GUITAR
HOW MANY PEDALS DO WE REALLY NEED ? | Chris Rocha & Jonathan Diaz
I ’ m currently running one of the smallest pedal boards I ’ ve ever had . I flew to Peru a while back and it cost me over $ 450 just to enter the country because they charged me taxes for my equipment . After that trip , I went with a super small setup and got it to sound amazing . Many people think , the bigger the board the better the tone but that ’ s not necessarily true . At some point , I would like to make a bigger board just to have more options , but I am doing great with my small board . In this article Jonathon and I will dive into how many pedals we think you need on your pedal board .
Guitar pedals can be overwhelming at times . We want what ’ s necessary , but we also want what ’ s cool and trending . The market for them is definitely saturated and we have plenty to choose from . One of the most common questions I get from students , friends , and other guitarists is always the same , “ How many pedals do I need ? And that question is always followed up by the same answer , “ How many do you want ? “ The real answer to this question is simple . You need as many as you want . And that ’ s because in our modern guitar market we now have pedals that have more than one function , and even have pedals that can do it all and eliminate the need to buy multiple pedals .
ALL IN ONE PEDALS :
Like I said before , there are many companies
that offer multi-effect units . The most popular options at the moment is usually Line 6 with the Helix , HX stomp ( and Stomp XL ), HX effects , and the Pod Go . But other companies such as Boss , Fractal , and Headrush also have great options . If you ’ d like something a little more expensive with more capabilities , you can look into the Quad Cortex that also gives you the capabilities to make an amp model from your real physical amplifier . These are all great and simple options to have that can do it all and you ’ d never have to buy another pedal . Before we continue , the only reason I do not include something like the Kemper is because although it does have the same capabilities as a multieffect unit , it is usually used more for its amp modeling capabilities , and it is usually not as portable as the smaller multi-effect units .
DIGITAL AND ANALOG BOARD :
This is definitely my favorite variation of a modern pedalboard . These boards have a combination of small digital multi-effects units with a combination of analog pedals . For example , my pedalboard has an HX Stomp used for its amp modeling and reverbs with some variation of modulation ( and tuner ). But I use external pedals along with the HX Stomp because I like the color and sound of my delay , overdrives , compressor , and octave pedal . Overall , on my board I have one compressor , one octave pedal , three distortions / overdrives , one delay pedal ( which is a digital multi-delay unit , and the HX Stomp where I am using a tremolo , chorus , amp modulation , an effect loop block ( for the delay ), and two different reverbs to stack . All in all , it ’ s a small footprint with a lot of power that will allow me to throw it in a suite case and travel with it . The truth is , I don ’ t need that many overdrives , I don ’ t need the compressor , I don ’ t even need the octave effect . But there are some songs that have the effects and I like to have them handy .
There are some pedals now that are just “ amp in a box ” style pedals to where you don ’ t need an HX effect for amp modeling … showing me that if I really wanted to go with all I would really need is … two overdrives , a reverb , delay , and a amp modeling pedal and make things a lot more simple .
ALL ANALOG WITH AMP
These are usually the most expensive boards and demand a lot more attention . When I started off with my first all analog board , I bought three overdrives , a wah , a volume , a chorus , a reverb , and a delay . And though that sounds like a little , it took up a lot of space on my Pedal Train 2 . And now I also have to include a physical amplifier and all the cables and microphones .
Over time I kept adding and buying and my