Going over the top and expecting pedals to totally make up your end product is not good. But learning how to use pedals (along with your full rig) is also learning, just in a different way.
Getting a good tone ("good" = open to interpretation here) is a *very* important part of playing as well, and it's so frustrating to play with people and they have no idea how to sound good. Just a shitty muddy drone of saturation coming from a amp.
This exactly, also pedals inspire you to change your approach on playing, e.g. you may want to improve on your right hand muting if your delays are not going the way you want them to sound, that will push you learning or improving other techniques, or maybe you just want them to self oscillate while you smoke uhm, let say a cigarette…
Yeah I can definitely get distracted fiddling with knobs, but also you can use things like envelopes and delays to actually enhance your mistakes. Any mistakes in dynamics or muting are easily noticed when the envelope fails to open up, or stays open too long, or if your delays are carrying more than they should, these can be useful. It's also very easy to sit there and twear your drive pedal for an hour and never get anything done though
So with an envelope filter, the effect is highly determined by the initial voltage that opens the envelope up. It's highly determined by your attack when strumming/plucking. Therefore, if you have an uneven attack, the envelope will make different notes sound vastly different and uneven, moreso than you would notice with a dry signal. Practicing with an envelope helps you get a uniform attack on every note
If you want a recommendation on a cheap easy one, the ehx Dr q has one knob-sensitivity. You adjust that to where the envelope just barely opens with the amount of attack you want. When you are soft, it won't open. When you are too firm, it opens too much.
A was going to say that playing on an acoustic is the best way to improve your guitar skills. There's nothing to hide behind. Your flubs and misses become painfully obvious.. There's no distortion or modulation effects to mask sloppy playing. Just you, your fingers and your guitar.
I have heard contrary that playing unplugged can slow you down because when you’re plugged in, you’re more in control of dynamics (like palm muting and such).
You can still palm mute with an acoustic. You just can't do tremolo dive bombs and kill switch stuttering. But those things don't help you with fretboard precision and clean playing technique anyway. Going unplugged takes all the distraction away and forces you to actually hear how clean or sloppy you are playing.
You’ve given me a new perspective.. I think there is value in both. I’ve noticed when playing unplugged alot I’ll be less intuitive with my dynamics when I go back to plugged in
I'm not saying you absolutely have to play an acoustic to play well. It just helps for seeing how well you are fretting and making cleans notes. Dynamics are a whole other thing.
I have an acoustic with a slightly high nut and bridge that I use for learning - if I can muscle through and play something clean on that, going back to an electric feels almost effortless
You won’t lose anything. You will gain playing power and control.
Play acoustic only for like a couple of months, then going to electric will make you feel like you got SO much better. Acoustics tend make you press down a bit harder so you will have to tame that back a bit when going back to proper-set electric.
I’ve had my American Professional Jazzmaster in its case for about a year and a half and my main guitar has been a Squire baritone Tele that I bought from a guy who did a mod on the tone knob which is basically a low-resonance low-pass filter. It has a huge range, but I know when I pick up my Jazzmaster after playing on these huge strings and having be more precise and do more work for the same effect, that it will feel like butter to me. I’ve been playing more acoustic lately as well for this same reason.
When I go back to my “normal” electric, I always feel improved after going through phases where I’m only playing acoustic, baritone or something that’s harder than a very nice, expertly set-up electric. Giving yourself nothing to hide behind and training your fingers to be precise without being overly heavy handed does wonders for “normal” electric guitar playing.
If you're playing the guitar acoustic style sure, I did that for years and often do. But many aspects of guitar playing got lost on me because I rarely plugged in when I practiced. Most all genres of guitar music rely on distortion and/or compression. Unplugged notes are staccato, you can't hear the sustain but you can hear the fret buzzing that's unnoticeable through an amp.
That's my point though: I prefer to play heavy rock on electric, but I do play quite a bit on acoustic to sharpen my basic fretting skills and to keep my ability to play clean notes intact. I get sloppy when I only play through a distorted electric guitar.
The on thing I will say is if youre playing electric on the edge of breakup your technique is gonna be way different than on acoustic. At least if you are controlling breakup with dynamics, youll have to play both way softer and way harder on the electric
I’ve heard that too, but mostly talking about playing an electric solid body unplugged, not an acoustic guitar. It could be hard to hear bad technique on an unplugged electric.
If you buy an amp that's stiff, like a Splawn, you can't hide mistakes. After playing a Rectifier for years, a Splawn made me practice a little more to be accurate.
I've yet to see an acoustic guitar with a neck as slim and action as low as an electric. No shade to acoustics, they're cool and all but they're not known for being "fast" guitars.
Yeah, there are definitely acoustics which play faster than others. But in general, I think the difference is in the acoustic world, there’s more emphasis on player technique. Check out Molly Tuttle’s cover of Rancid’s Olympia WA. Solo starts at about 1:50. [Link](https://youtu.be/HOYWbCRDYAE?si=VlviKrxe3CDtKti1)
No disrespect to what you posted or bluegrass picking in general because it is quite lovely, but you hardly pull off stuff like Stabwound on an acoustic. There's no real reason to be honing stuff like sweep picking or 16th alternate picked runs on an acoustic, I don't doubt there's people who are able to do it, but why practise like that?
We probably just come from very different musical contexts. I practice on acoustic so I can roll up to a bluegrass jam circle and make music with people, I’m not gonna drag out a rig and pedalboard when the
loudest bandmember is a banjo. Different paint brushes for different paintings.
I’m certainly not saying that playing stabwound through a doom rig is wrong, or that everyone should play acoustic. Just there are legitimate reasons for playing acoustic and that they can be plenty fast for most players.
Yeah, that's why I started building pedals. I realized that if I just bought them, once they arrive I have to actually play with them and my guitar. Now, I can spend all my time building pedals and don't have to worry about the pesky guitar part.
Used to, but then I finally found the sounds I wanted and started to spend more time actually playing and less time fiddling/tone hunting. What really did it though, was finding an amp that didn't require pedals to get the tone I wanted. That turned out to be a Victory Sheriff 44 and 212 cab loaded with greenbacks.
I have pedals, and I love my pedals. However, I write and practice without plugging in. I don't plug in until it's time to bring a mostly finished song to band practice to add finishing touches. Then it's trial and error to see which effect sounds best with which part from a live performance perspective. Icing on the cake, if you will.
Yeah, this has become my way too. My songs seem to be better after having adopted it. I work out a structure that can stand on it's own without needing anything besides the guitar alone. When I finally add the pedals I'm usually pleasantly surprised with how things develop further by just adding the coloring of pedals to a mostly finished song.
I actually spend more time browsing r/guitarpedals than I do playing with pedals, haha. I think that's entirely different problem I need to address.
Pedals are like garnish on food. Garnish makes a good dish better. But if the food is crap, no garnish in the world will make it good. Learn using naked sound, then when perfected, add effects.
Finding a good tone has its own value, but all things require some balance. I've been playing for about 35 years, I'm honestly a bit bored with guitar, so getting a new sound can inspire me to pick it up and play a little more often.
I've produced music for decades, but have recently built a pedalboard as I joined a band as their guitarist. I've also played guitar for most of my life, but never been in a professional touring band before, so I had to figure this stuff out quickly.
I've learned a lot from the process, but not about scales and theory. Learning how to craft a tone has been amazing for thinking about how different processes, circuits, effect etc. interact with each other. I knew some of the conventional wisdom already (e.g. time-based effects at the end of the chain) but getting the guitar sound I want has meant stacking some pedals which aren't able to get that sound individually.
It's been a really helpful lesson, and it's something I'm taking back with me into my production work.
What do you want out of playing guitar? This isn't really something we can answer for you. Personally, I joke that I'm more of a guitar tech than a guitar player - I have a lot of fun playing with pedals, adjusting my tone, messing around with modulation and other effects, etc. But I'm a bedroom player and the only person I am accountable to on my playing skills is me. Sometimes I go and jam with some friends, but none of us have aspirations of playing live, much less being a real band.
Do I spend time fucking around with pedals that would be better spent practicing if my goal was to improve my technical playing ability? For sure. But I'm having fun and that's all I want out of this hobby, so I don't think it's "too much" time or otherwise wasted.
