hands down the best reverb/sonic-soundscape-maker out there.

SFX Thumpinator – This pedal is a bandwidth optimizer for bass guitarists.  It completely obliterates sub harmonics that exist below 30hz.  Most amps/speakers/systems can’t handle frequencies this low but those sub harmonics peak their heads up every so frequently damaging speakers and adding unwanted mud.  Having this little pedal on the board makes sure all the craziness that lies before it doesn’t get muddy and too shaky and tightens up the low end dramatically. Awesome tool for any bassist in a studio or live application.

Fuzzrocious BDPG – The “Broke Dick Peanut Gallery”  is a one of a kind overdrive/preamp for bass guitar.  3 knobs – gain>volume>tone.  The tone stack goes from really dub scooped tones to bright metal highs and everything in between.  It’s the best tone shaping tool on my board and helps to breath new life into the effects before it.

3Leaf Audio Enabler -  The Enabler is another preamp at the end of the board.  It is very warm/tube like and can help shape tone a bit further.  It also has a great DI out so I can go straight to the front of the house at any venue bypassing amp/eq/di if I am backlining and not wanting someones amp to color my tone too much.  It also has an Aux in and a Headphone out for practicing with a metronome/beat machine and using headphones.

My amp has a nice parametric eq that I tweak a little but for the most part keep flat and transparent (which it does well) and let my tone shape up mostly on my pedalboard.

Lastly I run the Aphex 204 Aural Exciter with Big Bottom in my amps effects loop.  The Aural Exciter cleans up frequencies in the low end and brings out more tight low bass while not increasing volume.  It is very helpful for large venues with subs and really shakes teeth in the front row,  I usually run my DI to the FOH from my amp so the Aural Exciter is applied only when I use my amp.

That’s all for my current set up.  It is a dream come true to own such a wide range of effects from nearly all of the best boutique builders in the business.  I am really happy with the quality and consistency of each effect on this board.  If you’d like to hear this effects chain in action look for me playing gigs in the Denver/Boulder/Fort Collins area with my two bands “Realifeactual” and “Star Count”.

https://www.facebook.com/Starcountband
https://www.facebook.com/Realifeactual

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I’m a big fan of solo looping. As a guitarist, the possibilities have greatly expanded with the development of great loopers. Layering ambient loops to craft a sonic world is super fun and fulfilling. Also, I like that many of the loopers don’t store or save, so you have to be ‘on it’ as a musician. Screwing up a loop can be somewhat disastrous, but so is messing up in a band situation in a lot of respects.

The other day, I came across a great video by Evert Zeevalkink where he put together a nice little piece. As guitarists interested in effects, I thought a few of you would be interested, as well as possibly being inspired by this video:

Evert used the following pedals for this piece:

-Boss Blues Driver – Keeley Mod
-Keeley 4 Knob Compressor
-Carl Martin TremO’Vibe
-Ernie Ball VP JR
-Strymon El Capistan
-Strymon Blue Sky
-Eventide Pitchfactor
-TC Electronic Nova Delay
-Digitech JamMan Stereo

Let me know what you think about this piece… as well as what you think of looping solo performances in general by commenting below!

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Today’s pedal line is from Alvaro Martín Gómez Acevedo. 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 pedallineeffectsbaycom. Every Friday I’ll showcase a pedal line submission. Make sure you include any links to your band or music page.

Hi. I’m a veteran bass player (26-year experience so far) from Bucaramanga, Colombia, South America, who just recently got bitten by the effects bug. Although several years ago I bought a Zoom multi-effects unit, I stopped using it just because most of its effect sounds were too “toyish” for me.

But around one year ago, I started reading so many rave reviews about the Microtubes B3K bass distortion/overdrive pedal from Darkglass electronics and, since I’ve always liked distortion, I decided to give it a try. So I ordered mine and when I received it, I simply couldn’t believe my ears. I mean, what a big difference compared to the Zoom distortions! The B3K is a REAL pedal.

After that experience, the “problem” was, I WANTED MORE PEDALS! So I started my research taking my favorite effects (not brands, just effect types) as an starting point. After LOTS of reading and deciding what I wanted, the final result is the one in the attached pictures. My friends at the TalkBass forums dubbed it “the USS Bad Muther F%$&er”. At least from the current offer in the market, I don’t want anything else regarding pedals.

