Parallel Lines a Serial Killer?

[Al Krow]

I've currently got all the pedals on my board set up in series. Simples!

How about you guys? Any of you using any of your pedals in parallel loops on your boards (or possibly even in your amp's fx loop)?

If so, be really interested in your thinking behind this and what improvement to the sound it's delivering; what pedals you have in parallel and what you've left in series and what your board set-ups look like (pics very welcome!)?

Are you just using the effects loops on existing pedals or have a separate dedicated pedal (e.g. a Boss LS2)?

Cheers, AK

 

[el murdoque]

I have been experimenting a lot with dirt pedals.
Like, an overdrive that gives you the voice of an angry shouting, heavy smoking & drinking old man - stacked with a gnarly spitting Fuzz. Great sound, but virtually unusable.
In a parallel loop with clean sound, it suddenly becomes very usable.

Or for ambient sound, I like to have a delay that's set to 100% wet and then have a phaser or an envelope filter behind that, while I run a bit of reverb and a chorus on the other channel, which gives me the phased or enveloped repeats of the delay combined with the chorused sound (and just a touch of plate reverb).

I really like to dabble around with those loops and such, but I do it more or less for my entertainment.
I've had a time when I gigged a board with more than a dozen pedals.
But at some point I realized that I'm too lazy to carry around a setup where I use a looper and four pedals just for one chorus of one song.

 

[cardinal]

Dirt in parallel is awesome. I've been enjoying a Darkglass B3K in parallel with a Turbo Rat. The B3K is bright and tight and aggressive. The Rat sounds a bit like a fuzz wall of sound. Together in parallel you get both.

 

[catcauphonic]

This past one has been the year of the pedal for me I'm actually building 2 boards (tho only the smaller board itself is a DIY thing.)

I can honestly say out of the 2 dozen pedals I've acquired (mostly second hand right here on TB, with 2 more currently on the way), 10 of which are dirts, my favorite by far is my Boss LS-2 for how well it makes them all play together!

Some dirts that have a rep to be bottom suckers like my beloved Aguilar Agro and some fuzzes can get as much of a clean signal with the bottom fully intact as I like with the turn of the LS-2's two volume knobs. Even dirts that include a blend knob benefit from this parallel signal (the Boss ODB-3 was practically unusable to me on it's own until adding the LS-2.)

I'm still experimenting, but as of now I have several of those dirts running thru the LS-2's A-channel, while B only has my chorus and phase shifter cuz it's nice to be able to keep a clean signal along side those as well, since alone they can sound warbly making the bass signal seem out of tune in a band context. Running them parallel with some extreme dirt is a nice touch that just can't be done in series.

Yes, the LS2 is the MVP of my big board... though useless on its own, it really does add a lot of versatility to any one or more pedals

 

[cosmicevan]

I use a Boss ES-8 switcher which lets me creat 2 parallel loops. I have a HoF mini on my board set to a really washed out cathedral sound. Series it gives me that huge cavern that I like for spacey rhythmic loop beats, in parallel it acts as a nice normal verb giving me 2 distinct sounds to work with using one setting in the pedal.

Parallel also works killer w synth pedals and other monophonic effects since it lets you blend your dry tone back in. I have a Klein bottle but haven't fully incorporated it yet. I'll use that mostly for the ability to thread effects in and out of each other.

 

[thabassmon]

At present my board has two parallel signal chains, it's split at the EHX ring thing which has the dry output and effect output being fed into the Source Audio Kingmaker inputs 1 & 2 respectively, output one is going to the EHX talking machine with the EHX V256 in the effects loop. Output 2 goes to the Sonuus Wahoo. The two filters are input into 1 & 2 of the Boss MD 500 then the two outputs go through the Visual Sound Volume Pedal then the two outputs are sent to either two amps or two inputs of my recording desk.
I like parallel routing you can get a lot of very cool sounds that way.
What I actually want next is a Soundscupture Switchblade GL. 16 ins And outs routed anyway you want.

Sometimes when I record I have eight parallel signal chains.

 

[Al Krow]

At present my board has two parallel signal chains, it's split at the EHX ring thing which has the dry output and effect output being fed into the Source Audio Kingmaker inputs 1 & 2 respectively, output one is going to the EHX talking machine with the EHX V256 in the effects loop. Output 2 goes to the Sonuus Wahoo. The two filters are input into 1 & 2 of the Boss MD 500 then the two outputs go through the Visual Sound Volume Pedal then the two outputs are sent to either two amps or two inputs of my recording desk.
I like parallel routing you can get a lot of very cool sounds that way.
What I actually want next is a Soundscupture Switchblade GL. 16 ins And outs routed anyway you want.

