• TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
    Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
    Join free Log in
    Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.

Let's make a list: Magic tone sweetener pedals.

#202
sloppy_phil said:
You are certainly not wrong; EQ is so overlooked for these kinds of solutions! But personally I find a 10-band (especially if they are at fixed notches) to be insufficiently flexible. Perhaps it's because I'm used to a 31-band in my DAW, and I don't know of a decently sized pedal that offers something along those lines
Click to expand...

If you're not afraid of digital, the Source Audio EQ2 has all you want.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Keyser Soze and Killing Floor
#203
alex1fly said:
Probably in the minority but I'd be fine with the pedal market collapsing. There's a lot of redundant products out there with different names and different housings. An EQ pedal should be a required prerequisite for anybody buying pedals. Useful for literally every player of every amplified instrument in every style. Can't say the same for all of your Aguilars and Walruses and Sansamps and whatever else.


Yeah anything above 10 bands seems to be a rack unit. But even those can be inexpensive and slim enough to easily pack into your gear bags, just set it on your cab and you're good to go!
Click to expand...

As with almost everything in life, there are multiple ways to achieve a goal.
There are many interesting pedals around that do EQ in their own way. The Zeibek Designer Submarine, for example has very weird controls that have a lot of thought behind them (and I mean audio engineer brain power). Or the EBS Microbass 3. When you turn down the gain to minimum on the parametric mids, the Q gets needle sharp and you have a notch filter. It does not always have to be fully parametric with dozens of bands to be useful.
I find the Broughton RFE to be a Swiss Army Knife in that regard.
It's a resonant low and high pass filter with a single parametric EQ. This alone can solve so many problems.





Now in defense of this thread: There's more to an amplified instrument than EQ. There might be those that are happy with a studio grade graphic 32 band EQ that feeds a power amp that feeds PA cabinets that are dead flat in their response across the board. But there will be people calling this approach too sterile and maybe ask for something more Kilmisteresque.




Audio gear has always been abused to get something out of it that was not the idea behind it when it was constructed. I doubt Urei was aware what happens when you push in all the buttons on the 1176 when they released it. I also doubt that Neve envisioned that the 1073 would be used with the gain in the red because the clipping sounds pleasant on some instruments. Who knows if the makers of the Echoplex would have thought that a flock of high profile guitar players would seek out their units and play through them with the effect turned completely off, only to get the coloring of the sound it provides?

If memory serves correctly, the first stomp box effect ever was a fuzz - and that fuzz was invented because during a recording session, a transformer died in a piece of kit that was recording the guitar, creating that tone. The fuzz was meant to reliably recreate that accident (which could be called, by a little stretch, abuse of studio kit).

The very first pedal ever was meant to mimic a certain abuse of studio kit.

No wonder we have pedals that try to do the clipping of a Neve console or pedals that try to add the saturation you get from a tape machine. That literally has been the idea behind pedals from day 1.

This thread is about both. Those pedals that try and catch a certain kind of effect that happens when you use vintage studio gear in unintended ways and pedals that create pleasant sounds when they themselves are used in unintended ways.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Rev_Slinky, mrperkolator, gonzkal and 6 others
#205
el murdoque said:
If you're not afraid of digital, the Source Audio EQ2 has all you want.
Click to expand...

I am indeed not afraid of digital; I've recently gotten myself that Two Notes Torpedo C.A.B. and am very pleasantly surprised by how it's working out thus far. It's only early days, but there will be a full review forthcoming once I've had some more time with it. Including some gig scenarios, which is why I bought it, mostly; my recent Scotland tour showed me that I needed greater control over what was getting sent to FOH.

Should my initial impressions hold, it will render an EQ pedal unnecessary for live work. I was sceptical going in, but the price was too good to pass up on my local market, so went for it. Plus, in terms of digital, the ubiquitousness of things like the Line 6 HXS et al. meant I was forced to reconsider some preconceptions, if not possible snobbery, I held towards digital kit.
 
  • Like
Reactions: AmyTwonotes and Maxi Funkl
#206
el murdoque said:
As with almost everything in life, there are multiple ways to achieve a goal.
There are many interesting pedals around that do EQ in their own way. The Zeibek Designer Submarine, for example has very weird controls that have a lot of thought behind them (and I mean audio engineer brain power). Or the EBS Microbass 3. When you turn down the gain to minimum on the parametric mids, the Q gets needle sharp and you have a notch filter. It does not always have to be fully parametric with dozens of bands to be useful.
I find the Broughton RFE to be a Swiss Army Knife in that regard.
It's a resonant low and high pass filter with a single parametric EQ. This alone can solve so many problems.





Now in defense of this thread: There's more to an amplified instrument than EQ. There might be those that are happy with a studio grade graphic 32 band EQ that feeds a power amp that feeds PA cabinets that are dead flat in their response across the board. But there will be people calling this approach too sterile and maybe ask for something more Kilmisteresque.




Audio gear has always been abused to get something out of it that was not the idea behind it when it was constructed. I doubt Urei was aware what happens when you push in all the buttons on the 1176 when they released it. I also doubt that Neve envisioned that the 1073 would be used with the gain in the red because the clipping sounds pleasant on some instruments. Who knows if the makers of the Echoplex would have thought that a flock of high profile guitar players would seek out their units and play through them with the effect turned completely off, only to get the coloring of the sound it provides?

If memory serves correctly, the first stomp box effect ever was a fuzz - and that fuzz was invented because during a recording session, a transformer died in a piece of kit that was recording the guitar, creating that tone. The fuzz was meant to reliably recreate that accident (which could be called, by a little stretch, abuse of studio kit).

The very first pedal ever was meant to mimic a certain abuse of studio kit.

No wonder we have pedals that try to do the clipping of a Neve console or pedals that try to add the saturation you get from a tape machine. That literally has been the idea behind pedals from day 1.

This thread is about both. Those pedals that try and catch a certain kind of effect that happens when you use vintage studio gear in unintended ways and pedals that create pleasant sounds when they themselves are used in unintended ways.
Click to expand...

A lot of what you've said could also describe cutting-edge music, starting with jazz. All if it, examples of cutting-edge musicianship. :)
 
  • Like
Reactions: el murdoque and LunarEclipse81
#208
sloppy_phil said:
I am indeed not afraid of digital; I've recently gotten myself that Two Notes Torpedo C.A.B. and am very pleasantly surprised by how it's working out thus far. It's only early days, but there will be a full review forthcoming once I've had some more time with it. Including some gig scenarios, which is why I bought it, mostly; my recent Scotland tour showed me that I needed greater control over what was getting sent to FOH.

Should my initial impressions hold, it will render an EQ pedal unnecessary for live work. I was sceptical going in, but the price was too good to pass up on my local market, so went for it. Plus, in terms of digital, the ubiquitousness of things like the Line 6 HXS et al. meant I was forced to reconsider some preconceptions, if not possible snobbery, I held towards digital kit.
Click to expand...

Great to hear sloppy_phil! :thumbsup: Let us know how you get on!
 
  • Like
Reactions: Killing Floor and sloppy_phil
#210
37E51313-ADF4-444C-856E-DEC6BF9548DE.jpeg
Dr Thump said:
The Chase Tone Secret Preamp and the Boss EH-2.
Click to expand...
I had never heard of either prior to this thread. Do you use both together? I'll need to sell a few pedals before ordering a Secret Preamp, but have a EH-2 arriving tomorrow. I am going to try pairing it with a LMB-3.
 

Latest posts

Top Bottom
Back