So, here’s what I got:

- Loooper ABCD

- TC Electronic PolyTune

- Electro-Harmonix Bass Micro Synth
Love this one. A very versatile and great-sounding analog unit. The bass part from Van Halen’s “1984″ (yes, the synth prelude to “Jump”) sounds very convincing.

- MXR M82 Bass Envelope Filter

- Wilson 12-position vintage spec bass Q-wah

- MXR M87 Bass Compressor
One of the very few ones that has a detailed LED metering, which is a great visual aid for those of us not so experienced with compressors.

- Darkglass Microtubes B3K Bass distortion/overdrive
The one that started the fever. A great distortion/overdrive pedal for bass guitar.

- HardWire SP-7 Stereo Phaser

- DigiTech Whammy DT

- Copilot FX Planetoid Ring Modulator
Just for funny noises, actually. I must admit that I liked the Ringtone from ZVex demos more, but it’s way overpriced! The Planetoid is also great, anyway.

- Strymon TimeLine delay unit
This is a truly awesome delay/looper unit. Perhaps overkill for my needs, but its endless possibilities make it a worthwhile addition to any pedalboard.

- BSS Audio AR-133 Active DI Box

- Buzz Electronics Programmable Octo Looper
Everybody talks about Carl Martin’s Octa-Switch, which is undoubtedly a great unit, but this one is another terrific (and cheaper) product.

- PedalTrain Pro pedalboard

All of the above powered by three adapters: One Visual Sound 1-spot, the adapter that came with the DigiTech Whammy DT and the adapter from the EHX Bass Micro Synth. All of them plugged to a power strip tied to the bottom of the pedalboard (picture included). Neutrik plugs and Belden cable were used for connections.

And here’s an explanation of the effects path:

The Buzz Electronics Programmable 8 Looper is the “layout headquarters”. It has eight effect loops, an independent tuner out, a switchable internal buffer and two channels. Channel one covers loops 1 to 3 and channel 2 covers loops 4 to 8. Of course, each channel has its own In/Out jacks. The PolyTune is hooked to the independent tuner out.

The signal path starts on the Loooper ABCD, which is actually a box that can send one signal to several amplifiers, but it also can be used in reverse, as in my case: I use it to keep up to four basses plugged using the 1- 2 – 3 – 4 jacks and switch between them. So, the “In” jack actually works as “Out” in my setup. That signal from the ABCD box goes to the 8-Loop’s channel 1 in. The layout on channel 1 loops (1 to 3) is like this:

- No effect plugged to loop 1. I use it for different effects combinations.
- EHX Bass Micro Synth plugged to loop 2.
- MXR Bass Envelope Filter plugged to loop 3.

Then, channel 1 out goes to the Wilson Q-wah in, which means it isn’t included among the possible loop combinations. The wah’s out jack goes to the MXR compressor in, which is also out of the loop combinations, and is always on. Compressor’s output goes to the 8-Loop’s channel 2 in. Here’s the layout for channel 2 loops (4 to 8):

- Darkglass B3K assigned to loop 4.
- HardWire phaser assigned to loop 5.
- DigiTech whammy DT assigned to loop 6.
- Copilot Planetoid assigned to loop 7.
- Strymon TimeLine assigned to loop 8.

Next step in chain is the 8-Loop’s channel 2 out, which goes to the AR-133 DI Box input jack. From there, the signal goes to the FOH console through the balanced 3-pin XLR output and to the bass amp through the “Link” 1/4″ jack.

With the 8-Loop it’s pretty easy to combine the effect loops in any imaginable way. Most of the times I have each effect assigned to its own loop switch and use loop 1 to create combinations, but I can use all the eight switches to combine effects if I want to.

This is my YouTube channel, in which you can hear some of my effects in action:

http://www.youtube.com/user/Alvabass

Direct links to effect-related videos from my channel:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XSB_-ZxTDXA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q7r8jGLgzS8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CbrVEp09ZZo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ek24AnCexYc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vbsk0NXnffE

Thanks for reading!
Regards,

Álvaro Martín Gómez Acevedo
Bucaramanga, Colombia, South America.

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Today’s pedal line is from Andy Baker. 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 pedallineeffectsbaycom. Every Friday I’ll showcase a pedal line submission. Make sure you include any links to your band or music page.

