Best wah pedal for mono synth leads?

[EricBarker]

I have a Behringer PolyD that I absolutely love. Some of my favorite synth leads I've used in the past have featured wah pedals, but until now I've been mostly a workstation guy. I quickly borrowed a Crybaby this weekend, but it was ridiculously loud (gain boost), and didn't sound the way I expected it too. I didn't have much time to test it and was just experimenting mid-gig, which was a mistake. Probably my favorite lead sound of all time is Derek Sherinian's Monster synth, which though on a Trinity, is essentially an analog sawtooth through a wah and delay. I wouldn't mind building something similar in hardware. What are people's favorite hardware Wah pedals for synths?

[DaveMcM]

Just a thought- have you considered using a CV pedal into the Filter EXT Control Input? Instant wah wah pedal for free, sort of.

 

Years ago I had a pedal that had a braided steel cable inside a sheath (kind of like a bicycle brake cable) coming out of the pedal and on the other end of the cable was a knob that could replace any knob on any synth, in my case a Minimoog. As you moved the pedal, the cable would turn and control whatever knob you replaced, in my case the filter cutoff. The PolyD makes this far easier.

[Doerfler]

I use one of these with pedal du jour. Quiet, and stereo in and out.

 

https://line6.com/effects-pedals/m5/

[Caevan O’Shite]

Baggage, hype, drama and 2nd-party post-company-closing price-gauging aside (whew, that's a lotta hyphens! )...

I would highly recommend the Fulltone Clyde Deluxe, which has control features galore, including Input Level (boost as well as trim), Resonance, and a switchable Buffer with up to 15db Boost- you'll be able to dial-in EXACTLY the needed level, for sure.

 

Luckily, I bought mine for a sane price years ago; it was actually the second one I bought, as I gave my first one to a good friend in need of a good, dependable wah after his Morley had broke down for the umpteenth time and seemed to be unfixable, and a borrowed Cry Baby also stopped working mid-performance...  On that note, the Ft CD is extremely ruggedly built, VERY high quality and well designed. It sounds fantastic, too! If you get one, you will enjoy the longer throw of the pedal as well. Paint or decal it if you can't bear the brand-name.   
   



    
     

[Baldwin Funster]

7 hours ago, DaveMcM said:

 

...Years ago I had a pedal that had a braided steel cable inside a sheath (kind of like a bicycle brake cable) coming out of the pedal and on the other end of the cable was a knob that could replace any knob on any synth, in my case a Minimoog. As you moved the pedal, the cable would turn and control whatever knob you replaced, in my case the filter cutoff. The PolyD makes this far easier.

I had one of those from Electro Harmonix. I think it was called a hotfoot. Mine didn't work too good. Because the cable would have an arc between the hotfoot and the adjacent pedal, the knob turning action wasn't smooth so you'd get no turn then it would jump too far.

As far as what wha, do a web search of players who used a wha on keyboards and see what they did. I'm betting it was mostly a crybaby because that all that was commonly available in the classic years of funky wha clav styles. 

[mate stubb]

Back in the day we used to use Morley wah pedals on keys, but I'm sure those are long gone.

[KuruPrionz]

If you can find one, a Tech 21 Killer Wail is a great wah pedal. There is a 3 way switch on the bottom, Deep, Full Range and High. It's all analog and has that "insane animal growl" to it. I need to get mine fixed!

[Baldwin Funster]

2 hours ago, matted stump said:

Back in the day we used to use Morley wah pedals on keys, but I'm sure those are long gone.

No Morley is still making wahs and vol pedals. A favorite of Steve Vai.

[EricBarker]

I just put my buddy’s Crybaby through the gauntlet this morning, and I’m not happy with it. The wah is fine, but my big problem is the insane loudness cut between up and down. It ends up sounding like a weird volume pedal. Even when I have the synth dialed with very bass-heavy sounds with rich harmonics (double sawtooth with a bit of drive), it’s just really dynamic. Sounds more like a LowPass than a BandPass filter to my ears.

 

I think the issue is that for guitars, the wah pulls from a relatively dark sound before being overdriven. Synth leads are already starting with harmonically rich content, so I wouldn’t expect a wah to perform the same way.

[Baldwin Funster]

They are adjustable on the inside. You loosen a screw and move the pot.

 

I'd also say that most times I've heard wah on keys it was rhodes or clav. Maybe synth doesn't work the same.