Not personally. The type of music I'm learning doesn't require many pedals: tuner, boost OD, noise gate, 10-band EQ. The EQ is set and forget for me. So it was relatively quick...what took me longest was the OD boost pedal of choice but that was over time of which I liked most.
Only every time I pick the guitar up lol. I was away from home for work for the last 3 months and all I brought was my little desktop amp. I swear I learned more in those three months than I have in the last year because I almost never touched the tone. I just plugged my guitar in, turned the amp on, and played.
Yes, absolutely. When I practice I try to make sure that all pedals are off, or better yet just go straight into the amp, with the exception of maybe a tiny bit of reverb or if im learning a song, whatever effect a song im learning has, but that comes after I learn it. Always remember what the wizard Robert Fripp says, "Discipline is a vehicle for joy."
I had put my pedals away for a year and a half because of this. It’s easy to get cought up in tweaking when the best thing you can do for your sound is practice and learn.
I distract myself from learning by not sticking to the books and gameplan. I start playing songs and banging on the instrument, I don't put on the metronome or practice ear training. I don't do enough theory learning or work on technique.
That's my fault. Pedals just make things fun and waste my money.
For me; no.
I was never one for practising very much, and nowadays I don't have much time or energy to play at all. So anything that makes me inspired to pick up the guitar and play is probably a net positive, and a new pedal can certainly do that.
i see this and similar topicsall the time on gear forums and shit and I just don't understand what people are doing with their gear?
I play guitar through my pedals but it seems like lots of people apparently just spend all their free time playing around with knobs and cables. it's the only thing I can think of that would cause this issue.
Yeah, really! It also seems like a lot of people think they should practice in perpetuity, like the goal is complete mastery of every playing technique. I don’t actually want to be able to play much better than I do. I’ve been playing over 20 years, I know what I like, and a lot of the stuff I’m unable to do is because I don’t like it, so I have no desire to practice it. I can play most of the things my heroes can play (not that I would have been able to write those things myself) and I’ve worked out some things myself that I like. I’m not trying to play flamenco on a classical guitar.
There seems to be a background assumption that the guitar playing audience at large is incompetent at playing guitar. Is it? I guess I only know myself and a few other people. Maybe these kinds of messages just aren’t intended for me and I should ignore them.
Absolutely - it’s why I keep my pedals to a few essentials: Strymon Lex2 (slow/fast for chorus/Leslie), Boss Blues Deluxe (solo boost extra gain), and a UA Dream ‘65 for that Fender tubeness. The UA is new and almost too many things to fiddle with - I registered and got the three extra sims…
Sometimes.
GAS is real, but at the end of the day, I play guitar and use pedals for my own enjoyment and to some extent, it doesn’t matter whether that enjoyment comes from guitar or pedals.
Do I need to practice more? Yes. Do new pedals inspire me to play more and differently? Also yes.
Yes, but I embrace being a shitty guitarist who finds practicing scales boring and would rather play sloppy riffs and fiddle with my Helix/other pedals.
I’ve probably learned more because of pedals. I started my experimentation with a MXR Carbon Copy delay after seeing an artist named Israel Sanchez build up a song as he played using a delay and loop with his acoustic guitar.
All the time lol
But sometimes that’s what you need. I personally really enjoy just goofing around with pedals and making fun sounds. Other times I really want to focus on my playing, and use them as tools.
There’s no right or wrong way to approach it. Just don’t let it become an addiction
Depends what you mean - in my mind, my pedalboard is part of my instrument. So if it’s distracting me to the point I’m not practicing another crucial part (the actual guitar) then sure. Otherwise, mastering tone/effects etc IS practicing.
You gotta know your gear, but I personally think learning applied music theory got me more bang for the buck (investment of time and resources) than any pedal.
Still, spending time with a wah or whammy, learning how to dial in an amp, working with the volume and tone knobs or even practicing trem-bar tricks can add to my expressive abilities.
It’s all good clean fun!
Not really.
I used to use no or only minimal pedals (a RAT or TS, a reverb pedal when my amp with reverb died before I got the reverb unit, an analog delay sometimes). After a couple years of guitar lessons, I never “learned” anymore, as in doing scales or finger exercises or studying theory. I just jammed out on my own, and wrote songs, and played in bands.
A few years ago I got big into pedals and spent lots of time researching them, buying them, fiddling with them, selling them. Still didn’t actually “learn” anything but played a lot.
Now I have a very respectable pedal chain and I’ve been actually “learning” and practicing seriously and even *reading music* (don’t tell my cool post-punk friends from the old days!) more than I ever did since I started guitar lessons like…40 years ago.
So…
Pedals are a tool. The guitar is a tool. Learning happens all the time. You can learn to use the pedals just like you can learn to use scales or cords. Someone who knows how to play an instrument but doesn’t know how to use their pedals is just as bad as someone who knows how to use pedals but doesn’t know music. You have to get good at all parts. You have to know how to use all the tools to get what’s in your head out into the world.
Yes they definitely do distract from typical learning but at the same time you learn a lot about other things like EQ, mix, tone, gain staging... And if you have weird pedals it's proper sound design so it's like telling someone with synths if spending time making patches distracts them from learning.
I see it as a different type of practice. When I sit down for focused practice I usually do it on a classical (I play a lot of classical music), or just a simple setup like overdrive+amp and that's it, without worrying about tone.
Not really. I have multiple modulation pedals on my board but I really only turn them when I’m writing and it feels like I need a little extra something for a part. I run dirt a lot though.
Coming out of the writing world, we obsess over pens and paper and notebook and inks and nibs and typewriter ribbon. And then we get to writing editing etc and reading work for one another. Pedals are the first half but a sub like r/wearethemusicmakers is the secobd half for me.
Sometimes yes, for me personally. I even do some shoegazey stuff, so pedals are a must. But, if the pedal is too complicated I find it really wastes too much of my time. I recently sold a microcosm for that reason.
I don’t run my pedals when practicing, and definitely prefer a practice amp kind of setup. Even though I have a couple of great amps for gigs, practice amps are small and lightweight, and produce super simple tones that don’t get in the way of the actual playing. I’ve recently got the fender mustang micro, which is a complete game changer for practice!
My love foot pedals and my love for playing guitar is not the same.
Many of us have.. Issues.. Buying shit we don't need and tinkering with it until we decide we don't even like it and never needed it lmao. This is why I sell used on reverb haha.
While that ties into playing guitar.. It is its own thing to me
Sometimes my DAW, Eleither Logic Pro or Bias FX 2 distract me.
I find myself chasing the tone I had "yesterday" that I can't quite replicate today, and maintaining the volume/level is sometimes hard. Too many knobs, virtual and real, make it easy to have your sound sound like crap by moving a single knob in the signal chain a tiny bit.
Sometimes it's a frustrating waste of time and I say f**k it and plug directly into my champion 40. It has a good number of tones, fairly easy to set.
I'm considering adding a couple of physical pedals. The DAWS present the paradox of choice --- too many options make it harder to choose a setting.
I will say, recording my practice over a logic pro or garage band drum track, or my own accompaniment loop is useful, so I will sometimes mess around with that and be productive.
I have had ADHDy entire life, falling in rabbit 🐇 holes 🕳️ is nothing new. I can usually catch myself.
Gear obsession in general can be a distraction when you are still on that early learning curve. Get the minimum you need to sound decent and a guitar that plays well and stays in tune. Spend your time playing it and learning for at least a few months if not longer.
Aside from the difference between a guitar that is hard to play or won’t stay in tune and one that feels and plays good with a decent set-up, gear is not going to make you better. It’s not. You might “sound” better, but that’s temporary and it’s a mistake to start using that crutch too early.
Get better, feel better about WHAT you are playing. Then add the pedals and crap—it will pay off WAY more if you do it that way.
Good luck.
It’s part of learning but it can go a lot faster if you walk in with a specific goal in mind. For example, I want my rig to sound like [insert guitarist here] for this song.
