by bordonbert Wed Dec 19, 2018 3:03 am
I use only a very simple setup. As a jobbing "pub band" player I am not precious about tone. I am not one of those people who has a vapourous target tone defined in my head which I am constantly travelling barefoot across the land searching to find. Nor am I a believer in the absolute perfection of tone from any single pedal in most categories, for example I reckon most distortion pedals are basically the same and all talk about their finer points of tone is a wafflingly good joke. I know what goes on inside them all and how "samey" the methods of generation are. I prescribe to the view that, if you can't get a good basic tone out of a decent amp, a decent guitar and 8ft of decent cable then you 'aint going to be able to put it back in there with £200+ pedals! I live and play in the real world not the Nirvana world of the mojo blessed guitar guru.
I do have a pedal board but with only a few pedals on it, wherever possible built by me to my own designs, it really 'aint rocket science despite what they want you to think. I have a basic tuner pedal, (despite using one guitar which has Tronical tuning on it with two others without). This runs into an Origin effects Sliderig dual compressor which is a real boon for slide work which I have to do. I spent a lot of time seeing if I could make a version of that myself and I came to the conclusion that, while it was doable, taking into account the time it would take and for only a little more (£140) it was a good choice to buy it. Note that that is for that specific pedal with its very complex circuit configuration, not a back to back diode distortion setup with about twenty components costing pence at around £200! That feeds an old Marshall Bluesbreaker which I use only in a very basic way to add a little bite and grit to what the amp itself produces. Finally I have my own clean Boost pedal. Frankly, if you can't design a Boost pedal you can't design! It should take about 5 minutes, and 4 of those were to decide on the basic configuration you felt like using that day. Tonally it adds nothing, it takes nothing away, that's hifi, it's a simple basic done deal despite the mojo ravings which talk about magic components and non-existent tonesuck. These are all in front of the amp with nothing in the loop.
Occasionally I have a phase of using my own distortion pedal. It's a two stage muamp design, similar to the Okko Diablo but with the schematic design fault in that corrected! I don't use this for amything other than that tweak for a few numbers so the Bluesbreaker is the simpler and smaller option. I also sometimes add a first stage clean buffer pedal of my own design which allows me to consistently match the guitar to whatever loading I like, (that's the TRUE undiscovered secret to your guitar's tone), and to play with ridiculously long cables for wandering around the stage or pub.
So for me it's simplicity which is the key and an uncomplicated setup in front of the amp. You will need others to discuss 4 cable digital systems I'm afraid. Hopefully they will be along soon. I can't imagine any issues with pedals so what exactly is it you are having trouble with?
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