[JB Sherry]

Back in the dark ages ( I mean the 70’s ) I used a Wah on my Fender Rhodes Stage piano. The output of that keyboard is similar to a guitar with passive pickups. My clav E7 is the same as a guitar with active pickups. With both, the signal level is much lower and impedence different (higher?) than a line level instrument. The Fulltone referenced above should help if part of your problem was overloading the pedal. Looks like it’s discontinued so you’d have to buy used.

 

I have a Crybaby 535q, which has adjustable level, a boost on/off, and both adjustable center frequency and adjustable Q(resonance). There’s no input trim so you’d have to deal with that pre-pedal, but this might allow you to dial in just the sound you’re looking for. It’s still in production. I’ve only used on guitar, but I’ll give it a try on my mini-boog.

 

Somone mentioned just using a controller pedal mapped to cutoff - that’s a cool sound. In that same dark age, my only synth was an Arp oddysey. I used the voltage control pedal for leads, usually with oscillator sync on, and the pedal mapped to both filter cutoff and osc. 2 pitch. This going into a guitar amp was a great sound. The Wah pedal is going to give you some different mojo, especially if you run it into something that gives you coloration ( amp or smp sim). 

[vortmaxx]

Maybe this might help
 

 

[Al Coda]

On 11/11/2022 at 8:49 PM, EricBarker said:

my favorite lead sound of all time is Derek Sherinian's Monster synth, which though on a Trinity, is essentially an analog sawtooth through a wah and delay.

 

 

Sure ?

Double check if there´s also a overdrive/distortion in the ballpark.

 

(soundsource > OD/Dist. > WAH > DLY)

 

I mimik such stuff on a Kurz PC361.

There´s no dedicated WAH effect.

But the construct of a WAH as a FX chain is "Dist > resonant band-pass filter (controlled by MIDI CC#4 "foot pedal" or LFO (auto wah) or velocity (touch wah) > compressor.

 

 

A.C.

[Al Coda]

On 11/11/2022 at 8:59 PM, DaveMcM said:

a CV pedal into the Filter EXT Control Input? Instant wah wah pedal for free, sort of.

 

Yes,- only sort of !

Most synth filters are LP filters.

You need a resonant BP filter for WAH.

 

 

A.C.

[Al Coda]

21 hours ago, matted stump said:

Back in the day we used to use Morley wah pedals on keys, but I'm sure those are long gone.

 

In the past, I used the vintage Morley "Wah-Fuzz-Volume" combo pedal for the Fender Rhodes.

Didn´t like the fuzz too much, but the WAH and optical "pot less" operation was welcome.

 

Sold it one day ...

 

Some time ago, I´ve found a vintage Morley "Wah-Volume" in excellent condition for 40 bucks again.

No-brainer ...

I doubt it would work well after all the decades and was surprised it worked perfect still.

At least the vintage "Tel-Ray" manufactured Morley wahs have a wider range than the typical guitar pedals.

Dunno if the current Morley models are the same.

 

 

A.C.

[Al Coda]

3 hours ago, JB Sherry said:

Back in the dark ages ( I mean the 70’s ) I used a Wah on my Fender Rhodes Stage piano. The output of that keyboard is similar to a guitar with passive pickups. My clav E7 is the same as a guitar with active pickups.

 

 

For Rhodes I prefered Morley, for Clavinet D6 I prefered VOX,- the latter because the Clav is a stringed instrument offering different filter and phase settings.

 

For lead synth,- Minimoog D in my case,- both didn´ work perfect even it ran into a 50W green tolex vintage Marshall head w/ 2x12" cab.

I was disappointed and gave up.

 

Later, I got better results w/ a distortion device before the wah in the chain.

A Flanger before the distortion device helped even more, but as long the wah´s bandpass-center-frequency and it´s resonance-frequency isn´t adjustable to the source patch,- it´s often a futile compromize w/ synths.

 

 

 

3 hours ago, JB Sherry said:

I used the voltage control pedal for leads, usually with oscillator sync on, and the pedal mapped to both filter cutoff and osc. 2 pitch. This going into a guitar amp was a great sound.

 

Confirmed !

For this, I always use a flanger before amp(-sim), then run all into a (mono-) delay.

 

 

A.C.

[EricBarker]

20 hours ago, Al Coda said:

 

 

Sure ?

