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Guitar FX for Dance/Electronica?

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  • 28-08-2009 10:52am
    #1
    ShriekingSheet
    Registered Users Posts: 3,476 ✭✭✭


    Looking to get some new and interesting gear for my guitar. Starting to play a more electronic style of music in our band and if anyone here could offer any advice that'd be great.

    I've tried all the obvious eg: Boss Phaser, Vox wah pedal, and we have the Line 6 Green, Boss DD6 and too many overdrive pedals. Not a huge fan of Multi Effects pedals.

    Our guitars are Fender Telecasters, with a Fender HotRod Deluxe amp, and a Fender Twin amp. I guess Depeche Mode or LCD Soundsystem and that kind of thing would be a steer on the kind of stuff we're putting together.

    Any thoughts welcome!


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    #2
    thrush
    Closed Accounts Posts: 19 ✭thrush


    i've a bass synth pedal which is pretty fun. have a look on youtube for demos...

    pedal syb3


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    #3
    Four-Percent
    Closed Accounts Posts: 873 ✭✭✭Four-Percent


    Stick it through garageband if you have a mac, good for making weird sounds. If not, record it with soundforge/protools and alter to your heart's content.


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    #4
    ShriekingSheet
    Registered Users Posts: 3,476 ✭✭✭ShriekingSheet


    thrush wrote: »
    i've a bass synth pedal which is pretty fun. have a look on youtube for demos...

    pedal syb3

    Is there anything you don't have? ;) Looks like it does similar enough stuff to my DD6, which is cool, but limited enough.
    Four-Percent wrote: »
    Stick it through garageband if you have a mac, good for making weird sounds. If not, record it with soundforge/protools and alter to your heart's content.

    I don't have any software whatsoever - and it's for live use, as well as studio stuff so recording in and playing around with later isn't really what i had in mind.


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    #5
    thrush
    Closed Accounts Posts: 19 ✭thrush


    ShriekingSheet wrote: »
    Is there anything you don't have? ;) Looks like it does similar enough stuff to my DD6, which is cool, but limited enough.

    it's nothing like a DD pedal.

    bullet.gif11 DSP variations of Saw, Square, and Pulse synth waves
    bullet.gifControl filter cutoff and LFO rate via EV-5 Expression Pedal (sold separately)
    bullet.gifEnhanced Wave Shape Mode provides sharper sounds
    bullet.gifHold notes with the onboard pedal and jam over the top


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    #6
    thrush
    Closed Accounts Posts: 19 ✭thrush


    ah, didn't see in your first post you wanted something other than a pedal.

    get a cheap sampler dood. sp-404 or summat.


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    #7
    rcaz
    Registered Users Posts: 4,034 ✭✭✭rcaz


    Some ideas that I like;

    Get a volume pedal (or start using your little finger to ride the volume knob), an octave pedal (Electro Harmonix POG/Micro POG for lovely octaves, Digitech Whammy for glitchy cool-as-hell stuff), a phaser (Oh, you already have one) or some chorus, a ring modulator (MoogerFooger if you can afford it, I have a Copilot FX Android), and some reverb. All that together will make for some cool FM-type-ish pad sounds. Season with vibrato and tremolo to taste. A little warm overdrive would be lovely here too.

    The Electro Harmonix HOG is insane. Costs a bomb, but ****, it's everything you could want.

    Or what about a MIDI pickup and an actual guitar synth?

    Set yer DD-6 to HOLD mode, play a note and step on the DD-6 as quickly as possible to loop a super-short piece of signal. Do this over and over while playing to make cool glitchy noises. Not very musical, but I love it.

    Watch all of the Christopher Willits tutorial videos on YouTube!

    Hope this helps! Best of luck making your guitar sound unlike a guitar :cool:


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    #8
    ShriekingSheet
    Registered Users Posts: 3,476 ✭✭✭ShriekingSheet


    Thanks for all that! Definitely a big help.
    El Pr0n wrote: »
    Some ideas that I like;

    Get a volume pedal (or start using your little finger to ride the volume knob)
    Yeah, I'm a fan of this little technique. Used in a track before - really handy when you can keep time with it too.
    El Pr0n wrote: »
    an octave pedal (Electro Harmonix POG/Micro POG for lovely octaves, Digitech Whammy for glitchy cool-as-hell stuff), :
    Never thought of that! I think we have a winner. But with a bass player in the band, would this clash a little bit?
    El Pr0n wrote: »
    a phaser (Oh, you already have one) or some chorus, a ring modulator (MoogerFooger if you can afford it, I have a Copilot FX Android), and some reverb. All that together will make for some cool FM-type-ish pad sounds. Season with vibrato and tremolo to taste. A little warm overdrive would be lovely here too. :
    Yeah the Phaser was fun but was a little too obvious and daft punk-ish. That said, I like it and will most likely end up getting one to use in moderation.
    Have had two Chorus Pedals in the past and not a fan. Have really good reverb on my amp (Fender Hotrod Deluxe) and yeah, too many OD and DS pedals! ;)

