Musician Forum - Band Discussion Board - BandMix

How much delay is too much for a tastefull lead solo sound?
Been finally working some delay into my solo parts for the NKF music.
Got a boss delay pedal run through the effects loop on my Nomad.
Kinda worked out the effect level and feedback I want, but as for the actual delay time.
Thats tough.
Any thoughts? Kinda would like to have it tweeked before practice on Wednesday.
Should you actually hear the delay, or just extend the note a hint?

Sans, IMO to much delay is where your notes start to lap, in other words the previous note you played covers up the note you are playing. To much delay really depends on the tempo of the song you are playing. I like a longer delay time in a slow melodic solo. I play a lot of very fast leads like Eruption ect. you have to be very careful not to have to long a delay time when you play this way. I have an old boss I think DD5 it has a particular setting on it that really gives a lot of depth with a very short delay time it really thickens my guitar up for lead solo's and I use it a lot. My advise to you is to read the example settings in the little book that comes in the box with your new pedal and experiment untill you find the setting that you like and then maybe tweak that one a little untill it suits your taste. That is what I did with my delay pedal and I love it! Also I would advise you to find a general setting for live performance that you can use so you are not constantly bending over to adjust your delay time and spending to much time between songs, that also leaves room for error. A lot of players have 2 pedals just so they don't have to do this they have one preset for the slow melodic stuff and one for the faster stuff.
I prefer, I call it a slap back delay when I strike a note the delay will sound 3 to 4 times the first delay is of a lower volumn than the originally played note and the susequent notes progressively get quieter with the last one barely audible when you are playing with it set this way it really thickens your solos up. Your Les Paul through that Nomad will sound awesome.

Thanks J
I have had this delay for some time. From back when I just played pedals to PA. For the last year I have been just getting used to my Nomad with no effects at all. I dont have the little book any longer, perhaps I can find a downloadable verison. At any rate, my solos are all short riffs, and nothing fancy or fast, I tweeked it up and down for about an hour this morning before it got so hot in my shop that the sweat was running off my nose.
Perhaps I will record some examples for you guys to hear.
Preciate the input.

Sans, Fender doesn't make the 85 amps anymore. You either have to find one on ebay, craigslist, or in a Pawn shop (oddly enough I bought one of mine at the Goodwill store).

There are 3 common types of these amps that you can find:

Studio 85
Deluxe 85
Eighty Five

They're identifiable by their red knobs.

Another really cool amp is the Marshall 8080 as seen in this listing;

http://xrl.us/be2x8f

These are also discontinued amps. But the cool thing about them is that there is a 12ax7 for the distortion channel in the amp. SS cleans, tube dist. Kind of like getting the best of both worlds. The distortion on these are better than the Fender, but the cleans in the Fender are far better.

One thing to note about a good SS clean channel like a Fender is that a good Dist. pedal really sounds great when used with an amp with killer cleans. That's what drew me to the Fenders when I sold my Mesa. On the other hand with a Marshall 8080, you can shape the dist. channel's sound simply by swapping 1-12ax7 to the sound of your liking. So then it comes down to which channel you use the most. If you use dist. for 90% of your set, then the marshall is the better way to go. If you use more cleans throughout your set, and an occasional dist. lead, then the Fender is the better choice.

Thanks again shredd6:
I dont use the clean channel on my amp at all. Might as well not even be on there.
Although now that have become acoustomed to my amp I am experimenting more. I have my foot switch now so I can change channels on the fly.
I like the distorted lead sounds, and have no complaints from the band.
Before when I attempted to use the clean, it was so sharp, crisp and LOUD, it would shut down the whole project.
Takes some getting used to.

Yea, then I would stay away from buying a Fender. They're not revered for their distortion. I think you'd find it to be too high-strung. I use a good dist. pedal with mine. Even my MG-50 has a better built-in Dist.

Marshall MG's have a terrible resale value though.

http://xrl.us/be2y8g

It's hard to get rid of them at 1/2 price these days. Maybe that's a sign. Personally, for a $350 price tag, I can think of a lot of amps I'd rather have.

Hahaha.. I just noticed that I posted this in the wrong thread. People are gonna read this and be like, "WTF are they talking about??"

It's all cool and seamless from where I stand.
I think my little Ibanez may have a loose connection. It's worked fine ever since I talked about replacing it. Must be a female amp.

I think you would really like an 8080... With an RCA 7025 in it. I have the head version (8100), and it kills!!

I have two Fender amps. A '62 Fender Deluxe that I found in a pawn shop for $75 (it had a Radio Shack speaker in it which I replaced with a Celestion) and an Eighty Five I found in a pawn shop for $100 (I need to replace the speaker in it now as it has a rattle). Shredd, I'm glad you told us about the Eighty Fives being good amps and hard to find. Now I'll replace the speaker and hang on to it for dear life.

Oh, back to the thread. I'm a multieffects pedal guy myself, and can usually tweak the distortions to what I want, but mainly, I like them because you can set different lengths of delay for each preset. If I were to go back to using amp distortion or a stomp box distortion, I would still use my multieffects inline for the different delays, phase, flange, tremolo, etc. It's just too easy to go from sound to sound.

I use a LIne 6 Modeler delay pedal. You can program up to 3 basic delays in there, but the cool thing is that you turn the delay on and tap the tempo of the song in playing live.

The reality is that I use very little delay in solos, I like the old school basic in your face sound. It cuts live. I hear bands all the time that hteir guitarist use too much chorus or delay and to my ears it just washes out.

When I getsome examples of thetone / delay I am going to use for a while I will post it in the scratching post section.