Members Markeyz Posted July 14, 2005 Members Share Posted July 14, 2005 I really prefer using individual guitar effects boxes rather than multi-effect units both for immediate control and, in my opinion, their more individual sound. I have run into problems at times, however, usually due to the generally hotter outputs of keyboards vs. guitars. For instance, my Vox Wah cracks up and sounds terrible if the input is too hot. Also, I find the Small Stone phaser too base heavy with the "color" switch on and requires EQ. This seems to be below the range of the guitar and not an issue, but with the greater range of keyboards it becomes apparent. I'm sure there are others here that use guitar effects with their synths. What works well for you, and what doesn't? Any pleasant surprises? (I actually like the slight distortion my boss EQ pedal gives the Rhodes when the output is slightly boosted). The reason I'm asking is that I need to add a few effects to my collection to use with my Nord Lead. I'm interested in chorus and reverb and possibly distortion for the most part but would love to hear everybody's stomp box stories. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Sinner6 Posted July 14, 2005 Members Share Posted July 14, 2005 I have been very pleased using a Sansamp GT-2 with an FR-777. Conversely, I have also enjoyed running guitar through my various synths and a Kaoss Pad2. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Darkstorm Posted July 14, 2005 Members Share Posted July 14, 2005 You'll have better luck with pedals & multiprocessors designed for bass guitar and with the general purpose fx racks. Of course the overdrive or chorus one peep likes, wont necc be the one another peep likes. Alternately uses a mfg higher end guitar multieffect pedals ussually means theyre more likely to work well with syths lower freq's. Cause most of those are also geared for usefulness with regular, as well as 7 string & baritone guitars. Zooms top end such as the gfx3 & gfx5 are two good examples of guitar multi effects that can also work well with active 5 string basses. And thus synths too. Surprised you not useing general purpose fx rack that has midi footsswitch brd ability. Those also have the added advantage of stereo ins & outs & are also more geared for input sources ranging from guitar line level to cd player line level & all inbetween. Running a 8 or more and graphic eq as last effect, or just before reverb with it as last effect can also fix most tone sucking probs otherwise liked pedals cause. You can also run a good leveler/comp after the keyboard but before effects to help prevent overloading of pedals prone to that. Put your best able to handle the synths output level & freq range pedal first. That will help prevent overloading of pedals after it that are less able to handle its output level. Myself no longer uses seperate effects unit for synths. As my current ones have no need for that. But used such when had analog synths & a couple romplers that sometimes wanted other effects. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Markeyz Posted July 15, 2005 Author Members Share Posted July 15, 2005 Good points, Darkstorm. My main complaint with multi-effects is that it can be difficult to adjust them quickly. I play live and improvise so I want to be able to just reach for a knob instead of punch through layers of menus. I do notice tone problems with more than a few effects when bypassed. This seems to be result of the electronically switched pedals as opposed to the mechanical switch type? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members MorePaul Posted July 15, 2005 Members Share Posted July 15, 2005 One solution to the immediacy of programmability is to use an array of MIDI cc controls (Kenton makes a few, Doepfer makes a couple, etc) -- so that you get a "one-knob-per-function" type of effect if youare running your synth directly into some units meant for guitar, you may encounter some loading problems as your output impedence is probably much lower -- so perhaps a little signal conditioning is in order just some thoughts there Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Allerian Posted July 15, 2005 Members Share Posted July 15, 2005 One of my latest realizations of guitar pedal coolness is the fact that since most synths are stereo, you can use two of a given pedal, one on each channel with different settings. Dead obvious I know, but sometimes things are like that. I need a second Digitech Metal Master now! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members hyperstationjr Posted July 15, 2005 Members Share Posted July 15, 2005 That's kind of why I DON'T like guitar pedals... I tend to like pretty huge stereo image sounds with my synths, at least when I'm using effects, so having that mono signal. Although I have found SOME pedals sound pretty good with keys, most of the time I can do better with an effects rack or soft-effect, aside from those REALLY good pedals (Higher end EH and boutique stuff). I am STILL looking for a distortion I'm happy with though, I haven't heard ANYTHING good aside from an old Marshall 15 watter I had a few years ago. I also really like The Nord Modular G1's Bit reduction with 1-bit depth, and distortion from the speaker of an old Panasonic reel-to-reel. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members zone_ahead Posted July 15, 2005 Members Share Posted July 15, 2005 for chorus, i'd recomend taking a look at the visual sound H2O chorus/echo. i've been thoroughly impressed with the sound quality. very smooth. may be nice for your mono leads on your nord lead as i use it w/ my micro modular quite a bit and it's great for beefing up the digital quality of the m/m while still retaining its clarity. i also use it frequently with my fr revolution. that combo sounds fabulous, especially with the revolution's overdrive turned on. lush roaring acid. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members MorePaul Posted July 15, 2005 Members Share Posted July 15, 2005 Originally posted by Allerian One of my latest realizations of guitar pedal coolness is the fact that since most synths are stereo, you can use two of a given pedal, one on each channel with different settings. Dead obvious I know, but sometimes things are like that. I need a second Digitech Metal Master now! processors that allow "dual mono modes are able to do this, I suppose you could get 2 of whatever though and run dual mono regardless of the format luckily some of the older rack gear is actually cheaper than their "vintage" pedal counterparts Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members seifukusha Posted July 21, 2005 Members Share Posted July 21, 2005 i play my organ thru zvex pedals and they dont eat any tone that i can notice, in fact, they sound clearer sometimes.