Moog Murf and creating a simple board to push the limits

[Pepe Silvia]

I'm torn. The pedals & effects demo's have a lot of talking. I mainly want to hear the sounds it can make, see some knob turning, and the knobs demo does that well. However when I watch the knobs demos I am waiting for someone to sprain their wrist turning a knob, lose their balance and there being lots of bouncing and pounding of temples

[lazycircles]

I like the Shnobel demos alright...he does a good job of playing both chords and lead passages...he gets a little too U2 influenced at times, but I think he highlights the pedals pretty well.

[DanyoSound]

Thanks for the feedback

So my current setup is a Lovepedal Echophonic Jr Analog delay with modulation, a stomp under foot Violet Rams Head Muff, Mooer Black Secret Rat, and a Black Arts Tone works Black Forest Fuzz v1 which will do a clean boost, a kind of overdrive into kind of tonebender type fuzz.

I had some other fuzzes and tried gated fuzzed and real velcro fuzzes but they were like one trick ponies and I didn't really use them.

I had a Whammy but thought it sounded like shit, I never used the expression pedal so I think a Pog2. Can cover those bases.

I thought about an Organizer or some sort of synth pedal but again I see them as one trick ponies and I think a Pog2 can cover enough of those bases.

I like the Timeline as I am more interested in digital delay but it seems to be able to do everything.

I am really looking for pedals that have a variety of uses.

Your set-up doesn't seem that weird, so I'm not sure if you're going for a variety of regular sounds -- like a dirt pedal that can do overdrive, distortion, and fuzz -- or just some out-right weirdness.

The LovePedal seems like it would be fine for your uses, but I'm also a bit preferential toward digital delays (I use both though). There are a lot of great delays. If you want weirdness in your digital delay, I would suggest a digital delay with CV out to control delay time or feedback. DL4 is a cheap way to go. The DL4 gets a bad rap, but it's actually quite good, but it will cost you some real estate. Maybe look at the new Keeley delays. TC Electronic NovaRepeater is excellent, but will never get you in weird territory. If you can afford Empress SuperDelay, it's digital AND it will get weird. Amethyst Reverb V2 with built-in expression roller by ClassicAudio might be right up your alley, if you want weirdness in your reverb.

Big Muff clones are great. I've got a Wren&Cuff. But if you want something that does weird, why not get a ZVex Fuzz Factory? You can dial out much of the weird if you. If can do velcro fuzz, too! Other suggestions include the Dr Scientist pedals: Frazz Dazzler and Elements. Or there are plenty of Devi Ever pedals that toe the line between muff and all-out weirdness. Or go cheap and buy an Asian copy of a ZVex Wooly Mammoth. I personally don't need 2 fuzzes. However, I would consider a fuzz and high gain distortion (for some there is little difference). So many options. Choose small pedals if you can!

The Mooer Rat clone is probably excellent. I use a R.Attack: an Asian copy of a vintage Rat, Dirty Rat, and Turbo Rat, in one pedal for about $30. They're great, and they can do everything from subtle grit to mild distortion. But on my board I use AnalogMan Prince of Tone. It's really just a more expensive version, and slightly more useful. You pay extra for the increased usability, but if it were stolen, I would easily replace it with the R.Attack. (Not to say that Prince of Tone R.Attack are similar overdrives, but for me, overdrive needs to be subtle, like a little gain on a Fender).

If you want a clean boost, why not simply get a clean boost? I use Dr Green Booster Shot: it's a full boost and treble boost in one pedal. It's great for solos, when it's finally my turn to rock (use sparingly!). There are plenty of clean boosts and EQ pedals that will fit this bill.If wanted something super cheap, I'd probably get a small Asian EQ pedal with true bypass. If you like a little extra sparkle in your boost, I would look at Guyatone Sonic Shaper or their overdrive pedal. Their pedals are small, and many of them have true bypass.

If you want Whammy type sounds and Organizer type sounds, I would either go with Digitech Ricochet or Earthquaker Pitch Bay. Earthquaker Pitch Bay, to my mind, is more manageable than the Organizer: I find the Organizer to be gross and useless. The Ricochet is far more elegant than the awkward Whammy, I think, unless the expression controller is useful to you.

The MuRF, for me, is a difficult to use pedal. Any kind of sequencer pedal will be difficult to apply in a band situation because then you'll be constantly trying to sync the sequence with the drummer. The MuRF is also huge. I would look into ZVex Seek-Way or Super Seek-Wah if I wanted that kind of sequencing. There are also a variety of flangers and phasers that use a square wave and randomizer to get some similar results. Look at SubDecay, or even an old Digitech HyperFlange.

Right now you have:
analog delay, muff, fuzz2, overdrive, and boost.

That's not a bad set up. It's important to have a little dirt, and some volume changing abilities in a live situation, and a delay with a little mod adds just a nice touch of spice. I could work with that set-up if I had to, but it wouldn't be weird. Add weirdness with a digital delay with backward feature, synthy sounds, like pitch-shifting. Sounds like ring mod is too weird for you; and classic weirdness like phase and flange might not be the spices you're looking for. Empress SuperDelay has an excellent backwards and octave pitch shifter that might everything you need in delay and weirdness.

Too much coffee...

[Pepe Silvia]

I'm basically starting from scratch with my board, and am going to try this combo to give me some diverse sounds.

Right now I have:
Moog MF Ring
Mooer Rat clone
SHO clone
Vicks Audio Lotus Overdrive
Stomp under foot Violet rams head clone

I know I want:
Moog MurF
Boss Super Feedbacker and distortion (mainly for making noise)
Pog 2

Then I want a crazy delay pedal but I need to do more research, I thought I wanted the Strymon Time line but the new Empress Echo System looks interesting, or the new Mooer Ocean Machine if I want something cheaper.

I want to experiment having either the Rat or Boss down stream behind some effects to see how what I can make of it.

[i love sharin foo]

A looper is always a nice addition, especially with things like a delay, ring modulator, filter (even a wah) downstream from it. It can free up your hands to get more mileage from things like a ring modulator as well. A good bang for the buck, multi use one would be an old Digitech 1 or 2 second delay. They have a nice tone on the delays and you can use the hold switch to have it infinitely repeat. Then stomp on a booster and/ or fuzz box and play over top of it. When you get tired of the loop, just unblock the hold switch and let it naturally decay until you have some other sound you like, then click it again and hold that one. They are difficult to use in the sense of a typical phrase sampling looper, but once you get used to it, there's some awesome, unexpected things that come out of them. On all those Digitech PDS series, there is an internal trim pot that can be used to increase the delay time also. They can be pushed into complete, lo-fi, degraded, nasty, terrible, noise machines if desired.

[fuzzjunkie]

The Nemesis delay from Source Audio is a newer offering that does a lot of what the Timeline and Timefactor delays can do in a smaller format.

Your plan sounds solid. I like all those pedals. * You will want an expression pedal *

I think if I were putting a small board like this together it would be: Fairfield Unpleasant Surprise, Fairfield Four Eyes Fuzz, Source Audio Nemesis and the Eventide H9 with a Source Audio expression pedal to control the filter on the Four Eyes and time and rate effects on the delays and reverbs (the Nemesis and H9 can handle pitch shift and filter sweeps and the S.A. expression can send LFO and step sequence signals too). That would cover a lot of oscillating, fuzzy, looping, ambient sounds and then I could add a bigger pedal, something like the Moog Murf or my Lovetone RingStinger off board to create some chaos. The Moog MF Ring Mod or the POG or the Fairfield ring mod would probably be enough and fit on the board though.

4-5 pedals and an expression control. Done.