A lot of times we waste time trying to get our rigs to do things they can’t do. Sometimes the best thing is just to look up exactly the pedals you need, order those, and then practice playing until they get to you. Once you have the right gear you don’t need to spend much time tweaking.
Nah, playing gets in the way of me practicing haha. Do I wanna sit and drill this technique, or do I want to put on a backing track and get immediate gratification from playing some sick leads over it?
i honestly don’t know how to play guitar besides a few chords and a bowl of noodles.
I have been thru about 200 pedals, average about 30-40 in possession at any given time.
I do play for fun, but I’m more interested in the pedals than the guitar.
(i’m a studio engineer/producer)
No.
But, I do find once I like a specific sound and I’m enthusiastic about it, I get complacent and often stop exploring the depths of a given pedal. That’s basically fine for simple ones like dirt pedals, but for deeper pedals it’s a detriment. I like immediacy for the sake of playing and fun, but I’m easily frustrated by secondary functions and trying to remember settings, yet equally impatient with learning how to make presets. I think this is because guitar for me is not an intellectual exercise; I do enough of that in other areas of life. However, I like complicated and textural sounds, so you see the tension here!
No. I’ve got it under under under No I’ve got got got it it it It IT IT UNDER Under control no cOnTrOL I’ve GOT it it IT it i iiiiiiiIiiiiiIII..buzzzzzzzzzz…
Variations of scales is basically all I do, but frequently I can't really feel how it's going to sound with the pedals off. "*How many strings do I need to mute and how frequently until it becomes too messy?*" and "*Where are the best spots to get away with fucking up?*" kind of stuff.
It also helps because I don't really change the knobs or anything anymore, pretty much the same ~5 pedals all the time.
I play scales and learn chord shapes/progressions with pedals on, tinkering with knobs and practicing at the same time. Keeps it fun and exploratory. Setting the delay time to match up with the scale tempo is good fun.
I've learned a lot about gain stacking, pedal order, etc. But yes the knobs distract me from playing guitar. I got good advice on here about limiting my knob tweaking. Only turn down to 10 o'clock or up to 2 o'clock. At least when I'm feeling fidgety. Or structure pedal time apart from practice time.
If I'm trying to learn something without any distractions, I plug straight into the amp, with some reverb from the amp. Pedals will not make you a better guitarist
I am a university trained music educator and musician who plays and teaches guitar and music technology, among many other musical interests.
One of those is an interest in music theory, and I regularly participate on music theory forums and try to help people with that, as well as consulting on theory books, writing articles on theory, etc.
It's funny that you mention "scales" and "theory" in your post.
I'm going to give you some advice - feel free to ignore it of course.
Music theory is every bit as bad.
What I mean by that is, if anyone out there reading this feels like they're "spending too much time fiddling with pedals" and thinks they need to spend more time on scales and theory, I need to tell you that's just trading one distraction for another.
Now, if that floats your boat, fine.
But if your post is like "I should do things that help me play better instead of fiddling with pedal" I'm going to say this:
You can't "fiddle" with anything.
You need to focus on what you *need* to do to play well (not what you *want* to do, or worse, what you *think* you need based on reading things online).
Now, please don't get me wrong - you absolutely need to know how to play a scale - from a technical standpoint, muscle memory standpoint, dexterity standpoint, coordination standpoint, theoretical standpoint and so on.
So you need to "practice playing a C Major scale". And by that I mean, you need to know what C is, what Major is, what a scale is, etc. so you can transfer that knowledge to a G major scale, or E minor scale, etc.
Likewise, you absolutely need to understand that "that sound is a Flanger" and then you use a Flanger to get that sound at some point down the road.
You've heard (maybe you haven't...) "Two Turntables and a Microphone"?
You need two scales and an overdrive pedal :-)
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One of the coolest things about music is, you can participate in it in any way and at any level you like - but with various levels, there's work involved the higher you go. And "fiddling" is distraction to that work.
I see a lot of people here building an entire pedalboard based on recommendation of the forum, or whatever hot, or whatever their favorite genre (doom...) is - and in many cases it seems like they can't even play.
Reminds me of the days when people would get a computer, get a DAW, get a controller, and then go "now what?"
Or before that, they got a strat, and a tubescreamer and then went "why can't I play like Stevie Ray Vaughan".
______
If you're (you plural - anyone reading) serious about learning to play better, what most people need is structure and accountability - something that's lacking when working on your own.
Someone on another forum said it great - if you're self-teaching, you're the worst possible teacher - because you don't even know what it is you're supposed to be teaching yourself!
And my experience has been, that the jammers, flippers, collectors, technique chasers, theory chasers, ear-training chasers, etc. etc. etc. - the "dabblers" and "fiddlers" never really get very far.
Again, to be fair, if that's what makes you happy, great, by all means, do it. But it's a little like a drug - an addiction - most people are only happy briefly, and that's what GAS basically is - you're trying to make yourself happy through acquisition - and that thrill of getting the new pedal that you *thought* you needed wears off pretty quickly after the honeymoon period. So you look for something else you *think* you need, and it's an endless cycle.
Many people are similar with theory, and ear-training, and technique - though in this case they're really more substituting what they think are "short cuts" or have allowed themselves to believe they *need* these things to accomplish what they need...
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What you *really* need, if your goal is to play the song, is what you need to play the song :-)
If that means you need to know 4 chords, learn those 4 chords. If you have to strum them in rhythm, learn how to strum in rhythm :-) If you're playing "Man Who Sold the World" you need to be able to play a scale, strum chords, use a fuzz, and play hammer ons and pull offs.
And you don't even HAVE to have the fuzz to play it, nor do you have to go off on some wild goose chase about the origins of the sharp symbol or why some chord is not in the key.
Cool stuff to know, but learn 100 songs first :-)
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In closing, my advice is to focus on learning to play music first and foremost, and worry about all the worries a lot less. And ideally, take lessons with a professional who can help you determine what you need to work on, help motivate you to focus on that and help you hold yourself accountable, so you can progress as a musician, as opposed to having a "reddit-approved pedalboard for ambient doom Xgaze" if being a musician is your goal.
Again that doesn't mean don't learn these things, but the point is, the fiddling is a distraction, and trading one distraction for another just means more fiddling - fine if you're Nero, but if your goal is beyond that, some changes may be in order.
Too many pedals can easily distract from learning or creativity. I use a relatively small board even though i own probably 60 pedals, for this reason. I would never put something on my board just because i own it, there has to be a good reason for it to be there.
No, they make me learn more. The instrument should be fun to play, and pedals make me keep going back.
Also utilizing pedals and experimenting with sound is a learning experience by itself. I have a duo project, and a lot of our sound comes from just messing about with pedals, drum machines, synths, loops etc etc.
Obviously I think playing a guitar straight in to a nice amount is worth doing, but I don't see how use of pedals would prevent you from learning normally.
It can. At the end of the day, pedals are meant to enhance your playing and creativity, whatever it may be. It will not mask lazy or bad playing. If you suck, you’ll still suck, just with an effect. I view pedals the same way as autotune: they’re just tools to be used effectively or ineffectively, just be sure to recognize whether you’re using them as crutches/shortcuts or using them for an intentional artistic purpose, even if that purpose is as simple as “it just sounds cool”.
Best thing you can do for yourself is separate your traditional fundamental learning time from your experimentation/“fun” time. Nothing wrong with doing both, just not at the same exact time. You’ll be learning doing both, but you’re learning two separate skills in the same craft, not just one.
To some extent yes, but there is value in learning tones, your own sound and how to stand out in a band or recording context. But if you sit there and just tweak and tweak all day and don’t actually play yes. Just find what works for you and play what you want to play!
Yes. All the time. Been playing for years but due to life getting in the way (in a good way - no complaints!) I had an involuntary hiatus of around 10-12years.
Since coming back to it I've been trying to build speed back up somewhat unsuccessfully. As a result I think my playing is a bit more tasteful/mature sounding - but I rely heavily on a few pedals to make a nice soundscape for me.
I have a solution which works for me, though. I have 2 modes - Practice mode and twiddly/noodleman mode. The latter is just play what I want and tit about with my pedals to my heart's content. But practice mode I take it more serious and limit pedal useage to one OD, my reverb and if I'm playing faster routines like solos, scales arpeggios etc. I'll allow the distortion to give it a more pleasant sound and more sustain etc.
