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>> What did you 'replace' your Line 6 stuff with? <<
Ok, I had the four basic Line 6 modellers, Delay, Distortion, Filter,
and Modulation. Mind
you, all this was to process my acoustic steel string with piezo pickup,
so my perspective may not
match the next persons... I picked them all up on eBay with the knowledge
that I could get a
similar price back on them (which turned out to be true). I basically got
to play with all this
gear for a year or two until I learned more about what I really wanted.
The distortion modeller was the weakest of the bunch. I have never
played electric so I
don't have the same starting point as most of the rest of you. I *can*
say that my acoustic
guitar sounded very very sterile through any and all of the modelled
distortions.
Next, the filter modeller was either too crazy or not crazy enough.
What I was able to get
out of it didn't feel very musical. Again, it sounded sterile.
More useful was the delay modeller. Most of the delays themselves
again had a bit of that
sterile sound, though not anywhere near as much as the previous two. I
mostly got it for the
looping functions. A coupla things killed it for me... the short loop
time, the lack of fidelity,
the *feel* and sound of the expression pedal morphing between two
different settings... again, it
lacked life.
The one that I enjoyed the most was the modulation modeller. Perhaps
because I was playing
acoustic, it really helped formulate a tone for me. I never really cared
for what the expression
pedal did for any of the boxes, mostly because (as I said in an earlier
post) they didn't feel
like electronics, rather they felt like software manipulation. It's just
a feeling... and we all
gotta rely on our feelings or we ain't musicians now is we? :)
I used these four boxes as my learning curve to understand a little
better what was out there
and what I might want to explore. I used the Looper's Delight list quite
a bit for
recomendations.
At one point I had all four Line 6 modellers chained together in
series. Something about
this setup didn't seem to work very well, not quite sure what. I called
the Line 6 people and
they were amazed that I was using all 4 at once. They suggested a few
different orders of the
units and vaguely implied that all should work okay. I'm not sure if
that's true, as they seem to
accept a guitar signal at the input and put out line level at the output.
I was told that I could
plug my keyboard into them as well, though with real electronics, there
are a few problems with
the difference between guitar level and keyboard level. Stacking them all
up together gave me
actually less control over my sound than using them individually. I don't
really know anything
about the science in all this, just that 4 at a time didn't seem to me to
be the way to go.
The DL-4 was replaced by a Repeater for the looper functions (no
comparison) and a Hughes &
Kettner Replex for the delay functions. The H&K has done more for my tone
than any other single
module and I'll never plug in again without it. It has a tube as well as
digital reverb, and
digital single and dual head tape delay emulations. Mostly I use it for
the tube sound and a
slight bit of reverb. It makes the driest, tinniest guitar sound warm and
buttery. I got it for
about $375. Well worth it.
The MM-4 was replaced by a T.C.Electronic Stereo Chorus Flanger
pedal, wow what a sound. For
about the same price as the Line 6, you get three sounds instead of
sixteen. And since all three
sounds are about 5 times better, it's a good value for the money. Mono
in, mono or stereo out. I
also have the Electrix Mo-FX on my mixer aux send so I can use the delay,
tremolo, and flanger in
the FX loop.
The closest thing to the FM-4 is my Boss PS-5, a multi-function pitch
shifter that I wrote
about here a few weeks ago. Close only because it can do wild and crazy
sounds and so can the
FM-4. Like the Line 6 units, this one can also receive an expression
pedal for pitch shifting on
the fly. I also use the Electrix Filter Factory in the FX send of my
mixer like the Mo-FX above.
One of these days I'm gonna try out the Sherman Filterbank...
The DM-4 was replaced by a number of distortion units, the Hughes &
Kettner Tube Factor, the
DOD FX91 Bass Overdrive, the DOD FX69 Grunge, as well as the Boss GE-7 (7
band EQ). Of these, I'm
happiest with the FX69 Grunge and GE-7 combo (again, this is for
acoustic). The H&K is truly
awesome sounding though I think it would work better on an electric. And
the Bass Overdrive is
meant for a Bass guitar though I just wanted to try it for kicks. I liked
reading about
everybody's favorite Fuzz box recently as this gives me even more ideas.
Anyway, I found out that
EQ is a pretty powerful tool if used after distortion. You can make most
any kind of distortion
behave the way you want it to with the right application of cut or boost.
I am selling 3 of these distortion boxes if anyone here wants to own
them for a while. The
Grunge is selling for $35 + $5 shipping (I bought two of them on eBay by
mistake), the Bass
Overdrive is also $35 + $5, and the H&K Tube Factor is going for $175 +
$15 and comes with power
supply and two extra tubes with different specs so you can play with the
sound of various tubes by
changing them out. These are comparable prices as found on eBay, they all
are in immaculate
condition and they come with my personal guarantee of joy and wonderment
for several days if not
weeks or years. :)
Please reply offlist if you're interested in a purchase.
Stephen
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