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Roald Posted July 21, 2005 Members Share Posted July 21, 2005 got a whole range of pedals for my Rhodes, but that doesn't really count, as Rhodes also has lo output. I use Boss Tr2 (noisy, crap pedal IMHO), MXR 10-band eq (terrific, low noise, nice sound, everyone should have one!), Small Stone (color off, great sound!!), Ibanez TS7 (switch is wacky but very decent sound for a decent price). I use an Ibanez DE7 delay echo with my Nord Micromod and the Prosoloist. Works perfect at any level, not much noise and it has both the clean delay and the smooth echo. It sounds particularly good on those because they added a little reverb to the sound IMHO. Just a touch. To purists it's probably not a good feature but for me it's just perfect. The switch is, again, temperamental. I also tried the TS7 and Phaser on the ARP, but they don't go together, soundwise. Technically it was no problem though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members endmusik Posted July 21, 2005 Members Share Posted July 21, 2005 last night, I was running a CS-15 through an EH Double Muff pedal - dear god that was amazing! What would've been a tiny, clicky little resonant bass piece ended up into a snarling lfo driven divebomb.... pure bliss also - any old string synth through a Small Stone is proven, but throw that combo into a Sherman Filterbank and tweak the harmonic knob and you get some truly odd sounds! /michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Markeyz Posted August 1, 2005 Author Members Share Posted August 1, 2005 Originally posted by zone_ahead for chorus, i'd recomend taking a look at the visual sound H2O chorus/echo.i've been thoroughly impressed with the sound quality. very smooth.may be nice for your mono leads on your nord lead as i use it w/ my micro modular quite a bit and it's great for beefing up the digital quality of the m/m while still retaining its clarity.i also use it frequently with my fr revolution. that combo sounds fabulous, especially with the revolution's overdrive turned on. lush roaring acid. Thanks for the recommendation. I picked one up yesterday and love the sound of the chorus. I like the sound of the echo too, but it seems much more touchy with regards to levels and distorts horribly when overloaded. I also had a Line 6 Echo Farm for a day but it was much too noisy. The H2O actually isn't much better when the delay level is all the way up, but I don't see myself using this unit that way very much. I also tried the EH Deluxe Memory Man which had a fantastic sounding delay when overloaded and feeding back but I didn't care for the chorus. More of that midrange, honky sound. Not nearly as smooth as the H2O. Also the unit I tried was flakey. Incidentally, I saw the H2O on a local music store's web site for $149. I went to the store and it was marked $199. I told them and they checked, said "I guess you're right" and sold it to me for $149. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Fear My Potato Posted August 2, 2005 Members Share Posted August 2, 2005 A far more interesting thing to do is experiment with not the effects so much as the amplification. I'm about to get my hands on a vintage 1970 Ampeg Super Echo Twin that will be some fun to put things through. Problem is that new tubes are going to cost me a couple paychecks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members grumphh Posted August 2, 2005 Members Share Posted August 2, 2005 Just to have a delay of sorts i use a Boss DD2 in one of my aux sends (only the delay signal). It actually works quite well, as long as you like loads of colouring in your delayed signal - very retro sounding So far i haven't noticed any noise issues - but that might just be because i never listened for it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members SylvStuart Posted August 2, 2005 Members Share Posted August 2, 2005 So what might be the wah pedal of choice for the kbd player that has stereo emulations of clavinets and rhodes? Maybe that stereo Cry-baby? Jus askin. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members David R. Posted August 2, 2005 Members Share Posted August 2, 2005 I've had very good results using the Line 6 delay stompbox (DL4, I think it's called) on keyboards. Another keyboard player around town runs his keyboards through it and the pedal becomes an instrument unto itself - he uses it to change pitch and muck up the sound all sorts of creative ways. Really cool. I tried using the Moogerfooger MuRF on a buddy's Nord Electro and it didn'twork all that well (sucked out a lot of tone). I got it to make all sorts of spine-tingling weirdness on a Juno-106, though. Whenever I've used a wah pedal, it's been going into an amp, and I've just turned down the output on the keyboard as to not overdrive the wah. David Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members BillyWa Posted August 2, 2005 Members Share Posted August 2, 2005 I have used one of these since about 1981 or so (can't remember exactly). Not sure if the new ones have the same circuitry or not, but they look exactly the same. Oustanding for leads. Electro-Harmonix Memory Man Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Rabid Posted August 2, 2005 Members Share Posted August 2, 2005 I find the Line6 Pod to be a nice choice between individual stomp boxes and a quality rack unit. It does wonders for my Nord Modular. Robert Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Sinner6 Posted August 2, 2005 Members Share Posted August 2, 2005 I enjoy the boss DD-20. It is in stereo...and sounds great....and has a backlit display....and tap tempo with user assignable beat divisions. Example: If you tap in 60 BPM....the delay time can be set to whole notes, half notes, quarter....etc, and triplets too. Very handy! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members aeon Posted August 2, 2005 Members Share Posted August 2, 2005 Originally posted by Rabid I find the Line6 Pod to be a nice choice between individual stomp boxes and a quality rack unit. It does wonders for my Nord Modular. Robert A big fat +1 to that! cheers, Ian Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members barryj Posted August 5, 2005 Members Share Posted August 5, 2005 Yeh I am going to be buying a BOSS dd-6 PEDAL (WITH REVERSE DELAY) FOR MY Synth what do you guys reckon ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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