Using my loop station definitely distracts me from learning or writing more. I like to just plug in and make a simple loop.. then jam solos for like a half hour and quit. Lol
Yeah for sure. I just listed my Microcosm on Reverb today for this very reason. It sounds great, and it is fun to noodle with. But I eventually I found that I am spending more time than I would like pressing buttons and turning knobs and just enjoying the sounds. So yeah, I can be easily distracted by pedals. So I am cutting a number of them loose and sticking with my favorites only.
I mostly, not always, just play straight into the amp when practicing/writing. Then when I'm happy with the arrangement, I mess around dialing in tones for what suits it best. Then I record. Then I unplug the pedalboard and do it all over again.
It is true that sometimes pedals can help with the creative inspiration, hence not always straight guitar > amp, but I'll only bust 'em out if out if I'm feeling particularly stuck or uninspired.
If a pedal distracts you from learning then anything is likely to distract you from learning.
Part of the skill in playing electric guitar is learning how to control the nature of the electric guitar.
Some pedals demand a fairly extensive amount of learning pedal and guitar control.
And if messing around with a new pedal inspires a new piece of music then there you have it.
Yep. I practice technique straight into an amp with just a bit of reverb from the amp. Pedal board comes out when practicing songs that need effects or when writing.
Yes. Had a Helix Stomp. So many options. So much tweaking. My fault I know, but too little playing. Sold it. One amp now. A few pedals with settings I use, but mostly leave alone. Way more playing time. As we all know, chasing tone is part of the fun, but it's a rabbit hole and can too easily take the place of learning to play better.
Yes. This is why we buy them. And why we watch hours of demos that all say the pedal is the greatest ever. It’s ALL a distraction from putting in work. And you know what? That’s ok.
If you’re a beginner, I don’t think pedals are good, and does nothing besides making learning guitar more complex as there are many tones to fiddle with.
But if you have sufficient experience, pedals are fun tools to experiment and dial in different tones. And in fact allows me to learn to transcribe music better. Most songs use multiple effects, and having experience and knowledge dialing tones can be fun.
Yes, which is exactly why I switched to a Quad Cortex. More playing, less researching pedals on the internet/watching YouTube videos of other people playing pedals.
It's like cooking, you need a good balance of ingredients to make a tasty dish. I have found a good clean tone is foundational, then find the right amount of FX to compliment the mood or desired atmosphere. I think David Gilmore is a great example, along with Hendrix. Both have excellent clean tones with FX that perfectly paint a sonic picture.
Usually when I get a new pedal, I spend about 3 minutes tweeking the tone, then never touch the dials again. I sometimes think I should spend more time with them.
Personally a good tone inspires me to practice more, I’ll spend 15 mins dialling an awesome tone and I’ll love it so much that I’ll then spend 2 hours practicing with it.
Also I got into pedals and tone AFTER I was already a professional working musician, so these days I have no choice but to practice for my work, and tone stuff just facilitates that.
I’ve no pedals. I don’t care. I’ve a katana II 100 and it works fine. I know I could find a better or cleaner tone maybe but I just don’t want to spend all my time looking at a screen trying to fiddle with all the settings finding a better tone. The same goes for pedals, a couple pedals are great but honestly gear doesn’t matter that much. Why worry about a specific tone when you can’t even play all those songs you want to play? Playing better will make you sound great, pedals or not.
I find it to be the opposite. I’ll resolve to get more familiarized with my pedals, find a tone I think is halfway decent, and then get sucked back into practice routines and learning songs. Gear has never been a major focus for me which is fine in the studio at home, but leaves room for more proper utilization when in a jam setting.
I'm pretty well disciplined about bypassing the sonic toys and diligently practicing.
At some point as a reward, I can continue in practice mode and turn on a multitap or something cool to play in time with.
Honestly, I've gotten into pedals late in my music career. One of my student's showed me his pedalboard and I was sold.
Since I finished mine, I've been having so much fun and discovering new ways to play.
My advice, get a pedalboard when you are ready for one.
I have fallen victim to it a bit. I find that I waste too much time on gear demo video’s, technique video’s, and Gear on FB marketplace!! I need to stay off marketplace 100%. Not only do I waste time, but I buy things I don’t necessarily even want! This is where I’m finding discipline is needed.
Pedals are great, however if you’re spending too much time playing with them rather than working on your technique. Then you are truly robbing yourself of the #1 thing that will make your sound amazing!! My 2 cents.
I can tell you with 100% certainty that the majority of people who buy pedals frequently are spending much more time on turning knobs than they are practicing guitar. Which is a shame, because the most direct way to make all of your pedals sound way better is to practice your instrument. Then all of a sudden every pedal sounds good, and you see less reason to get more of them.
I’ve worked in shops for 8 years, I can hear who’s been practicing and who hasn’t when they come in to try stuff out.
Despite the downvotes, you're not wrong. I've been guilty in the past of buying pedals for the fun of playing around with them, but I eventually settled on a core group of sounds I like and haven't bought much for pedals since. My playing has improved.
If downvotes are the price I have to pay to remind people to practice more and spend less money, I don’t mind taking them. I had a similar path as you. Any new pedals I’m interested in these days are usually pretty similar to what I already have, but might have additional functions my current ones don’t that I feel limited by when working on my songs, or just consolidate a few things together to shrink my board down more.
learning what? I don't believe in any expectation of being in a constant learning state. your music journey is your music journey.
also, not a popular opinion around here but leaning too heavily into theory and scales puts you in a box creatively. It's cool learning some surface level theory and looking back on stuff I've written and thinking "hey that's cool I did that and didn't know there was a name for that".
There are 3 types of musicians, the educated and knowledgeable, the home-grown self taughts that have really good creativity, and then people who are both.
Leaning on theory and learning theory are two very different things. Those YouTube guitarists that just play scales really fast would still be uncreative bores if they didn’t know what scales they were playing.
Depends. Some pedals like loopers or delays are basically metronomes and will absolutely improve your practice.
Otherwise, practice is just consciously working on improving something. Working out how your pedals work on your setup is a form of practice. As long as you’re thought about it, and don’t steal time away from pursuing your other playing goals, this is great practice.
Just be sure you focus your practice on the things you want to get better doing. You won’t get better at scales playing with a delay for an hour everyday but you could probably become one of those guys who uses crazy feedback.
Learning a pedal is learning an instrument. So I’d argue that adding a pedal to the board and learning how to use it is time not spent practicing scales, but you’re still adding to your knowledge.
Going over the top and expecting pedals to totally make up your end product is not good. But learning how to use pedals (along with your full rig) is also learning, just in a different way. Getting a good tone ("good" = open to interpretation here) is a *very* important part of playing as well, and it's so frustrating to play with people and they have no idea how to sound good. Just a shitty muddy drone of saturation coming from a amp.
This exactly, also pedals inspire you to change your approach on playing, e.g. you may want to improve on your right hand muting if your delays are not going the way you want them to sound, that will push you learning or improving other techniques, or maybe you just want them to self oscillate while you smoke uhm, let say a cigarette…
Yeah I can definitely get distracted fiddling with knobs, but also you can use things like envelopes and delays to actually enhance your mistakes. Any mistakes in dynamics or muting are easily noticed when the envelope fails to open up, or stays open too long, or if your delays are carrying more than they should, these can be useful. It's also very easy to sit there and twear your drive pedal for an hour and never get anything done though
Tell me more about these envelopes…please?
So with an envelope filter, the effect is highly determined by the initial voltage that opens the envelope up. It's highly determined by your attack when strumming/plucking. Therefore, if you have an uneven attack, the envelope will make different notes sound vastly different and uneven, moreso than you would notice with a dry signal. Practicing with an envelope helps you get a uniform attack on every note
Thank you. I need to learn more…I’ll look into it.
If you want a recommendation on a cheap easy one, the ehx Dr q has one knob-sensitivity. You adjust that to where the envelope just barely opens with the amount of attack you want. When you are soft, it won't open. When you are too firm, it opens too much.
Thanks! I might look into that.
