I know you’re probably all wanting to hear ZAVALAZ.  We have been recording music for over a year and we are about to start mixing our debut.  We’re not putting music up on the site yet, but you can hear it at our shows. Stay tuned- it will all happen in time.

As you can imagine, this can lead to problems even if you have the proper adapters.

It’s very easy to fry your pedals if you are plugging your 110-volt pedalboard into a socket that was made for 220 volts.  In my experience, a lot of these adapters may convert your toothbrush or iPod, but they are not actual power transformers.  Power transformers allow you to take your 110 volt gear and use them in 220-240 volt countries.

I had a power transformer go down and, although none of my pedals went up in flames, they just wouldn’t power up.  It was an easy fix where all that was needed was for a wire to be reconnected/resoldered.  My European tour mate  insisted he could fix my transformer so I let him handle the repair.

-

We were at soundcheck and I asked my friend if he had a chance to test the transformer to make sure his repair was successful.  He assured me it was an easy repair, he had discovered where the wires were separated, and was 100% confident he had fixed the issue…yet he hadn’t checked the gear because we were packing the night before and driving all day.  It would have been so easy for my friend to have tested his work at the point when he first repaired it.  He had all the time he needed to make any adjustments to the repair right then and there, instead of at a rushed soundcheck the following day.

When I went to plug in my pedalboard, none of the pedals lit up but I had my French soundman was waving his arms, frantically urging me to unplug the pedalboard ASAP.  He said later that I was lucky I hadn’t fried my entire pedalboard.  Apparently, my friend had mistakenly soldered the wires backwards so there we were, breaking out the soldering gun and repairing this transformer, hoping to have the job done before soundcheck.

The lesson here was that it would have been ideal for my friend to check his repair in the comfort of his own work environment, the day before the show.  He had the proper tools and all the time he needed to review his work without putting an entire pedalboard in jeopardy and possibly delaying or missing a soundcheck.  Always check your work ASAP, no matter how confident or how many times you have pulled off the task.  It will put your mind at ease to know your gear is working and you can put your focus back on playing.   I am so lucky we pulled off the show and my pedalboard with all the pedals is still with me, alive and well!

“How do I chain pedals on a pedalboard?”

It seems that many of you think there is a right way and a wrong way.  I am here to tell you that your “perfect” pedalboard is in the eye of the beholder- YOU.

Chaining, or combining, pedals in a certain order is probably the most exciting part of creating new, unique sounds.  The order in which pedals are chained together plus the musician’s musical ability creates that unique sonic expression.  Why does pedal order really matter?  Most musicians use a combo of effects to get sounds they desire, so how those effects are stacked up changes the resulting sound.  For example, a lot of bassists use compression with a chorus to make the chorus chime a little more. Others use an overdrive with a phaser to get that Jet Phaser sound made famous by Larry Graham:

In a nutshell, the majority of players like to combine pedals to get sounds that will help express their voice as a musician.  I find myself spending hour after hour “sonic crafting” and creating something new until I think, “No one has EVER used this sound on a record before!” As you can imagine, I could do this for days. Months, even.

Here’s a clip Jonathan Hischke and I made where we combined some new acquisitions with some old, reliable pedals:

What we have in this chain are:

• 1970 fretted Fender Precision bass
• MXR Micro Amp
• Boss CS-2 compressor sustainer (out of production)
• Dwarfcraft Devices Pitch Grinder
• Electro Harmonix Micro Synthesizer (out of the production and no, the new ones don’t sound anything like this one, sorry!)
• Fairfield Circuitry’s Randy Revenge Ring Modulator
• Red Panda Particle granular delay / pitch shifting pedal
• Jonathan Hischke’s custom circuit mangler

Here’s a little bit of explanation behind this pedal order:

When Aen at Dwarfcraft sent me the Pitch Grinder, he suggested I add something with a lot of gain or sustain in front of it because it needs a consistent signal in order for the sequence to be generated.  I love the sound of the MXR Micro Amp combined with the CS-2 because it is really makes the bass grind and creates a sustained bass tone.  That signal gets dumped into the Pitch Grinder where the sequence is generated.  What’s great about the Pitch Grinder, besides the sequence ability, is the tone of the bass coming out of the effect.  It gets bit crushed (the signal gets digitized and then is degraded, which is known as “bit crushing”) and that results in a more synthetic sounding signal.

