a "BLAST" button?

[UnklMickey]

as you all know, "your favorite uncle" occasionally has these electrical discharges across the gray matter.

i had one today, and i thought i'd share the results with you.

i chose not to do a poll, because the comments will be much more useful than votes.
______________________________________________

i have heard eddie VH (and others) use a technique where
he modulated the volume suddenly, dramatically, and in rapid succession.

i like some of the VH stuff, but it's not really a style that i would play myself even if i could.
(sometimes i DO enjoy listening to it though)
so i never researched the way he achieved this.

i don't know if he is just really quick with the volume knob, or if he uses a switch.
_________________________________________


so now that i decided it should be done with a switch, to jump from part volume to full volume, my questions to all of you are:

• do you see a use for this?
  
  
• would you want one on your guitar?
  
  
• am i just re-inventing the wheel 'cause it's common knowledge,
  and unk must have been living in a cave not to have seen this done before?
  

your comments on the above or any other thoughts on the matter will be greatly appreciated.

"...and as always, we thank you for your support."

[stinkmonkey]

My GNX3 has a tweakable volume swell effect. I've seen it else where too.Yes I do use the volume for a swell.

[bam]

volume pedal. thats it.

[erikh]

Hey guys. It's been a while since I've posted. Life has been busy. Anyway, this thread caught my attention. The way Eddie did that technique was not only with volume pot swells but with a delay unit set to about 330ms and hammer-ons with his left hand. The lowering of the volume allows him to change positions with minimal to no noise. The delay makes it all flow together and it makes it sound like he's playing a violin, just like the studio version of Cathedral.

[UnklMickey]

the effect i was talking about was almost percussive, not a swell.

i can't remember what song it was in. maybe hot for teacher, or the cradle will rock. it was in one of those exposed instrumental breaks so it really was obvious. went from eighth notes to sixteenth note repetition.

i'll have to pull out the discs and find it so i can do a better job of describing it.


unk

[RandomHero]

Perhaps a grossly modified tremolo box?

[UnklMickey]

admin said:

Perhaps a grossly modified tremolo box?

well as the saying around here goes: "all things are possible..."

but the tempo of the pulses felt more like it was being "played" rather than dialed in.

[erikh]

Hmm, percussive. In "And the Cradle Will Rock", that entire rhythm part is an organ, not even guitar. The only guitar is the solo and a little overdubbed speedpicking. If you can find the song and the part, I may know what's going on. Some of his stuff is crazy but I've seen him live enough to remember how he's pulling some of it off.

[UnklMickey]

i pull out some VH discs last night and found, much to my chagrin, a mind is a terrible thing. i was way off on my recollection of where he did that. it was in "you really got me". almost 1:40 into it.

you guys must have listened to those other tunes, and thought unk had lost it.

[pollyshero]

Right after the solo. That's a switch. He used the "Frankenstein" Strat on that - Charvel body, no-name neck, one PAF, one vol, and a switch to cut out the pickup live because the setup was hideously noisy (I have a lot of old GP's laying around! And say - sounds like EVH is a GuitarNut too!).

Using a switch or vol pot in this manner is as old as the hills. In my mind the idea of a separate effect to replace them would be redundant, however not so far-fetched. After all, someone invented the "Whammy-Pedal", didn't they?

Unk - here's the catalyst to keep your idea alive:

Tom Morello (Rage Against The Machine/Audioslave) has developed his entire style around modulating "the volume suddenly, dramatically, and in rapid succession." Give either Rage or AS a listen sometime - that high-tech sound is simple (yeah, right!)manipulation of on-board controls. You'll FREAK when he uses the switch against the pot at the same time. And by the way, he loves his Digitech Whammy Pedal. You'll know it when you hear it - it makes you queasy...

Anyway - point is I don't think you'd be re-inventing the wheel - you'd just have to find a way to market it.

How 'bout a triggered noise gate? Hmm...

Later

[bam]

it's a total on-off switch combined with volume (or wah? no, I think it's volume.) pedal. yeah, it is.

I think the S1 switch would do that job almost perfectly.. wouldn't it ?

[erikh]

Now I know what you're talking about, unk. It's a switch with a dead position. The volume pot isn't used. The same thing can be accomplished on an LP with the coupled volume pots by turning down the neck and flipping between bridge and middle quickly. With a single pickup guitar, just install a small on/off toggle.

[Mini-Strat_Maine]

erikh said:

With a single pickup guitar, just install a small on/off toggle.

How about a normally-closed (momentary) push button? You might get a little more speed with that, and less chance of it getting left in the "dead" position. Could also work as a kill switch if held down long enough to unplug the axe. (Just more proof that a mind is a terrible thing . . . )

[bam]

pretty neat idea.

.. how 'bout a doorbell button ? :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
(of course, just kidding)

[Ripper]

Years ago when I played a Les Paul, Id turn off the neck pup. Then while in lead mode for affect sometimes id toggle back and forth quickly between lead and rhythm for that same sound. I believe thats what Eddie was doing as well.

[4real]

Yeah...The Kill Switch...very popular these days....

I've seen a few posts on this and people seem to like the idea of a small puhbutton switch to get the effect...so the doorbell switch isn't far off.

Basically, a momentary normally open switch seems to be the go so that when pushed (closed) it shorts the hot to ground of the whole guitar.

Great track...I thought EVH used a V or explorer to do this on this track...at least he did in the film clip as I recall (it was a few years back). I originally saw it done by Townsend who used it a bit in The Who.

It's sometimes used by folks these days to simulate turntable "scratching" and reverse effects (the sudden cut off can sound like the abrupt end of reversed sounds, especially if there's a swell ahead of it).

So a simple mod and you could hide a SMD momentary switch just about anywhere (i thought in the pickup ring of a humbucker for instance)...if you wanted to get tricky.

[UnklMickey]

my thoughts on this were a bit different than one would think of at first.

for implementation i would use a spst momentary contact push-button NORMALLY CLOSED.

i'd wire it in series from the low terminal of the volume control to ground.

when the volume control was at a lower setting, and the button is pressed, instantaneously the volume would go to (almost) full when the ground connection was broken.

should be a lot easier to control than toggling a 3-way.


unk

[cband7]

Read a documentary on EVH recently and on "You Really Got Me" it was the pickup switch. I never used to think someone could move a volume/wah pedal that fast until I heard a demo where I thought the guy's ankle was on speed.