Pedals/Effects?

I think I know the tones you are getting, I have a Fender Telecaster and a Hot Rod Deluxe. You are probably getting a tone that sounds a little thin to you. You want to "fatten" it up some, don't you?

Thought so. :D

Couple of pedals I would recommend. These are all by Behringer, but I own them and like them all a lot, and won't cost you an arm and leg.

Behringer CS100 Compressor/Sustainer

This pedal will add a lot of warmth and presence to your tone. It will also sustain notes quite a bit longer. This will especially give you a great clean tone with sparkle like you hear on recordings. This pedal is pretty darn good. If you have lots of money, try the MXR Dynacomp. But I think this pedal is just as good.

Behringer UC100 Chorus

Another good sounding and versatile pedal. Chorus thickens up your tone, almost sounds like two guitars playing the same thing at the same time. When you turn the settings way up you can get some real wobbly, tremelo type tones. Got lots of money, go with the Electro Harmonix chorus pedal.

This is a beautiful sounding effect for clean or overdriven tones. You will like it a lot.

Behringer 7 band EQ

An EQ pedal is one of the most useful of all pedals. You will be able to dial out the thin, twangy, nasal tone of the Telecaster. Of course you can dial it in too (actually, you use sliders, not dials).
But with an EQ you can add some bottom end (bass) to your tone. Very useful pedals.

Behringer TO800 Vintage Overdrive

I cannot say enough about this pedal, it is AWESOME. Just the best sounding overdrive pedal I have ever heard. With this you will get a beautiful, thick, but smooth and creamy lead tone. You can turn the Gain down to get just a clean boost, or turn it up and get a pretty great overdrive crunch. This pedal sounds absolutely fantastic in my opinion.

I do not work for Behringer. I just always assume that most people are on a budget, but looking for the best gear they can get. And Behringer makes good reliable gear at the best price around.

These pedals will add a lot of color and fullness to your tone.

Hey, that's exactly what I find with the Tele/HRDx Combo...sounds a tad too bright and thin.

Thanks for the recommendations, Wes, but just a few quick questions..

These are all stompboxes, right? So they will require 9V batteries? Would they consume at the same rate as the Digitech Hot Rod Distortion pedal? Because that was just insane...1 battery per hour, basically.

Would a string of stompboxes be better than a multi-effect board-type-thing?

As well, when running through a distortion pedal, do people normally double that up with distortion on amp? Or simply clean amp + distortion pedal?

Stompboxes do eat batteries, but they're only switched on when you've got a cable plugged in to the input socket and the light is on. Disconnect the cables when you're not using it.

Power adaptors are a good investment - saves paying for batteries - but if you've got to use batteries then get Duracell or Energiser; don't get the £1.99 cheapo specials from the local sweetshop

Clean amp + distortion pedal. If you run the amp on distortion too you'll hear more of the amp than the stompbox.

Best,

A :-)

If you want a single unit check out the Behringer DSP2024P: it costs $100 or so and is loaded with all kinds of effects. It's a 19" device so you can just dump it on your amp.

I play on a worship team in my local church and I'm not quite sure what pedals are good.

What style or styles of music are you playing? Surprised to hear you say you used a distortion pedal, unless you're doing Kutless or heavier stuff.

I play on a worship team in my local church and I'm not quite sure what pedals are good.

What style or styles of music are you playing? Surprised to hear you say you used a distortion pedal, unless you're doing Kutless or heavier stuff.

I like to use some light distortion to add a distinct sound to the music, mostly more of the upbeat songs. We do songs from a variety of artists..Hillsong/United, Tim Hughes, Matt Redman, Delirious?, Brian Doerkson, etc

An example of where I might use distortion is in "Blessed Be Your Name", for the crunch of the driving palm mute.

Maybe I might be fooling myself and distortion sounds like crap in that setting. Who knows :P

..
Will the single unit that Arien recommended, the Behringer DSP2024P, have all the effects that Wes prescribed, to fatten out the sound?

A nice review can be found here: http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/Dec02/articles/behringervirtualizer.asp

I like to use some light distortion to add a distinct sound to the music, mostly more of the upbeat songs. We do songs from a variety of artists..Hillsong/United, Tim Hughes, Matt Redman, Delirious?, Brian Doerkson, etc

An example of where I might use distortion is in "Blessed Be Your Name", for the crunch of the driving palm mute.

Maybe I might be fooling myself and distortion sounds like crap in that setting. Who knows :P

Well, it's just preference, but I'd think some smooth overdrive would be all you'd need for most songs by those bands, rather than full blown distortion. (I don't really know where overdrive ends and distortion begins, but I hope you know what I mean.) Something like the Boss Super Overdrive might be nice for your leads, but I think you want to stay fairly clean for rhythm - set your amp to where it's just getting sparkly/fuzzy, and kick in with the pedal when needed.

I'd suggest a delay pedal as well for many of the songs by those bands, rather than chorus. Personally, I'd use compressor-overdrive-delay for those. Chorus for the bass player though. :wink:

A multi-effect unit might be a good way to get it all in a convenient package.

