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Effects!!! Fender Blender???

Started by PaulDigs, August 05, 2008, 12:18:16 AM

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PaulDigs

Hey guys...
I have a suitcase and want to beef it up and get some
Stevie Wonder "Too High" gritty type tones as well as some Bob James type sound...any ideas of what kind of effects are good out there...
Anytime i ask someone at a Guitar Center, they claim to own a rhodes and tell me i should get some kinda guitar stomp box i never heard of...

help me out!  I want to beef up my sound some how...

Also...

Don't know it the suitcase bottom really does it for me...it sounds great but get muddy when i play too many keys holding the sustain down...can i run the suitcase model through other amps?

I have a beautiful suitcase mark I 1979 i think....with Bass and trebble sliders..

Best

Jordy

Quote from: "PaulDigs"Hey guys...
I have a suitcase and want to beef it up and get some
Stevie Wonder "Too High" gritty type tones as well as some Bob James type sound...any ideas of what kind of effects are good out there...
Anytime i ask someone at a Guitar Center, they claim to own a rhodes and tell me i should get some kinda guitar stomp box i never heard of...

help me out!  I want to beef up my sound some how...

Also...

Don't know it the suitcase bottom really does it for me...it sounds great but get muddy when i play too many keys holding the sustain down...can i run the suitcase model through other amps?

I have a beautiful suitcase mark I 1979 i think....with Bass and trebble sliders..

Best

If you want only some grit, i wouldn't use the Fender Blender (it soaks all your sound in the fuzz).  A Rhodesguy I know got some pretty good results with the Fulltone OCD (which works pretty good if you have a completely clean base) I've heard the the Hughes & Kettner Tubeman and Tubefactor are good too (and no, they are not toob, so won't comprimise your sound - ask andi85)
'71 Stage 73  >>  Fender Hot Rod Deluxe

LanceMoore

Hey guys,

I am new on this board, but I am not new to Rhodes pianos.  I have a Mark 1 Stage 73 Rhodes.  I play Alt/Rock...  Think Coldplay/The Fray/Keane/Travis.  Hey bro, ironically, I think for what you are looking to accomplish, the guy at Guitar Center was right.  That is exactly what I do, but I mount them on top of the piano (not stomping them on the floor) so that I can adjust live.  I use 2 guitar pedals with my Rhodes and they serve my needs perfectly and are relatively easy to operate by hand.

1) Ibanez Turbo Tube Screamer, model TS9DX - This pedal has 4 different settings.  The "Turbo" setting gives it a nice, rich, amped-up sound.  The TS9"+" mode gives it a really overdriven, gritty, dirty, distorted (you get the picture) sound.    I like this pedal (over other distortion pedals I tried) because it has 4 sound settings, 2 of which are very unique and also very useful for a Rhodes application.  
http://www.ibanez.com/electronics/product.aspx?m=TS9DX

If you have a Rhodes piano (like the Mark 1) that does not have a Tremolo dial, this next pedal is a good catch...
2) Electro-Harmonix Micro Pulsar Effects Pedal - This pedal is great on a rhodes.  It lets you choose between a Triangular Wave (smooth) or a Square Wave (fragmented) vibration pattern, and it also lets you change the shape of the waveform and the intensity of the vibration.  For some of our more-pensive songs, I will get a nice medium-slow, pretty intense, square waveform going, and it sounds great.  In one of our medium-tempo harder-rock jams, I play around with some vibration velocity decreases... Everyone drops out but me on Rhodes, with a really fast vibration, then I dial it down quickly for a really funky, spacey transition.  Possibilities are endless.
http://www.guitarcenter.com/Electro-Harmonix-Micro-Pulsar-Stereo-Tremolo-Effects-Pedal-104087846-i1171531.gc

You can do some pretty funky things with your Rhodes by playing around with these pedals.  I'd definitely recommend checking these guys out at your local music store.

L