Some of the sounds coming out of this pedal resemble a bass synthesizer even more than those coming from an electric bass, so what did we do?  We ran that sound into the Electro Harmonix Micro Synthesizer to give it some fuzz and square wave sounds.  This is where you here the real distortion happening.

What we did next was synthesize the signal even more by putting it into my favorite ring modulator- Randy’s Revenge by Fairfield Circuitry. That pedal is what’s providing the weird, synthetic filtering on the sequence and when you move the main frequency knob, you really get synthesizer tones out of it.  It sounds less like an electric bass more like a Moog synthesizer.

The signal gets the most radical treatment in the chain by the next two pedals.  The Red Panda Particle is responsible for the signal chops. It’s providing the various strange, trippy, robot-like sounds, using the techniques of granular synthesis in real time. The radical pitch and delay modulation, plus the shimmering repeats and stutter/glitch sounds then go into Jonathan’s circuit mangler.  That pedal is similar to a circuit bent keyboard where basically the signal is tossed into electrical chaos and is very unpredictable and, at times, uncontrollable.  I own a couple of keyboards that have had their circuits “bent” and I love the results.

I’m anticipating a wave of comments on this post that will question how the sounds being generated don’t sound at all like those from a bass. That’s kind of the point of it all- to create sounds that are new, unique, different. The point of this post is to show you the benefits of taking pedals to their most extremes.  As a player, doing this gives me choices, options. Maybe some of these sounds aren’t ideal for a band situation (since they’re looking for the bass to sound like….bass!) but come in handy during recording sessions or writing music. This is the concept that inspired my tag line, “sonic crafting is limitless.”

Here is audio that I made using sounds created from these pedals:

I hope this first post will encourage and inspire you to experiment by chaining different pedals together until you get the sound that really blows you away. If you already have a favorite pedal chain, let me know in the comments section!

This was on top of the SVT cabinets at one point.

The pedalboard you see here was the one I used on a Frances The Mute tour, and that was the last time I used such a massive one. It was comprised of three boards which surrounded me, then one more pedalboard on top of the Ampeg 8×10 cabinets.  Not only was it a lot of road cases, it was a lot of weight.  The crew told me that my bass rig was the heaviest of all band members gear- my stuff weighed more than all the drum cases combined! Here’s the list:

• 2 Ampeg SVT 8×10 cabinets in road cases
• 3 Ampeg SVT vintage heads in road cases
• 4 pedalboards in road cases
• At least five basses (all Fender) – 2 Geddy Lee basses, 2 fretless Precision basses, one modded Geddy Lee bass (shown here)
• I also had an Evil Twin direct box and assorted speakers, cables, pickups, tubes, and pedals for either future use or back up, all in a giant road case with my strings and picks.

Not a lot of bands or musicians get the chance to be this overindulgent, but it was at a time when The Mars Volta was trying to reach beyond past and present, and we did whatever had been done.  I got to drive my bass tech, Jerry Riccardi, crazy by always trying pedals on pedalboards and then yanking them off and replacing them with others.  As my pedalboard grew, Jerry would have to build the board in the chain that I had dreamed up.  It was an exciting time for me, but likely a taxing time for Jerry, even though he never complained (thanks Jerry!).

The reason some pedals got booted for others was simple- I just didn’t use them as much as the others. One pedal that got taken off was my Digital Whammy pedal. Although it was a great pedal, the band needed me to always maintain a certain frequency level so going up an octave was not an option. Dropping down was cool but I had other pedals that did that.  The Whammy also took up a ton of space due to its large size, so that was another reason why I’d yank it so I could replace the same real estate with two pedals.

Another pedal that didn’t last long in its position was the Fulltone Octafuzz.  That pedal sucked too much low end, and again, I couldn’t have a pedal take me out of the frequency range in which the band needed me.  It had a cool, saturated sound but in the end, it also didn’t work as well as other fuzzes I owned and it never worked well with other pedals.

