Delay to warm up tone and help with pick attack

[willytown]

Hi All,

Can anyone advice on how to fatten up tone with delay settings? And something that contributes to smoothing out pick attack?

For pick attack - I'm not interested in the swell effect of a EHX Pog2 or Hog pedal, but something that can sort of add warmth to the pick attack. In a way similar to the tone mike moreno has going.

thanks

[Carltone]

This will warm up your pick attack like you wouldn't believe. It should be called the plastic finger.

[blille]

Usually for fattening up the tone you use a very short delay (eg 30ms). The point is to emulate double tracking. The Keeley 30ms (terrific pedal) and the TC Mimiq do this.

That's a technique I've seen in rock, not jazz. When I've heard delay for jazz it's either been single ambience or as a creative tool.

For the pick attack, I agree that the trick is on the pick (or the strings). I can't use vpicks with roundwounds because the attack is "plinky". I use JD207 now but I experimented with wooden picks. I'm happy to send you one for you to give it a try.

[uburoibob]

As far as pick attack, go buy a bunch of different picks and select the one that works best for you. It's amazing how different picks can be and what a HUGE difference they can make to your sound. Strings and picks are the place to start before even thinking about pickup changes, etc. As far as fattening a sound with a delay, check out a Strymon Deco. It's billed as a doubler and while I don't know the artist you refer to, I use it for exactly that. Not sure it will help with the pick attack thing, though. I'd think that it'd accentuate it rather than smoothing it.

[Pierrot]

In music recording studios, an automated double tracking (ADT) was achieved by doubling a track adding to it a delay within a margin of 25 - 50 ms, usually, and returning the effect with a mix of 100% on a new channel. (This was in the analog era. Nowadays, copy/paste plus delay and... voilà) But time values remain the same. That's actually a starting point, and the engineer will add o rest some ms according to the nature of the sound beeing doubled and the context.
It' s normally considered that if the delay time is shorter, the brain will integrate the two sounds together and the listener wouldn't hear any difference, while with a longer delay, a slap back or echo will begin to be clearly audible.
This trick is used for multiple purposes, one of them beeing, precisely, fattening the sound of an instrument.

Hope that helps, as it works exactly on the same way for a guitar.

[uburoibob]

What Pierrot says. The Deco nails that.

[Skip Ellis]

Delay is part of my sound - always use it just a little bit. Earthquake Devices Dispatch Master here.

[jazzgtrl4]

I use a MXR carbon copy analog delay, its pretty warm! they even make a "bright" version for people that think the original CC is to dark.

[Boston Joe]

I use a MXR carbon copy analog delay, its pretty warm! they even make a "bright" version for people that think the original CC is to dark.

The CC is a great delay. I don't think it's too dark. I think it's extremely transparent.

I read somewhere that 125 ms is the threshold where most people can discern two distinct sounds, so a delay of 30ms would certainly not be audible, but I would think would provide some fattening.

[Boston Joe]

Delay is part of my sound - always use it just a little bit. Earthquake Devices Dispatch Master here.

Yeah, yeah! Great pedal. I don't even use the onboard reverb on amps anymore. Just plug in the DM and go.

[rpjazzguitar]

I went through something similar and settled on a Golden Gate Mandolin pick.

Golden Gate MP-12 Extra Large Flat Pick Nitrocellulose, One Pick

It's made of a material which produces a softer sound. They come in other shapes as well.

[whiskey02]

The cleaner the guitar tone, the more I f*cking hate delay. A touch of reverb sounds natural, delay sounds like a delay pedal.

[D.G.]

A thick pick is better than any delay settings, far more natural sounding. A good guitar, a good amp, a good pick and most of all, good technique and notes are all you need

[coolvinny]

A thick pick is better than any delay settings, far more natural sounding. A good guitar, a good amp, a good pick and most of all, good technique and notes are all you need

I mostly agree and I've played with a thick pick for years, but I find that a thick pick requires thick strings otherwise the high strings sound plinky. I can't play less than a .13/.17 with my pick of choice...sometimes a .14 for the E.

[D.G.]

I mostly agree and I've played with a thick pick for years, but I find that a thick pick requires thick strings otherwise the high strings sound plinky. I can't play less than a .13/.17 with my pick of choice...sometimes a .14 for the E.

I understand I don't like heavy strings myself and find 11's on my archtops and 10's on my gypsy and Teles to work fine for my needs. But that's me, and what works for me might not be right for someone else!

[Pierrot]

The cleaner the guitar tone, the more I f*cking hate delay. A touch of reverb sounds natural, delay sounds like a delay pedal.

With a short delay (within the 25 - 50 ms margin I' ve mentionned above) you won't hear any repetition but you'll get a fatter sound which is what the OP asked for.

And BTW, you have to choose carefully your
reverb and spend big money if you want a really natural sound. Lexicon for instance was a natural sounding reverb brand. TC Electronic, is another one. Strymon, in some cases...

[grahambop]

The angle at which the pick hits the strings has a big effect on tone, that's what I've always worked on to get a better sound.

It's why classical guitarists don't pluck across the strings at a right angle to the string direction.

If the pick hits the strings 'flat side on' you get a thin tone and hard attack. If it hits 'at an angle' it rounds out the attack and fattens the tone. Experiment with the pick at different angles.

[christianm77]

Delay is a crutch, as is compression. I agree with grahambop. I want to post a video of Adam Rogers because he gets that modern sound with little or no effects:

Check out his pick technique - lots of edge picking. I suggest you explore this (and pick choices) before looking to complicate your signal chain. I don't think there's anything wrong with effects, I just feel for my tastes there's a few Big Name players who I won't mention who could do with turning down the delay, and it just serves to muddy up their playing.

I don't count Kurt Rosenwinkel among them incidentally - Kurt's sound is always very clear, but his use of delay is just one ingredient amongst many, and he seems to constantly changing his set up in pursuit of something only he can hear... A low mix long train delay usually seems to be part of his sound, though.

[christianm77]

Not strictly Op related, but a player who is quite known for getting the sound of delay and reverb without actually using it THAT much is Bill Frisell. Leni Stern mentioned that he sounds like he's using a fat delay even when he plays acoustic... .

[coolvinny]

The angle at which the pick hits the strings has a big effect on tone, that's what I've always worked on to get a better sound.

It's why classical guitarists don't pluck across the strings at a right angle to the string direction.

If the pick hits the strings 'flat side on' you get a thin tone and hard attack. If it hits 'at an angle' it rounds out the attack and fattens the tone. Experiment with the pick at different angles.

While I believe this to be true based on what I've seen and heard other players do, I have not been able to get it to work for me - and so I am a "across the strings at right angle" (or perhaps at very slight angle) picker. This is part of the reason why I use a thick pick and thick strings, but I guess my technique and gear preferences (including pickup height) have evolved together to a degree. Where I think my "right angle" picking hurts me more, to be honest, is in (a) speed and (b) my tone from the thicker wound strings can tend to be too dark - sometimes if I'm playing a tune's head on the low strings I might consciously angle my pick slightly, but if I'm improvising then I'm right-angle the whole time.

But yeah, I think that with a thicker pick and strings (and technique which has developed to make try and get the best sound out of this approach) the "right-angle" approach can sound plenty round and fat...however it has downsides and I'm not saying it's better than the angled approach.

I should mention that I use unbeveled picks. The beveled ones sound too thin for me which I think is due to my right-angle technique.