Pedal

If I were to buy some sort of FX pedal for my E standard what would I buy, a looping pedal?

Depends on your budget, and what sort of effects you are looking for.

Personally, and I am sure there are folk around here who are fed up of me saying it, I like my delay pedals. They're a brace of low-cost fun.

Check my youTube vids - http://youtube.com/profile?user=GordonCharlton - for examples. (Both the pieces were a single take with no overdubbing etc.)

According to my Big Briar News, fall/winter 2000, which came with my Etherwave (and 2 VHS tapes wow!) you can have a lot of fun with Moogerfooger pedals, a ring modulator and low pass filter.

If it's Moog, it's gotta be good?

Wow! those were some really strange videos.

Was that an E pro in some of that video?

I like the delay. I only have the digiverb for now. I actually frightened a friend with the reverse reverb. I only wish I had a delay, and extra reverb to go with it.

I have a strange imagination.

Nope - just your standard etherwave.

What's happening is - with Void Ship I've got the echohead set with min delay, max feedback and a whole bunch of frequencies resonate inside the pedal giving a variety of effects at different pitches. The PB&J feeds it with a 1 second repeat.

With Hadal Zone I'm using the ping-pong delay on the echohead so only one side passes through the pb&j and the other goes direct to the amp, giving the pattern on the sonar pings. In the bass I'm holding notes for longer than the delay so they layer up on top of each other, and the inevitable microscopic variations in pitch make for interesting changes in the timbre of the note and make it richer and fuller. (You can hold a bass note for ages without vibrato and it remains listenable.) That weird sound in the midrange is made by fluttering my volume hand whilst making a down-stroke with the pitch hand.

Reverse reverb sounds fun.

Oh, and yes, moogfoogers good. Used to great effect by Jon Bernhardt here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eNl8qq-f1F0. Jon posted some time ago about this, and said it was done "using a Moogerfooger MF-101 low pass filter and a MF-102 Ring Modulator." Perhaps he read Big Briar News too.

That's a cool video. I've watched it a few times before. He does some cool stuff with pedals.

This may sound dumb, but I did not know there was a Big Briar news letter.

I need to look into that.

Oh, has anyone ever tried running the theremin through a vocoder, and wawa pedals?

GORDON! OMG!!!! I LOVE your videos! Both are well done and your hits are so good. My favorite is the Hadal Zone. The visuals are so scary and the sound is perfect. I LOVE how the end with the chick turns and smile- oh it's so SUPER creepy. BRILLIANT!

Andy- After talking to lots & lots of people about it I've decided that I'm going to get two Line 6 DL4s. People really like the effects (there are many) and it has a short loop record time (which the only problem seems to be the short looping record time). Pamelia Kurtsin uses them and she does so very well with them. You can find her music page with recordings on myspace if you are interested.

Another suggestion I liked, but was more pricey because I'd also need to buy a laptop, is to use AbeltonLIVE. You can see a sample of this on YouTube as well. Look up a performer by the name of Kid Beyond (he has a really good demo video where he shows you how he does what he does, what gear and how he uses LIVE). He's awesome and you can totally see that LIVE software is really really good and has MANY posibilities.

:)
Paula

I really, really enjoyed your videos Gordon - they're so surreal and imaginative! The theremin really blends into that genre so perfectly. I do keep expecting some terrifying hideous face to suddenly emerge though - like in a screamer. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_prank#Screamers)

[i]Oh, and yes, moogfoogers good. Used to great effect by Jon Bernhardt here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eNl8qq-f1F0. Jon posted some time ago about this, and said it was done "using a Moogerfooger MF-101 low pass filter and a MF-102 Ring Modulator." Perhaps he read Big Briar News too.[/i]

Thanks for the plug, Gordon. And the compliment, Thomas! One thing I don't do on VKtRS, but have since incorporated into some other songs is a neat effect that combines the MF-101 in series with the MF-102 to create something that sounds eerily like a man's voice. I first read about the combination in (where else!) the Big Briar newsletter, but forgot about it. It wasn't until Wilco reintroduced me to it in Asheville two summers ago that I began using it.

You're welcome, Jon. Now I know what to get to go with the theremin next. Some MogerFogers.

I'd love to see what happens when you run that human male type sound through a reverse reverb on a long delay reverb with echo.