Winston Psmith

Love the idea, but I think it's something you could set up with a splitter and an A/B box? Have to try that later today . . .

I love Crapulators & Randomizers, as I call them, Ring Mods, Bit Crushers, Lo-Fi boxes, what-have-you; anything that chews up your signal and craps it back out, bent, broken and bad-smelling. Any Tube Screamer or Phase 90 is going to sound pretty much like any other Tube Screamer or Phase 90, so if you want stock sounds, they're easy to find, but as the line from Tuxedomoon goes, "Give me new noise!"

At least it aspires to be a truly original Crapulator, not just another TS clone. You'll either love or hate that signal breakup, excuse me, 'crackle', and it'll take some nerve to show up with that pedal for a P&W band . . .

Caevan, I love the idea of the Talk-Box sound, but never wanted to invest in one. My workaround for the Talk-Box sound involves a small synth with a Vocoder; sing into the Vocoder mic, and trigger synth tones with my guitar, via MIDI. I can also run the guitar audio signal through a second Audio In jack, so my voice modulates the guitar sound.

I have an iPhone...now I'd just need to learn enough Japanese to make the feature useful (if I bought the pedal). I know a little bit, but my vocabulary needs expansion. I've been running through what I call a "Stupid Loop", in trying to access the iPhone app. First off, it's only available through the Japanese iTunes Store, so I can't download it directly to my iPhone - can't use my computer as a workaround, for the same reason. If I try to create an iTunes account with the Japanese iTunes store, it asks me for an address in Japan, then switches me back to the U.S. iTunes store. There's probably a workaround, or else Korg and iTunes may make the app available over here, now that they're shipping the pedal, but for now, you can't get there from here.

If anyone is interested, Korg has shipped 90 of the Miku Stomp pedals to the U.S., to test the market, I guess. My FLMS got 3 of those, and of course, I got one. Still testing it out, but I'll have some tracks up soon. I don't know who got any of the others, but I suspect they mostly went to independents, rather than GC. I guarantee you, you don't have anything like it. Korg Miku Stomp

a long time ago, I used two DOD passive mixers, one to split the signal into 4 different rack effects and the second to recombine the signals. The output and input came from the effects loop on my amp. I've used "stereo" pedals, like a Flanger or Chorus with dual Outs, which is very straightforward, if you're not using two amps that are horribly mis-matched. I've also used an old Boss J-5 passive splitter box with an MXR Micro Amp in front of it, to drive dual effects chains to different amps. Lots of fun with sounds, but it's easy to run into phase or gain issues with a rig like that.

Another track for your enjoyment . . . I hope. The Winston Psmith Project - Lost Horizon

Something from my latest album. The Winston Psmith Project - Mono No Aware

Funny thing about that; Robert Smith and Billy Duffy both use stock Boss pedals. I know Smith got the Primary sound from a Boss BF-2 Flanger. The reasons are many: availability, familiarity, functionality, reliability, etc. Who made 'em don't much matter as long as the doggone things get the job done, right? Exactly that. Billy Duffy says he doesn't need to be hunting down some oddball box when he's on tour. If something breaks down, he can walk into nearly any music store anywhere, and find a replacement.

Funny thing about that; Robert Smith and Billy Duffy both use stock Boss pedals. I know Smith got the Primary sound from a Boss BF-2 Flanger.

A flanger, huh... ? Iddunno... Well, as long as it seems to be a pretty nice one... I love how he starts right off with The Cure's Primary, which was one of the great Flanger workouts of the 80's.

Hey, Caevan, just sent you a PM, with some ideas about this.

Caevan, I would suggest a Boss Line Selector, which has a switchable Send/Return loop. Most of the switching systems I've seen, whether for pedlaboards or racks, were meant to handle 6 or 8 or more devices, and they were all pretty damned expensive. The GCX and the Ground Control together run around $800 - the Boss pedal is around $80, and it doesn't care how many pedals or multi-efx you have in the S/R loop. Of course, you would have to have both pedals chained together, which might mean taking the RT-20 out of your amp's Effects Loop. Boss Line Selector

IIRC, the Ground Control is the switching system for the GCX; big floor unit, with a bank of switches. My wife was looking into one of those systems for me a couple of years ago. Digital Music Corp is the digital division of VooDoo Labs. I have a couple of their MIDI patchbays, including an MX-8, a very cool MIDI tool.

The phase cancellation was the kind of problem I was thinking of, especially if you're going to sum the split signal again, to go into a single amp. Even using two matching amps, it's tricky. My splitter box is a little old thing from Boss, the J-5, 1 In, 4 Out, no batteries, no buffering, no active electronics at all! I've had it since the late 80's, and it still works; don't know why they stopped offering it. I used to place an MXR Micro Amp in front of it, for buffering, but any Boss pedal will work for that purpose.

I've tried something like this, using a simple splitter box, and two amps; I even have a Volume pedal that doubles as a Balance pedal, so I could play with moving the sound from side to side. It took some tweaking to get the sound balanced, and even then, I wasn't convinced that it was worth the effort. In a small, intimate setting, that kind of thing can be a neat trick, in a large room or hall, no one really notices the faux-stereo effect. Never tried using a splitter, then summing the two signal chains again? I could see where you might run into some weird phase issues trying that - like running two parallel Modulation effects. I could also see where you might have some issues with gain structure.

Looks like someone took the concept behind the EHX Flanger Hoax (multiple interacting Delay/Modulation effects) and carried it to the extreme! That's it, I'm off looking for one . . .

Love the overall concept, but I hate the idea of having to add a laptop or a tablet to my rig. It also reminds me of these things - Z-tar

Not sure if I'm supposed to play it, or drive it?

Bit crushers are great Crapulators (my term for anything that intentionally turns your signal into noise), but I'm not sure it's the same sound as the old Space Station Pixellator. Closest thing I've found is the Catalinbread Heliotrope, which is sub-titled Harmonic Pixelator. It's like a Ring Mod on weird street drugs. Another great Crapulator. Still have my Space Station, I just wish they'd re-issue the damned thing so I could have a back-up.

This is from a recent rehearsal of a work in progress, getting ready for a local show. This is one live take, BTW, of me with my live rig, no other musicians, no other instruments; I do, however, have a good bit of tech. Enjoy . . . Winston in rehearsal.

Am I right in counting 32 frets on that thing?

Here's a track I did for the recent Album In A Day project. The title came, in part, because I was working with some new sound gear. Enjoy! New Wings - The Winston Psmith Project

This is a link to my most recent album, which came out in May. You can listen to any of the tunes, without having to download the album, but, if you like what hear, well, you get the idea . . . The Winston Psmith Project - Figures Of Speech