Ok, there's a LOT to say about overdrive pedals. Where to start, where to start.... Well I'm going to quote a member of my favorite worship band, Hillsong (the first of may to come trust me,) he says that a good reliable overdrive pedal "is like a favorite pair of jeans." That's the genius of Nigel Hendroff for you. He is. of course, correct. Having a good overdrive pedal is one of the single most important parts of having good tone, and in the end, being a successful guitar player, especially for worship.
First of all, OD versus distortion. And overdrive will almost always sound more organic, alive, smoother, warmer, and less manufactured than distortion. When you use distortion, you're going to get a very gritty and robotic sound with a lot of edge and bite. The same CAN be said for OD, but typically it's going to sound less so. To truly understand the difference, you'll have to hear it yourself.
A good overdrive can be used for many different things. Simply boosting the tone of your clean sounds is one of the first. It can ive you moreof the mids, treble or bass you want, while adding maybe a little drive when needed. It can also add drive like I just mentioned, giving you a good semi dirty tone for less intense or upbeat passages. I find the best tone for laid back songs or slow worship is a semi dirty with a lots of delay. It can also push your tone into full-on overdriven madness, which i okay too. For pure overdrive tones rather than distortion I find you get more of the guitar and amps natural tone and less coloring from the pedal or effect.
Once again, any questions so I'll know what to address next time, I am relatively new at this
So I'm frequently asked questions about what kind of delay I use, how to use it, how do I make my delay sound good, etc. etc. I figure it's time to shed a little light on some of the finer points of using a delay and making it work.
First of all I play predominantly worship music on our church youth band, and delay (along with a good overdrive) is one of THE most important components of a worship guitar player's rig.
I don't own the amp or effect system I'm using for this (and to be honest, I wouldn't want to- Spider II ) But I have used it extensively and so have had the chance to experiment and, eventually, get a good tone and working setup out of it. If it were up to me I'd use stuff from home, my amp and all, but the church doesn't allow. More frowns
Now before I begin, I don't recommend Spider amps because to be blunt, they're nature's sick joke on the musci industry thy just plain suck, but for blog's sake, this IS the amp I've been using.
First of all, a few little tricks and settings I like to use:
- Depending on whether your tap tempo counts to 2 or 4, this is how I get a good triplet delay. Tap it off on beat 1, and beat 4. Simple and this is basically how you get triplet delay, as opposed to trying to tap in between off beats or whatever and I wont go into that...
- For faster songs, use a faster delay time
Technically, it doesn't even have to be on beat! For a lead in a more upbeat song (look up Hillsong's Run or Take it All) turn the level of the delay down a bit and up the speed or tap.
- For slower songs, slooowww it down. (Duh) When you're doing swells (which is when you pluck a note, then turn the volume pedal slowly up and then back down to achieve a violin-ish sound basically) the delay will extend the swell a bit and make it trail off more naturally, depending on where the delay and volume pedal are in your signal chain. I'll go into more detail on this particular technique later.
Ok, now you've got the gist of what I typically use MY delay for, let's hear some questions and input so I'll know exactly what to say for my next installment.
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cscissorhands's blogs, last updated : November 5, 2009
) But I have used it extensively and so have had the chance to experiment and, eventually, get a good tone and working setup out of it. If it were up to me I'd use stuff from home, my amp and all, but the church doesn't allow. More frowns 