dSix

Got the Digitech Whammy I bought from Ollie delivered today in an impressively protected box! Great communication made for an easy sale. Cheers!

Unfortunately for pedals 1, 2, 3 and 4 you can only assign: 1: Compressor or Wah 2: OD/Distortion or FX-1 3: Chorus or FX-2 4: Reverb/Delay or Sound on Sound Using the "Pedal Assign" feature though you can assign multiple effects (e.g. Compressor Off, Distortion On, Octave On) to the expression pedal switch or the Bypass/Control pedal. I think you can plug in an additional switch pedal to use as well if you have one of those. Okay so a little Pedal Assign guide... I'll use using the [i]CTL[/i] pedal to turn the compressor on and off as an example. [b]Pedal Assign[/b][list=1] [*]Press the [i]Pedal Assign[/i] button to the left of the [i]Tuner/Bypass[/i] button. [*]Using the [i]Parameter[/i] buttons, find the settings for [i]Assign[/i] X. I'll use[i] Assign 1 [/i]as an example. [*]Press [i]Pedal Assign[/i] to turn[i] Assign 1[/i] on. [*]Press [i]Parameter Right[/i] to choose a [i]Target[/i]. Find [i]CL: On/Off[/i] for Compressor/Limiter: On/Off using the [i]Patch/Value [/i]wheel. [*]Press [i]Parameter Right[/i] again and set [i]Min: Off[/i]. [*]Press[i] Parameter Right[/i] again and set [i]Max: On[/i]. [*]Press [i]Parameter Right [/i]again and set [i]Source[/i] as [i]CTL Pedal[/i]. (Set it to[i] EXP SW [/i]if you want to use the switch underneath the expression pedal. The [i]SUB [/i]settings are for external pedals.) [*]Press [i]Parameter Right[/i] again and set [i]Mode: Toggle[/i] otherwise holding the pedal down will turn the compressor on and letting go will turn it off. [*]Pressing[i] Parameter Right[/i] again shows you [i]Act. Range Lo [/i]and pressing it again shows [i]Act. Range Hi[/i]. You want [i]Lo[/i] to be 0 and [i]Hi[/i] to be the maximum allowed. (It should be like this by default). [/list] You can repeat the exact same process for each of the [i]Assign[/i] banks (1 - 8) so that one pedal turns multiple effects on and off.

The way I learned string skipping (and I suppose it helped with alternate picking as well) back when I started out was by learning Plug in Baby by Muse. It's relatively simple note-wise but it should help you to build up some finger strength as the verses consist of octave walks. Give it a shot!

I've been messing around with the distortion and I've found that: 1) You were right dincz, adding some mids put in some much needed richness 2) Passing the clean sound through the auto-wah to use it as a filter before distorting gives me more control over the sound of the distortion 3) The GT-6B is capable of making usable distortion I haven't tried using my P-Bass yet but I will soon!

Sounds like I might have to buy a couple of extra pedals, the number of hours I've spent messing with distortion is getting ridiculous!

Thanks for the replies guys. Trev, I tried keeping the volume low for the distortion, disabling the EQ and raising the overall volume but it didn't work for me. xgsjx, that distortion sounds awesome! Nice and synthy. What part of the mid-range should I be eqing out? I was told that a high Q value at around 580Hz would help to get rid of the mud but if I'm boosting the wrong frequencies either side...

I've been using a Boss GT-6B for quite a while now and most of the effects have served me well. The distortion effects on the other hand always seem to sound very muddy no matter how I EQ them. I don't have any standalone pedals and I've never heard any bass distortion on its own outside of my headphones so I've got no idea how my distortion is "meant" to sound. I've spent a hell of a long time messing around with the EQ but I'm no expert so I'm not really sure about the frequency ranges that I should be cutting or boosting. The effects chain is: Light compression on the direct sound -> Distortion with a 60/50 blend of distorted/clean sound -> 3 band parametric EQ. The EQ currently boosts at 63Hz and 7.0kHz and it cuts at 575Hz. My amp EQ is off so that it won't interfere with the distorted sound and the GT-6B isn't in the effects loop. It sounded weird when I tried it. I realise that most of this is a matter of taste but if anyone has any tips on frequencies that could be cut/boosted or on the sort of clean/distorted tone blending that people use it would be greatly appreciated!