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is the answer eq or compressor?

hey everyone

i've recently gotten into effects and as i have been building up my board i've noticed some volume issues. seems some of my pedals really get loud and others get quiter than my normal clean bass tone. so i'm looking for a way to solve this, i don't know if an equalizer or a compressor will work best. i know the compressor will help even out the peaks and drops in my sound, but the eq will control certain frequencies that are causing problems...right? or should i just go for a volume pedal?

-jimbo
 
no, my pedals don't have a Level Control, although i know what you are talking about and have seen them on other pedals. that sure would be helpful!

yeah, Eisenmann, i was looking at the ebs if i do go for compressor--it seems to get only positive comments here on TB

-jimbo
 
Treat the illness, not the symptom. A compressor will be a band-aid patch that will have other consequences on your tone that you may not want.

If your pedals are radically changing your levels and do not have level controls, then you need to replace those effects with ones that do. Most quality effects have level controls precisely for this reason.
 
Probably the best thing for you is a Boss LS-2. I'd take the pedals that raise your signal and put them in one loop and the pedals that lower your signal in the other loop. That way you can use the volume controls to balance out the loops and make them even. Then I'd run that into your loooper since the LS-2 doesn't have true bypass and then just use your loooper as a true bypass pedal.
 
Eric Moesle said:
Treat the illness, not the symptom. A compressor will be a band-aid patch that will have other consequences on your tone that you may not want.

If your pedals are radically changing your levels and do not have level controls, then you need to replace those effects with ones that do. Most quality effects have level controls precisely for this reason.

Or if you like the tone those effects are yeilding you can get a loooper with built in level controls.



Ted
 
thanks for all the suggestions guys. i think right now my pedals aren't radically changing my volume, only enough thats noticeable to me and my band. i guess a better way to express it would be to say that some frequencies seem to be boosted more so than others by the effects.

so i'm starting to lead towards an eq that i could dial in when i switch the pedals on to round out the sound and boost/cut what needs to be.

does that make sense?

-jimbo