Being Inspired by Sound

Some of my favorite guitar players soak their guitar in effect pedals. My journey with effect pedals is a weird one. I started with my first pedal, a Digitech Crybaby Wah-Wah, the GCB-95 specifically, in 2008. I bought it to play Ali ce in Chains’ “Man In The Box”. After digging into Rage Against The Machine, I got a Digitech RP-255 because Tom Morello used a Digitech Whammy and I figured the Whammy sound was in there. I didn’t know a damn thing about amps, the differences between fuzz/overdrive/distortion, what modulation was, or any of the fine details. It was pure ignorance and innocence. In 2020 in August though, all of that changed, for the better and for the worst.

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You see, my ex girlfriend got me into guitar pedals. She got into guitar after our breakup and heard about pedals and got into them as well. I believe she started off with two KMSIE clones of a delay and a distortion, but I could be wrong. She became a huge fan of Electro Harmonix and grabbed a Metal Muff, the Canyon Delay, and the Oceans 11 Reverb. I had a passive interest in pedals because of my aforementioned favorite guitar players, and because of Premier Guitars’ Rig Rundown videos, but specifically also cause of Julien Baker. I always associated pedals with rock and roll and I figured her sound was maybe three pedals, but not the spaceship it actually was. She really piqued my interest as to what could be done with the guitar. When my ex mentioned pedals, I figured it was time I dive into it all.

Pedals changed my music writing forever. Prior to them, I only thought about gain like distortion. I never considered how chorus or delay could be used in my writing to fill out sound. They completely made me recontexualize my playing. Not only did they change my playing, but it really helped me find my sound. They also helped accomplish a childhood dream of mine, and that’s to have an ampless rig, one that doesn’t require a physical amplifier.

When I got some pedals that I knew I’d stick with for a while, the Neunaber Immerse and Inspire, and the Boss DD-200, I was reminded of Claudio Sanchez of Coheed and Cambria discussing pedals in the documentary, “Fiction Will See The Real”, describing pedals as these ‘magic boxes of sound’. And that was a generation ago. As a music teacher, I have a student who was fascinated by the same magic boxes that I and Claudio were fascinated by.

Below is a picture of the rig I built for him. It starts off with a tuner, cause what point is there in playing the guitar if it’s out of tune? I follow it up with a Swiff Audio Fuzz Face which is stupid loud in all the best ways, and then the MXR Super Badass. It was my first medium to high gain drive and it does incredibly well. From there we go into the Horse American Sound which is a clone of the Sansamp Blonde amp sim pedal. For $30 bucks, it cannot be beat. I was running low on space here, so I had to pick between chorus or delay. The student is a big fan of chorus, but I didn’t have a spare chorus laying around, so the Boss DD7 would have to do. Worst comes to worst, he can use the modulated delay and turn the time “Time” all the way down. Pulling up rear, effects wise, is the Digitech Polara. It’s an incredible reverb, and if the switch wasn’t iffy, it’d be on a different board for sure. Lastly, the Mooer Radar makes this ampless rig complete with its cab and power amp sim. The entire board is powered by a Cioks DC-8, because accurate power is important. I hope this board, as sparse as it is, keeps this kid inspired and helps him find his sound.

Some of my favorite guitar players soak their guitar in effect pedals. My journey with effect pedals is a weird one. I started with my first pedal, a Digitech Crybaby Wah-Wah, the GCB-95 specifically, in 2008. I bought it to play Alice in Chains’ “Man In The Box”. After digging into Rage Against The Machine, I got a Digitech RP-255 because Tom Morello used a Digitech Whammy and I figured the Whammy sound was in there. I didn’t know a damn thing about amps, the differences between fuzz/overdrive/distortion, what modulation was, or any of the fine details. It was pure ignorance and innocence. In 2020 in August though, all of that changed, for the better and for the worst.