When it’s too much ...

[ilansgroove]

I must admit , some pedals have so many options ... that it’s just TOO much

got the SA AFTERSHOCK to fill all my dirt needs ... It’s a great tool but I get lost in it ... and eventually rarely achieve the sound I hear in my head , that I could easily achieve before with pedals like the B7K , or the YOU’RE DOOM ..

Same with the H9 , got the basic one just to fill out some modulation sounds ... overwhelming options ... again , I get lost

got the CABM, which I think is such a great piece of gear for recording, I find so many completely different Sounds , and they’re all good ...


how many of you actually use more than 3/4 presets on these king of pedals ... ?!?!

 

[cosmicevan]

There are plenty of pedals made that have 1 or 2 or 3 knobs. Maybe just go for those?

I like the deep pedals that have MIDI and do a zillion things. Sometimes I use them for many things sometimes for just one. If they overwhelm you w the options go for stuff that has less options.

 

[mikewalker]

Life is too short... and time is FLEETING! I used to buy gear that has a trillion ways to program and preset, but now I tend towards 'one knob' (or no knobs...)

 

[jwr]

I've owned so many complex pedal. I've use up to 3 presets, but never for a song, just to fart around. So, the ONLY preset I want is the ones I have my knobs set to.

I've been exclusively using non digital interfacing pedals or ones that are simple and don't require a PC, tons of menu diving or just impossible and not intuitive.

Some of the pedals you named are but for what I do, yea, none of them would work for me either. I have an H9 and it just sits collecting dust now or I use it as a tuner. lol

It's all about the music you create. I don't need as much as I thought I did, but I don't think I was really playing before. I was noodling.

 

[ilansgroove]

I sometimes realize that I spent more time searching for a tone than the actual recording or “writing “
(Hate to call it “writing”, more of a riff and ideas searching)


Anyway , I’m thinking of at least changing the aftershock back to a darkglass ... that ultra X really turns on some lights in me !!!

 

[jimfist]

IMO, for the non-professional, it's a luxury to be able to spend the time exploring all of the cool stuff packed into today's digital effect processors, and it definitely can set you far away from focusing on making music or working on your playing skills. Unless you really enjoy the journey and/or take this part of the learning process very seriously, you have to remain disciplined and not chase the rabbits down the hole. You may be better served to not be tempted and use pedals that that are simple by design, and sound good across the limited range of parameter options provided.

At one point, I needed to use every bit of 30 or so presets for a gig I was doing, using the Fractal AxeFxII w/MIDI controller. It was a demanding, challenging gig that cost me perhaps hundreds of hours in programming time, tweaking and testing. Though the results were pretty rewarding and I learned a lot, I seriously doubt I'd go that deep into another effect, even if it offered the possibility. It's also pretty cool to be able to impress with less. Unless your gig demands that you get very specific and detailed with your effects, I'd suggest you keep it simple and find more rewarding ways to spend your time. Trust me, it's worth it.

 

[Deleted member 132197]

Samesies!

My AfterShock is now just the default overdrive, because there were too many options and I kept changing them and I was never really happy.

The CAB M is the same. Sooo many options! But for now I'm just using one arcade setting that I'm happy with.

 

[ilansgroove]

I think the AFTERSHOCK just has too many tweaking options , I always find a preset “close” enough to what I like ... then when I try to tweak it, I often lose it completely.... I just had this fantasy of OD, Distortion and FUZZ in one pedal and just switch between them with midi ... Which is possible with the Aftershock, I just can’t find the sounds I want ...

I’m glad I didn’t take the H9 MAX
Right now I play along with only 4 algorithms.


The CABM is just great and I use it for guitar (that I have been playing for a year now ... lol)
However with the guitar it’s a little harder cause I don’t always know the references of cabs to the sounds I want .... but I eventually find sounds that I like

 

[ilansgroove]

Ohhh and I won’t even start to describe the frustration I get when I try to dial in a sound I want from the SA C4

 

[allintime]

I feel the same about the C4, and even the SA Manta to an extent.
The youtuber Andrew Hoang had a recent video where he discussed spending time just creating sounds. He does it for electronic music, but the same principles apply for bass pedals. Doesn't really help or solve the problem, just a different approach.

 

[Timmah]

Oh, man, this is my experience to the T. I actually just sold my Aftershock because of that exact issue- I was paralyzed by the amount of choices and options it offered, so it just never got used. Now I'm back to an overdrive and a fuzz on my board, because those are the effects that I constantly find myself tweaking from song to song. In the interest of having a good compact board, though, I leave most of my other effects up to the Boss MS-3- things like choruses, delays, phase etc. that only get used once or twice in a set and don't require much tweaking once you've got them figured out. I've spent too much time thinking about my effects rig over the past few years, and the constant switching and changing has become a distraction, so I'm shifting back towards minimal, reliable gear that ideally is a non-factor when I'm practicing or playing.

 

[sonojono]

Never felt overwhelmed with my Aftershock IME. I love that pedal for bass distortion, honestly prefer it over Darkglass stuff that’s double the price.

 

[TOOL460002]

For me the sweet spot is like 5 or 6 how Empress has on the Nebulus. Function-wise, the HOG1 foot switch is great, but that whole thing is gigantic.

 

[crankypants]

When it’s too much ...

When your thread title is not enough ...

 

[Hot Rats]

I use the Aftershock for the recording studio so I like the tweakability. Same for the Gemini chorus and the sounds get changed often. I've never used 'em live so I don't know about any of that.

 

[Steadfast]

I use the sa aftershock as my preset overdrive. I have never plugged it into a computer. I just tweaked the knobs until I found the sound

 

[SunByrne]

Here try this:

If anything with that many knobs and switches and that much text isn't "simplifying" things for you, what could possibly be wrong?

 

[4Mal]

IMHO what you (the OP) describe is simply the transition from analog to digital. The paradigm shift is disorienting. If you think it's tough with a pedal, man you shoulda lived through the early migrating from analog to digital mixer days ... freaking Presonus and Yamaha took a year off my life I'm sure... then after messing with it a while the light bulb glows and you're in the club... Pedals like the Aftershock, The Manta, The C4 - even the new EQ2 are really sophisticated. You just have to approach them differently ... Personally I am a big fan of SA. Using the PC based editor helped a lot in that regard.

 

[cosmicevan]

I dunno...I like options...having options is a luxury. I say start. Start small...just start. Build...or don't...but start. Get a crazy pedal use one sound...but use it. If you love that sound who cares. If you figure out how to sweep a knob and it becomes your sound...even better. Do or do not....

 

[FaithNoMan]

Try buying an analog polyphonic synth(the programming is digital, and you can read a book on it, but it's really nice - the uneffected sound is the analog part).

I Feel like a monkey in a spaceship, and have a lot to learn.
(I learned how to upload some Juno106 patches into it from the internet today, though!)