Wahs

[justinhedrick]

i have never got into using a wah pedal. every time i try to use one they just don't work out for me. actually, it seems like my morley wah really take away a lot of volume (even in bypass), so i just never use it, except in the studio. anyone else not use them?

[Instant Dan]

I'm always on the fence about them. In scenarios where it calls for it being used tastefully in riffs/leads/solos, absoutley. Sadly, so many Metallica and other thrash metal songs have turned me off to it at times that I rather just hit a boost pedal than a wah.

[RacerX]

I'm on the other side of this one. I often find myself thinking, "Step away from the Crybaby, sir."

[grimniggzy]

I use a Qtron instead, its easier IMO.

[johnny problem]

I'm brand new into the wah game.  Came across a fairly cheap Morley Classic Wah.  It definitely sucks the volume.  I also find it really hard to stay within the extremely narrow sweat spot.  For now it stays in the chain, I don't know how long though.

[VOLVO)))]

I use a Qtron.

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[Discö Rice]

fuck all that - kick it on, leave it all the way up, shred eardrums.

[justinhedrick]

fuck all that - kick it on, leave it all the way up, shred eardrums.

ah yes, the "destroy" setting. the several times i used a wah, that is actually all i used it for!

[Chovie D]

I like em , but dont use em much. not sure what that means really.
I wish I were better at using them. Check out how Robert Randolph uses his in that rig rundown vid, so expressive, its not just wah wah wah wah..its vocal when he does it.

I sue to not like em live because they wree diffcult ot run on and off and had no led.
Then i got a switchless wah and that was okay but theres a slight delay before the wah kicks in on the switchless.

Lets see I got a morley tel ray fuzz wah, a "thomas organ" crybaby, and my favorite so far the Foxx Wah machine.

if you put a compressor after the wah and before your distortion, then cock the wah(thats what she said?) you can get a nice Brian May tone.

[inductorguitars]

it seems like my morley wah really take away a lot of volume (even in bypass),

This is why true bypass is so popular.

[+--Stonah--+]

Yeah i'm not into wahs really but am planing on to give it another go...don't know how long will it last this time, i'm just fuzzed out all the way 

[Stonergrunge]

I like it a lot clean and with fuzz/delay, I try not to overuse it though because I don't want to be like Hammett.

[fallen]

I have a modded wah from the guy who makes the 8-Bit Fuzz.

It's an old Vox with added bypass and some internal pots that let you control how much gain boost it has, what the q is and how sharp the q is.

He's got all kinds of cool stuff on that site: http://www.fxdoctor.com

[nonoman]

How bout the wah's place in the chain? I've always loved the really pronounced sound when its at the end. I had a young guy from the other band we were playing with come up at the end of our set telling me I had it all wrong, filters were supposed to come before dirt, blah, blah, (with condescending tone) . I wish I'd had the presence of mind to punch him, but was too busy breaking down. What's the general consensus here?

[RacerX]

How bout the wah's place in the chain? I've always loved the really pronounced sound when its at the end. I had a young guy from the other band we were playing with come up at the end of our set telling me I had it all wrong, filters were supposed to come before dirt, blah, blah, (with condescending tone) . I wish I'd had the presence of mind to punch him, but was too busy breaking down. What's the general consensus here?

I've got dirt right before my wah and right after it. With just the pre-wah dirt, it gets really pronounced and vocal. With just the post-wah dirt, it's nice & watery. With both on, it's somewhere in between.

[hayseed]

I would have to say that my Wah is probably my favorite effect that i have on the board and the one pedal i would never remove from the mix. I use a Dunlop Cry Baby, no mods of sort, just the basic model. I started out using a Behringer Hellbabe Wah but found that it didn't do what i wanted for guitar. My bassist uses it now and just crushes with it. I think for $35 it is an amazing bass wah.