Double check if there´s also a overdrive/distortion in the ballpark.

 

(soundsource > OD/Dist. > WAH > DLY)

 

 

I was over-simplifying for the sake of brevity. I have an exact replica of this sound, and yes, it has an overdrive and amp simulator too. I have the KORG Legacy Collection, which has the MDE-X effects processor from the Trinity. The Wah Block includes an overdrive and cab simulator. The patch I use begins with a MonoPoly sawtooth > Wah/Dist > Delay. I think the important point is that the Wah is likely before the Distortion in side that effects block (It's hard to know for sure because it's all one block, but that's typically the default order).

I think to be able to replicate this sound and most other in its category, I need to put it through a Distortion Pedal or tube amp at the end. The PolyD has a wonderful distortion module, but there is no effects send/return before it. So probably PolyD > Wah > Distortion > Delay is the ticket.

Now the question is, what's a good distortion/overdrive pedal to use? I tend to hate 80s sold state distortion on guitars, but it might be fine for this purpose. Then again, I had a guitarist friend who used to have a Tube Distortion pedal (I think it was called "The Demonizer"), that was the best distortion PEDAL I've ever heard (outside of just ODing a Tube amp). Once again, no idea how this would translate to sawtooth.

I could rough this out with software effects and ballpark what type of pedal to buy.

[niacin]

Years ago I went through a period of trying phaser and wah pedals, often the sweep range that is fine for guitar doesn’t work so great on keys. I found a Lovetone Meatball at a reasonable price, if you can find one and have the cash to splash they are sooooo good.

[KuruPrionz]

7 hours ago, EricBarker said:

 

I was over-simplifying for the sake of brevity. I have an exact replica of this sound, and yes, it has an overdrive and amp simulator too. I have the KORG Legacy Collection, which has the MDE-X effects processor from the Trinity. The Wah Block includes an overdrive and cab simulator. The patch I use begins with a MonoPoly sawtooth > Wah/Dist > Delay. I think the important point is that the Wah is likely before the Distortion in side that effects block (It's hard to know for sure because it's all one block, but that's typically the default order).

I think to be able to replicate this sound and most other in its category, I need to put it through a Distortion Pedal or tube amp at the end. The PolyD has a wonderful distortion module, but there is no effects send/return before it. So probably PolyD > Wah > Distortion > Delay is the ticket.

Now the question is, what's a good distortion/overdrive pedal to use? I tend to hate 80s sold state distortion on guitars, but it might be fine for this purpose. Then again, I had a guitarist friend who used to have a Tube Distortion pedal (I think it was called "The Demonizer"), that was the best distortion PEDAL I've ever heard (outside of just ODing a Tube amp). Once again, no idea how this would translate to sawtooth.

I could rough this out with software effects and ballpark what type of pedal to buy.

Tech 21 started selling SansAmp devices in 1989, it's a good analog tube emulation tone. I have 2 of their distortion boxes and I like them both but the Double Drive 3x MOD is my favorite by far. LOTS of variations, from a "kinda turned up a bit" Fender amp tone to insane overdrive. Double Drive offers both even and odd order harmonics or any blend of the two. It is also very easy to program (I've done it on stage in seconds) and has 3 presets so you can go from sorta crunchy to insane just by switching. 

 

That said, if Peavey would make a rack mount version of their TransTube circuit, it would have a permanent place in my studio gear. I have a 3 of their Vypyr amps with Transtube and once you learn how to dial it in there is nothing better. I've owned Mesa, Fender, boutique stuff and played Marshall, Hi-Watt etc. TransTube wins. 

[The Real MC]

I took a lawn mower apart and salvaged the choke cable, attached one end of the choke cable to a hihat pedal the other end to the filter cutoff pot in the synth.  It's all secured with duct tape.  Push down on the hihat pedal and it mechanically rotates the cutoff pot.  Neat to see the knob move by itself.

 

Follow me for other Red Green redneck mancave solutions 

[Al Coda]

15 hours ago, EricBarker said:

The patch I use begins with a MonoPoly sawtooth > Wah/Dist > Delay. I think the important point is that the Wah is likely before the Distortion in side that effects block (It's hard to know for sure because it's all one block, but that's typically the default order).

I think to be able to replicate this sound and most other in its category, I need to put it through a Distortion Pedal or tube amp at the end. The PolyD has a wonderful distortion module, but there is no effects send/return before it. So probably PolyD > Wah > Distortion > Delay is the ticket.