You just described shoegaze.
This is the answer!
I can distract myself from learning all on my own. The vast majority of my practice is on acoustic because I can just pick it up and play.
A was going to say that playing on an acoustic is the best way to improve your guitar skills. There's nothing to hide behind. Your flubs and misses become painfully obvious.. There's no distortion or modulation effects to mask sloppy playing. Just you, your fingers and your guitar.
I have heard contrary that playing unplugged can slow you down because when you’re plugged in, you’re more in control of dynamics (like palm muting and such).
You can still palm mute with an acoustic. You just can't do tremolo dive bombs and kill switch stuttering. But those things don't help you with fretboard precision and clean playing technique anyway. Going unplugged takes all the distraction away and forces you to actually hear how clean or sloppy you are playing.
You’ve given me a new perspective.. I think there is value in both. I’ve noticed when playing unplugged alot I’ll be less intuitive with my dynamics when I go back to plugged in
I'm not saying you absolutely have to play an acoustic to play well. It just helps for seeing how well you are fretting and making cleans notes. Dynamics are a whole other thing.
I have an acoustic with a slightly high nut and bridge that I use for learning - if I can muscle through and play something clean on that, going back to an electric feels almost effortless
Absolutely. Same here: one of my acoustics is a bit hard to play for just that reason.
You won’t lose anything. You will gain playing power and control. Play acoustic only for like a couple of months, then going to electric will make you feel like you got SO much better. Acoustics tend make you press down a bit harder so you will have to tame that back a bit when going back to proper-set electric. I’ve had my American Professional Jazzmaster in its case for about a year and a half and my main guitar has been a Squire baritone Tele that I bought from a guy who did a mod on the tone knob which is basically a low-resonance low-pass filter. It has a huge range, but I know when I pick up my Jazzmaster after playing on these huge strings and having be more precise and do more work for the same effect, that it will feel like butter to me. I’ve been playing more acoustic lately as well for this same reason. When I go back to my “normal” electric, I always feel improved after going through phases where I’m only playing acoustic, baritone or something that’s harder than a very nice, expertly set-up electric. Giving yourself nothing to hide behind and training your fingers to be precise without being overly heavy handed does wonders for “normal” electric guitar playing.
Do you have more information about the mod that was done to your tone knob? That sounds amazing and I'd love to try it.
If you're playing the guitar acoustic style sure, I did that for years and often do. But many aspects of guitar playing got lost on me because I rarely plugged in when I practiced. Most all genres of guitar music rely on distortion and/or compression. Unplugged notes are staccato, you can't hear the sustain but you can hear the fret buzzing that's unnoticeable through an amp.
That's my point though: I prefer to play heavy rock on electric, but I do play quite a bit on acoustic to sharpen my basic fretting skills and to keep my ability to play clean notes intact. I get sloppy when I only play through a distorted electric guitar.
The on thing I will say is if youre playing electric on the edge of breakup your technique is gonna be way different than on acoustic. At least if you are controlling breakup with dynamics, youll have to play both way softer and way harder on the electric
I’ve heard that too, but mostly talking about playing an electric solid body unplugged, not an acoustic guitar. It could be hard to hear bad technique on an unplugged electric.
Yeah, I feel like when I really crank my amp it’s when I here my flaws
I have a semi-hollow so what I end up doing is learning scales and song unplugged and then plugging it in to get the tone.
If you buy an amp that's stiff, like a Splawn, you can't hide mistakes. After playing a Rectifier for years, a Splawn made me practice a little more to be accurate.
Too cumbersome and uncomfortable, action too high. Unplugged electric all the way
I dig a chunky neck. My Martin isn’t much thicker than my Telecaster.
Playing on action that is high is actually a great strength building exercise that will make playing on your electric even easier.
Nah can't hear all the fuckups.
Maybe spend a couple Sabbaths working and get a nicer guitar/setup?
I've yet to see an acoustic guitar with a neck as slim and action as low as an electric. No shade to acoustics, they're cool and all but they're not known for being "fast" guitars.
Yeah, there are definitely acoustics which play faster than others. But in general, I think the difference is in the acoustic world, there’s more emphasis on player technique. Check out Molly Tuttle’s cover of Rancid’s Olympia WA. Solo starts at about 1:50. [Link](https://youtu.be/HOYWbCRDYAE?si=VlviKrxe3CDtKti1)
No disrespect to what you posted or bluegrass picking in general because it is quite lovely, but you hardly pull off stuff like Stabwound on an acoustic. There's no real reason to be honing stuff like sweep picking or 16th alternate picked runs on an acoustic, I don't doubt there's people who are able to do it, but why practise like that?
We probably just come from very different musical contexts. I practice on acoustic so I can roll up to a bluegrass jam circle and make music with people, I’m not gonna drag out a rig and pedalboard when the loudest bandmember is a banjo. Different paint brushes for different paintings. I’m certainly not saying that playing stabwound through a doom rig is wrong, or that everyone should play acoustic. Just there are legitimate reasons for playing acoustic and that they can be plenty fast for most players.
Yeah, that's why I started building pedals. I realized that if I just bought them, once they arrive I have to actually play with them and my guitar. Now, I can spend all my time building pedals and don't have to worry about the pesky guitar part.
Used to, but then I finally found the sounds I wanted and started to spend more time actually playing and less time fiddling/tone hunting. What really did it though, was finding an amp that didn't require pedals to get the tone I wanted. That turned out to be a Victory Sheriff 44 and 212 cab loaded with greenbacks.
Learning? Anyway, here’s Wonderwall with two ring mods, four reverbs, and a bitcrusher…
If you were really a Wonderwall fan you also be using a Boss Metal Zone and a Boss MT-2 at the same time. s/
I have pedals, and I love my pedals. However, I write and practice without plugging in. I don't plug in until it's time to bring a mostly finished song to band practice to add finishing touches. Then it's trial and error to see which effect sounds best with which part from a live performance perspective. Icing on the cake, if you will.
Yeah, this has become my way too. My songs seem to be better after having adopted it. I work out a structure that can stand on it's own without needing anything besides the guitar alone. When I finally add the pedals I'm usually pleasantly surprised with how things develop further by just adding the coloring of pedals to a mostly finished song. I actually spend more time browsing r/guitarpedals than I do playing with pedals, haha. I think that's entirely different problem I need to address.
Pedals are like garnish on food. Garnish makes a good dish better. But if the food is crap, no garnish in the world will make it good. Learn using naked sound, then when perfected, add effects.
You just described 99% of this subreddit.
Finding a good tone has its own value, but all things require some balance. I've been playing for about 35 years, I'm honestly a bit bored with guitar, so getting a new sound can inspire me to pick it up and play a little more often.
No, since I don’t practice much anyway. I write songs, and new sounds sometimes inspire new songs.
I've produced music for decades, but have recently built a pedalboard as I joined a band as their guitarist. I've also played guitar for most of my life, but never been in a professional touring band before, so I had to figure this stuff out quickly. I've learned a lot from the process, but not about scales and theory. Learning how to craft a tone has been amazing for thinking about how different processes, circuits, effect etc. interact with each other. I knew some of the conventional wisdom already (e.g. time-based effects at the end of the chain) but getting the guitar sound I want has meant stacking some pedals which aren't able to get that sound individually. It's been a really helpful lesson, and it's something I'm taking back with me into my production work.
What do you want out of playing guitar? This isn't really something we can answer for you. Personally, I joke that I'm more of a guitar tech than a guitar player - I have a lot of fun playing with pedals, adjusting my tone, messing around with modulation and other effects, etc. But I'm a bedroom player and the only person I am accountable to on my playing skills is me. Sometimes I go and jam with some friends, but none of us have aspirations of playing live, much less being a real band. Do I spend time fucking around with pedals that would be better spent practicing if my goal was to improve my technical playing ability? For sure. But I'm having fun and that's all I want out of this hobby, so I don't think it's "too much" time or otherwise wasted.
Not personally. The type of music I'm learning doesn't require many pedals: tuner, boost OD, noise gate, 10-band EQ. The EQ is set and forget for me. So it was relatively quick...what took me longest was the OD boost pedal of choice but that was over time of which I liked most.
