I feel like I've been watching Bob Ross on guitar pedals. And I mean that as a compliment. Very informative, perfect video. Thanks!

i would have never found my voice as an ambient guitarist without you, thank you so much bill.

Just wanted to say thanks! ....and it's surprising that the T.C. Electronics Chorus still sounds great after so many years. Glad they brought it back!

The clean sound is amazing! 👌

Once again an excellent video and selection of equipment. Thanks so much for all the effort you put into these videos. Sooooo helpful.

You are a fantastic teacher!!! Thank you for everything!!

Thanks for your energy! I love your content!

Amazing video and great explanation Bill! Love the crystal clean unique sound you can get with the Strymon Riverside. It cuts so well in any mix situation. Beautiful drive pedal!

I love chuggy chuggy and weedly weedly metal but I also love your channel. Thank you.

Beautiful! I'm building an ambient setup just for me (at first). I'm a classic, self taught, bedsit guitarist. Rock, blues, folk but with a taste for Tangerine Dream, obscure Oldfield & David Bedford... Also English & Irish trad. folk tunes and then I discovered the many hymns that fit on the first scale I was ever taught. I think it's called a minor pentatonic scale and I discovered the Dorian version by exploring, is it? Which adds a major 2nd & 6th... Hum the gorgeous tune of "He who would valiant be" and that's on the minor pentatonic with those Dorian notes. They give you the classic ending with the phrase "to be a pil-grim". That's where I discovered the intersection of British traditional folk tunes that musicians had a stock of with British hymns that all fit on that scale. The tunes were kept & words put to them so the bard could take them across the country. It makes real folk music, our roots music, the Six O'Clock News from 300 years ago! Bu way of an example... Put "Tramps & Hawkers" sung by Luke Kelly (it's on KZread) on... "Tramps and Hawkers" is a Scottish Ballad, written around 1870/1880 by an Angus hawker by-named 'Brechin Jimmy' and 'Besom Jimmy' - his real name was Jimmy Henderson, born in 1850 in Brechin (county Angus) in Scotland. Jimmy used a tune from an air, which might be more than 150 years old, and which was used in many songs for donkey's years. Bob Dylan used the tune for at least 3 of his compositions: "The Ballad of Donald White", "I Pity the Poor Immigrant" and "Huck's Tune". Stick "Luke Kelly Come me Little Son" into KZread & there's that 150 year old tune again! “Come My Little Son was written by Ewan MacColl for the radio ballad Song of A Road, which first aired on November 5th, 1959. The lyrics were inspired by workers he interviewed in England and Scotland on the age old story of the hunter, the soldier, the Navvies and on and on. You'll recognise the story when you hear it. I was born in a pub in 1964 that was part of the British trad folk revival of the mid sixties & beyond. I'd fall asleep, aged three, wuth the Dubliners, Maddy Prior & Tim Hart pre Steeleye Span, Ewan MacColl & Peggy Seeger playing downstairs... That was my formative musical indoctrination. No wonder that Dorian Pentatonic Minor scale lit something inside of me! Go forward to a decade ago. Sepsis takes both legs... But also my ring & middle fingers on my left (chord) hand. I couldn't look at my Aria Pro II ZZ DeLuxe, alder body 8n candy apple red, pale maple neck, gold fittings without tears. I couldn't even listen to guitar music. But I've hatched a plan. Open tunings, DADGAD, standard tuning with a couple of tunes I made up using that scale... An electric ukulele with a gizmo attached for one finger chords and pedals, midi, VSTi's... And you've just given me the kick up the arse I've been needing! Those layers of sound were gorgeous and with modern tech it's a world that I can contribute to! Thanks man! I've just subscribed. Thank you for the inspiration! Keep safe mate! Les ☮️🎸🎹🎛️🎵🎧🎶

Very good teaching! Thank you!

Very cool demo to get people started in ambient guitar! I love adding my Boss Dimension DC-2W to the chain; it adds that je ne sais quoi.

@chordsoforion

10 ай бұрын

The DC-2W is one great pedal!

Holy shit, man. Luscious sounds! Great explanations and advice too.

Very helpful. I'm learning my way through a Helix I got last week, and I was wondering about why I'd put things in which order. Thanks for laying out your thinking and rationale.

You have already showed us multiple times your pedalboard (its fine, not a critic), I feel entertained and you made me grab my guitar and dail in some new patches on my Headrush MX5. I spent my time here well.

Thank you, sir. I learned a ton in 20 mins from you.

