FX pedals

[jimmy behan]

Anyone use FX pedals/DIY gizmos in their live setup and if so what? (Particularly as desktop fx, but all you axe-lords, feel free to chime in).

I've been mucking about with some DIY pedals lately and quite enjoying it (tonebender, red llama, reverb, delay, envelope filter and a few others).
It's a nice break from staring at a computer screen.
Still thinking of how to best incorporate them into a live setup, I was thinking of maybe 3 or 4 fx chains of 3 or 4 pedals in each, going in and out of the interface.
I'm in the process of making some router/fx looper type boxes for versatility.
One thing I've been wondering about is how important impedance matching is when using a line level into the pedals and if it's worth getting a reamp box or something?

There's a lot of interesting non-traditional fx out there in DIY land these days.
The Gristleizer looks interesting:

http://www.throbbing-gristle.com/tg/gristleizer.html

Been looking at picking up some pcbs from 4ms too:

http://4mspedals.com/kits.php

[mfischer]

i use an eventide timefactor live.  it is great delay/looper for desktop of floor use. nice display and a lot of useful functions.  you can create some great granular style effects from sweeping the start/end loop points in loop mode. 
i've used the Frostwave Resonator a lot live in the past.  it's a clone of the filter section from the Korg MS20 in pedal form.  it does the self oscillation thing perfectly.  i was using it in conjunction with a mxr carbon copy. it really gives you a lot of control over just which parts of your signal get through to the delay.

it may sound funny but my favorite pedal by far is my ernie ball volume pedal. 
simple trouble-free design.  nothing is better for making swells.

[monkey]

I've been getting interested in diy lately also, gristelizer looks interesting as a future project.
there is some interesting stuff at
http://www.beavisaudio.com/
including how to build a feedback looper. Another great resource is
http://www.freestompboxes.org/index.php?sid=af31173ef12a8c3babf1d5755c46438e
loads of schematics and vero layouts here ranging from vintage to modern boutique pedals
theres some but not many schematics on the Ilove fuzz forum in the devi ever diy section.
http://www.ilovefuzz.com/index.php
and if you're into a bit of hacking check out Nick Collins book Handmade Electronic music, feedback looper crossed with Hex inverting ic chip(details of what you can do with these IC's in the book) leads to OHONO utter stutter pedal from ILove fuzz index page (gated feedback looper,)i think.

[s_hamann]

I used a lot of pedals and desktop effects when I played live, none DIY though. I'm not really good at committing to DIY projects.

Regarding impedance, I never bothered to worry about it. As long as I could get a sound I liked out of it, I never cared if I was doing anything technically wrong.

The only pedals I've encountered that really didn't like a sampler's output were newer EHX pedals. They don't seem to have the headroom on the input to handle it, lots of clipping unless the input is turned way down.

[billygomberg]

that Gristlizer pedal looks especially  nice. I think it is fun that the TG crew has turned to producing their entire archive for commercial consumption.

Death By Audio makes really unique and amazing pedals.

I'm not big on pedals but the right one is really the right one.  Anne uses a Moog lowpass which is a really lovely sounding little thing...

[Guy Birkin]

If you're looking for something like the Gristleizer in terms of sound and quirkiness, check these:

http://www.subdecay.com/

http://4mspedals.com/swash.php

[radere]

I'm not one for boutique or DIY pedals, generally; as I tend to buy things that are convenient (re: cheap and easily locatable) to replace if they break down. That said, I've pared my pedal chain down a lot in the past 18 months. At one point I was running a total of 9 pedals, but I've settled on an EHX Small Stone (the old Russian kind...hopefully soon to be replaced with the new, smaller footprint Nano version), an EHX Stereo Memory Man w/ Hazarai and a Boss RV-3 Digital Reverb/Delay (which I'm aiming on swapping out for EHX's new Cathedral Reverb unit). I patch all that into my soundcard and run it into Ableton, where I can add on whatever additional processing my little heart desires!

[billygomberg]

I'm not one for boutique or DIY pedals, generally; as I tend to buy things that are convenient (re: cheap and easily locatable) to replace if they break down. That said, I've pared my pedal chain down a lot in the past 18 months. At one point I was running a total of 9 pedals, but I've settled on an EHX Small Stone (the old Russian kind...hopefully soon to be replaced with the new, smaller footprint Nano version), an EHX Stereo Memory Man w/ Hazarai and a Boss RV-3 Digital Reverb/Delay (which I'm aiming on swapping out for EHX's new Cathedral Reverb unit). I patch all that into my soundcard and run it into Ableton, where I can add on whatever additional processing my little heart desires!

that seems like a nice chain.  how is the memory man/hazarai? 