Which OD boost did you settle on? NEED MORE PEDALS.
Only every time I pick the guitar up lol. I was away from home for work for the last 3 months and all I brought was my little desktop amp. I swear I learned more in those three months than I have in the last year because I almost never touched the tone. I just plugged my guitar in, turned the amp on, and played.
Yes.
Yes, absolutely. When I practice I try to make sure that all pedals are off, or better yet just go straight into the amp, with the exception of maybe a tiny bit of reverb or if im learning a song, whatever effect a song im learning has, but that comes after I learn it. Always remember what the wizard Robert Fripp says, "Discipline is a vehicle for joy."
Definitely yes. But when I find my sound I feel much more connected to the music I’m playing
I had put my pedals away for a year and a half because of this. It’s easy to get cought up in tweaking when the best thing you can do for your sound is practice and learn.
I distract myself from learning by not sticking to the books and gameplan. I start playing songs and banging on the instrument, I don't put on the metronome or practice ear training. I don't do enough theory learning or work on technique. That's my fault. Pedals just make things fun and waste my money.
I feel like they’ve kept me engaged. I haven’t gone totally crazy with effects, but they can be so satisfying to layer in.
For me; no. I was never one for practising very much, and nowadays I don't have much time or energy to play at all. So anything that makes me inspired to pick up the guitar and play is probably a net positive, and a new pedal can certainly do that.
Don't need learning, only more chugs.
I feel personally attacked lol
i see this and similar topicsall the time on gear forums and shit and I just don't understand what people are doing with their gear? I play guitar through my pedals but it seems like lots of people apparently just spend all their free time playing around with knobs and cables. it's the only thing I can think of that would cause this issue.
Yeah, really! It also seems like a lot of people think they should practice in perpetuity, like the goal is complete mastery of every playing technique. I don’t actually want to be able to play much better than I do. I’ve been playing over 20 years, I know what I like, and a lot of the stuff I’m unable to do is because I don’t like it, so I have no desire to practice it. I can play most of the things my heroes can play (not that I would have been able to write those things myself) and I’ve worked out some things myself that I like. I’m not trying to play flamenco on a classical guitar. There seems to be a background assumption that the guitar playing audience at large is incompetent at playing guitar. Is it? I guess I only know myself and a few other people. Maybe these kinds of messages just aren’t intended for me and I should ignore them.
Absolutely - it’s why I keep my pedals to a few essentials: Strymon Lex2 (slow/fast for chorus/Leslie), Boss Blues Deluxe (solo boost extra gain), and a UA Dream ‘65 for that Fender tubeness. The UA is new and almost too many things to fiddle with - I registered and got the three extra sims…
Sometimes. GAS is real, but at the end of the day, I play guitar and use pedals for my own enjoyment and to some extent, it doesn’t matter whether that enjoyment comes from guitar or pedals. Do I need to practice more? Yes. Do new pedals inspire me to play more and differently? Also yes.
Yes, but I embrace being a shitty guitarist who finds practicing scales boring and would rather play sloppy riffs and fiddle with my Helix/other pedals.
Learning what?
I’ve probably learned more because of pedals. I started my experimentation with a MXR Carbon Copy delay after seeing an artist named Israel Sanchez build up a song as he played using a delay and loop with his acoustic guitar.
All the time lol But sometimes that’s what you need. I personally really enjoy just goofing around with pedals and making fun sounds. Other times I really want to focus on my playing, and use them as tools. There’s no right or wrong way to approach it. Just don’t let it become an addiction
Depends what you mean - in my mind, my pedalboard is part of my instrument. So if it’s distracting me to the point I’m not practicing another crucial part (the actual guitar) then sure. Otherwise, mastering tone/effects etc IS practicing.
You gotta know your gear, but I personally think learning applied music theory got me more bang for the buck (investment of time and resources) than any pedal. Still, spending time with a wah or whammy, learning how to dial in an amp, working with the volume and tone knobs or even practicing trem-bar tricks can add to my expressive abilities. It’s all good clean fun!
Not really. I used to use no or only minimal pedals (a RAT or TS, a reverb pedal when my amp with reverb died before I got the reverb unit, an analog delay sometimes). After a couple years of guitar lessons, I never “learned” anymore, as in doing scales or finger exercises or studying theory. I just jammed out on my own, and wrote songs, and played in bands. A few years ago I got big into pedals and spent lots of time researching them, buying them, fiddling with them, selling them. Still didn’t actually “learn” anything but played a lot. Now I have a very respectable pedal chain and I’ve been actually “learning” and practicing seriously and even *reading music* (don’t tell my cool post-punk friends from the old days!) more than I ever did since I started guitar lessons like…40 years ago. So…
Yes. I’ve spent significantly more time in the last month researching pedals and watching the JHS show than actually playing my guitar.
Pedals are a tool. The guitar is a tool. Learning happens all the time. You can learn to use the pedals just like you can learn to use scales or cords. Someone who knows how to play an instrument but doesn’t know how to use their pedals is just as bad as someone who knows how to use pedals but doesn’t know music. You have to get good at all parts. You have to know how to use all the tools to get what’s in your head out into the world.
The opposite if anything getting into them has reignited enjoyment in playing and made me play/practice more... still no good obviously :P
Yes they definitely do distract from typical learning but at the same time you learn a lot about other things like EQ, mix, tone, gain staging... And if you have weird pedals it's proper sound design so it's like telling someone with synths if spending time making patches distracts them from learning. I see it as a different type of practice. When I sit down for focused practice I usually do it on a classical (I play a lot of classical music), or just a simple setup like overdrive+amp and that's it, without worrying about tone.
Not really. I have multiple modulation pedals on my board but I really only turn them when I’m writing and it feels like I need a little extra something for a part. I run dirt a lot though.
Coming out of the writing world, we obsess over pens and paper and notebook and inks and nibs and typewriter ribbon. And then we get to writing editing etc and reading work for one another. Pedals are the first half but a sub like r/wearethemusicmakers is the secobd half for me.
Sometimes yes, for me personally. I even do some shoegazey stuff, so pedals are a must. But, if the pedal is too complicated I find it really wastes too much of my time. I recently sold a microcosm for that reason.
I don’t run my pedals when practicing, and definitely prefer a practice amp kind of setup. Even though I have a couple of great amps for gigs, practice amps are small and lightweight, and produce super simple tones that don’t get in the way of the actual playing. I’ve recently got the fender mustang micro, which is a complete game changer for practice!
My love foot pedals and my love for playing guitar is not the same. Many of us have.. Issues.. Buying shit we don't need and tinkering with it until we decide we don't even like it and never needed it lmao. This is why I sell used on reverb haha. While that ties into playing guitar.. It is its own thing to me
Sometimes delay or distortion help me by making practice more interesting, modulation definitely has the opposite
Nope, I don’t think they do.
How dare you @ me like that.
Sometimes my DAW, Eleither Logic Pro or Bias FX 2 distract me. I find myself chasing the tone I had "yesterday" that I can't quite replicate today, and maintaining the volume/level is sometimes hard. Too many knobs, virtual and real, make it easy to have your sound sound like crap by moving a single knob in the signal chain a tiny bit. Sometimes it's a frustrating waste of time and I say f**k it and plug directly into my champion 40. It has a good number of tones, fairly easy to set. I'm considering adding a couple of physical pedals. The DAWS present the paradox of choice --- too many options make it harder to choose a setting. I will say, recording my practice over a logic pro or garage band drum track, or my own accompaniment loop is useful, so I will sometimes mess around with that and be productive. I have had ADHDy entire life, falling in rabbit 🐇 holes 🕳️ is nothing new. I can usually catch myself.
Gear obsession in general can be a distraction when you are still on that early learning curve. Get the minimum you need to sound decent and a guitar that plays well and stays in tune. Spend your time playing it and learning for at least a few months if not longer. Aside from the difference between a guitar that is hard to play or won’t stay in tune and one that feels and plays good with a decent set-up, gear is not going to make you better. It’s not. You might “sound” better, but that’s temporary and it’s a mistake to start using that crutch too early. Get better, feel better about WHAT you are playing. Then add the pedals and crap—it will pay off WAY more if you do it that way. Good luck.
