Brave New World: Effects

So my career as a bass player has been pretty low tech. The first three or four years, spent in Ye Olde Motor Primitves/Pants del Fwego, was me playing either a borrowed bass or a cheapie through a 30 watt practice amp. No effects. Not even really sure what all the knobs on the bass or amp did. In chapter two of my bass career, the Kim Deal project, I was still playing with no effects and crappy basses...through slightly better amps to be sure...but still only vaguely sure of what all the knobs were about. I learned to turn the volume on the bass all the way up and adjust volume using the amp...and that the other knob on my bass basically made things sound "sharper" or "muddier". Some things sounded better one way or another...but I stayed pretty middle of the road. I decided I liked a "clean" sound. And now I've entered chapter three...the Michael Ivins project...a man who said in Bass Player magazine "I never use a clean, Dave Matthews Band kind of bass sound—ever." So here I am...thrown into the world of effects. Luckily, with Ivins the education is pretty basic...possibly the best introduction I could have had.

Note here that, while I own an electric guitar, I've never played it what you might call "properly". Barre chords are still relatively new to me and the concept of power chords, though in theory understood to me, have not, in practice, become part of my toolbox. My history with the guitar is largely of playing chords in open position on an acoustic, usually with my thumb and index finger ACTING like they are holding a pick, but not ACTUALLY holding a pick (though I have started to use a pick now...perhaps in the last five years or so). I have never plugged an effects box into a guitar/amp rig...though the guitar amp I bought on a whim several years back has some crappy on-board digital effects.

So last night, our second FLIPS rehearsal, I learned several things about effects. Until now I've not understood any of this at all...and now it seems stupid and intuitive...but it was like a light bulb going on.

#1 Bass fuzz only sounds good on low notes. Turn it off if you know you are going into a high passage

#2 The volume knob on the bass can actually be used, you know WHILE you're playing, to do things like fade out

#3 Don't try #2 when you are "punched in" with an effect...cause you probably won't fade but instead will just suddenly drop out at some point while turning the knob (ergo, if you know you will need to fade out in an upcoming passage, "punch out" before you get the the note that needs to fade)

#4 The volume "punched in" is louder than the volume "punched out" all other things being equal. Try to adjust the volume on the pedal and the volume on the amp in such a way that this is less noticable (unless you WANT to be super loud punched in and super quiet punched out). For me I kind of want the level to stay pretty even. Suddenly...the design of pedals seems important. Can you turn the knobs with your foot? With shoes on?

#5 You kind of have to plot out when you will punch in and when you will punch out. For someone like me, who leans heavily on written notes while I'm learning a song, this means you gotta write in when to punch in/out onto your notes.

#6 If you only have one power cable and two pedals and both pedals need it...well there's some planning and bending over to switch the power cable involved in plotting your performance. For instance, my bass stays in tune pretty well...so the only tuning I do during a show typically is when I have to tune down to low D or back up to E. So when if I'm gonna do that, I gotta remember to switch the power supply back and forth between pedals. Or I gotta buy another power source or make sure I got batteries in the tuner (but it eats batteries and is too hard to put new batteries in on stage cause there's a spring that could get lost). Now I understand the benefit of a nice pedal board case with an integral power supply...expensive as they are. I also understand why buying cheap pedals that eat batteries is bad. And I get why guitarists always have to have a "sixer" power strip available (you might have a lot of power supplies to plug in if you don't have everything integrated into one power supply. Six pedals...six plugs...plus the amp...yikes).

So yeah...suddenly I understand a lot more about all of that bullshit going on at a guitarist's feet. I still think plenty of it is unneccessary and I still can't tell the difference between 90% of effects out there, but I can appreciate all that's going into figuring that stuff out.