Category Archives: guitar effects / pedals

Electro Harmonix Stereo Talking Machine

February 8, 2012 — Leave a Comment

Guitarists have been experimenting with sound possibilities for as long as they have been around. Many recognize the voice as the most expressive of instruments and many guitar FX pedals have tried to emulate that expressiveness through various talk-box like effects.

Electro Harmonix (EHX) have produced a very versatile pedal in the Stereo Talking Machine. It not only has great presets right out of the box, it’s also highly programmable giving you even greater control over the way the pedal alters your notes. With 9 selectable voice types, you too could be  AH-OOing and OW-EEing in no time at all.

Like the sounds created by a mouth harp, where the metal reed is plucked and the vibrations altered by changing the shape of the players mouth, a Talk-box takes the sounds/notes you put in to it and alters them according to the volume you’ve played them and the shape of the specific filter you have chosen.

Because the sweeping effect is driven by how hard or soft you play the strings there is a massive scope of what sonic sounds can be achieved using the EHX Stereo Talking Machine. And because each sound choice responds so differently, it’s worth spending time experimenting with each to get a good grasp on what is possible.

The unit is a rectangle box affair, with the 6 control knobs across the top: Blend, Voice, Attack, Decay, Sensivitiy, and Preset. The preset knobs gives access to auxiliary functions for each knob including Volume, Fuzz tone, Fuzz Gain, LFO Rate and LFO Shape. A Low frequency Oscillator or LFO is a filter that responds over time rather than to playing dynamics and creates a more regular filter sweep.

You won’t find any lose of your guitar tone, but instead applies the different tonal colors of the ‘voices’ available from the unit. From the dark and smooth/soft tone of the EE-ER voicing to the midrange-heavy and rather resonant sound of the I-A voicing.

For each voicing, you can reverse the voicing for example EE-ER to ER-EE or I-A to A-I which gives you further options with the flick of the Preset/Sweep knob. You can also control this function via the expression pedal option.

The Stereo Talking Machine is an extremely versatile pedal with a wide variety of voicings and multiple control options of those voicings. Add to that access to a distortion circuit and sensitivity control and the tonal possibilities really grow. If you’re not familiar with talk-box effects sitting down and having a chat with the Stereo Talking Machine may result in a new found friendship.

 

ab4e2097d32a3cfb2d407817c82c42dd Electro Harmonix Stereo Talking Machine

Posted by Dan Orr.

Posted in Electric Guitars, gear, music, Rock | Tagged , , ,

IK Multimedia VocaLive App

February 3, 2012 — Leave a Comment

We’ve written about IK Multimedia products in the past and they just continue to set the bar for portable recording software for iOS as well as breaking new ground for DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) software.

As previously mentioned, the iRig interface adapter enables guitarists to plug their guitar into their iPhone and not only apply great sounding effects to their guitar via the FREE Amplitube application, but also record those great sounds.

The VocaLive app for iPad is yet another release, following on from the success of the iPhone version and provides a one stop shop for singers or songwriters. Touted as being the “first professional performing and recording vocal processor for iOS”, the app just oozes ease of use and is packed with essential effects to bring to life your next performance.

newsletter30 gear ik vocalive IK Multimedia VocaLive App

It comes with a suite of 5 dedicated vocal effects (pitch correction, choir hamonizer, voice doubler, vocal morpher and de-esser) that can be applied to your voice in real-time along with a further 7 effects specific to vocal processing (reverb, EQ, compressor, delay, envelope filter, chorus, phazer) that can be combined in a 4 processor chain.

The single-track recorder is expandable to a full 8-track recording studio through an in-app purchase which will give song writers plenty of scope to record new and interesting tracks.

For the novice vocalist, there are enough preset functions to enable you to get up and running quickly leaving plenty of room for more advanced features and effects as you become more familiar with the application and confident with your recording.

VocaLive can be used with the iPads in-built microphone, headphones with a built-in mic or IK Media’s very own iRig mic – the first quality hand-held condenser mic for iOS.

As you will see in the following videos, using VocaLive is both easy and fun to use as well as producing really professional sounding recordings.

With the continuing development of technology and the ability for users to create their own music, VocaLive and applications like it place the tools firmly in the hands of the user to capture their own creativity. There’s little wonder that the internet is bursting with quality user content and there are no signs it will slow down. Have you got yours?

object style=”height: 390px; width: 550px”>

ab4e2097d32a3cfb2d407817c82c42dd IK Multimedia VocaLive App

Posted by Dan Orr.

Posted in computing, gear, music

What do the pros use?

January 19, 2012 — Leave a Comment

If you’ve ever wondered how your favorite artist gets that unique sound you can wonder no more. The guys at GuitarGeek, have dedicated their time and energy to compiling a comprehensive list of the amps, effects and guitars that artists use.