Sometimes when I record I have eight parallel signal chains.

So what's the key things you're looking to achieve with your various parallel chains rather than running in series?

 

[thabassmon]

So what's the key things you're looking to achieve with your various parallel chains rather than running in series?

Good question.
If I use the ring thing as an octaver
The drive pedal then receives a clean and an octave below on separate inputs allows me to drive and eq them individually send them to their own filters and send to their own modulations or filters with output options of dual mono or stereo.
Basically I like layering the sounds have the lows accentuated with low pass filters and the direct with band pass filter into phasers. Helps me get really effected sounds and retain the bass presence. That sort of thing.

 

[Johno Dunn]

This past one has been the year of the pedal for me I'm actually building 2 boards (tho only the smaller board itself is a DIY thing.)

I can honestly say out of the 2 dozen pedals I've acquired (mostly second hand right here on TB, with 2 more currently on the way), 10 of which are dirts, my favorite by far is my Boss LS-2 for how well it makes them all play together!

Some dirts that have a rep to be bottom suckers like my beloved Aguilar Agro and some fuzzes can get as much of a clean signal with the bottom fully intact as I like with the turn of the LS-2's two volume knobs. Even dirts that include a blend knob benefit from this parallel signal (the Boss ODB-3 was practically unusable to me on it's own until adding the LS-2.)

I'm still experimenting, but as of now I have several of those dirts running thru the LS-2's A-channel, while B only has my chorus and phase shifter cuz it's nice to be able to keep a clean signal along side those as well, since alone they can sound warbly making the bass signal seem out of tune in a band context. Running them parallel with some extreme dirt is a nice touch that just can't be done in series.

Yes, the LS2 is the MVP of my big board... though useless on its own, it really does add a lot of versatility to any one or more pedals

I run my Fairfield Accountant in parallel with an LS2. Grind magic!

 

[Ric5]

I've currently got all the pedals on my board set up in series. Simples!

How about you guys? Any of you using any of your pedals in parallel loops on your boards (or possibly even in your amp's fx loop)?

If so, be really interested in your thinking behind this and what improvement to the sound it's delivering; what pedals you have in parallel and what you've left in series and what your board set-ups look like (pics very welcome!)?

Are you just using the effects loops on existing pedals or have a separate dedicated pedal (e.g. a Boss LS2)?

Cheers, AK

I am totally into parallel processing

1 - First I run into an equalizer

2 - Then I split the signal into 4 parallel signals with a rolls mixer.

3 - I run one of the parallel lines into the Line6 bass pod where I model an acoustic 360 with a rat or big muff distortion pedal. I use this to get a retro growlly distorted sound. Or I also model an Ampeg fliptop with the Rat Distortion pedal. And I also Model an old Marshall amp. With the bass pod I can get a wide range of clean or dirty sounds and various effects and model different amps and speaker cabinets.

4 - The second parallel signal goes into a MXR bass di+. I use this pedal to get a clean modern sound. It also has a distortion button that can give a moderate to extreme amount of modern distortion.

5 - The third parallel signal goes into a Marshall Guv'nor. This gives me an old 60s marshall stack sound. This can go from a small amount of distortion to an over the top marshall sound. This effect can give you a the classic Jack Bruce Cream tone.

6 - The fourth parallel signal goes into a Tech21 VT Bass pedal. With this effect I get a slightly dirty Ampeg SVT bass amp sound with a tube like growl.

7 - Then I remix the 4 signals back together and run it into a bass amp, or pa, or studio mixer. Because the signals are parallel I can mix clean and overdriven sounds together and still get effect and a sound that punches through the mix.

 

[Seashore]

I have a noise gate, EQ, and EHX HOG synth pedal followed by a splitter. On one side after the splitter I have a tight, attack-oriented compressor always on, followed by a Carbon Copy delay that I mostly use for self-oscillating feedback swells. This goes into the dirtier channel of my head. On the other side I have a treble-oriented distortion that's usually on, followed by a Memory Toy delay set for nice lush repeats with modulation. This goes into the cleaner channel of my head. When the distortion is on, it gives me a rich high-mid top end that complements the guitar sound; when it's off, I get a baritone-like clean sound that's great for alternate picked chords and moody passages. I'd initially thought to only have the synth going through half of this setup, but it has a dry blend built in and sounds great pushing through both channels. It's a flexible setup with two great base sounds on call and some nice extra flavors only a step away.

 

[cheapbasslovin]

When I've run parallel signals it was to run octave signals through their own chains. I love having octave and envelope filter in parallel chains. I also ran my HOG octave ups with a guitar chain of effects.

