Pedals or no Pedals

[88prs]

Just curious.... I was playing a gig a long time ago and this person walked by the stage and said "there's all the magic pedals".... shortly after that I became a minimalist using at most one pedal and letting a good tube amp do all the work. Now,,,,, I miss some of the cool stuff.

You all like pedals, or do they eat your signal and leave you missing the raw sound of your $$$$$$$$$ axe?

 

[KentuckyBoiledChiccan]

Personal thing buddy. Some cats do clean amp + lots of overdrives, others go straight in. I'm all about my amp overdrive but I like to push it a notch with some boosters. Whatever makes you happy

 

[alantig]

Pedals. Like Simon said, do what makes you happy, and what gives you the sound you're after.

And remind yourself who paid to get into that gig, and who got paid.

 

[Greywolf]

The more years I play , the less pedals I use

 

[KentuckyBoiledChiccan]

The more years I play , the less pedals I use

Totally, right?

I remember back in the 90s I had to had one of each - od, distortion, flanger, chorus, and so on.

Right now I have two Secret Preamps, a octafuzz, digital "tape" delay and that's it really - couple of utility units to zip things together. Less headache, more play time.

But I do get people having door sized pedalboards. My jam-mate has one and he sounds great

 

[Texas_minor_blues]

Typically I keep only minimal pedals running, Delay, Reverb, Boost, Wah, and an OD or 2. I have found that I tend to use a good amount of Reverb and Delay with my cleans and tend to pull back when on gain. Currently my main / favorite amp has me plugging everything inline (no F/X loop) and I really don't find that it degrades my tone (at least to my ears). An interesting thing I do find is that when I do have an F/X loop I tend to go heavier with the effects adding chorus and other modulation stuff but still use them minimally at best.

 

[Mark Ray]

Well my band plays a LOT of genres, covering songs that sometimes have specific effects. I have a full pedalboard. Having said that, the only pedals aways on are an MXR 10-band eq and a RYRA Klone. Everything else is just a spice, used sparingly.

 

[88prs]

The band plays all Classic rock and blues,,,, old rocker here.. so with my victoria or jtm and a bb pre-amp I am good for most everything. But "spice" is nice... hmm,,, pile of pedals in the bottom of the trunk I should break out.

 

[veinbuster]

I don’t use pedals very often.
I don’t know enough to use them effectively and I’m still learning how to manipulate the sound with my fingers.

 

[alantig]

I don’t use pedals very often.
I don’t know enough to use them effectively and I’m still learning how to manipulate the sound with my fingers.

When I saw Chet Atkins 30+ years ago, he told a story about his 'rivalry' with Les Paul, and how Les put out a record with reverb on it. He said when he heard the record, his jaw just dropped at how great it sounded, and after a short period of being discouraged, he started woodshedding until he learned how to make that sound. A short time later, he saw Les at a party, and he said, "Hey Les, I learned how to get that echo-y sound like you have on your new record." And Les said, "Oh, you got yourself one of those reverb boxes too?" And Chet said, "Reverb box?" He'd learned to do it all with his hands. And then he played it, and it was amazing.

 

[vchizzle]

Hmmm. Pedals. With my band it feels like I’m a slave to them. Specific sounds for certain parts of songs. I’ve got a Boss Es-8 that controls a combo of analog, digital + midi. If we’re not running sets in rehearsal, sometimes I just take a mini board with 3-4 different pedals not on my board. Sometimes I just want to go back to super simple.

 

[DISTORT6]

Wellllll…here’s my pedal board.
Maybe someday!

 

[Tony M.]

Crystal clean amp and a small pedalboard.
I can get "my sound" in any size room at any volume that way.

 

[nac]

Does a Kemper count as a pedal?

 

[JasonE]

It depends on the amp I am using. I have gigged with a hand built modified Vibrolux style amp for the past 7 years or so. It has reverb in it but is used for the clean tone. I then use OD pedals to get the drive sounds that I want. The specific amp I have has an OD Dumble type circuit built into one side of it. I found it way too difficult to get the OD tone I wanted at the volume I wanted it at. As soon as you touch one knob you have to start tweaking the others to get it where you want it.

If I were to take one of my amps out that has a drive channel in it that I like, which I used to do, I take the same pedal board but don't turn the drives on for the most part. I can go either direction with it.

 

[Mike J.]

When I first became interested in wanting to learn how to play (1965) the only thing people had was their guitar, a cord and their amp! Most players I knew and played with stuck with that arrangement for years back then. There was something that was so primative but yet so appealing with the simplicity of it all back then. It's amazing how far things have come since. You can get very lost with all the choices now.

I play through a Pod Go but I use an Xotic BB preamp as a lead boost and it works great. Also use a Strymon Big Sky into the Pod's effects loop. Right now, that's it.

 

[veinbuster]

Does a Kemper count as a pedal?

A really big and complex one!
I’m taking mine to the beach next month.

 

[Alnus Rubra]

“Horses for courses” or Horse Meat.

 

[veinbuster]

“Horses for courses” or Horse Meat.

Ah...now it makes sense.

 

[Daryl Jones]

I remember when our guitar player first got a wah pedal for the garage band back in the 70's, that was like ooooh! I ordered a Hotcake a couple months ago and I don't know why really, sort of a weak moment really. I don't gig anyway but whatever. Not like I needed it at all, just seemed like a good idea at the time. I mean, who doesn't have use for an overdrive right? I sort of keep hearing Joe Bonamassa's words that the amp and the tone buttons and guitar controls are all the effects anyone really needs.
If you are Joe Bonamassa I guess that could be true...
I never use all the effects my amps have built into them as it is, so maybe he's right.