I'm using : tuner into Bluguitar Amp 1. FX send to volume pedal to DD200 to EHX Oceans11 for the poly reverb as a wierd pitch shift. RC10R looper with FS7 as a patch switch for verse chorus stuff and Ditto x4 for decayed loops. Back to the Bluguitar on the left channel and the right into a Katana 50 with onboard fx to give a full stereo live sound that is just huge! Thanks for all the pointers over the last couple of years, Bill. I was really ill when I started ambient guitar and am now spreading my wings a bit as I recover. The sounds have helped me out of a very dark place!

You know your pitch fork in the detune mode is just like a chorus. I use the he EHX freeze for my drone stuff. I love all your videos, you have taught me a ton.

Very nice to see which pedals you´re using and in what order, thank you! :-) 🙏

Interesting how views can vary. I had what you considered the essentials for years but I never played much ambient with them. I never really felt driven to. I will admit my delay was just a pair of Boss PS-2 s so not much variety of delay types . I didn't get into ambient guitar until I got my oceans 12. THAT is the item that gives me lots of different textures to play with and inspires me to play in the genre for hours. My old PS2s will pick up the texture out of the reverb and multiply/regenerate whatever flavour it's bringing to the table this time . Whole different world view, but just as effective.

@JosephCompton66

10 ай бұрын

Love the oceans 12

The MXR Poly Blue Octaver is wildly good for this sort of thing. Five octaves, optional distortion, and modulation. I use mine so often that I'm considering a second.

@illegal_space_alien

10 ай бұрын

Some people gripe that it sounds too digital. But I agree that it's a great pedal, which is why it's on my board as well.

Thanks for the video, Bill. I found an EHX Canyon for ONE of my delay pedals and love it. Great value for the options.

@chordsoforion

10 ай бұрын

Excellent!!

@jasondorsey7110

4 ай бұрын

The canyon has a nice shimmer feature

Great informative video! I definitely need to upgrade my compressor. Without a blend control it lacks subtle expressive nuance, so I end up not using it as much as I'd like. Along with the pedals you've suggested I also like to add an equalizer. It can be graphic or parametric. With full hollowbody electric or an acoustic with a pickup I prefer a parametric eq.. but nothing wrong with a graphic...it's just my preference at this point in time. Now I'm heading to watch your "Desert Island Pedalboards". Always enjoy your videos and music.

Great video - this will come in handy when I'm ready to embark on creating an effects board of my own. My conceptual idea for an effects board is similar, but I'm also thinking to add a couple of additional components - perhaps based on your experience you can suggest where in the signal chain where they best belong: 1) Guitar Synth pedal (e.g. BOSS SY-200) - the idea is that many external sounds, plus additional notes in a given idea can be generated along with my own playing 2) Wah pedal - often times if I find a tone via the expression pedal I might leave it there, but at times I'd use it to alter the tone while playing. 3) EQ (e.g. BOSS EQ-200) - to dial in/out frequencies as needed 4) A pedal that simulates a Rockman - I'm thinking this might come at the end, as I may want to be able to bypass an Amp/Sim

omg i love your meditative music. huhuhuhu I bought an acoustic, i wish i had bought an electric to make the music you have on your other channel. maybe I can save and get an electric later

What's interesting is that my pedal order is exactly like yours in its core and the placement of the optional pedals. I think that's because I used suggestions from your earlier videos. Unfortunately I've created a bit of a monster since I'm using multiple loopers and some complex signal routing trying to be Andy Othling! 😂

I'm using tuner, compressor,phaser, overdrive,eq, reverb,delay then vibrato. I also have a footswitch for the distortion channel of my amp. However I could totally get by without phaser or eq but they sure are nice lol

Very cool! I followed your guide..but used the blocks on my Helix Rack to achieve this rather than stomp boxes. I am playing my 1st ever solo gig in a couple of weeks on NS Stick and bass since leaving my band. This video helped me get on the right path towards building a nice ambient rig. Thanx!!!!

@chordsoforion

10 ай бұрын

So cool you are playing the Stick! One of my former bandmates plays the Stick. He sounded great, but I was always jealous, as he got more people coming up to talk to him after a gig than me. :-)

@meshica7

10 ай бұрын

@@chordsoforion LOL! Yes..there is a "wonderment and coolness" factor that carries a lot of mileage when you play the Stick. Than God too! It's a hard instrument to wrap your head around at 1st!

Nice! I use my Line 6 HX-Effects and EHX Expression pedal. Provides many options. I always like to have an EQ after the amp and before the time based effects to fine tune my sound for the room or my ears which seem to hear differently.

@chordsoforion

10 ай бұрын

the EQ is a great suggestion!