[radere]

I'm not one for boutique or DIY pedals, generally; as I tend to buy things that are convenient (re: cheap and easily locatable) to replace if they break down. That said, I've pared my pedal chain down a lot in the past 18 months. At one point I was running a total of 9 pedals, but I've settled on an EHX Small Stone (the old Russian kind...hopefully soon to be replaced with the new, smaller footprint Nano version), an EHX Stereo Memory Man w/ Hazarai and a Boss RV-3 Digital Reverb/Delay (which I'm aiming on swapping out for EHX's new Cathedral Reverb unit). I patch all that into my soundcard and run it into Ableton, where I can add on whatever additional processing my little heart desires!

that seems like a nice chain.  how is the memory man/hazarai? 

It's fantastic! It's really become more or less the heart of my performance set-up. Great sound quality, really well-designed, intuitive looper function. The delay modes are a bit hit and miss, I must confess...but I primarily use it for the looper, so it's no big deal. Actually, if you hold down the "record" footswitch and just keep playing, you can treat it like a 30-second delay almost, adjusting the feedback/volume attenuation with the "repeats" knob. I can get lost in the thing for days...

[theowlbox]

Live (and this is very much still a work in progress), I've been putting my two iPods through a Boss DD7 and a Kaoss Pad to spit out/chew up/loop shuffled things.
This year, I'm looking to try my two new Bliptronic 5000 thingies through this setup - maybe trying a EHX synth pedal to envelope one?
Also, going to see if the 'link out' of the Bliptronic can trigger the drum sounds on a Casio drum keyboard...
J

[jimmy behan]

i've used the Frostwave Resonator a lot live in the past.  it's a clone of the filter section from the Korg MS20 in pedal form.  it does the self oscillation thing perfectly.  i was using it in conjunction with a mxr carbon copy. it really gives you a lot of control over just which parts of your signal get through to the delay.

Yeah, they sound great, would love to try one. Someone was selling one recently in dublin but wanted E250 for it.

I've been getting interested in diy lately also, gristelizer looks interesting as a future project.
there is some interesting stuff at
http://www.beavisaudio.com/

Great site, makes it very easy to understand, quite funny too.

A lot of the diy sound generators seem to favour square/saw wave functions over sine, which is fine if your into the noize. I think I'd find a little sine generator type thingy more useful.
Something like the Dronelab, but with sines.

http://casperelectronics.com/finished-pieces/drone-lab/drone-lab-v2/

There's something I've always liked about pedals, maybe it's the small size and simplicity of their functions. I think the trick is to use them subtly rather than giving in to the urge of just cranking them (which is always fun). I'm doing an envelope filter and a fuzz factory at the mo, which I hope will give me some options.  It's very addictive once you start making them and tweaking them to your needs.

[puggo]

[taylordeupree]

the cathedral.. yes, when i was in the UK last october i picked one up. the infinite reverb is quite nice. it turns anything you put into it into a drone... not bad i also like the spring reverb emulation on it.

i'd recommend checking one out for sure.

the only drawback, though, is you have to press down the switch to hold the reverb. as soon as you let go the reverb fades away. it can get quite tiring to hold it down with your hand for 6 minutes

[radere]

the cathedral.. yes, when i was in the UK last october i picked one up. the infinite reverb is quite nice. it turns anything you put into it into a drone... not bad i also like the spring reverb emulation on it.

i'd recommend checking one out for sure.

the only drawback, though, is you have to press down the switch to hold the reverb. as soon as you let go the reverb fades away. it can get quite tiring to hold it down with your hand for 6 minutes

Here's a question: when you let go of the hold switch, does the drone fade away with a natural decay? Or does it merely cut off abruptly?

[jimmy behan]

am I going mad or wasn't there a post with images about putting a toggle switch in for the momentary on the Cathedral?
was it deleted?
maybe I saw it on another board.

some nice drones can be got by putting a reverb on a feedback loop too, with a knob to control the amount of signal out the output being returned to the input.