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Most useful effects live

#21
darkstorm said:
Comp/sustainer and overdrive as the two essentials for the last 30 plus yrs. Eq section as add to this for the last 25 plus yrs. Ring mod as 4th esential tone tweak for the last 6 plus yrs. But thats just me. I have enjoyhed occassional use of phaser, echo/delay, or chorus once in awhile for the past 30 plus yrs to. But theyre not a constant like the others are. A little bit of room reverb for room ambience for the past ten or so yrs also. But this a result of switching to procesor to recorder or Pa system for voice thats fully ready for recording without need for micing anything.
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Would you say that compression is key bc of peaks, roundness of sound, etc? Do you tweek compression much live or just set and go? I use a fingers and pick player mainly.

I am very curious as to why anyone would use ring mod? I have looked up a lot of clips on it and it seems kinda weird for bass unless used in studio for certain things (intros, ambience, etc)
 
#23
Until recently - just a tuner. I now need a synth (HOG) for synth lines for some pop songs we are doing. I could see using a fuzz or other dirt in certain situations, but I prefer to play a rather clean basic setup.
 
#24
My Comp is an "always on" kind of thing, so I wouldn't even count it. My most used effect would have to be an OD, I've used many different overdrives over the years, but it's the one thing I've always felt I needed for the styles I've played. Wah, Delay, Ocatve, etc... those are fun toys that come and go, but the one thing that's always been a constant is that desire for a little extra push.
 
#30
sethlow3 said:
that's funny bc the whole reason I got into effects is that I was told I NEEDED a synth pedal for some 80s synth pop. I read on here to try a cheap mix of chorus, fuzz, and octave. I have a digitech bass chorus, bass muff, and have yet to get an octaver. This was after a ton of research I did on synth pedals. It came down to 3. The Octavius Squeezer looked cool, but got mixed reviews and was EXPENSIVE! I love EHX so far, why did they make everything programmable in it's price range except the bass MS? I'd have to put the pedal on a table and tweek it all the time live. The markbass one also caught my eye, but there are mixed reviews on here, there are quite a few used ones on guitar center etc.. (returns), and it's a little pricey. It looks cool though.

It seems more and more to me that a synth maybe is done best on an actual synth like a microkorg or alesis mico synth. It's just a matter of learning. What do you guys think?
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I think, in your case getting an actual synth or MIDI-keyboard would be a good choice. In lot of synths (MicroKorg, Micron, Roland SH-201) you can find those 80´s synth-pop sounds, so it is just a matter of learning. It is better to interpret those songs on actual synth than getting tons of pedals and spend hours of tweaking to emulate it.
In my band we are playing just our own songs, so in process of creating bassline I can make any sound I consider to be good for a song. But in near future I´m getting an actual synth (or MIDI keyboard) because still there are lot of things I´m not able to play on bass.
 
#33
every pedal gets used at the moment on my board (well except for flanger, sometimes have trouble where to include that)
over drive, fuzz, wah, chorus, reverb + delay (god bless the RV-3)

I find that my effects use has actually changed, I thought would be less but not that we have two guitarists I can actually incorporate more, spices up the rythm section cos there's ALWAYS someone playing it where as before I was always tasked with holding it down (I like to have my fun too!!!)
 
#36
Jacob J said:
I think, in your case getting an actual synth or MIDI-keyboard would be a good choice. In lot of synths (MicroKorg, Micron, Roland SH-201) you can find those 80´s synth-pop sounds, so it is just a matter of learning. It is better to interpret those songs on actual synth than getting tons of pedals and spend hours of tweaking to emulate it.
In my band we are playing just our own songs, so in process of creating bassline I can make any sound I consider to be good for a song. But in near future I´m getting an actual synth (or MIDI keyboard) because still there are lot of things I´m not able to play on bass.
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good to hear this. I need some encouragement to give the whole keys synth thing a try. I am debating on a Novation Xiosynth25 or a Novation bass station both of which are WAY cheaper and convincing than any pedal bass combo I've seen. The more I wanna sound like a synth on bass, the more I find its expensive and not easily tweeked. Plus think of all the other options like strings and synth leads that are near impossible on a bass setup.

I do still love chorus, fuzz, loops, freeze and envelopes tho. It's just funny bc the whole effects thing was revolving around me sounding like a synth.
 
#39
sethlow3 said:
good to hear this. I need some encouragement to give the whole keys synth thing a try. I am debating on a Novation Xiosynth25 or a Novation bass station both of which are WAY cheaper and convincing than any pedal bass combo I've seen. The more I wanna sound like a synth on bass, the more I find its expensive and not easily tweeked. Plus think of all the other options like strings and synth leads that are near impossible on a bass setup.

I do still love chorus, fuzz, loops, freeze and envelopes tho. It's just funny bc the whole effects thing was revolving around me sounding like a synth.
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You should definitely try it ! Plus, learning another instrument always extends your abilities as a musician. You can´t go wrong with Novation stuff, Xiosynth is really good. If you want to play just basslines try Bass Station. I´m thinking about getting Korg R3 as it seems to fill all my needs.
You are also absolutely right that purchasing a second hand keys synth is much cheaper than pedals. In my opinion pedal combo will never fully replace an actual synth, but it can complement it and using it right way, pedal synth actualy can be really usefull.
 
#40
For me it's OD -> Filter -> Flanger. This gives me a good variety of useful combinations (and I like to keep things simple so 3 pedals are plenty). I love the sound when all are engaged, but it's definitely for the space jam sections! Specifically, I use Hematoma, Groove Regulator and an old Maxon FL-01. I find that the GR does not throw volume spikes at all, certainly nothing compared to my other filters. That's a key thing for me, actually.
 

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