Hi there, thanks for your kind comments on Twitter. You asked me to submit my pedal board for Pedal Line Friday. Here are my effects and a bit of history and background to my pedal collection/obssession:

My pedal board comprises of:

Gigrig Pro-14
Jim Dunlop Wah (with true bypass mod)
Ernie Ball Volume
Effectrode PC-2A Photo-Optical Tube Compressor
Ibanez Tube Screamer (Analogman mod)
Paul Cochrane – Tim
Pete Cornish P-2 Fuzz
MXR 10 Band EQ
MXR Phase 90
Hartman Analog Flanger
Eventide Pitchfactor
Strymon Timeline
T-Rex Room Mate Tube Reverb
Korg Pitchblack Tuner

Initially I started with a rack system with Mesa Boogie preamps and power amps, but then I noticed I preferred the tone and response from certain pedals such as a Tubescreamer and Boss CS-2 Compressor; therefore, I used those pedals in conjunction with my rack gear. The pedals then started to build up and before I knew it I was encasing my favourite stomp boxes in a rack system too (this was operated via GCX Switch System). Plus, I love Marshall Plexi 100 heads and I was running two into Palmer Speaker Simulators and that was fed via XLR cables into an A-B box; I would switch between heads which would go into a Lexicon  MPX1 and then stereo out into a Mesa Boogie 50/50.The size of my rack was gargantuan and as tall as a refrigerator.

If I was doing smaller gigs I would use the pedals encased in a rack with my Marshall Super Bass. Even though I really liked my tone, I was frustrated that I couldn’t boost solos with the GCX system I had; furthermore, I wanted to add more pedals. I was looking at various VCA options but then I discovered Daniel Steinhardts GigRig Pro-14; after careful consideration, I added the Tim, P-2 Fuzz and Nova Delay and had controlled via the GigRig Pro-14. This has changed a great deal since then and has installed the Strymon Timeline, Hartman Flanger and the Effectrode Compressor. Nevertheless, even though the Effectrode Compressor is wonderful and great for squishy tube lead lines, I do miss the chunky funky sounds from the Boss CS-2, and I believe certain pedals work extremely well with others. The CS-2 into the Tube Screamer sounds fantastic! Just doing a small gig with those two pedals does the job, saying this; the Effectrode Compressor – Tim – Timeline is one of the sweetest combinations of effects pedals I’ve heard.

I’m a sucker for experimentation and obsessed with infinite pedal combinations and just as I thought I was completely nuts, I’m about to install MIDI into the Pro-14, this is to link the GigRig Pro-14 with Eventide Pitch Factor and Strymon Timeline. As the Timeline has a looping function, I’m particularly interested in layering ambient sounds both from Timeline and Pitch Factor. Some of those swells Allan Holdsworth created on the Metal Fatigue album is something I’ve always wanted to aim for. The atonal lead lines Adrian Belew did on the King Crimson albums especially the harmonic squeals on Frame By Frame is also a strong influence. As well as being really fascinated with experimental options, I’m conscious about the integrity of tone and have always wanted to use a Smörgåsbord of colourful sounds.

For more information please go to:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lODImaNW6NY&feature=relmfu
http://paradigmworship.bandcamp.com
www.andybaker.info

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My memory is a little foggy, but I believe that I first listened to Smashing Pumpkins back in 1991, but honestly I feel it may have been in 1990, but that really doesn’t mean anything. What I do remember, is listening to Siva off of Gish. At that time, I was just learning to play guitar. I had a Yamaha RGZ guitar and crappy Crate G-40 amp. I was just learning about distortion, very limited control, but was having fun playing with my friends. When I listened to Siva I was absolutely blown away by the dynamics. I had never heard anything like that before, the now-classic loud/quiet/loud algorithm of the 90s. I can think of countless hours of listening to Gish, and it is definitely one of my “foundation” albums that would be included in my life soundtrack. That sounds dorky, but I often think of periods of my life and associate those times with very monumental albums of the time – and Gish is definitely up there.