 

 

Do what you like most ...

experiment w/sequential order of FX in a chain.

 

My "default" order was always "Dist/OD" before "Wah" but a change makes another usable difference/ alternative for sure.

 

Flanger before Distortion device is Jan hammer´s prefered order,- wah in addition or not.

 

With a Kurzweil workstation keyboard and since the PC3 was released, experimenting w/ FX chains is a breeze.

Already w/ PC3 8 FX in any order inside a single insert FX chain are possible.

K2700 doubles that FX count.

 

Doin´ that w/ hardware FX alone costs a kingdom.

 

According to Poly D,-

 

it´s analog and even it´s surface mount design, it should be possible to cut traces on circuit board and implement an unbalanced analog insert point w/ SND/RTN on a single TS jack.

You might need an op-amp to adjust correct level for ext. stomp box devices.

Add a switch and it´s user selectable pre/post distortion.

 

 

A.C.

[Piktor]

Eric Barker, I sent you a p.m.

[CEB]

Hard to say without actually USING with a SYNTH.  Keep this in mind when guitar players are recommending wah pedals.  I can say that because ... well hell look at my profile pic.  I just bought a new wah but its for guitar.  I'm a fan of using a CV pedal to control filter parameters on a synth myself.  Its effective and a low additive noise solution but I'm just a guitar player.

[Dave Bryce]

On 11/11/2022 at 11:02 PM, Jr. Deluxe said:

No Morley is still making wahs and vol pedals. A favorite of Steve Vai.

...and of mine.  I use a Morley Power Wah.

 

 

dB

[CEB]

On 11/11/2022 at 10:41 PM, matted stump said:

Back in the day we used to use Morley wah pedals on keys, but I'm sure those are long gone.

 

No Morley is still around and making a bunch of wah pedal but the power scaling of the circuits have totally changed.  Its all standard Boss type dc powered.  Not like the AC powered chrome beasts we used to use.  I just replaced the Morley on my guitar direct rig.  Due to the nerve damage in my legs I am not getting along with the top side switches and knobs.  I got a switchless Crybaby thingy.  Last Crybaby I used was my old Thomas Organ Company pedal.

 

Not sure how the new Morleys would play with synths.

 

 

 

 

[TommyRude]

Another option would be to use a talkbox - get the wah effect with your mouth

[CEB]

On 11/11/2022 at 11:40 PM, KuruPrionz said:

If you can find one, a Tech 21 Killer Wail is a great wah pedal. There is a 3 way switch on the bottom, Deep, Full Range and High. It's all analog and has that "insane animal growl" to it. I need to get mine fixed!

It's an easy fix.  Its just a standard fasal inductor wah.  Nothing is gooped.  I've repaired mine.  It still on my 6 string electric amp rig.  Though several other things have changed.  I split my board into two smaller boards after my hernia.  The bigger board hits the nose.  The smaller board hits the loop.

[Doerfler]

12 minutes ago, TommyRude said:

Another option would be to use a talkbox - get the wah effect with your mouth

exactly what Shawn Martin does with his Moog Lilttle Phatty

 

[CEB]

11 hours ago, The Real MC said:

I took a lawn mower apart and salvaged the choke cable, attached one end of the choke cable to a hihat pedal the other end to the filter cutoff pot in the synth.  It's all secured with duct tape.  Push down on the hihat pedal and it mechanically rotates the cutoff pot.  Neat to see the knob move by itself.

 

Follow me for other Red Green redneck mancave solutions 

 

 

I shit you not.  I saw this done minus the duct tape.  Guitar player built it to create volume foot control for an old Fender Blackface Super Reverb.

[KuruPrionz]

Just now, CEB said:

It's an easy fix.  Its just a standard fasal inductor wah.  Nothing is gooped.  I've repaired mine.  It still on my 6 string electric amp rig.  I split my board into two smaller boards after my hernia.  The bigger board hits the nose.  The smaller board hits the loop.

Yeah, I've had it open and taken a look. Very serviceable. Then I put it back together since other projects were higher on the priority list. 

I have a love/hate thing for stuff on the floor, mostly hate. 😇

Nice boards!

Currently I'm just plugging straight into an amp and using the EMG SPC mid boost on my guitar to kick up solo sections or back down to accompaniment. 

When I fix it, it might be the only thing on the floor...