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?: Which Guitar Pedals Hurt Low End?

M

mysticalcracker

Jan 8, 2011
23
0
#1
May be a dumb question, but I must ask. I am a recent convert from guitar to bass, and I was wondering if guitar pedals work as well with bass. I have been using a Phase 90 with my bass rig, and it sounds pretty good. I guess I'm asking more What types of pedals work better for one or the other, or both?
 
#3
Actually, I kind of was talking about non-true bypass boss stompboxes. They say that they have some sort of buffered bypass, does anybody know about that, but I was really interested in when the pedal is engaged, but the bypass thing has been on my mind lately. We have been recording a lot lately, and I have been investing quite a bit of money in equipment, and many say that your recording is only as good as your weakest link. Is true bypass as important as I am beginning to think it is?
 
#4
OK first, please read the FAQ. Srsly. Second, true bypass is mostly hype. Buffers are not inherently bad, and in fact many, many guitarists and bassists think a good buffer is the key to great tone! Think about this: the whole point of an "active" bass is that it contains a buffer!

A bad buffer is bad not because it is a buffer, but because it was cheaply built and poorly designed.

Some Boss pedals are great on bass, so anyone who tries to tell you they all suck is showing childish ignorance.

As a broad rule of thumb, the guitar pedals that tend to have inadequate low end are dirts (OD, distortion, fuzz) and compressors. There are many, many exceptions!!! It's just a general guideline to consider.

Most other types of effects do not inherently lose any lows--though of course you have to go on a case-by-case basis, really.
 
#5
The best effects, are the ones you leave at home..(in my Old Man "get off my lawn" voice). LOL....do what you and your band like. It has been such a battle to get a pure clean high fidelity sound over the years....."Clean" is my special effect. (Joe Bardens and a Piezo bridge)
 
#7
bongomania said:
Some Boss pedals are great on bass, so anyone who tries to tell you they all suck is showing childish ignorance.

As a broad rule of thumb, the guitar pedals that tend to have inadequate low end are dirts (OD, distortion, fuzz) and compressors. There are many, many exceptions!!! It's just a general guideline to consider.

Most other types of effects do not inherently lose any lows--though of course you have to go on a case-by-case basis, really.
Click to expand...
Yeah, I should have taken the time to make a more accurate post.
I didn't claim they all suck, because they *don't* suck, even if all the guitar Boss stompboxes I've tried negatively affected the tone.
Personally, I find that the resulting tone has less texture, it's more "generic" and "round". Same for my Dunlop Crybaby Bass Wah. I don't use it anymore because of that. Not because it's a bad pedal, but I just can't stand the (small) difference it makes to my tone.

Anyway, as bongo said, the loss of lowend is mostly dirt pedals, but *in my experience*, non-true bypass pedals take a bit of life out of the tone. It's less raw and aggressive and more fat and warm.
 
#8
bongomania said:
OK first, please read the FAQ. Srsly. Second, true bypass is mostly hype. Buffers are not inherently bad, and in fact many, many guitarists and bassists think a good buffer is the key to great tone! Think about this: the whole point of an "active" bass is that it contains a buffer!

A bad buffer is bad not because it is a buffer, but because it was cheaply built and poorly designed.

Some Boss pedals are great on bass, so anyone who tries to tell you they all suck is showing childish ignorance.

As a broad rule of thumb, the guitar pedals that tend to have inadequate low end are dirts (OD, distortion, fuzz) and compressors. There are many, many exceptions!!! It's just a general guideline to consider.

Most other types of effects do not inherently lose any lows--though of course you have to go on a case-by-case basis, really.
Click to expand...

Thanks for pointing me to the FAQ section. I totally should have checked that out. Gave me a lot to think about. However, I an now confused b/t true bypass and hardwire, b/c well, I got a digitech hardwire tuner to get the true bypass, which they say it's true bypass, yet it is called hardwire, and MXR calls the block phase 90 a hardwire, but everybody says it's not true bypass. And the buffered thing is apparently not all bad, and I'm supposed to put a buffered pedal in front of a mxr. Its a lot to ponder.
 
#10
I pulled out a decades old Electro Harmonix Matrix Chorus to get some phase shifting on the bass for the Doobies. Interesting. It does seem to cut the edge off both the highs and lows, but nothing more power hasn't fixed.

Definitely a different phase shifter/flanger vs. what my guitarists are using tone wise.
 

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