My Ernie Ball volume pedal was another pedal that was removed because of it’s size and lack of use.  Instead of using the volume pedal for volume dynamics, I would just shut off my Boss CS-2 compressors to bring down my volume.  It wasn’t the same tone but I figured when we’d drop in volume, the full dynamics of my tone weren’t being heard through the PA speakers anyway.  I eventually put another CS-2 on my main board with a different setting so I could do dynamic shifts.  Jerry called one CS-2, mild, and the other, spicy.

Another reason why some pedals were eliminated from the board was because of their gain structures.  If you look, you see the famous Mu-Tron envelope filter and the Moog Ring Modulator.

Both pedals have gain knobs on them and are not true bypass as a result.

There was always a chance that these two particular pedals could affect my tone, volume and signal strength so I’d put them in a loop via the Boss loop selector.  By doing this, I essentially pulled the pedals out of the signal chain, so when I wanted to introduce the effect, I could just step on the Boss so the Mu-Tron or Moog would get pulled into the signal chain via the loop selector.

Additionally, having two loop pedals took up extra space. When I decided that had to go, I pulled the Mu-Tron because I didn’t use it as much.  The Moog Ring Modulator was a big part of our songs so it won out.

In the end, it also comes down to trial and error, and just plain, personal preference. Some pedals got pulled just because the sound or function wasn’t to my liking. I once bought a Chopper pedal because of all the hype; turns out it was just that. All hype, nothing more.

I hope this post sheds some light on how I build my pedalboard. In the end, the deciding factors are based on what you need, what your band needs and ultimately, what sounds musical. Once you choose your pedals based on those criteria, be prepared to hear, “NO, you can’t do that!” from crew guys because of powering or cabling logistics, which are also important.  It is all in the trial and error stage until you get what works, what sounds great and what makes you happy.

It was an honor working for TMV and Juan. I learned more during those years then all my other tours put together. It’s quite a badge of honor to walk on any stage in the world, look down at any pedal board and say, “eh, that’s cool, but I’ve had more….with a bass player.” I believe at the peak there were 42 pedals in the live rig.  - Jerry Riccardi

Teaching is a challenge for me because I don’t sight read very well, so I have to rely on my music theory and technique.  The cool thing is, LAMA is very progressive and see the value in non-traditional classes as well as the standard ones. So what was my class on?  You guessed it…pedals!

For my very first class at LAMA, I brought what I call my ‘modulation station.’ I basically played with a few pedals, got a few crazy sounds, then spent the rest of the time answering questions.  It was really fun, and the best part was that they asked me to come back and teach again. The second time, I thought I should do something a little more informative so I brought a set of overdrives, distortions and fuzzes to show the differences between all these noise makers.  I then broke it down into the various overdrives and how they sound, the did the same with the distortions and fuzzes that I’d brought.

After a bit of experimenting, the class came to a general consensus on which pedals work well on bass and which ones didn’t fare as well.  Here are pics of the pedals I brought:

Overdrives:

Distortions:

Fuzzes:

I really enjoyed having students play through my pedals and watch them realize how pedals affect their sound. You could see them get inspired when a setting would be just right or they came up with sounds they’d never created before.

Thanks to LAMA for having me and to the students who are attending my classes.  I look forward to teaching more and love nothing more than passing on all of the tricks I’ve learned over the years.

As you probably already know, my close friend, former bandmate and one of the world’s greatest drummers, Jon Theodore, is now drumming for another amazing band, Queens Of The Stone Age.  He called me when he got back from South America, having played to thousands of fans on his very first show with them, and recalled how similar it was to my first week in The Mars Volta. I’d had only three rehearsals and one club show with TMV before playing for tens of thousands at Coachella, so I could definitely relate.  If you haven’t seen Jon in action with QOTSA, here’s a video from that first show:

Soon after I joined The Mars Volta, Jon and I became close.  It was 2003 and we were just starting out, so band members had to share hotel rooms. Being the rhythm section, Jon and I stayed together. I will never forget those days.  During our first tour of Europe, we stayed in London for over a week, and Jon and I would rap out every night until 4 or 5 in the morning, getting to know each other while trying to beat our jet lag.  We’d head down to the lobby bar almost every night and kick it with the crew and other band members who wanted to hang out.  I was in awe of his ability to give 110% every night we played, and it was a really special time in my career as a musician and our time as a band.