As for where to put it in the chain, I may be a little backwards but this has always worked for me (I have used this chain for several years:
Guitar--> Crybaby Wah-->Small Stone Nano-->Ibanez TS9 Tubescreamer-->Boss DD# Delay-->Behringer Tuner-->Amp.
I have been told to put it at the end but I can never seem to get it to sound right.

[fallen]

Thanks to this thread I ended up ordering an 8-Bit Fuzz this afternoon.

Nothing to do with wahs just ended up on the site where I got my wah modded and remembered how much I wanted that pedal. Oops.

I like wah first. I also like just kicking it on and using it as a signal boost / treble boost into fuzz. There's a few Sabbath songs that have that tone.

[OUTLANDAH]

I have a Vox Wah and Crybaby original. I only tend to use the crybaby after my rat pedal on occasion. It one of those things that you don't want to overdue for the most part

[chille01]

Wah has probably been the one constant on my board too.  Not always the same wah, but always SOME wah.  Can't say that about anything else, except for a tuner.  Nowadays it's a Vox.  I like the subtler sound of putting them in front of the dirt pedals.  I run it second, right after the tuner.  Years ago I had a newer (at the time) Fender amp with an FX loop and a blend knob for that loop.  Would run the wah on the loop, and blend it with the uneffected tone.  That was an interesting sound.

[yesca]

i've never had one in my 3 years of playing but sometimes i think "hmm this would sound sweet with a wah on it" i still wanna pick one up but im not sure which one to get with so many options.

[grimniggzy]

I run my Qtron before dirt but right after my OC-2
Qtron-->RAT = Some tasty grooves
They're definitely the only 2 pedals I would never remove from my board.

[Stonergrunge]

How bout the wah's place in the chain? I've always loved the really pronounced sound when its at the end. I had a young guy from the other band we were playing with come up at the end of our set telling me I had it all wrong, filters were supposed to come before dirt, blah, blah, (with condescending tone) . I wish I'd had the presence of mind to punch him, but was too busy breaking down. What's the general consensus here?

I always place the wah first in the chain, I don't like the way it sounds after the octavia and fuzz.

[liquidsmoke]

I have the old version of this- http://www.realmccoycustom.com/RMC2.htm

It is true bypass and has knobs for volume, Q, and sweep. I like it a lot and have it placed after my Analog Man dark peppermint fuzz(cranked almost fully up) for standard E tuned late '60s/early '70s psych type stuff inspired by Cream, Iron Butterfly, Hawkwind, Hendrix, etc.. For that sort of stuff I generally like tons of fuzz and/or wah or other effects for every riff plus I have a spring reverb pedal turned full up all the time too.

For metal I don't use any effects aside from distortion currently.

[JimBob83]

I recently got myself a Crybaby 535Q which has an adjustable sweep range and Q-control as well as a built in boost.  I had a wah when I first started playing for the same reason most people probably did, because it made my shitty soloing sound more dynamic.  Then I got rid of it for that exact reason.  I wanted to get a wah back on my board because of the possibilities for cool tonal changes with riffs rather than soloing. 

The best example of the sound that I was after was Adam Jones' solo in Lateralus, specifically around the 7min mark.  It's a kind of "bow" sound rather than a throaty wah.  Anyway, after some research it seemed this was the best wah for the job, and I've had a play around with it and it sounds really cool, especially with riffs, you can add so much texture to even a very basic riff and kind of bring it to life.  I don't really like to be too reliant on effects as I like to consider myself a plug-in-and-get-on-with-it type of guitarist but it is temping with this pedal.

As for my opinion on wah's in general... as with most effects pedal, when used tastefully they can really bring something to the table but all too often they just end up sounding (to me) like a substitute for a "proper" solo/guitar part.

[Andrew Blakk]

I'm a really sloppy leadplayer so I do tend to nearly always use my wah when I play solos(me and Kirk!).  I can't really see myself without one on the board(after the dirt of course).

My current one is a Silver Machine Wah.