half a dozen pages ago I posted V1 of my U2/tribute show direct rig:
- v1.jpeg (3.76 MiB) Viewed 417 times
While I was getting some decent sounds, I wasn't entirely happy with this rig. I was using amps and overdrives from the Eleven Rack and modulated delays from the M5 and in the end I figured out that the issue was both the Eleven Rack and the M5.
The Eleven rack is a great unit and in general I really like it, but the U2 sounds are all about delays, boosts and random shit in front of the amp, and the more stuff I added in from the of Eleven, the rattier the amp sounded and I was forever tweaking and not really getting to where I wanted.
And finally, two pedalboards and a skeleton rack turned out to be annoying to transport and set up, specially as I didn't have cases for the pedalbaords.
Enter Version 2.0:
- 441162223_777141584390756_3149342669029800365_n.jpg (421.13 KiB) Viewed 417 times
- 440018656_3603230836657494_272167488239318481_n.jpg (497.59 KiB) Viewed 417 times
After doing a fair bit of hunting around for bargains over the past couple months, I have picked up (and fixed up) a flight case, an Eventide Timefactor and a UAFX Ruby. The Ruby seems to be quite happy to be slapped around with a whole lot of input on the front end, the Timefactor is a brilliant delay with a silly good vintage delay mode and the Line6 M5 has been relegated to overdrive and special FX. The Edge used Line 6 distortions from about 2004 to 2018 or so, so unsurprisingly, certain modes on that thing sound the business.
I thought I was happy with this rig and tones until a couple of days ago, when I figured out something that took it all up a level. In the Timefactor, you can set two delays with different tempos, and when you do this in stereo, you are swimming through a world of sparkling delays bouncing around your ears and it's quite lovely.
It's also completely inappropriate for U2, because for the most part the delays only have a couple of repeats and there's only one delay.
But I found if you set both delays to the same time, everything gets huge and wide sounding, even though the delays are not ping ponging around.
I think this works because as the delays modulate, the delay times change very slightly, creating that stereo width. Even more fun, I can set only one delay for the verse of a song and it feels good, and then in the bridge I can use two delays at the same delay time, and make every thing feel sound bigger and wider.
This combined with the subtle stereo room reverb in the UA Ruby and occasional stereo reverbs and modulations from the M5 has been rather enjoyable.
There will at some point be a version 2.1 - The boss delay in the pictures is a placeholder, I'd like to add a boost pedal of some sort, and I'd like to get a bypass looper thing so that I can add the boost, compressor and whammy bypass into a preset.
Anyway, that's quite enough geekery for one night, as you were
