After the shock caused by the great demand for vintage guitar pedals, the manufacture of electric guitar fuzz effects as well as that of other types of guitar effects in analog pedal format have multiplied, something that is a nightmare for those who start in the world of effects pedals.
It is not possible to give an exact figure for all the effects pedals on the market, especially since many manufacturers around the world each year develop models that fail to be imported.
However, it is more convenient to know some popular brands as well as the types of effects that exist, and with that information start looking for something that meets the needs based on the available budget.
Guitar Effects Brands
Some manufacturers of effects and instruments are still leading the market for these products, other brands appeared later to offer high-quality effects capable of competing successfully, while others were only able to sustain themselves by being acquired by their competition or bigger manufacturers. Finally, among some of the most popular brands of analog guitar effects and effects guitar pedals include:
- MXR
- Boss
- Xvive
- Joyo
- Nux
- Behringer
- Dunlop
- Digitech
- Electro Harmonix
- Catalinbread
- Death By Audio
- Earthquaker Devices
- Ibanez
Some of these brands’ types of guitar pedals are geared more toward the live sound, while others are geared towards home production, as is often the case with guitar pedal effects, in any case, only these manufacturers can reach a very wide audience and meet their needs in terms of quality, variety, and price.
Order of guitar effects
After knowing how guitar pedals work and knowing some brands, it’s time to improve the sound of the guitar. For that, you need to know the order of the effects chain, something that applies equally to analog and multi-effects pedals. The optimal order would be as follows:
- Tuners: Responsible for ensuring the correct tuning of the instrument prior to the chain of effects.
- Compressors: Control the dynamics of the instrument’s sound, they function as an automatic adjustment for rapid increases in volume or gain.
- Expression: Volume, Octaver, Pitch Shifter, or Whammy pedals, primary modulations are included.
- Distortion: Effects that produce increased gain and take advantage of the harmonic saturation of the instrument are included. Fuzz, overdrive, and distortion pedals go in this place and are not usually combined with each other.
- EQ: Output tone control so far, EQ is useful for dealing with undesirable harmonics or changing the colorature of the sound.
- Modulations: Here are chorus, flanger, phaser, and other effects that play with the waveform and phase of the sound signal. These can be combined and arranged to create very complex sounds.
- Time: Delay and reverb, effects that double the signal and simulate the sound within a physical space with more channels, just to go directly to the amplifiers.
This is not a law, but it is the configuration that usually best takes advantage of the combinations of guitar effects. It is possible to play freely with this, but there is also the possibility that the effect of some pedal goes completely unnoticed or that another makes important differences when applied to the signal.
Another thing, you should not be attracted by the idea of filling yourself with effects thinking that this will serve to have the best tone. Many great guitarists like Kirk Hammett don’t use too many pedals, because they consider the natural sound of their instruments and their amps to be involved in the process, for example.
So far the explanations, but there is still more, we have other publications with useful information so you can improve the tone of your instrument. We have effects, accessories, and equipment at your disposal. We are Vntagetone, for a modern age.