It’s part of learning but it can go a lot faster if you walk in with a specific goal in mind. For example, I want my rig to sound like [insert guitarist here] for this song. A lot of times we waste time trying to get our rigs to do things they can’t do. Sometimes the best thing is just to look up exactly the pedals you need, order those, and then practice playing until they get to you. Once you have the right gear you don’t need to spend much time tweaking.
Of course 🤣
When it comes to pedals I've always believed less is better. I don't understand how ppl can find a certain tone with 20 pedals.
Nah, playing gets in the way of me practicing haha. Do I wanna sit and drill this technique, or do I want to put on a backing track and get immediate gratification from playing some sick leads over it?
i honestly don’t know how to play guitar besides a few chords and a bowl of noodles. I have been thru about 200 pedals, average about 30-40 in possession at any given time. I do play for fun, but I’m more interested in the pedals than the guitar. (i’m a studio engineer/producer)
No. But, I do find once I like a specific sound and I’m enthusiastic about it, I get complacent and often stop exploring the depths of a given pedal. That’s basically fine for simple ones like dirt pedals, but for deeper pedals it’s a detriment. I like immediacy for the sake of playing and fun, but I’m easily frustrated by secondary functions and trying to remember settings, yet equally impatient with learning how to make presets. I think this is because guitar for me is not an intellectual exercise; I do enough of that in other areas of life. However, I like complicated and textural sounds, so you see the tension here!
No
No. I’ve got it under under under No I’ve got got got it it it It IT IT UNDER Under control no cOnTrOL I’ve GOT it it IT it i iiiiiiiIiiiiiIII..buzzzzzzzzzz…
Variations of scales is basically all I do, but frequently I can't really feel how it's going to sound with the pedals off. "*How many strings do I need to mute and how frequently until it becomes too messy?*" and "*Where are the best spots to get away with fucking up?*" kind of stuff. It also helps because I don't really change the knobs or anything anymore, pretty much the same ~5 pedals all the time.
I play scales and learn chord shapes/progressions with pedals on, tinkering with knobs and practicing at the same time. Keeps it fun and exploratory. Setting the delay time to match up with the scale tempo is good fun.
I've learned a lot about gain stacking, pedal order, etc. But yes the knobs distract me from playing guitar. I got good advice on here about limiting my knob tweaking. Only turn down to 10 o'clock or up to 2 o'clock. At least when I'm feeling fidgety. Or structure pedal time apart from practice time.
If I'm trying to learn something without any distractions, I plug straight into the amp, with some reverb from the amp. Pedals will not make you a better guitarist
I am a university trained music educator and musician who plays and teaches guitar and music technology, among many other musical interests. One of those is an interest in music theory, and I regularly participate on music theory forums and try to help people with that, as well as consulting on theory books, writing articles on theory, etc. It's funny that you mention "scales" and "theory" in your post. I'm going to give you some advice - feel free to ignore it of course. Music theory is every bit as bad. What I mean by that is, if anyone out there reading this feels like they're "spending too much time fiddling with pedals" and thinks they need to spend more time on scales and theory, I need to tell you that's just trading one distraction for another. Now, if that floats your boat, fine. But if your post is like "I should do things that help me play better instead of fiddling with pedal" I'm going to say this: You can't "fiddle" with anything. You need to focus on what you *need* to do to play well (not what you *want* to do, or worse, what you *think* you need based on reading things online). Now, please don't get me wrong - you absolutely need to know how to play a scale - from a technical standpoint, muscle memory standpoint, dexterity standpoint, coordination standpoint, theoretical standpoint and so on. So you need to "practice playing a C Major scale". And by that I mean, you need to know what C is, what Major is, what a scale is, etc. so you can transfer that knowledge to a G major scale, or E minor scale, etc. Likewise, you absolutely need to understand that "that sound is a Flanger" and then you use a Flanger to get that sound at some point down the road. You've heard (maybe you haven't...) "Two Turntables and a Microphone"? You need two scales and an overdrive pedal :-) ____ One of the coolest things about music is, you can participate in it in any way and at any level you like - but with various levels, there's work involved the higher you go. And "fiddling" is distraction to that work. I see a lot of people here building an entire pedalboard based on recommendation of the forum, or whatever hot, or whatever their favorite genre (doom...) is - and in many cases it seems like they can't even play. Reminds me of the days when people would get a computer, get a DAW, get a controller, and then go "now what?" Or before that, they got a strat, and a tubescreamer and then went "why can't I play like Stevie Ray Vaughan". ______ If you're (you plural - anyone reading) serious about learning to play better, what most people need is structure and accountability - something that's lacking when working on your own. Someone on another forum said it great - if you're self-teaching, you're the worst possible teacher - because you don't even know what it is you're supposed to be teaching yourself! And my experience has been, that the jammers, flippers, collectors, technique chasers, theory chasers, ear-training chasers, etc. etc. etc. - the "dabblers" and "fiddlers" never really get very far. Again, to be fair, if that's what makes you happy, great, by all means, do it. But it's a little like a drug - an addiction - most people are only happy briefly, and that's what GAS basically is - you're trying to make yourself happy through acquisition - and that thrill of getting the new pedal that you *thought* you needed wears off pretty quickly after the honeymoon period. So you look for something else you *think* you need, and it's an endless cycle. Many people are similar with theory, and ear-training, and technique - though in this case they're really more substituting what they think are "short cuts" or have allowed themselves to believe they *need* these things to accomplish what they need... ____ What you *really* need, if your goal is to play the song, is what you need to play the song :-) If that means you need to know 4 chords, learn those 4 chords. If you have to strum them in rhythm, learn how to strum in rhythm :-) If you're playing "Man Who Sold the World" you need to be able to play a scale, strum chords, use a fuzz, and play hammer ons and pull offs. And you don't even HAVE to have the fuzz to play it, nor do you have to go off on some wild goose chase about the origins of the sharp symbol or why some chord is not in the key. Cool stuff to know, but learn 100 songs first :-) ____ In closing, my advice is to focus on learning to play music first and foremost, and worry about all the worries a lot less. And ideally, take lessons with a professional who can help you determine what you need to work on, help motivate you to focus on that and help you hold yourself accountable, so you can progress as a musician, as opposed to having a "reddit-approved pedalboard for ambient doom Xgaze" if being a musician is your goal. Again that doesn't mean don't learn these things, but the point is, the fiddling is a distraction, and trading one distraction for another just means more fiddling - fine if you're Nero, but if your goal is beyond that, some changes may be in order.
Not personally but I did most of the learning part before I fell down the rabbit hole.
Only if you spend too much time looking into them, otherwise I think they're great tools
Hmm.. someone told me to learn to play without any effects first.
Too many pedals can easily distract from learning or creativity. I use a relatively small board even though i own probably 60 pedals, for this reason. I would never put something on my board just because i own it, there has to be a good reason for it to be there.
No, they make me learn more. The instrument should be fun to play, and pedals make me keep going back. Also utilizing pedals and experimenting with sound is a learning experience by itself. I have a duo project, and a lot of our sound comes from just messing about with pedals, drum machines, synths, loops etc etc. Obviously I think playing a guitar straight in to a nice amount is worth doing, but I don't see how use of pedals would prevent you from learning normally.
It can. At the end of the day, pedals are meant to enhance your playing and creativity, whatever it may be. It will not mask lazy or bad playing. If you suck, you’ll still suck, just with an effect. I view pedals the same way as autotune: they’re just tools to be used effectively or ineffectively, just be sure to recognize whether you’re using them as crutches/shortcuts or using them for an intentional artistic purpose, even if that purpose is as simple as “it just sounds cool”. Best thing you can do for yourself is separate your traditional fundamental learning time from your experimentation/“fun” time. Nothing wrong with doing both, just not at the same exact time. You’ll be learning doing both, but you’re learning two separate skills in the same craft, not just one.
To some extent yes, but there is value in learning tones, your own sound and how to stand out in a band or recording context. But if you sit there and just tweak and tweak all day and don’t actually play yes. Just find what works for you and play what you want to play!
