Dark Star rumblings (was: Deco warblings)

[niftyprose]

Hello guys, another interminable 'Hey, has anyone tried this?-type question, this time specifically for OBNE Dark Star users. Everyone else: thank you for your patience.

I'm considering the Dark Star as a means of making a boring input signal sound more lively and textured, via the bitcrusher and particularly the *added harmonic info* pitch mode.

Is anyone out there using a Dark Star for drone purposes, especially in the bass register? How would it do in the role I describe?

[starmansam]

I haven't used mine for exactly what you are describing, but the bit crusher and pitch modes are super engaging to play with. I was using mine in a band where my role was to fill out the sound and make things sound giant and textured, and the dark star's pitch mode really worked for that. I got a lot of 'oh wow I thought there was extra synth player up there" type comments. I mostly used octave up (I was playing a low tuned guitar and didn't want to fight the bass player's frequencies, but the octave down does sound really nice as well. I did find it hard to dial in specific intervals that sounded "good" outside of the octaves, however. ymmv.
all in all I dig it, and I think you might dig it too

[Kasrkin]

Up until recently the Dark Star has lived exclusively on my bass board, the bitcrusher and delays settings sound great in the lower register and playing octaves can add a lot of texture. I mostly just use it for droney interludes between songs and personally like the pedal best with no dry signal at all for maximum drone, the pre-delay might annoy some in that context but you can adapt your playing to it. Not sure if its just me but I do find the output signal low on this pedal (I have the internal trim pot maxed out too).

[starmansam]

Not sure if its just me but I do find the output signal low on this pedal (I have the internal trim pot maxed out too).

I guess I need to mess with the trim pot too. I've noticed a bit of volume drop but I assumed that was just a headroom issue, since I run my dirt and boost pedals unreasonably loud most of the time. for a lot of these types of pedals I honestly think the best move is to run it at max and throw it in a loop with a blend. The eqd afterneath is another one that the output signal is just too low compared to what gets fed into it, no matter where the blend is set.

[niftyprose]

Hi guys, thanks for intelligent responses. I've spent a couple of days listening to Dark Star demos and came *that close* to pulling the trigger, but just can't love it.

I think it was the Just Nick demo that finally turned me against it. I really like Nick's playing, which I've listened to for years, and I noticed the extent to which the pedal managed to impose its own character on his. I don't want to find myself posting YouTube clips titled 'Dark Ambient Experiment 6'. It's all very frustrating.

The only freeze-y pedal I really like is the venerable Raptio, which has the exciting ugly rough edges of a New Thing but doesn't seem to play well with modulators. Don't want to end up with five chained pedals in my bass drone channel. Grr.

[goldrausch]

What about the Drolo Stamme(n)? The Pitch Freeze can go really low on that one - and it has a ton of other great options. It's a little finicky to tune to a certain pitch on the fly and I have not played it with a bass. But I liked it with synths and it does play well with other stuff.

[niftyprose]

Thank you, Goldrausch, I will relisten. I'd discounted the Drolo box not because of its sound (which I like) but because of all the modes -- I tend to focus myopically when I'm playing and don't have the brain cells to control a complex box. But the Stamme[n] seems a lot less full of itself than the Dark Star.