    But what is a ring modulator?? I'm guessing it means "ring" as in effects loop?
    El Pr0n wrote: »
    Set yer DD-6 to HOLD mode, play a note and step on the DD-6 as quickly as possible to loop a super-short piece of signal. Do this over and over while playing to make cool glitchy noises. Not very musical, but I love it.:
    Yeah you can get some trippy stuff out of it like that but the problem, there's zero chance of replicating it live with a band. You can of course use longer loops in time but then the band have to keep time to your guitar loop (rather than the drummer) which causes issues. Fun on yer own though ;)
    El Pr0n wrote: »
    Watch all of the Christopher Willits tutorial videos on YouTube!

    Hope this helps! Best of luck making your guitar sound unlike a guitar :cool:

    Cheers man. Have you any recordings or clips of your own work in this area? Seems you're pretty into it.


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    #9
    Quiggers
    Closed Accounts Posts: 282 ✭✭Quiggers


    Look for unusual delays,
    and the moog pedals,
    anything that offers lots of modulation.

    If it doesn't need to be a pedal then the sherman filterbank will offer enldess sound mangling


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    #10
    rcaz
    Registered Users Posts: 4,034 ✭✭✭rcaz


    A ring modulator is really an amplitude modulator (it got the name "ring" because the original circuits made a little ring on the PCB, afaik). It's a really really fast tremolo effect, where the rate of the tremolo effect is within the threshold of hearing (20-20,000 Hz). My ring modulator generates a square wave, and if you don't plug a guitar into it, can be used as a really primitive mono synth, if that illustrates the idea any further - the effect has an oscillator which generates a signal and then multiplies it with your guitar signal. Think robot noises - it's the effect that was used to make the Dalek voices in Dr. Who!

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uQbhLIHEQU

    As for the octave pedal - use it to go UP!! :D The POG is really cool because it does fifths, as well as +/- 2 octaves, and it has sliders for you to mix in your exact sound, rather than being 50/50 all the time - but the Whammy can bend, and is monophonic so you get cool distortions when you play two notes at once. The newer POG 2s have an envelope filter in them too, which is definitely worth a look.

    I'm a big fan of phasers, I like mine (EH Small Stone) slow so it's less obvious - really obvious phasing does sound pretty tacky :p Before the ring modulator, it kills, because it effects the tones generated by the ring mod.

    http://soundcloud.com/captain-wow/alison

    That's the only real example of my weirder effects I have recorded. The swells at the start are all Volume pedal - OD - Phaser - Ring Mod - Delay - Reverb.

    +1 on delays, everyone needs delay. I have a DD-6 and an RE-20 Space Echo. The Space Echo is great for weird noises. I have it on top of my amp and I work it with my hands so I can control the feedback and repeat rate in real time.

    The best thing you can do, I think, before rushing out to buy new gear is to re-think your old gear. Change up your order - a really great one is distortion after reverb, but if you're only using amp reverb, you can't do that :( Simple things can have big changes - distortion after phaser is totally different to distortion before phaser. That's how I learned the phaser-before-ring mod thing, and I keep them like that permanently now.

    Experiment!

    One of my favourite guitarists is Ronald Jones, who used to play with The Flaming Lips. There's little-to-no available information about the gear he used, but he's super inspirational to listen to and try to figure out.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tN7lEAShGjM

    Look at some analogue modular synths and see what all the controls do and try and find ways of doing them on guitar! Synths have portamento, guitarists have slides! That kinda stuff.

    And most importantly, never decide "that's enough" - it's never enough!! :p


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    #11
    jimi_t
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,579 ✭✭✭jimi_t


    Immediately the MOOG Murf or the EH Hog come to mind. Both of them are absolutely insane and would be perfect for what you need. Unfortunately, both of them cost the same as a mid-range guitar.

    A good analog delay, or even something like the TC Nova Delay would be half the battle. The most important effects you need are a good reverb and a good delay.
    http://www.tcelectronic.com/novadelay.asp

    The TC Nova Modulator would be an interesting buy as well
    http://www.tcelectronic.com/novamodulator.asp

    Electroharmonix have a GREAT stock of youtube videos up. Start from this one onwards

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMoP01seRZ4


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