@MrDonc78

10 ай бұрын

You can use the global eq if you want to save a block.

Davvero bravo 👏👏👏

I play keys really but I enjoy noodling on guitar… It’s surprising how my simple little setup kind of does the same as yours… …guitar into plethora X5, boss SD-1 in the X5’s insert send/return, and an expression pedal into the X5 to control volume. The X5 has an ok ish cab sim too. It’s very interesting to be able to change the order of pedals so easily. The SD-1 & expression pedal can go anywhere in the chain. (Trying this with a Rhodes or Minimoog is lots of fun toooooo!!! 😂)

Great video as always, Bill. Your channel and your approach to music has helped me get through some rough times as of late. Just wanted to say thanks a bunch for sharing your knowledge and experiences and to keep up the great work. :)

Your take upon music facinates and inspires me.

Thanks for this insight Bill. I would prefer the pitch shift after the tuner for integrity of the pitch effect. The overdrive tends to do weird things to a pitch shifted signal to my ears. Yet the trippyness of that effect could be desirable. Depends on what your poison is. LOL!! Thanks again.

Just getting started on a board, but I'm liking running my volume pedal before the dirt, that way I can swell into distortion. If I want full tilt on the pedal to still be clean, I roll back the volume knob on the guitar.

@chordsoforion

10 ай бұрын

Yes - it is definitely a viable option! Here's a video that I posted on this topic. kzread.info/dash/bejne/nKeprc96etKZgcY.html

Love your Channel, bought the Soma Cosmos and the Joyo infinite Sustainer because of your Videos (and love them both). I’m making a Pedalboard right now, so to get the most of the Strymon Iridium, I should place it behind distortion, but before time based effects, right? Thanks for all your Videos, they really inspire me 🙏

@chordsoforion

5 ай бұрын

Greetings and thanks for the kind words! I like to think of the Iridium as an amp to help understand where I should place effects. Thus, the distortion should come before the Iridium. As as the time based effects go, i would recommend placing them after the Iridium, unless you want any to be less "studio" sounding.

I appreciate your approach, it's clear and straightforward and you're up front about the retail connection. What are you using to power this small warehouse-on-a-board collection?

@chordsoforion

10 ай бұрын

Thanks! The power supply for the board is the Strymon Zuma.

Ooh, nice 16 men tone.

Surprised by the lack of a shimmer. Especially with that much love for Strymon. Blue Sky, Line 6, any of this...

@chordsoforion

10 ай бұрын

I don't use out and out shimmer very often, but the DD-200 and Neunaber Immerse both have shimmer options.

I'd say those are all crucial pedals. Though, I also like having two volume pedals, one at the start of my chain and one before my modulation/delay/reverb pedals. Otherwise, there are only some minor order changes I would make. First of all, I like my pitch shifting prior to my overdrive/distortion. This is because I prefer to emulate multiple guitars going through identical rigs. Also, I prefer my looper to be the last pedal before the amp. This way the loop will have any and all changes to the sound can be added to the loop should I choose to add it.

@suede__

6 ай бұрын

Have you ever watched Andy Othling? He puts the looper first and is able to put the loop through the pedal chain. Pretty cool stuff.

The Empress Zoia is one pedal I have that I almost always use. I use my piano as a tuner....

I love ambient I'm using two distortion pedals

Breaking out throw backs like the boss Dd 200 and the immerse! Have you looked into old blood noise endeavors? They have some really really cool pedals

@chordsoforion

10 ай бұрын

I know a lot of folks like them, however, their delays and reverbs are all/mostly mono. Doesn't really work for me.

Wow! Great video,as usual. These are the types of pedals I have on my board except I use a mini swell pedal instead of the volume pedal. It takes up a lot less space on my board and gives me frippertronics. Try it.

@rowanschenck4756

10 ай бұрын

And then I found your video on Moore slow engine, so nevermind.

@chordsoforion

10 ай бұрын

:-) Auto-swell pedals are cool too!

Hey Bill what do you think about the Boomerang III Phrase Sampler looper? I've been thinking of getting it with the side car combo available on their website!

I like Wah from time to time. Where does a Wah pedal go in the signal chain?

A LoFi pedal could be interesting. Right before the delay.

@jfo3000

9 ай бұрын

LoFi delays themselves are also very interesting!

Could you explain why you put the volume pedal in the middle of the chain, as compared to earlier or later? Thanks

Great video! To be fair, you could take this same pedalboard, run it into a distortion pedal or gain channel of an amp, and instantly have killer shoegaze tones. Lol.

