So, wordpress is awesome. I just found out that I can actually tell what people are searching on my blog. So I can get a feel for what to post next. Could I do this on my last domain? Blog.com? Ya, not so much.
Therefore (I really was trying not to use the word ‘so’ again to open up a paragraph. I do that all the time. But I don’t think Shakespeare-sounding words are the best replacement word choices. And it’s not even really cool enough to be Shakespeare-sounding. It’s just awkward. Oh well), I am doing a post on the effects chain and the best placement for pedals, because I see a lot of searches for that. However, that post turned out to be like, 8 million years long, so I’m breaking it up. This first one is going to be the really boring one about buffers, true bypass, bypass loops, effects chains, and tone suckage. So, if you just read that and are already starting to feel all bored and like you want to vomit, I am also posting another post above this one with much more fun musical content. This one here is for the tone people that eat this stuff up. (I know; we’re really, really odd.)
But that being said, tone suckage due to pedalboards is probably the biggest culprit in bad or sub-par tone. It’s the main reason for the thought, ‘I have all the right gear, I’m a fairly decent guitarist…..why don’t things sound right?’ One of the best things that ever happened to me tone-wise, was a friend of mine taking a single bypass looper and plugging my entire pedalboard into it. Hence (oooh, another word from Hamlet or something), I could hear my tone when it went straight into the amp when the switch was off. And then when the switch was on, I could hear my tone through my pedalboard. And the difference seriously blew me away! Someone who had never picked up an instrument in their life could have easily heard the difference. My tone sucked through my board. I would recommend all of doing this every so often, just to see where we’re standing tone wise with our pedalboards, and how much tone we’re losing.
So, I’ll start by showing my signal chain:
Guitar–>
Bypass looper–>
Bypass looper
–>Delay pedal (Diamond Memory Lane…..true bypass)
–>Delay pedal (Damage Control Timeline…..always on at very low, ambient setting)
–>
Amp
Now, if you look at my board, you’ll see a ton of pedals. If I were to run through all of them, even with the high end cables I use and the fact that most of them are true bypass, my tone would suffer greatly. So I use bypass loopers that hardwire your pedals in and out of your chain with switches. I really, really like the idea of my signal running through the least amount of pedals as possible. As a general rule, your tone will sound best when it’s the purest as possible…..meaning the least amount of cable and circuits is has to travel through. So the best possible tone is guitar straight into the amp. I’ve even heard stories of guys going so far as to take all the tone and volume pots out of their guitars and amps, and then run a six inch cable from their guitar to the amp, so they have to literally hunch over the amp to play. And they record this way to get the purest tone possible. I’m just going to tell you right now that I am not that crazy……although, I once told myself that boutique pedals and expensive cables were a waste of time and money…….hehe. Things have changed a bit. So in five years, let’s hope I’m not leading worship hunched over my amp with my six inch guitar cable.
But, even though guitar to amp is the best possible clean sound, in modern music (and worship music), effects play a big part. So, you can just run a big board in front of your amp and not worry about tone loss (it usually ends up being high end, definition and sparkle loss), you can run bypass looper boxes that switch your effects in and out of your signal chain, you can run a buffer in front of or behind your effects, or you can use the amp’s effects loop.
Now, and this is just me personally, I want my tone to be as pure as possible, and I want to use effects. So I don’t use the effects loop because they usually mess a bit with the amp’s tone. Granted, some builder’s have done a great job with their amp’s effects loops, but I have yet to hear one I really liked. Also, I think the effects sound better out front, if you have an amp that takes effects well. I also prefer not to use buffers…..I understand the concept, but to me, it’s adding pedals to take away problems caused by pedals. Basically, you put a buffer either before all your pedals or after all your pedals, to ‘push’ the signal through all the circuits and cables, to regain your high end and definition. Again, some people get great sounds with these, and I have been itching to try out the VHT Valvulator or the Siegmund Missing Link; but I have yet to hear one that works properly in my rig without sounding just a tad bit fake. And it will definitely depend on the rig…..I have some guitar friends who use buffers (most specifically the HBE Uno Mos) and their tone sounds fantastic.