I of course continued to listen to their follow up Siamese Dream, but the immense popularity of the band started push me away. This is an incredible annoying bad habit I have. Sometimes when bands get too mainstream, it annoys me. This is no fault of the band, or the music, but my own hangups. I honestly think I’ve grown out of that now, but back in the mid-90s, that would often happen to me. I think, I need to rediscover Smashing Pumpkins again and listen to the stuff I arrogantly passed and catch back up. Of course, I’ll have to throw some Gish back in my listening library… just for good measure.

I’ve always kept a 3rd eye on Billy Corgan throughout the years after. I’ve always admired his playing, his tone and his song writing. So, I was incredibly excited to see Premiere Guitars’ Rig Rundown on Billy Corgan’s gear.If you aren’t following Premiere Guitar’s YouTube Channel, I highly recommend it.

Immediately in the interview, I was very interested in what he is using for amps. He’s using Salvation Mods to create small compact pre-amp modules to model is classic amps. I didn’t realize how many styles/types of amps he’s used in his career (showing 8 modules), but it makes sense, and a system like this is perfect for him! I hadn’t heard of Salvation Mods before, this is a great “new” product to look at.

Here is a shot of Billy’s pedal board. Back in August I posted Billy’s rack, which is incorrect. I’m very glad that Billy took the time with Premiere Guitar to do this rig run down! I was very surprised to see how trim the pedal selection is, and how much he is relying on the amp tones.

Here is the breakdown of pedals:

Skreddy Echo
MXR Phase 90 x2
Keeley True Bypass Loopers x3
Fulltone Catalyst
GTC Super 72 “Bloody Finger”
Chicago Iron Octavian
Boss PH-3 Phase Shifter
Strymon El Capistan
Strymon Favorite Switch
MXR Custom Audio Electronics MC403 Power System
Rocktron All Access Controller

Were you a fan of the Pumpkins back in the day or today? Let me know by commenting below!!! Also, if you’ve used Salvation Mods, I would love to hear what you think about them!

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Today’s pedal line is from Nate Shoemaker. 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 pedallineeffectsbaycom. Every Friday I’ll showcase a pedal line submission. Make sure you include any links to your band or music page.

I’m Nate Shoemaker, lead guitarist of Westward, a alternative rock band from Portland Oregon, and this is my pedal board! Check out my band and our EP which will be released soon at www.westwardmusic.com. You can reach our Twitter at twitter.com/westwardtheband.

Board (order of pedals is the order of the chain) -

JHS Little Black Buffer – Man this thing is great. Gives that high end clarity back when 99% of your pedals are true bypass and you have over 40′ of cable between you and your amp.

Boss TU-3 Chromatic Tuner – Had the TU-2 for a long time and finally upgraded to this one! Also tried the Korg Black and thought it was a piece of junk. You can see the LED readings from a mile away! Perfect for playing outside. The output is on the “Thru” signal so it’s always on; just have to lower the volume pedal and I can tune with ease.

Ernie Ball Volume Pedal Jr. – Nothing special here, just the volume pedal that has become the industry standard. Fantastic for swells, feels good. It is a tone sucker, and JHS makes a mod to put a buffer in it so there is no loss of signal. Definitely gonna get that.

Digitech Whammy V5 – This is the bees knees guys! Had a V4 for forever, and this thing is phenomenal. The jump from the V4 to the V5 came with some sweet mods, such as true bypass and 9V AC (finally), along with some cool new harmony settings and a switch that goes from “Classic” to “Chord” mode, and chord mode provides better tracking and modulation when more then one note is present. The biggest change is the sound. It’s super clear and smooth now, and is a lot less intrusive, which I know will be a negative to some of you. It also pixelates less, which is nice. It just feels more modern, and the tracking with pedal is laser accurate.

Diamond Compressor – This thing is pure magic. Plug it in, set everything at twelve, and boom, your tone is FAT. It’s great! Brings out a lot of notes that weren’t really pulling through (see: high e string on a strat while playing chords), and now I can hear everything all the time. For you guys that know how compression works, this one has a 3:1 ratio, which is my favorite in my opinion. Some offer up to a 10:1 ratio, but that is way too spanky and country for me. 3:1 is great for rock and roll, and it doesn’t shape the sound of your pedals (in a negative way). There are about 1000 features this thing has, but I won’t go into them there. Check out Diamond’s website!

