You know that moment, when you plug that pedal in or twist that knob – that tone hits you that you were not expecting. And you are in the zone. The chords just flow. You could sit there and play all day.
I had that recently while trying chorus pedals at Mass Street Music in Lawrence, KS.
I took this non-descript JHS Chorus pedal, the least expensive of the five pedals that I had lined up to try, and I turned the Depth knob. And it was something special.
At first I couldn’t describe it. It was like a 12 string, but something else. There was a Mojo to it. I A/B’d it with other pedals and it stood out. I immediately bought it.
Chasing that Tone in My Head
What is the tone that is inside your head? That sound that you can’t always put your finger on.
It can be from a specific record. Maybe it is from a specific gig where the stars aligned and your tone was perfectly dialed in. Maybe it was that vintage amp or guitar that sounded or played like no other.
How do you describe the ideal guitar tone that is inside your head (the tone that we are all chasing)?
For me, that tone is mostly a Mesa Boogie amp with 6L6 roar, but not that buzzy mid-90’s version that all of the modelers use. It’s somewhere between the F-50 I had 15 years ago and a Rectifier that I bought from Mass Street Music that had worn out tubes but sounded great and perfectly dialed in..but turned out to be failing tubes, and then did not sound the same when I retubed it.
With a MultiChorus, sort of like Rush. Until not long ago, the only chorus I’ve found like that is the MultiChorus on the Eleven Rack. But I want it in a pedal.
What about you?
Is the pedal easy to use?
The next big thing that I look for in a pedal is: it is easy to use?
Does it sound the same when I get it home as it did in the store or at a friend’s house, or on the demo video on YT (it frequently won’t).
Everyone loves more knobs, more sounds.
But can I get it dialed in, and will it stay dialed in? Will that tone only dial in with the knob somewhere between 1 and 2?
I have had gigs where that dialed in sound failed and I was twiddling with knobs instead of playing. It’s like watching a guitar player stopping in a gig to change a string or endlessly tuning.
Lots of knobs may be cool, but if it breaks the “Easy of use” rule, then it’s thumbs down.
Or even worse – all of the mini pedals with one footswitch that does more than one thing depending on whether you hit it once, twice, or hold it. I had problems playing live with the one button Ditto Looper and I had to switch to the two button Ditto Looper X2.
Does the pedal have some interesting twist on the effect?
The Ibanez Airplane Flanger was a Paul Gilbert signature model pedal from Ibanez, made in the late oughts through the early 2010’s. It has a wide range of uses and nails both the throaty chorus flange of VH’s “Hear About it Later” as well as “Unchained” (better than the MXR or EVH Flangers, in my opinion).
But what sets it apart is the Takeoff button. For some reason, Paul Gilbert, known as a shredder, switched from a Floyd bridge on his signature Fireman guitars to a hard tail bridge. How to still get the shredder dive bombs? Put it into a pedal. You hit the Takeoff button for a quick sweeping dive bomb and then click it off. It is perfect for a dive bomb type transition in a song or at the end of a lead.
Does the pedal inspire me and make me want to play?
That’s the ultimate question – does it inspire me to play?
Every time I turn on that JHS Chorus it adds something. It sounds good with distortion in the chain in front of it or distortion after it, or on the amp. It reminds me of Rik Emmett’s sound from Triumph’s Live at the US Festival in 1983. But something more. It sounds good played with the piezo acoustic sound on my EBMM Petrucci guitar or with full distortion.
Get the JHS Chorus here
We Are Living in a Boutique Pedal Golden Age
We live in a new Golden Age of boutique pedals. Every day I see new pedals on Instagram that I have never seen before. And many are US companies, with my favorites being JHS Pedals in Kansas City and Walrus Audio in OKC.
One thing I like about Walrus Audio is that they approach pedals in a similar fashion – Chasing the sounds in our heads.
Now you could say that everyone is doing that – copying some tone from a band. But their approach to pedals is something different.
I really like JHS. With their Bonsai, it is “put every historical Tube Screamer into one pedal. But don’t use modeling – use the actual circuit from each iteration of the pedal.” Crazy.