So, as far as my thinking goes, I would use either buffers, bypass loopers, or a combination. I choose to use bypass loopers. If you’re unfamiliar with them, they use hardwire switching to literally take your pedals out of your effects chain when they are not in use……..so there is no tone suck when you want the effect off. For me, I use those and pedals with no noticeable signal loss, and you can maintain almost all of your original tone while still using effects. (Notice I did say ‘almost all’…….no matter how good you use your effects loop, or buffers, or bypass loopers, there is still something really special about plugging straight into the amp.)
You will also notice that I do have two delay pedals on in my chain at all times. They are both in one of the bypass loops of my second looper box. I leave that loop on most of the time, because I keep that second delay on most of the time as just an ambient, reverby type sound. Just fills up and meshes things together nicely. The first delay is there because I am out of bypass loops. hehe I need to order a bigger one from Loop-Master. Ah, nothing’s ever perfect.
(Loop-Master is making some great bypass switchers right now.)
So, after you’ve got some bypass loopers or good buffers, it’s time to look at cables. This is where you lose people. Buffers are cool because you get to buy another cool looking pedal. Bypass loopers are cool because not only do they help with tone loss, but they actually clean up your board and create a nice control board at the front of your pedals (I don’t even touch the switches on most of my pedals. It’s all done from the control of my loopers.) But cables? I admit, it’s the absolute most boring thing to buy. But! The difference it makes in your tone is huge. Most run-fo-the-mill cables take away some serious tone. Now again, my thinking is that I want my gear to be as transparent as possible. (Yikes, I seriously use that word all the time!) Meaning, I don’t want a cable that puts tone or highs back in my signal, I want a cable that just lets my tone shine through. Currently, I’m using Lava ELC’s. I would highly recommend them. I also order them directly from Mark at Lavacable, and have him solder them. I really, really like the idea of all my connections being soldered. You can buy the build-it-yourself kits from Lava, George L, Bill lawrence, Planet Waves, etc. These are cool, but I would highly suggest sticking some solder in there. I used to use the George L solderless cables, and I was constantly getting fizziness in my tone because the ground connections would just come ever so slightly loose. If you move your rig around a lot to a lot of gigs, I would highly suggest solder. Lava’s are great, EA are great, and I even like the sound of Bill Lawrence’s. Planet Waves are okay, and George L’s add their own highs, which I’m not too keen on. I’m still in the process of replacing all my george L cables with Lava’s.
And lastly……get that tuner out of the volume pedal out. This is the easiest one to test. Play an open E, then pull the cable from your tuner to your volume pedal, in and out of the volume pedal. You can literally hear the sparkle come and go. I even go a step further and put my volume pedal in a bypass loop because it sucks tone as well. That’s a little extreme, but it definitely helps. But as far as the tuner goes, get one with a good buffer, or get a bypass looper with a tuner out. Hanging it off the volume pedal sucks a lot of tone.
And of course, note that this is all crazy, tone-head, gear-freak stuff. I see guitarists every day with a pedalboard with 15 tone sucking pedals, cheap tone sucking cables, and tuners hanging out of their volume pedals, and their tone sounds great. In fact, if you have a really bright sound, sometimes a good tone-sucking pedalboard will tame that. hehe But……a good exercise is to plug straight into your amp, especially if you haven’t done it in a while. If the tone is appreciably better, it may be time to start getting that pedalboard re-arranged to let your pure tone come through. Buffers, bypass loopers, good cables, switchers and effects loops–whatever works for you. This can actually be a fun time to experiment and get back to your best base clean tone.
And someday maybe we’ll get to this point. That’s Edge’s rig from U2. He has a custom made switching system from Skrydstrup to avoid tone sucking. Imagine being able to run through all that and still get pure tone. Impossible? Probably. But Edge’s tone does sound killer good. Sorry, I love U2 more than is even arguably healthy.
Splendid……and very long……and a little boring…..but hopefully helpful…sorry…….go read the post above!…….it’s way more fun!
Karl.
Guitar for Worship 