Multi effects guide?

[DocTrucker]

Morning all. I'm a notch or two up from beginner on the bass and reherse monthly with a guitarist and drummer in a local studio. I like blues rock through to heavy metal with a few outliers like Vangellis and Zimmer sound tracks. The musical tastes of the others is wider still. I've been looking at multi effects units as both a similification (aside from the learning curve!) and cost perspective.

 

My ears aren't what they used to be. I have Meniere's disease which comes hand in hand with a-symetric hearing loss which is profound at high pitch and severe throughout the rest of the spectrum on my right side and normal ish for a ~40 year old on my left! With that in mind the highest details of digital vs analogue are likely to be lost on me and it makes setting tones on the fly in a noisey environment very difficult.

 

So for a broad spectrum unit that does well from bypass (/tuner) out towards more synthy blade runner sound track like stuff what are the community favorites without loosing £300+? Would these allow me to set up a play list and increment through them quickly at a poor light (had thoughts about adding a light to the pedal board!) gig?

 

I wouldn't mind a balanced out (stereo as going to PA) but could easily add that separately.

 

Zoom B9? Boss GT-10b? Something else?

 

I was thinking whether this should be my next investment or a rig, but the more I think about it working towards getting a PA ready output seems more sensible, but stand to be corrected!

[DocTrucker]

Not that it changes this much but I mainly focus on plucking and have recently added a couple of pick tracks to the rehersal list.  I don't slap at the moment.

 

My equipment is a daily 4 string Squire Vintage Modefied and a Harley fretted Six string which is in the process of being having its electronics swapped at the moment.

[Bassman68]

You could do a lot worse than considering the Zoom B3n in the classifieds

I have one myself & find it easy to navigate, a whole bunch of good effects as well.

The only thing lacking is a XLR output but nothing a cheap d.i box can’t solve..

[DocTrucker]

Good spot! The Boss GT 1000 there looks great too, but that is a tad out of range!

[tauzero]

Yes, Zoom B3n is a good starter. You can switch effects in and out, the effects themselves are pretty good, and switching between patches is quite simple (the B3 that preceded it needed a bit more tapdancing). The freeware Tonelib editor is also very useful (https://tonelib.net/tonelib-zoom.html)

[uk_lefty]

On 19/12/2023 at 06:23, DocTrucker said:

Boss GT-10b

These are fantastic if you can find one reasonably priced. However, for what you describe I'm not sure it's the right unit. It also needs external software made by some chap on talkbass and hours upon hours of studying if you want to create your own patches for things like synth sounds. There's better tech in a smaller footprint these days.

[Bleat]

I had a GT-10B recently, It does a hell of a lot, very versatile but for synth-like stuff I found it pretty dire.

 

If you can locate one, an old  Boss ME-8B can produce some huge Vangelis- like synth sounds. I managed to program a fantastic Moog-like synth patch on mine as you can layer up all the effects eg Chorus/ Delay/Reverb/Synth/Octave. It is super easy to get to grips with also. I am still looking for another one currently.

 

 

[visog]

15 hours ago, uk_lefty said:

These are fantastic if you can find one reasonably priced. However, for what you describe I'm not sure it's the right unit. It also needs external software made by some chap on talkbass and hours upon hours of studying if you want to create your own patches for things like synth sounds. There's better tech in a smaller footprint these days.

Not sure that's right. Maybe for the B3n unit, it's non-proprietary software but the GT-1B is official Boss software and very good. However @Bleat is correct in that the synth sounds are dire - or I think, sound good but the tracking is awful so either way, unusable.

[uk_lefty]

43 minutes ago, visog said:

Not sure that's right. Maybe for the B3n unit, it's non-proprietary software but the GT-1B is official Boss software and very good. However @Bleat is correct in that the synth sounds are dire - or I think, sound good but the tracking is awful so either way, unusable.

Yes you can use the Boss software. Maybe instead of "needs" the external software I should have said it's highly advisable to use that because it's way, way better than the Boss software. It's also free. And I was talking about the GT10-B not the GT1-B.

Edited December 28, 2023 by uk_lefty