I only have one gig now with no need for all that so it's just series stuff for now.

 

[catcauphonic]

At present my board has two parallel signal chains, it's split at the EHX ring thing which has the dry output and effect output...

So this can be done with any effect pedal that has one in and two outs (wet & dry?) Assuming the volumes are controlled by said pedals single volume knob... they should exit there at about the same level, correct?

The Bass Big Muff comes to mind. But unless your amp has two inputs, how do you go about merging those 2 parallel signals without having an LS2 (or equivalent) to have them converge again??

Genuinely curious. Thanks!

 

[Al Krow]

I am totally into parallel processing...

Really helpful post, particularly with the pic and pedal org / flowchart. Thank you!

Not really thought about using a Rolls Mixer before, but they look very useful and the model you're using, the MX 41b, is a similar cost to the Boss LS-2. Particularly as it can be used as both a mixer and a splitter!

The only feature lacking for live use would be some stomp switches and something like the EHX Tri Parallel Mixer seems to provide you with this all of this in a single box and for a similar price to two Rolls MX 41b. Three loops rather than four though.

 

[thabassmon]

So this can be done with any effect pedal that has one in and two outs (wet & dry?) Assuming the volumes are controlled by said pedals single volume knob... they should exit there at about the same level, correct?

The Bass Big Muff comes to mind. But unless your amp has two inputs, how do you go about merging those 2 parallel signals without having an LS2 (or equivalent) to have them converge again??

Genuinely curious. Thanks!

There's a few ways to bring a split signal back together.

Use a pedal that has stereo to mono routing option

Use a pedal that has an effect loop, either normal effect loop use or put one big muff out to input and the other to the return. Blend on pedal would mix between the big muff and talking machine in this example.

Simple little connector can create splits or merges, cheapest option.

 

[Al Krow]

Guess where I'm getting to is that if you're creating your synth sound with the traditional octave --> (poss gated) fuzz --> filter then you need these in series. If you have an actual synth pedal or looking for your octave to track well then these pedals IMO are going to need as much clean signal as possible and would be ideal candidates for parallel looping.

Filters, on the other hand, seem work best by having the most complex wave-forms to be acting on. So I'm kinda landing on:

Initial in-series
BASS --> hpf --> comp -->

In parallel loops:
- Synth
- Dirt
- Octave

Final in-series
--> filter --> modulation & delay --> AMP

Does that make sense?

 

[Al Krow]

Nice explanation of the Tri Parallel Mixer at 1.40 in the attached and bass demo starts at 2.40.

 

[BurningSkies]

I've currently got all the pedals on my board set up in series. Simples!

How about you guys? Any of you using any of your pedals in parallel loops on your boards (or possibly even in your amp's fx loop)?

If so, be really interested in your thinking behind this and what improvement to the sound it's delivering; what pedals you have in parallel and what you've left in series and what your board set-ups look like (pics very welcome!)?

Are you just using the effects loops on existing pedals or have a separate dedicated pedal (e.g. a Boss LS2)?

Cheers, AK

Some in series, some in parallel (with bypass switcher) some split high pass/low pass.

 

[naetog]

I got a Saturnworks Parallel looper a few months ago and it's easily one of the best decisions I've made.
It's like having another bassist playing different effects in unison on each loop.

Tuner -> Comp -> Looper
Loop 0: Clean Signal
Loop 1: Delay(s)
Loop 2: Dirt -> Synth
Loop 3: Reverb
Out: Chorus -> another Reverb ->HPF

I have a midi controller for the delay, synth, dirt, and one of the reverb pedals, so there's no shortage of stupid fun sounds to be found.

That EHX pedal looks pretty sweet too. Seems the footprint of it is pretty manageable, which is nice.

 

[Seashore]

I got a Saturnworks Parallel looper a few months ago and it's easily one of the best decisions I've made.
It's like having another bassist playing different effects in unison on each loop.

Tuner -> Comp -> Looper
Loop 0: Clean Signal
Loop 1: Delay(s)
Loop 2: Dirt -> Synth
Loop 3: Reverb
Out: Chorus -> another Reverb ->HPF

I have a midi controller for the delay, synth, dirt, and one of the reverb pedals, so there's no shortage of stupid fun sounds to be found.

That EHX pedal looks pretty sweet too. Seems the footprint of it is pretty manageable, which is nice.

Saturnworks rocks. Tons of great routing solutions at reasonable prices. I got an active splitter with boosts from them a little while ago and it's awesome, much cleaner sound and more control than my old ABY box.