How did you create the drone for the loopwe Bill?

Not a pedal, but have you ever tried a sustainer pickup? I have a Sustainiac and in my opinion it's more flexible than an E-Bow. Love your content Bill !

do you have the diagram pf the signal path!? or tell us which is 1st and last.thx

I have the Boss DD 200 DELAY. It's great and it has a lot of useful options. x2 Questions for you.... Do you have any experience with the Wampler Ethereal Delay and Reverb Pedal (2017) at all? Do you think the new Boss ME 90 UNIT could rival your current pedalboard and tones? Any plans to check it out? Cheers Bill.

Do you need a guitar preamp and cabsim for ambient pedalboarding if you play in line?

I have the Immerse V2. Great pedal. What do you use for your actual board/power supply?

@chordsoforion

10 ай бұрын

The Strymon Zuma is my usual power supply. Thanks for commenting!!

Oh No, please don't tell you've given up on the Strymon Dig? Your Channell is part of the reason that I purchased mine.

@chordsoforion

10 ай бұрын

of course not!

Bill is the bob ross of electric guitar !!

Tried the quad cortex or helix? Id love to see if you have shared any presets

@chordsoforion

10 ай бұрын

I have a HX-Stomp and a Helix LT. Here's a playlist with a bunch of stuff: kzread.info/head/PLseB5HzFJKVwTQebcJXQzOcVeOvZ80J80

Hi from Russia!!!! St.Petdrsburg watching;))))

@chordsoforion

10 ай бұрын

Greetings!

@maximfadeev2012

10 ай бұрын

@@chordsoforion thanx a lot for your unbelievably interesting material. Just added a compressor i in my line in tonib gfx. Sounds more interesting

@MarkChe

10 ай бұрын

Воронеж тоже тут! Делаем эмбиент в сельской местности😊🎉❤

I see how paper towels and napkins help you keep a dry and clean sound.

@chordsoforion

10 ай бұрын

I know... I should have gotten something fancier to cover the pedals. :-)

Delay and reverb after the looper?

@chordsoforion

10 ай бұрын

yep. That's the way I like to run them.

@hankpiece

10 ай бұрын

@@chordsoforion I'd love to understand more about this decision. Do you ever change the settings mid-song?

@hankpiece

10 ай бұрын

Btw I love this content. I've been making a lot of ambient music lately and I really find you inspiring

You don't really need a reverb pedal for ambient music. You need 3 reverb pedals)))

@chordsoforion

8 ай бұрын

Ha!!

Are you using a half capo?

@chordsoforion

10 ай бұрын

Yes. It's a partial capo that covers strings 3-5. Here's a video I posted a number of years ago about capos if you are interested: kzread.info/dash/bejne/Y3-otpOCc6a1j6w.html

@Alex_Martz

10 ай бұрын

@@chordsoforion thanks!

Hi Bill, very illuminating and quality done video. Just a small remark about modern compressor pedals. They appear to be what me and my friends in the old days used to call a compander: a combination of a compressor (limiting the upper level of the signal, by literally compressing it) and an expander pedal (expanding the signal level by amplifying it). Basically, a combination of them works as the tool that is used for commercials: significantly raising the average volume of the audio signal. It requires a little practice and fine-tuning of the compandor pedal to get the volume adjustments that are needed for a particular application. i tend to do this manually, using the free Audacity software After recording and Before mastering / mix-down, to ensure the best signal-to-noise ratio per channel.

Nice, tho

@frankslade33

2 ай бұрын

Thanks!

Considering that phasers, pitch shifters, and delays can come close to a chorus sound, who needs a chorus?

Wyndham Bill. I think there are not enough good room reverbs in the world, no need for giant reverbs with delay..

“Consumption is the new national pastime. People spending money they don’t have on things they don’t need, money they don’t have so they can max out their credit cards and spend the rest of their lives paying 18 percent interest on something that cost $12.50. And they didn’t like it when they got it home anyway.” -George Carlin

You forgot the boutique pedal. Even if these pedals sound good, you need the expensive and unobtainable pedal to let every one know that it sounds good.

@jfo3000

10 ай бұрын

I gotta say the Big Sky does sound AMAZING!!!

I thought you'd focus more on individual manufacturer options than just talk about broad functions; I'm not sure how useful these generalisations are for your normal viewership, though maybe you've done it to reach outside the subscriber base.

@chordsoforion

10 ай бұрын

Replace the Infinity 2 with the TC Ditto X4 and the DD-200 with the Flashback Triple Delay, and that would be a pedalboard full of my favorites. :-)