ilovefuzz.com

For years, guitarists have been fed pretty much the same types of effects: overdrive, fuzz, distortion; wah; reverb, delay, chorus, vibrato, tremelo…etc. There have been innovations along the way, of course, but the situation is still substantially the same – perpetuated by the mainstream pedal companies and by some of the boutique builders (albeit made with greater care and better components). The ILF collective seems like a real oasis in the desert…

But, outside of ILF, what are the most original effects today?

The Geiger Counter stands out, some of the 4ms pedals too… but what's out there that's a real departure from the standard sets of sounds and circuits?

http://www.analoguehaven.com/lastgasp/

Not sure what you're looking for but.... if I had money I'd like to try out one of these pedals.

Me neither! Just looking for something different, y'know. Last Gasp effects are very, very cool - but again mostly clean boosts, fuzzes, or distortions. The Cyber Psychic is interesting, though.

The EHX Hog, Pigtronix Mothership are definitely moving in new directions...

I wish someone would come up with a REAL vibrato pitch-shifting pedal that allowed you to combine the sound with other effects in innovative ways.

aside from EHX, Diamond Skeleton & Zvex. i am basically drawing a blank right now. new concepts & innovation-wise.

royaltrux wrote:I wish someone would come up with a REAL vibrato pitch-shifting pedal that allowed you to combine the sound with other effects in innovative ways.

Second that.
Nobody seems to make a true vibrato pedal that sounds good.
Still looking for the solution short of dragging an old Magnatone around.

MM

http://soniccrayon.blogspot.com/

The Hollow Earth is pretty original! I can't wait to get my own!

Some things are just too hard to do with analogue... enter the pog, Octaves with analogue are stupidly hard, Mike Matthews of EHX did a great job on the rectifier in the Octave Multiplexer but octave up... and this is the simple stuff, www.foxroxelectronics.com seem pretty inovative with analogue circuits but digital (not that I like it) makes life so much more interesting and still there are only so many ways you can alter an sound wave... 4ms have some good circuits but they do work off existing ideas... I guess for new sounds you'd have to start working with square, triangle and saw waves...
Distortion and fuzz all mainly work one way though, clipping and this is where the tone comes from... it can be altered but only so many ways...

But that's just my input.

Moog Murf, Freqbox





















i thought my Power Struggle was pretty clever

I have something I'm working on that seems... just crazy enough. At least for the idea of something that nobody has seen before. I don't even know what the end result will be (er... what it will "sound" like).

Just hope I can find small enough fans...

aen wrote:i thought my Power Struggle was pretty clever

Oh it is, but I was thinking promiscuously and non-ILF...

SirBlend12 wrote:I have something I'm working on that seems... just crazy enough. At least for the idea of something that nobody has seen before. I don't even know what the end result will be (er... what it will "sound" like).

Just hope I can find small enough fans...

i'm your fan

metalmariachi wrote:

royaltrux wrote:I wish someone would come up with a REAL vibrato pitch-shifting pedal that allowed you to combine the sound with other effects in innovative ways.

Second that.
Nobody seems to make a true vibrato pedal that sounds good.
Still looking for the solution short of dragging an old Magnatone around.

MM

Yeah, you really haven't lived until you've played a magnatone....

I guess it is a hard sound to replicate, but you'd think someone could come up with say, a dual pedal that featured tremelo/vibe on one side and vibe specific pitch shifting on the other (not just crazy phase shifting)...combining those two might get you close to a magnatone type sound.

i think new concepts for effect pedals are directly tied to new concepts & movements in music. if there is no demand for new pedals by guitarists, then the pedal makers won't build them:

for example, say a nu-metal dubstep fusion band comes along, & becomes popular, &they use vibrato & pitchshifting as an integral part of their set-up, then a pedal builder is going to make a pedal combining those two effects & market it as a "new" pedal to people who also want to make nu-metal dubstep music also.

or maybe i'm wrong...?

less_cunning wrote:i think new concepts for effect pedals are directly tied to new concepts & movements in music. if there is no demand for new pedals by guitarists, then the pedal makers won't build them:

for example, say a nu-metal dubstep fusion band comes along, & becomes popular, &they use vibrato & pitchshifting as an integral part of their set-up, then a pedal builder is going to make a pedal combining those two effects & market it as a "new" pedal to people who also want to make nu-metal dubstep music also.

or maybe i'm wrong...?

I guess you are right to some degree - look at how many muff clones are out there. Originality isn't exactly the watchword for most boutique builders.

ZVEX is the only one off the top of my head who has designs that are totally off the wall (machine, for example). But I'm not willing to throw down $400 on a single guitar pedal; to me, his prices are totally absurd. I'd rather throw that towards a new guitar or an amp or something....

Still, there are a lot of people obsessed with '50's and '60's tones (pretty much everyone plays a guitar/amp/pedal that was conceived originally at that time). Because rock music is so obsessed with that period (though honestly I'm not sure why), anything you make that you call "vintage" or "60's" will probably sell a lot better than a "fad" effect. So, you'd think someone would take the plunge and try to sort that out. If it were a double pedal format, the price could probably be set fairly high. After R&D, I think you would have a winner..