Cheers!

I don't really know where overdrive ends and distortion begins, but I hope you know what I mean

Overdrive is on the input side of the amp, and distortion's on the output side, so stompboxes are really only providing degrees of overdrive because they're in between the axe and the input.

I suspect a smooth warm overdrive is what's required, and maybe boost the treble on the amp to give it an edge. I have a Danelectro FAB overdrive, it does the job nicely. How about some reverb? You can probably control that on your amp.

Best,

A :-)

Lorfyre

I didn't think you would need a "distortion" pedal, that's why I recommended the Behringer TO800. This is an "overdrive" pedal designed after the original Ibanez Tubescreamer made so famous by Stevie Ray Vaughan. At minimum Drive (gain) settings it will give you a nice smooth, but clean boost. At max settings it will give you a nice Blues type overdrive. It is really a fantastic sounding pedal, I really can't imagine anyone not liking it, that's how good it sounds.

You could get a multi-efx, but you will get better tones with individual pedals. All of the pedals I recommended sound very good. You can spend a lot more and your sound won't be much better. I would say the more expensive pedals are more rugged. But if you are reasonably careful with your equipment these pedals will last for a long, long time.

I wouldn't go with batteries, too expensive. Really (here we go, more money), I would get a small pedalboard. If you are on a budget, here is a nice pedalboard that will power up to 6 pedals.

Johnson Powered Pedalboard

I own one of these, had it over 2 years of heavy use, works perfect to this day. This is about the least expensive powered pedalboard out there. But it is good, works fine and comes in a nice bag that you can carry lots of other gear in.

As I said, I always assume that folks are looking to save money. But if you want to spend more I can give you some recommendations for really great gear. But everything I have shown is very good, much better than you might expect for the low cost.

But put everything on a pedalboard. Just take it out of the bag and plug your guitar in. You are all set.

You could just buy a Visual Sound 1 Spot AC adaptor to power everything. Excellent quality. But a pedalboard keeps everything arranged and in order, don't have to spend half an hour setting everything up. Very convenient.

Another expense I forgot to mention was patch cables. You have to have a small instrument cable between each pedal. You would be surprised what some charge for these. Here are some that will do just fine.

Live Wire Patch cables

So, as you can see, this stuff gets expensive. But it is well worth it to get professional sounding tone.

You could buy a less expensive multi-efx like Arjen mentioned. That is even simpler and less expensive, but I really don't think you get nearly the good tones with these. Just my personal opinion.

If you had to buy just two of those pedals, go with the Compressor and Overdrive. Those two alone will really improve your live tone alot.

Still more. :D

You could use the Behringer TO800 overdrive pedal with your amp's Drive channels. Funny thing about this pedal, it seems to sound fantastic with everything. I know I keep going on about this pedal, but it is really that good.

But once you hear this pedal you will probably not use your amp's Drive channels ever again (seriously), unless you need it for a solo boost while using the amps Drive channel for rhythm.

I would do the opposite, use the Behringer for the overdrive rhythm tone (because it sounds so great), then if you need to solo above that, set Drive very low on your amp, but crank volume up to just boost volume for a solo. You really will not need any more distortion.

Now hopefully I'm finished. :D

You could get a multi-efx, but you will get better tones with individual pedals.

For completeness sake: this goes for 'beginner' multi-effects. A $40 Zoom/Digitech/behringer/whatever will indeed sound less then a bunch of seperate pedals, but there are many, many high-end professional multi-effects (Eventide and stuff like that). Even in the mid-price region the difference is hardly there anymore: i've A/B'ed the Boss GT8 Pro to some of Boss pedals and the GT8 could hold it's own easily. So don't use multi-effects to save some money, that will definitely hurt your tone. Decide first if you want seperate pedals or a multi-effect and then get the best ones you can afford.

I know you know that Wes and it's pretty irrelevant here, just to prevent some possible confusion for the GN lurkers. :D

Hey all, thanks for all the info!

I think I'm going to go with the Behringer pedals with pedalboard. However in Canada, I phoned up Axe Music and they said that they were selling them at $49.99CDN a piece! A farcry from the jaw-dropping $20.00USD I read from Harmon-Central.
http://www.axemusic.com/product.asp?P_ID=9784&strPageHistory=search&strKeywords=Behringer,CS100&numPageStartPosition=61&strSearchCriteria=any&PT_ID=all
http://reviews.harmony-central.com/reviews/Effects/product/Behringer/BEQ700/10/1

I'm not sure if this is that great of a deal now -- the CDN/USD exchange rate isn't too great, the two currencies are fairly close now.

I'll be coming down to the States soon, and I am wondering if it would be better to just buy the pedals/pedalboard/theworks down there and bring them back up. But then I will have to pay duty?

Has anyone had any experience with this before? Is the $50.00CDN still a good deal for these pedals? ($50.00CDN is around.. $43.00 USD??)

Thanks