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Getting The Best Output of Your Delay Pedal
Delay pedals have become very popular among guitar players all around the world. It produces various effects and textures that can totally give the sound a professional finish. It can create rhythmic repetitions, live loops, harmonies sounding like twin- guitars etc. The versatility of this pedal makes it one of the most important part of the guitar effects pedal board.
There are some key points to remember when you are trying to get the best out of your delay pedal. The point to start is by knowing the functions of the delay controls and where to place the delay in the pedal chain. There are many delay pedals in the market. Today we are going to use a very basic and common delay pedal, Boss DD-7, as a reference to describe the various settings. Most of the simple delay pedals are very similar to the Boss DD-7, that is why we will be using it as an example here.
Functions of delay controls:
All delay pedals consists of mainly three controls- Time, Feedback (also known as Repeat or Regeneration), and Level (also labeled as Mix).
Time: This is used to control the time length between the repetitive signals. You can adjust the knob of the Time control to set the delay time between the signals. The delay is typically measured in milliseconds. Since most of the delay pedals do not have any time readout you have to mostly set an approximate delay time by adjusting the knob. There are some set ranges in every delay pedal, for example the Boss DD-7 has four ranges, starting from 50 millisecond up to 3200 milliseconds.
Feedback control: The amount of repetition of the signal can be controlled with the Feedback. If you keep the feedback to a minimum it will create one repetition of the signal. So if you want more repetitions just turn the Feedback up. The maximum setting will let you have infinite amount of repeats in some delay pedals.
Level: This will allow you to control the volume of the repeated signals. If you keep the repeat to the minimum level there will be not sound of the repeat. To get the best sound you should try to keep the volume of the repeat equal to the volume of the original sound.
Perfect place in the signal chain:
To get the best output of your delay pedal you need to place in the right order in the signal chain. It will help you get the right effects while using it with other stompboxes, like fuzz, overdrive and the distortion pedal. Make sure that you place the distortion before your delay pedal. This will allow you to have delayed effects on your distorted signal and not the other way around. Unless you will get an unclear and indistinct sound. Delay pedal is typically set towards the end of the effects chain because it can then create repeats on the final signal you get after adding the effects created by the other pedals. Try to add the delay to the effects loop of you amplifier. It will let your delay come after the preamp gain in the effects chain. These are mainly applicable if you are playing outside the recording studio, because today all studios add the delay during post production sound editing.
Doubling and Modulation:
Doubling is the process in which an understated delay is used to create a thicker sound. It can be done by setting the Time within a range of 50-100 milliseconds, one or two repeats by setting Feedback to minimum and putting the Level high. It will create the effect of two guitars playing together but it will not sound anything like an echo. If you want to get a pseudo effect of chorus and flanges, you should set a delay time ranging from 20-50 milliseconds.
Matching the Tempo:
It is important to match the delay time with the tempo of the beat source that you are playing to, it could be either a band or a rhythm track. These fixed beat sources may have a delay time up to or more than 200 milliseconds and high Level, so you need to precisely match your delay setting with the tempo in order to achieve the distinct characteristics of that tone. Unless you get that, the repeats will remain unmatched with the underlying tone of the rhythm. You need to carefully set the Time because most of the delay pedals do not come with time readings.
Delay pedals of recent times offer tap-tempo matching functions by adding external footswitches. It helps to achieve the perfect match of tempo by allowing the player tap on the footswitch to get the tempo he needs.
Using Delays as Harmonizers:
The delay pedal can be used to create a twin-guitar harmony. In this case make sure that the harmony line you are creating matches with the original line’s rhythm and construct. So try to play pre composed parts instead of improvised ones. Predictable and consistent rhythms are easier to work with when trying to harmonize a tone. If you are using delay to create harmony, you won’t be able to start both of them a t the same time. The opening line must be set to mute using the volume pedal and the once the harmony starts gradually put the volume higher. If this sounds too complex you can just start the line you are plying and the let the harmony line have a staggered entrance.
Dotted-Eighth Rhythmic Repeats:
You can use your delay if you want to create an illusion of playing more notes and faster than how they actually are. It can be done by using a trick called dotted-eight rhythmic repeats. In order to get this trick right set the delay to repeat the original note played to a dotted eighth note, that is the three 16ths. This will happen if you keep playing eighth notes. After the last 16th of the first beat the delay will enter the tone and then keep coming back in the 2nd and 4th sixteenth note of the sequential beats. By keeping the Level knob to the maximum point to match the original sound volume you can get a neat natural sound.
These are some common techniques to get different textured sounds using your delay pedal. But if you keep exploring and experimenting you will see that there are many other ways to get the best output from your delay pedal. So needless to say that it is just as important to look around and try to find out new ways to use the delay pedal to achieve the perfect tune.
You can read more information about How To Choose A Guitar Pedal That Suits Your Need by click here