Jon and I have remained great friends over the years and have talked about one day playing in another musical situation together. I hope that happens, but until it does, I’m happy to have had the experience and great memories of playing with him in The Mars Volta and one Vato Negro show with me back in 2010.

Although I know I won’t see him as much due to his touring schedule, I’ll be rooting for him, as always, and look forward to hearing all that he does with Queens. I’m lucky to have had the opportunity to play with him, and look back on that time and think, “We tore shit up!”

The people at Strymon were kind enough to send me one of their Lex rotary speaker emulator pedals.  This is a kind of pedal that requires a thorough understanding of the many features the pedal has and how they function. Mason has been using the Lex for quite some time and has a great understanding of it, so naturally, I asked him to show us what it is capable of doing.

The Lex, I understand, is a Leslie simulator.  The Hammond Organ company designed the “Leslie Speaker” which is basically rotating speakers.  The high frequency driver has an independent motor that rotates the actual horns, as does the low frequency driver and its speaker.  Strymon has basically made an amazing emulator pedal of this Leslie speaker design that sounds strikingly real.

Please check Strymon’s site to read what went into this pedal design and to see their entire pedal line.  All the pedals they make are in an elite class of their own.  Stay tuned for a video featuring their El Capistan tape echo delay that is just as remarkable- it’s coming soon!

Since this video features just guitar, Mason wanted to add a little grit for his tone so we brought in Earthquaker Devices Speaker Cranker overdrive.  Mason does a great job describing how well this pedal works on guitar, while his playing does the pedal justice.  I like to put the Speaker Cranker ahead of a lot of pedals to make them go crazy.  I will feature both the Lex and the Speaker Cranker pedals on bass in an upcoming video.

What do you think? Would love to get your feedback in the comments section. Thanks!

My 1970 Fender Fretless Precision goes into a Line 6 DL4 Delay Looper followed by my TC Electronics PolyTune then the main pedalboard is as follows:

MXR Micro-Amp

Boss CS-2 (Out Of Production)

Earthquaker Devices Disaster Transport Jr

Dwarfcraft PitchGrinder

Electro Harmonix Bass Microsynthesiser (Out Of Production)

DOD Bi-Fet PreAmp (Out Of Production)

Fairfield Circuitry’s Randy’s Revenge Ring Modulator

Cry Baby Bass Wah

Into my second pedalboard that I call my modulation station:

Boss CS-2 (Out Of Production)

Boss VB-2 (Out Of Production)

Electro Harmonics Ravish Sitar

Earthquaker Devices Rainbow Machine

Earthquaker Devices Organizer

Boss OC-2 (Out Of Production)

Gojira Tremolo

Digitech 20/20 (Out Of Production)

DOD Meatbox (Out Of Production)

Ampeg Bass Rig

I think there will be some video of the performance but here is a snippet of what this pedalboard sounds like (The PitchGrinder is doing most of the work).

Solo bass performances can be nerve racking I am really excited for this, so I hope all of you who live in and around Northern California will come to NorCal Bassix Bass Day and check it out. I always love to meet PedalsAndEffects readers in person, so come by and say, “hi.” Tickets are only $10; you can find more info about the event here.

A few weeks ago, Blake Hickey from Blakemore Effects emailed me about Circuits to Cure Cancer, a group of guitar pedal builders, retailers, reviewers, and musicians who have donated either their products or their time to help raise money for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.  From April 18th through April 28th over 30 guitar pedals will be auctioned off on eBay, with 100% of the proceeds going to this pioneer in children’s cancer research.

Having been diagnosed with a rare blood disorder myself, I can only imagine how difficult it must be for children or the parents of children with cancer, so I want to do whatever it takes to be involved and spread the word.  Every penny counts when it comes to funding research that will, one day, lead to a cure.