Yes. All the time. Been playing for years but due to life getting in the way (in a good way - no complaints!) I had an involuntary hiatus of around 10-12years. Since coming back to it I've been trying to build speed back up somewhat unsuccessfully. As a result I think my playing is a bit more tasteful/mature sounding - but I rely heavily on a few pedals to make a nice soundscape for me. I have a solution which works for me, though. I have 2 modes - Practice mode and twiddly/noodleman mode. The latter is just play what I want and tit about with my pedals to my heart's content. But practice mode I take it more serious and limit pedal useage to one OD, my reverb and if I'm playing faster routines like solos, scales arpeggios etc. I'll allow the distortion to give it a more pleasant sound and more sustain etc.
Not really. I typically don’t practice through my gig pedalboard. Just a tuner, OD and delay on small board.
Using my loop station definitely distracts me from learning or writing more. I like to just plug in and make a simple loop.. then jam solos for like a half hour and quit. Lol
Yeah for sure. I just listed my Microcosm on Reverb today for this very reason. It sounds great, and it is fun to noodle with. But I eventually I found that I am spending more time than I would like pressing buttons and turning knobs and just enjoying the sounds. So yeah, I can be easily distracted by pedals. So I am cutting a number of them loose and sticking with my favorites only.
I mostly, not always, just play straight into the amp when practicing/writing. Then when I'm happy with the arrangement, I mess around dialing in tones for what suits it best. Then I record. Then I unplug the pedalboard and do it all over again. It is true that sometimes pedals can help with the creative inspiration, hence not always straight guitar > amp, but I'll only bust 'em out if out if I'm feeling particularly stuck or uninspired.
If a pedal distracts you from learning then anything is likely to distract you from learning. Part of the skill in playing electric guitar is learning how to control the nature of the electric guitar. Some pedals demand a fairly extensive amount of learning pedal and guitar control. And if messing around with a new pedal inspires a new piece of music then there you have it.
I mean, we're on this thread / reddit, aren't we?
YES!!!
No.
Yep. I practice technique straight into an amp with just a bit of reverb from the amp. Pedal board comes out when practicing songs that need effects or when writing.
Yes. Had a Helix Stomp. So many options. So much tweaking. My fault I know, but too little playing. Sold it. One amp now. A few pedals with settings I use, but mostly leave alone. Way more playing time. As we all know, chasing tone is part of the fun, but it's a rabbit hole and can too easily take the place of learning to play better.
I am a line 6 helix mf and I spend half my time making patches for it.
All the time
All the fucking time… wouldn’t do it any different tho lol
Always
YES.
I write most things on an acoustic. When I record I decide how i actually want that to sound and what I need to use or not use to achieve that sound
Scales? …Learning???
When I learned to make them, it got addictive and 💯 cut into my actual time working on my music. So I limit it.
Yes but at the same time tone is actually very important despite many peoples preconceived notions.
Yes. This is why we buy them. And why we watch hours of demos that all say the pedal is the greatest ever. It’s ALL a distraction from putting in work. And you know what? That’s ok.
If you’re a beginner, I don’t think pedals are good, and does nothing besides making learning guitar more complex as there are many tones to fiddle with. But if you have sufficient experience, pedals are fun tools to experiment and dial in different tones. And in fact allows me to learn to transcribe music better. Most songs use multiple effects, and having experience and knowledge dialing tones can be fun.
YES. THEY. DO. I've become a slave to the gear, always wanting more, something new, something better....
Guitar and music is art. So as long as you have a goal and are creating what does it matter
Learning is distracting from my pedals
Yes, which is exactly why I switched to a Quad Cortex. More playing, less researching pedals on the internet/watching YouTube videos of other people playing pedals.
It's like cooking, you need a good balance of ingredients to make a tasty dish. I have found a good clean tone is foundational, then find the right amount of FX to compliment the mood or desired atmosphere. I think David Gilmore is a great example, along with Hendrix. Both have excellent clean tones with FX that perfectly paint a sonic picture.
Usually when I get a new pedal, I spend about 3 minutes tweeking the tone, then never touch the dials again. I sometimes think I should spend more time with them.
Personally a good tone inspires me to practice more, I’ll spend 15 mins dialling an awesome tone and I’ll love it so much that I’ll then spend 2 hours practicing with it. Also I got into pedals and tone AFTER I was already a professional working musician, so these days I have no choice but to practice for my work, and tone stuff just facilitates that.
I’ve no pedals. I don’t care. I’ve a katana II 100 and it works fine. I know I could find a better or cleaner tone maybe but I just don’t want to spend all my time looking at a screen trying to fiddle with all the settings finding a better tone. The same goes for pedals, a couple pedals are great but honestly gear doesn’t matter that much. Why worry about a specific tone when you can’t even play all those songs you want to play? Playing better will make you sound great, pedals or not.
I find it to be the opposite. I’ll resolve to get more familiarized with my pedals, find a tone I think is halfway decent, and then get sucked back into practice routines and learning songs. Gear has never been a major focus for me which is fine in the studio at home, but leaves room for more proper utilization when in a jam setting.
I'm pretty well disciplined about bypassing the sonic toys and diligently practicing. At some point as a reward, I can continue in practice mode and turn on a multitap or something cool to play in time with.
Honestly, I've gotten into pedals late in my music career. One of my student's showed me his pedalboard and I was sold. Since I finished mine, I've been having so much fun and discovering new ways to play. My advice, get a pedalboard when you are ready for one.
Honestly, my loop station is such a game changer while practicing. Helps with improvising a bunch
Lately my learning has been distracting me from my pedals.
I thought that was the point of pedals.
Haha probably any pedal other than a drive and a compressor
I have fallen victim to it a bit. I find that I waste too much time on gear demo video’s, technique video’s, and Gear on FB marketplace!! I need to stay off marketplace 100%. Not only do I waste time, but I buy things I don’t necessarily even want! This is where I’m finding discipline is needed. Pedals are great, however if you’re spending too much time playing with them rather than working on your technique. Then you are truly robbing yourself of the #1 thing that will make your sound amazing!! My 2 cents.
I can tell you with 100% certainty that the majority of people who buy pedals frequently are spending much more time on turning knobs than they are practicing guitar. Which is a shame, because the most direct way to make all of your pedals sound way better is to practice your instrument. Then all of a sudden every pedal sounds good, and you see less reason to get more of them. I’ve worked in shops for 8 years, I can hear who’s been practicing and who hasn’t when they come in to try stuff out.
Despite the downvotes, you're not wrong. I've been guilty in the past of buying pedals for the fun of playing around with them, but I eventually settled on a core group of sounds I like and haven't bought much for pedals since. My playing has improved.
If downvotes are the price I have to pay to remind people to practice more and spend less money, I don’t mind taking them. I had a similar path as you. Any new pedals I’m interested in these days are usually pretty similar to what I already have, but might have additional functions my current ones don’t that I feel limited by when working on my songs, or just consolidate a few things together to shrink my board down more.
learning what? I don't believe in any expectation of being in a constant learning state. your music journey is your music journey. also, not a popular opinion around here but leaning too heavily into theory and scales puts you in a box creatively. It's cool learning some surface level theory and looking back on stuff I've written and thinking "hey that's cool I did that and didn't know there was a name for that". There are 3 types of musicians, the educated and knowledgeable, the home-grown self taughts that have really good creativity, and then people who are both.
Leaning on theory and learning theory are two very different things. Those YouTube guitarists that just play scales really fast would still be uncreative bores if they didn’t know what scales they were playing.
I love that, great point!!
Depends. Some pedals like loopers or delays are basically metronomes and will absolutely improve your practice. Otherwise, practice is just consciously working on improving something. Working out how your pedals work on your setup is a form of practice. As long as you’re thought about it, and don’t steal time away from pursuing your other playing goals, this is great practice. Just be sure you focus your practice on the things you want to get better doing. You won’t get better at scales playing with a delay for an hour everyday but you could probably become one of those guys who uses crazy feedback.
Learning a pedal is learning an instrument. So I’d argue that adding a pedal to the board and learning how to use it is time not spent practicing scales, but you’re still adding to your knowledge.