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Is it right to use delay with clean tone?


mbengs1

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How bout this? He uses a really long echo trail on this one.

 

[video=youtube_share;Or9RKrxGiMQ]

 

Yeah I heard the echo. but i'm considering a reverb pedal for once. I think reverb works just a good as a delay pedal for giving the tone more 'air' to it.

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I played out last night and the room was large enough to have its own natural reverb. And because of that reverb I didn't need much drive either. Clean notes sounded fantastic compared to driven.

 

In all cases, the trick is to use effects to complement and enhance the music. If you have an effect you haven't used before you have to use them awhile in order to learn how to integrate it into your playing and most importantly, use it well showing you have mastery over its use like you do over the strings you play. Its a tool that can take years in order to use well. You have to be the master over them, not have them master over you.

 

Once you learn how to manipulate them at will - as needed - when needed - and exactly the right amounts needed - there is no guesswork involved. Unless you're willing to spend that time learning to use them well, you're likely better off not using them at all because the unsurety they produce will distract you from your number one goal as a player which is playing the notes on that instrument well.

 

I'll also say, not everyone is cut out for using effects well. Some simply have a singular focus and cannot walk and chew gum at the same time. Others can walk around on your hands playing the instrument with your toes, and still have enough control to use effects to express the notes they wish to present to people.

 

Heck I can play an entire night and not know a single note I played. The scales, chords, notes I play have been practiced tens of thousands of times to the point they are completely automatic, just like my heartbeat and breathing are. They have to be if you also want to use those effects and sing at the same time.

 

Of course if you're chasing the notes because you haven't mastered them then you're open to making all kinds of mistakes. A mind that is listening to the music the body is producing will hesitate. It will want to go ying when the body wants to go yang. You cant be an audience and a performer at the same time. If you listen to your own notes and the effects you're using like an audience does, it creates a negative self indulgent feedback loop and you become your own worst critic. You must project - beyond yourself - to others, or there is no challenge to improve your musical skills.

 

Its zone a performer resides in when he performs, and its no different then many other professions. Athletes are one of the better examples of this same kind of focus. They aren't thinking about the stitches on the ball or the weeds on the field when making a play. They do that and they get clobbered.

 

The focus must be on that end goal and the journey between here and there just like it is in music as you play notes on a journey through time. Effects are like putting on different shoes when walking that journey. The effects can be pleasant to that audience or pure torture to their ears. Its the contrast between the two that make the music interesting. A well trained artist doesn't notice the difference beyond the point of guiding it because his concentration is on the pure notes he hears in his minds eye, not what's coming from the speaker.

 

If you wait to hear what's coming from the speaker like an audience does your mind is two steps behind the notes being played. You have to be out in front of those notes commanding they be played before its actually time for them to be played. Those effects then take on a whole different voice which is hardly recognizable. At best you feel the effects they have on the notes and trust the optimal settings you dialed up to be right.

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More often than not I'd personally rather have at least some delay and / or reverb than a truly dry, clean, electric guitar sound.

 

The Johnny A video in the post above this one is a great example of how the subtle use of those effects can augment the basic sound of the instrument, giving it a more polished and interesting sound. In fact, I'll go so far as to say that most of the clean tones you'll hear on record have at least a small amount of one or the other on them, either from the guitarist's own rig (pedals, amp reverb) or from the mix engineer.

 

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Super dry with no verb at all can be tough to record.

 

When you hear how dry this studio version is....

 

[video=youtube_share;69AkHZkNsBo]

 

Then compare it to the same song played live where the room itself adds the reverb.

 

[video=youtube_share;PXEhdytTI6U]

 

I posted this contrast because you always have to consider the playback system. If either the band or the Hi Fi system is in plush sounding room where all the sound gets absorbed, the music will sound dry, but it will also sound close and intimate.

 

If a band or the Hi Fi system is in a large/reflective room - you get the beat reverb there is - natural.

 

Back in the 70's my band mates and myself used to drive a good 40 miles to a place that had a big hall and stage just to perform and record there. The sound of playing on a big stage like that was amazing. We were so used to playing in garages and living rooms where the sound was so dead. Playing where you could hear that guitar coming off the back wall was amazing. Having artificial verbs and echoes does in a pinch but you hear the three dimensional sound of natural reflections coming back at you from all directions and there's nothing like it. I always though a music hall that you could rent out to bands would be something worthwhile. But seeing you could simply fill that hall with people and have that hall pay for itself made allot more sense.

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