JHS Morning Glory – JHS has done a wonderful jon with this overdrive, basing it on an amp circuit instead of a distortion box circuit (see: tubescreamer) which translates into the clearest and most transparent overdrive I’ve ever heard. This is usually on all the time if I’m on my clean channel, and is a beautiful pedal. Also has a treble cuttoff switch which fits quite nicely in dealing with the harshness of strats.

Blackout Effectors Mantra – This baby is on the other side of the Morning Glory. With the gain at 0 and the bass barely on, this thing SCREAMS rock and roll and FAT chords man. Simply a monster. This thing is also fantastic with my strat because it can run my bridge pickup with this thing on and it sounds great; the bass response evens out the highs of my guitar and offers a truly unique sound that I haven’t heard from a pedal yet. It’s no overly dark though; I played a gig the other night with a Tele with EMG’s in it and with a little EQ change it brought a sweet and punchy midrage tone though that pedal.

Empress Multidrive – So…. Many… Knobs…. This one takes awhile to dial in but I use it for my “Hey I’m about to play solo everyone listen to me.” This thing will cut through any mix with three separate gain circuits; fuzz, overdrive and distortion, with two channels on the pedal so you can switch from any two combinations of those three. Not a big fuzz fan myself, but the distortion channel is phenomanal! Sounds like a Mesa Boogie Triple Rectifier on my board! The distortion section of the pedal was created to emulate the natural complression that high gain amps have, and this does the job wonderfully. My second setting it the distotion and the overdrive setting at the same time, with the gain on the overdrive dialed back but the volume cranked for a nice db boost for solos/lead lines. Sometimes you can’t always trust the sound guy!

Diamond Memory Lane – Not much to say other then the best sounding analog delay I have ever heard. Sweet features, two bank settings, and it doesn’t oscillate as easy as the Memory Lane 1. The modulation is very pleasing and the EQ is my favorite. Super expensive in my opinion, but it was $100 in a “blemished” case at Pro Guitar Shop because of a sticker missing on the back. It stayed there for about a year and a half and I finally bought it before someone else did. My favorite pedal on my board.

Diamond Memory Lane Jr. – The oldest pedal on my board, and perhaps the best digital/analog delay on the market. This I use exclusively for dotted eighths, because I can crank the mix and the repeats are bright and shimmering, and don’t change tone as they repeat, like an analog delay. Modulation is always cranked on this one because of how much color it gives; never have had a chorus-y sound from it. My second favorite pedal on my board.

Wampler Faux Tape Echo - This is actually a prototype of the version that is out right now, found it on Ebay. Has some nice controls on it, and I only use it for swells. Having an all analog delay only use for swells might seem like overkill, but it is so nice to be able to swell into a song, tap the temp on one of my Diamonds, and be ready for whatever is coming up without worrying about changing and settings. Sometimes three delays is what you need!

Strymon Blue Sky – This is an oddball on my board. I haven’t decided if I want to keep it, because everyone and their mom sem to have one of these things these days. Don’t want to be all hipster on you guys, but I don’t want to sound like everyone else. Luckily there is only one setting that a ton of people use because it’s a “turn to this setting and you will sound awesome” type of deal, which is true. But there are some other sweet sounds if you spend time dialing them on. Also great that it has a favorite bank on it, so i always have two settings at my disposal.

Empress Tremolo – Holy freaking awesome. I love this thing. Features features features. Just go read about it, I could write about it and review it for about a page and a half haha. Definitely the most fun to play with on my board, and the gain knob is one of my favorite features. Very impressed by Empress.

About my pedal chain order: there is really nothing special about it. Just a few core choices that are made in the beginning, and everything fites into place. Mine being that I wanted my delay after my overdrives, so the effect them in the chain, and other “true” effects (such as reverb and tremolo) afterward. Another big decision is if your compressor lies after or before your overdrives/boosts/distortions. I have mine before because I want my signal to be compressed before going in, so the compressor doesn’t have to actually compress the signal that the overdrives are creating. Also buffer placement is not as crucial, but is merely an opinion. With my rig it sounds better up front.

About my board – I have a Trailer Trash Pro Series 30“. Rooster (the guy who makes them) is an awesome old-school rocker that helped me out a lot on what I needed, and his boards are priced great. His motto is pedal board art – and the craftsmanship/look/feel of his products are a testimony to that.

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