Your First Pedaboard

Experienced Guitar Players love creating new guitar tones, but as a beginner it can be scary. There are so many options. What is the best way to improve your tone? Is it a new guitar? A new amp? Those are great options depending on your goals, but if you want to play live, you often need flexibility. This is why so many guitar players have a pedalboard.

A pedalboard is a board that sits on the ground with effect pedals on it. These pedals change the sound of your guitar by clicking a button. This allows you to play songs that change guitar tones or sounds. A pedalboard can be individual pedals put together, a multi-effects unit with every sound or a mix of the two.

Multi-Effect Units

Buying a multi-effect unit has a higher up front cost but is cheaper overall. A pedalboard requires pedals, the board itself, patch cables, and a power supply to get going. The effects unit has almost every sound there is for as low as $650.

Here are some great multi-effect units that you can use: 

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Building a Pedalboard

Building your own pedalboard is a great option. It often costs more than a multi-effects unit, but you can buy what you need in stages instead of all at once.

A beginner pedalboard needs 3 pedals, a power supply, and patch cables. An overdrive, delay, and reverb pedal get the job done. Here are some attainable pedals with a power supply and patch cables for about $360:

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[products=3seriesdelay]

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Once you have your board together, you may realize that it's hard to play live with pedals sitting on the ground. They move and are hard to transport from your home to the gig. This is the point you may want to buy an actual pedalboard. It will keep them organized, and they usually come with a case for transportation. Here are some great options for pedalboards:

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Next, you may want more sound options. The next step is usually to get another overdrive pedal. If you have a high-gain overdrive pedal, a lower gain option is a good place to start. This will allow you to have different levels of overdrive for different songs. The opposite is also true. If you have a low gain pedal, you may want a higher gain option for solos or intense riffs. This is dependent on the type of music you play. If you play soft indie music, a high gain pedal is probably not the best option. If you want to understand how overdrive and distortion works check out this article: How Overdrive Works

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The next type of effect to add is a modulation effect. Options include chorus, flanger, or phasers. These effects give you more tone options and are used in a wide variety of genres. You can also get more multi-effect units here. You don't have to get a complete does everything multi-effect unit. You can get a lighter version for these unique effects. 

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Most musicians never end their quest for beautiful tones. They swap out pedals, amps or even guitars. But if you use the steps outlined above, it will help you get started. If you are looking for help putting a pedalboard together give us a call at (219) 362-2340.