Over time their images of the artist’s setups have changed so that now they are both easy to understand and very nice to look at.

newsletter24 gear pros clapton What do the pros use?

Ever wanted to know just what Clapton was using in his days with the Bluesbreakers? The year is 1966 and Clapton is playing his 1950s Les Paul’s Standard through a Marshall Combo. Wanna know what speakers and tubes were in that model? Those details are all but a few clicks away.

While it might be hard to track down this particular model with a modest price tag, the information provided gives you a decent head start on what to look for and what could be possible.

And if nothing else, this information will add to your ever growing understanding of great tone. You can be pretty sure that the information provided on the site are sound, given that most of the information comes from the artist’s or their guitar tech’s mouths.

And with this type of direct contact you’ll find the occasional gem of behind the scenes takes from the artists themselves on their gear or band members and/or techies on the artist.

A great resource for geek-ing out and putting together the dream set up, should all your stars align and you win the lottery. Take a look.

ab4e2097d32a3cfb2d407817c82c42dd What do the pros use?

Posted by Dan Orr.

Posted in amplifiers / pickups, Artists, buying guitars, Electric Guitars, gear, Guitar Tools, Rock | Tagged , , ,

Getting a Metal Sound

January 18, 2012 — Leave a Comment

This is a very common question, specially among young students; How do I get a metal sound?

Many people start playing guitar, because they hear a super heavy hardcore riff on the radio and it inspires them to become a musician. That’s cool because heavy metal is a fun genre of music that is also a rewarding genre for guitarists. The sound of a hardcore metal guitar is awesome; however getting ‘that’ sound can be difficult.

First let me note that there are many variations in metal sounds depending on the bands style and how heavy they are. Just like any genre of music there are many variations depending on the band or song. Also lead players need a different tone when they are playing.

However there is a basic ‘metal tone’. This is essentially loud and as distorted as you can be. Often it is common in metal to ‘scoop’ the tone. This means that you should put your bass and treble near full and pull your mids back to around 3 or so. The results this can have may vary wildly depending on the kind of amp you have, so experiment with your equipment.

When it comes to your guitar, generally metal guitarists use humbucker pickups. This is because they reduce feedback and give off a warmer fatter sound. For this reason if you find you are having trouble getting a good sound out of your guitar maybe you need to think about whether you have the right kind of pick ups.

So try these ideas if you are having trouble getting the right metal sound. Remember these are only guidelines for you to experiment with. Remember turn your amps up to eleven and rock out.

Another way to get a good metal sound is the use of distortion or effects pedals. This gets into an area that really can’t be covered in the Tech Tips section of this newsletter, but it’s an important topic to talk about. It can’t be covered because guitar sound is very personal, and the ideal sound for one guitarist won’t sound good to others.

Here is one of the most innovative Metal bands with a great and classic metal guitar sound:

moses Getting a Metal Sound

Posted by Moses Robbins.

Posted in amplifiers / pickups, Electric Guitars, gear, guitar strings, music, Rock | Tagged , ,

BOSS DD-3 Digital Delay

January 17, 2012 — Leave a Comment

Boss have been creating guitar and bass effects for over 30 years and in their own words are known as the company “that put the “stomp” in “stompbox”. Not only have they developed a wide range of individual stomp pedals dedicated to a single effect (like the Boss DD-3 Digital Delay pedal) or function (Boss TU-2 and 3 tuners), but also multi-effects units and rhythm machines for musicians of all types.

Weighing in at just 1lb, this is one robust pedal that will faithfully replicate any sound you send through it with pin point accuracy. Options for guitar lick altering goodness include: three auto delay modes – 50ms, 200ms and 800ms. You can also manually adjust, to pin point accuracy an exact delay time from as low as 12.5ms to 800ms as with the auto mode.

The Hold Mode allows basic looping of a chord or lead lick. After playing the section you want to ‘hold’, engage the pedal and you will continue to hear it until you release the pedal.

It runs on both mains power and DC9V cells so can easily be added to your pedal arsenal by daisy chaining the power or stand alone with the DC9V. If using the latter, remember to unplug your leads when not using the pedal to conserve your battery.

For more delay options, consider the DD-7 which expands on the functions of the DD-3 and DD-6 with expanded delay times, new delay modes, external control option – allowing for tap delay and stereo output. While the DD-7 boasts more features than its predecessors, it’s interesting to note that Boss still sell more DD-3s, so it seems simple is sometimes better.

For a faithful digital delay pedal with little or no learning curve, essential features packaged in a robust and compact pedal, you really can’t go past the Boss DD-3 Digital Delay.

To hear the sonic effects capable with the DD-3 check out this video:

ab4e2097d32a3cfb2d407817c82c42dd BOSS DD 3 Digital Delay

Posted by Dan Orr

Posted in Electric Guitars, gear | Tagged , , , ,
« Older Entries