Ordering Guitar Pedals For Producing Perfect Tone
We keep getting questions on the ‘Perfect’ ordering of guitar pedals to produce a perfect tone. After much thought we realized that for creating a perfect order in your pedal board it is necessary to have an idea about the various effects of the pedals. Asking yourself ‘why’ and ‘how’ to use the pedals will most likely give you the order you need to create the tone you are intending. Keep in mind that the better you understand the functions of different pedal groups the better you will be able to produce the perfect sound.
But for simplification purposes and to understand the basics, we are going to show the most commonly used pedal board ordering. A common order, starting from the guitar to the amplifier, is the Robert Keeley Method. This famous maker of the Keeley Compressor has an acronym for the most common method:
Which Chain Of Effect Pedals Makes Life Easy?
So what we get is:
• Wah (Which)
• Compression (Chain)
• Overdrive (Of)
• Equalizers (Effect)
• Pitch (Pedals)
• Modulation (Makes)
• Levels (Life)
• Echo (Easy)
Now let’s explain in details:
1. Plug in your guitar.
2. Tuner:
We think it is essential to have a tuner in the pedal board. The tuner should be placed first in order so that it can take direct input from the guitar and the unprocessed signal goes in for proper reading. Placing it first also ensures that the signal does not continually go through the tuner. It will be easier if you use a tuner with a true bypass switch.In case of using a true-bypass pedal putting the tuner first will protect any loss of signal from the guitar tones.
3. Filters:
In the second place you need to place the filters such as the wah pedal, phaser pedal and auto-wahs. The wah sweeps a peak in the frequency and the phasers cuts or notches the frequency. The pedals needs to be as close as possible to the guitar signal since the effects of these pedals are dependent on the dynamics of the signal, so the signal needs to be mostly unprocessed. Yet we think that it is a personal choice if someone wants to put the wah before or after the distortion. But putting it before the distortion will give you an opportunity to vary the intensity of distortion of the frequency.
4. Compressor:
The majority of us want to place the compressor before the distortion and after the filters. Compressors are known for their volume level increasing capacity. The filters can sometimes decrease the volume level which can be evened out by setting the compressor after it. Compressors also can ensure the delivery of a clean sound. If you want to use the compressor after the distortion make sure that you are ready for a darker tone, because in that case it increases the sustain.
5. Overdrive and Distortion:
A pedal board will remain incomplete without overdrive distortion pedal. Placing them after the filters will ensure a clean and natural sound. If they are placed before the filter effects the sound will become more synth like and stronger. One thing should be kept in mind that heavy overdrive does not go well with heavy compression. Overdrive pedals create harmonics so unless you place them here they will receive modulated signals which will distort the harmonics.
You can place a light EQ just before the overdrive if you want to create a change in the character of your overdrive.
6. Equalizers:
Equalizers are normally set after the distortion pedals because they can shape the tone of those pedals. So they are used as overdrive tone controllers. They are also boosting pedals as they can swiftly boost the volume of the sound. It helps to boosts the mids while you cut through with a solo. Equalizers can also create subtle effects like short delays.
7. Pitch:
Pitch effects include vibrato, pitch benders, harmonizers, octave, whammy pedal etc. It should be used after the compressor and distortion because they create the perfect sound if they are fed compressed signals. Particularly, the harmonizer should always be set after the overdrive.
8. Modulation:
This is the place for the modulation pedals which include the Chorus, Flanger, Envelope Filters etc. They thicken the frequency of the tone. In fact they perform well if set any place after the distortion and overdrive pedals. The effects created by the Flangers and Chorus are quiet subtle and the combine the effects of delay, filter and pitch. If set in a high resonance the subtlety of these effects will be gone.
9. Level Pedals:
Volume, Limiters, Noise Gate, Tremolo etc are all level pedals and they control the volume of the guitar tone. In order for it to affect all the previous tones they are set close to the end of the pedal board. Also setting them before the echo will deliver a more natural echo sound. Volume pedals, when pushed down to zero will ensure that no hiss will be passed into the amp. It will cancel out all noise except for the delay.
10. Echo Effects:
Delay, Digital Delay, Analog Delay etc all create echo effects and make the environment more responsive to the guitar sound. Placing it here helps it to emulate all the different effects of the signal chain. There is a place of experimentation though and we have seen that delayed signals can be sent to a pitch shifter or chorus and can work well. But surely they will be harder to control if set before the overdrives.
11. Reverb:
At the very end set the reverb and you will get a better sound. It should be the last pedal that feeds to the amp. Some amps have built in reverbs too.
12. Finally the amplifier.
So there you have it. The most common chain of effects. But we can’t stress enough on the need of experimentation since there are no hard and fast rules on pedal ordering. You can personalize the pedals and try to get your desired tone. So keep in mind that these are just the common rules to get you started. So go on experimenting!
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