Here is a list of the cool companies that are participating by donating their gear:

• ANALOG.MAN
• ARC EFFECTS
• BearFoot Effects
• Black Arts Toneworks
• Black Cat Pedals
• Blakemore Effects
• Build Your Own Clone
• Caroline Guitar Company
• Coldcraft Effects
• Cusack Effects
• Disaster Area Designs
• DMB Pedals
• Dr. Scientist
• Earthquaker Devices
• El Musico Loco
• Empress Effects
• GMR FX
• GREENHOUSE
• JHS Pedals
• Lotus Pedals
• Lovepedal
• Mr. Black
• Paul C. Audio
• Penny Pedals
• Push + Pull Pedals
• Red Panda
• SHOE
• Skunqworks
• smallsound/bigsound
• Sonic Crayon
• Strymon
• VFE
• Wampler Pedals
• Wilson Effects
• ZVEX Effects

I hope you can help by either purchasing a pedal during the auction, donating to St Jude Children’s Research Hospital or just telling your friends and family about this incredible cause.

Here’s a video of a pedal from one of the participating companies, Sonic Crayon.  I hope this goes up for auction, so I can bid on it. Let’s start a bidding war to raise as much money as possible!

There are many flangers available these days (and I’ve seen many come and go) but the one that always gets me fired up is the A/DA (Analog/Digital Associates) Flanger, made in the 70′s and 80′s.  The first time I ever heard an A/DA was on a Pat Travers record.  You may have heard of Pat because he had a big hit on his live record, Live, Go For What You Know, called “Boom Boom (Out Go The Lights).” Mr Travers and his second guitarist, Pat Thrall, used A/DA flangers all over this record.

The guitarist in my first band bought one, and I remember he would take over the live mix when he kicked on that pedal.  The sound of it reminded me of when a jet takes off at LAX.  That same band made a trip to San Francisco’s Warfield Theater to see The Pat Travers Band live and it was during that show that I knew I had to get a A/DA flanger for myself.

You can really hear my use of this flanger on live recordings of Goliath by The Mars Volta.  I would kick it in half way through the first verse and anytime things got really loud and over the top. I still use it all the time and it’s one of my all-time favorite flangers.

I have not heard them yet, but A/DA makes a re-issue of this flanger, and if they’re anything like the Electro Harmonix re-issues, they’re no match for the original. You know the saying, “oldie but goodie?” That’s exactly how I feel about this A/DA flanger.  Please let me know your opinions on the reissues!

A little while ago, I did a post called The Unknown Russian Distortion Pedal where I discussed this pedal which I bought, used, at a local music store.  This distortion pedal is so weird, out of control and so unlike any distortion I own.  Most US builders would never think to make something so over the top, violent and grating, but someone in Russia did and I have to admit, I’m forever grateful.

I stated in that first post that I didn’t know much about the history of the pedal or it’s name, but the pedal community responded to me on YouTube and this is what they said:

• “Hello Juan! I am a big fan and collector of vintage USSR pedals\basses. The Russian company that you interested called “Lell” and is still alive! Check out http://lell.ru/pedali.htm.
• “Yours is late 90x (English labeling, previous was with red knob and all Cyrillic labeling). DD is also a discontinued model. It was their first line of 3 pedals DD (drive dist – red knob), CZ (digital delay – you said greatest crazy pedal! – blue knob) and EP (true parametric EQ – green knob). Unfortunately, modern Lells have different schematics\technology, and don’t have that “unique” RAF sound, except they’re modern ЛЕЛЬ EX-9 Exiter may be (in my opinion). I think u wonder how many COOL pedals USSR did:) Feel free to contact me, I would glad to help you!”
• “LELL were the first normal stompboxes made in Russia. They had normal guitar jacks and even a 9-volt socket – the same format as BOSS pedals. The footswitch pad reveals a battery cavity underneath.”
• “The company still exists! It’s website, for some unknown reason, claims the company was established in 1992. But look at the pictures – we’ve got a proof it was active in the 80′s. The headquarters are located in Moscow, on the Lower Krasnoselskaja street. “Digital Delay” in Russian goes like “Cifrovaja Zaderjka”, and while in Russian “CZ” makes sence, it was lost when it was transferred to another language. In fact, there was no chance to convert it into “DD” (digital delay) since the DD pedal already exists – it’s “Drive/Distortion.”

I am fascinated by the other products Lell makes.  Their factory seems like one, giant industrial compound that manufactures electronic instruments and computers.  It reminds me of the pedals and effects company, Eventide, that also features some unusual, non-musical products on their website as well.

