Re: Things are quiet 'round here

["K. Douglas Baldwin" <dbaldwin@suffolk.lib.ny.us>]

Subject: Things are quiet 'round here

>
>Of those of us who are left, has anybody tried inserting FX into their
>feedback loops? I've been thinking about this - it strikes me as a great
way
>to "thicken up" a loop, but on the other hand once the signal's been 
>around
>the FB loop a few times it'd be so effected it'd sound like an exposion at
>Digitech's Preset factory.  Comments?


Mike- I've used effects in feedback loops quite a bit. First time was with
an EH 16-second delay; I added an Ibanez pitch shifter to add an upper
octave to the repeats because the EH just totally ate up frequencies above
2k at the longer delay settings. It worked in a cool, weird way. Knob
settings are very critical, as you can imagine. Too much signal or effect
and your regeneration goes blooey. (And that's NOT Belew-ey) I've also 
added
an Alesis Microverb to the feedback chain so that the original note gets
hazier and hazier. Kinda makes the sound disappear into a cloud of fog.
    With any feedback loop, you obviously must split the signal and reenter
it with your primary source, unless the device has a prewired aux in. Set
regeneration or feedback to minimum and begin with fairly short delays (1 
or
2 seconds) to hear what will happen. Have a ball. Or a series of infinitely
receeding balls. Which may be what you get when attaching alligator clips 
to
your Johnson.
Douglas Baldwin