There are so many guitar effects pedals on the market and it is hard to know what the difference is between them. Categorizing effects pedals has been difficult to find a consensus on how to do this. There are six common classifications: Dynamics, time based, tone, filter, pitch/frequency, and feedback/sustain. This article will focus on the Dynamics Classification and the Tone Classification.

Dynamics Classification: Clean Boost/Volume Pedal, Compressor Pedal, microphone amplifier.

Clean Boost/Volume Pedal; Amplifies the volume of an instrument by increasing some aspect of its electrical signal output. These types of effects are usually used for “boosting” volume during solos and preventing signal loss in long “effects chains”
Examples: Fender Volume pedal, Dunlop MXR Amp effect, Visual Sound True Tone Clean Boost

Compressor Pedals; stabalize volume and smooths a note by dampening its onset and amplifying its sustain. Compression is achieved by varying the strength of a signal to ensure volume stays within a specific dynamic range.
Examples: Dunlop’s MXR custom Comp pedal, Erockson Compressor/Sustain pedal, Boss CS-3, Aguilar TLC Compressor, BBE Benchpress pedal.

Microphone Preamplifier or “preamp”; Increases a microphones low voltage output to levels that can be picked up and used by equipment such as mixing consoles and headphones.

Tone Classification: Distortion, Overdrive, Fuzz, Lo-Fi

Distortion and Overdrive; distort the tone by adding “overtones” creating different sounds such as “warm” “dirty” “gritty” types. Distortion effects produce the same amount of distortion at any volume. Overdrive units produce “clean” sounds at a lower volume and distorted sounds at louder volumes.

Examples: BBE GreenScreamer, Dunlop MXR Distortion III, MXR custom GT overdrive, Dunlop Zakk Wylde Overdrive Pedal, BOSS Bass Overdrive, Pigtronix Aria Distortion pedal, Pigtronix Disnortion, Visual Sound Jekyll & Hyde Ultimate Overdrive, and Route 66 American Overdrive.

Fuzz Pedal or ” Fuzzbox”; A type of overdrive pedal that clips a sound-wave until it is nearly a square wave resulting in a heavily distorted or “fuzzy” sound. The Rolling Stones greatly popularized the use of fuzz effects.
Examples: Electro-Harmonix Big Muff, Visual Sound Angry Fuzz Octave, Boss Fuzz, Dunlop MXR Blue Box Octave Fuzz.

Lo-Fi Effects; Emulate the hiss, static and poor tone quality of vintage and analog electronic equipment.

Boost, Compression, Distortion and Fuzz are the most popular class of effects. Usually, if a guitarist only owns one pedal, it is one of these. Many musicians have several of these types and use two or three at a time to get the many different sounds that make music so wonderful!

What type of music uses these kinds of effects? Let me just say that all types of music uses all of these or some of these effects. Turn your favorite radio station on or listen to you favorite downloads, and I\’m sure you will hear some of the above listed effects. They are the fabric of our music that we have listened to for so many years.

Next time you listen to your favorite music, try and pick out the fuzz, distortion, overdrive, Lo-Fi. Then, think how that music would sound without those effects. Totally different, we would have a hard time recognizing it!

Author Bio: I have a passion for music and love the effects that are placed into music, especially Distortion .We feature a great selection of the best guitar pedal power supply products on the market in a broad range of prices to accommodate any budget guidelines you may possibly have. For all your guitar effects needs visit www.guitareffectsplus.com

Category: Entertainment
Keywords: distortion, pedal, guitar effects