I’m so grateful for this information, and to find out that the company still exists.  I have heard about the delay they make and it sounds like a “must have.”  I hope more people will seek out crazy pedals like the Lell line and try to stretch their own sonic palate. I know I stretched mine!

Since the Ghost Disaster’s run came to an end, Earthquaker Devices has put their energy into creating a pedal that gave more than it’s predecessor. That pedal is the Disaster Transport Sr.  This is the mother of all delays and yes, it gives you two delays and has a great sounding reverb on it as well.  Delay A is a 600ms delay with modulation and delay B is a 300ms delay with reverb. Both delays can be run separately, in parallel, in series or in series/parallel. There are also expression controls for the repeats on delay A, and you can bleed delay A into delay B.  What does all that mean?  Crazy, over the top, psychedelic delays that will find its way onto your next recording!

Here is an up-and-coming guitarist from Los Angeles, twenty one year old Mason Stoops (Mason first appeared on PedalsAndEffects in a jam session video with Jamie from Earthquaker and myself) helping display what the Disaster Transport Sr is capable of doing.  He knows this pedal, and his style of guitar playing really articulates the tone of the effect.  His finger picking style really works well, articulating the nuances of the delay’s tone in the same way a bass player’s finger playing would.  I love the sound of the delay that gets produced in this pedal so much that I throw it on snares to make them sound like they are from a vintage recording.

If this unit seems to be too much delay for you, or you don’t have the real estate left on your pedalboard, Earthquaker Devices offers the Disaster Transport or the Disaster Transport Jr.

The Disaster Transport Jr is an analog voiced digital delay with 625ms delay time, while the Disaster Transport is essentially Delay A from the Disaster Transport Sr with 625ms delay time and modulation.  Both delays get that beautiful sounding delay, with a tone control that doubles as a noise filter on longer delay settings and really help the delay shine with a dirty signal.  I promise, you won’t just use this delay with your primary instrument.

For more information on all the great pedals and effects from Earthquaker Devices, please visit their site at: www.earthquakerdevices.com

MXR has made a bass overdrive that has growl and edge to make any bass more aggressive without losing low end.  The pedal comes with a clean control so you can blend a pre-set EQ clean signal with the overdrive signal.   Check it out here in this video.  I purposely held out notes and let the bass sustain, so bass players could hear the pedal’s overdrive quality and tube-like qualities.  I think playing fast notes or busy passages wouldn’t have let the pedal’s magic come through in the video.  At times, I was so excited about the pedal, I started to hit the string too hard, putting the E string out of tune!

I know the Bass Overdrive will be on many bass players’ pedalboards because its clarity and grittiness are so useful in recording and live situations.   The level of innovation at the MXR labs remains extremely high, and so does their commitment to making useful effects specifically for bassists.

Video shot by the Jim Dunlop Company for MXR Innovations.

In this installment, Henry runs us through his pedalboard and gives us audio examples of what he does with each and every pedal on it.  Whether it is his synthetic and metallic assault of the Digitech X-Series Synth Wah, or his shimmering use of the old DOD FX 50B Overdrive Plus, this kid knows how to dial in really musical sounds that work well together.

One of the sounds I recommend you check out is the stutter effect Henry pulls off with his Digitech X-Series DigiDelay.  I never use my DigiDelay this way, but I will now!  As Henry was showing this technique, I started to think of how I would use this effect in conjunction with other pedals.  The possibilities are endless, and as I develop these sounds, I will make a video for PedalsAndEffects to show you what I came up with.

Another part of Henry’s playing that impressed me so much is how he takes all of these pedals and layers them on top of each other, creating an orchestra of sound that makes you realize he is a one man band.  He has a keen understanding of his pedalboard, and the knowledge of how to merge it with his harmonic ideas.  Henry is no slouch when it comes to getting around the guitar either.  I can hear the Robert Fripp and Adrian Belew influences in sound.  In fact, we spoke about King Crimson, and I mentioned that I had seen them live before he was born!

I shot a lot of video with Henry so be on the lookout for more videos in the future.  We shot some cool stuff with him taking on pedals he has never messed with, a few really great musical passages and some more interviews.

Be sure to check out his debut release under the name, “Mylets“, coming out later this year on Sargent House.  Also stay tuned for more guest guitarists on PedalsAndEffects!