Woodinblack

I am not a pedal guy - I am happy with most multieffects. I hate all the wiring and hassle. Probably because I spent most of my early years as a major pedal guy but since then I have spent too many lost hours of my life standing next to people trying to get their pedals to work so we can get on with the gig. But, this is the first pedal I have had in ages that is something I couldn't approximate with something else, and genuinely does something fun and relatively unique. And it is just so useable - no setup, just find a setting and play it.

So what is the input to that compressor? Is it direct from an active bass? That could be another issue

I never understand the popularity of it either, but we do it as we got hassled into it, and frankly if we didn't do it the average audience would be very unhappy. I must admit to disliking the song quite a bit but just one of those things you have to do. And on the grand scheme of it, its not the worst thing on our setlist.

Yes, if you press and hold the switch (or external footswitch) it will hold whatever it is playing until you let go of the switch.

I gigged mine yesterday, and the day before. They were odd gigs and we didn't do our normal set list, so no poker face. But I used it, mainly for fattening the sound up. However, we did 20th Century boy (which was a surprise, we haven't done that for a good 20 gigs), So I thought as I didn't have the synths set for the start note like I used to a few years back when we did it all the time, and I had about 5 seconds of notice, the synth was set to a pad sound, I turned it up, played a higher E and then pressed the hold button to hold that E while I did the riff. It sort of worked. With a bit of notice and practice it could certainly work.

Nope. It is a proper synth arpegiator, so you trigger it with some notes and it does a pattern of notes with the synth, like any other synth would do. At no point does the SY-1 do anything with your guitar signal apart from use the pitch to set its oscilators, your signal goes straight through unchained (if you turn it up).

Now I have read your original post, it will not help you (sorry, I was sitting in exeter high street waiting for my wife to come out of lush when I replied before). It helps in the situation where you have a shared power supply, and the digital noise gets on the power going to the other effects. If you have it sat on your amp, that is the first thing to change.

Well, I have a few ashdown pieces, a few of those aren't worth the effort of advertising, and old EVO 300, and a mibass 150. I am happy to keep the EVO 300, its a solid amp even if I don't use it, the mibass, will probably sell it for whatever somewhere. And I have a CTM100. I think I could probably get a couple of quid for that if I advertised it. I am not going to though!

To clear up space for other things. Some people don't have the space for lots of things.

It is dc only, sorry I missed you wanted AC. The only reason I said about the polarity converter is the smoothhound is backwards That is exactly what it is for

No, the last ones I saw were very overpriced, the fishman is a better deal

Tbh, I would very surprised if you couldn’t get the stomp to do the same thing. The akai I think had a better sound but not the flexibility and was a bit glitchy sometimes (and stupidly overpriced now) the fishman I had (and the akai before it) when I was in a 3 piece doing all that 70s punk pop stuff and green day, works well for that, maybe less for rock i use the octave up on the hx effect for the “second guitar” on “are you going my way”, works ok

They are standard connectors, I use one with my smoothhound (after a polarity changer)

I used both a fishman powerchord FX and the akai Unibass. Both do a 5th up / 4th down, octave etc. both do what they say and can sound good if a little artificial. The fish man was a little less artificial but a bit more flexible

Will give it a try, but will almost certainly have tried it as I spent an age in the ARP section, hands down my favourite place I gigged it yesterday, didn't do our actual synthy songs but I used it in a few random places. Probably some places where it didn't go, but I don't care, it is a brilliant thing.

Yeh, that was what I was considering before the SY1 came out, and then the GI-10 but that was non bass. I was almost considering going back to the GR5 or maybe even a VB-99, although they are a bit like rocking horse leftovers I was interested briefly in the C4 until I found out it was mono, but I really needed a poly pedal, I don't want to do just basslines, otherwise it would be interesting. The FI was also interesting but too expensive for me when it came out. Nope, that is what I am currently gigging with. For other reasons I might be going for the zoom G3n for the bass, so I can use the HX for other things. Yes, apart from the guitar amps and number of blocks it is the same. The sims are ok and better than the mono pedals I had before like the SYB-5 and behringer copies of it, but nothing like this. Well, that video was my phone balanced on my piano, but normally I use a combination, either the B3/B3n, the Stealth pedal if I am practicing or the Behringer UMC202HD U-Phoria interface, which is connected but I haven't yet used. When I do some proper videos I think the U-Phoria would be the best choice, then I don't have to have anything else in the signal path.

Its the standard one mans choice of a set of guitar solos, I like quite a few of them, but honestly a solo is pretty meaningless without the song. I am not one to judge, my favourites will never get on that list (although I agree with the steven wilson comment above, i love that). I did used to like la villa solo that they have on the list, but honestly most of the time I prefer upbeat, so if I had to pick one rush solo that moves me now it would be analog kid because it is sharp, discordant and goes perfectly with the song.

I was very impressed with the tracking - I can play a fast (as fast as I can) riff on the B string from open to the e, and it tracks every bit. The Synth pedals I had before didn't, and also the GR5 with the GK3 pickup didn't as well as this, so that is impressive. All in all, the word synthesizer is very much an 80s / 90s synth, things that sound like synths, not synths sounding like something else, which is fine, that is what I want. The SEQ presets are a ton of fun, I got sort of trapped in them last night, I don't know how much use they are particularly with a group but I sort of wrote a few songs around them! As you can imagine just a series of arpeggios and sequences in a variety of patterns, 9/10ths of them in key and one out (seems all modes have one that is out of key). SFX you could probably use as one offs or as background, a bit to random to be that useful I feel. Bell makes good background sounds but I wouldn't describe them as particularly bell like, maybe they are different on the guitar? who knows, I didn't get round to trying. Organ - this is really the weak bit. I can see where they are going with the idea, but you aren't convincing anyone it is an organ, and it is not very pleasant. Strings and Pads, probably the place that I am going to spend my time, some fantastic synth sounds, all working well with chords, even as just a background turned down a bit I find them pleasant. The variations are really good variations - some up, some down, some spread out. Bass, well, does what you expect, but if you are already down to the low b you are getting pretty low with this! As a result I didn't spend a lot of time with that, I am feeling that is much more a guitar effect. Lead - loads of fun for real in your face leads, some pretty useable, some I am sure just there for comedy value. In short, I found loads I liked. How you can work out a system of finding the one you want again, I am not yet sure, the knobs are pretty small, the device is pretty small. Not only are there all those groups and all the variations, the filter and rate knobs can completely change the sound too. I think it is a case of find the effect you want, and take a picture of write it down! I tried it with a zoom footpedal, but it didn't work in a predictable way that I expected, I am guessing maybe it needs to be wired in a different way. The guitar / bass switch didn't seem to make a whole load of difference either, I imagine it is just there to give it a bit help to the input filters, but as it worked fine in guitar mode, who knows. I have noted down a couple of patches, One I will give a try on Poker face which we play, and also one for the chorus of brick in the wall as maybe a background subtle thing (I already have synth floor pedals for that). I have the advantage that the pub we are gigging tonight is our 'home' pub - they are our people, its where we do the new songs, its where we get forgiven if we mess up, its where other people occasionally come and join in. This is not one of those pedals where you buy it and have to work out what it is doing, it is very in your face. Obviously you can turn it down, Strangely instead of a mix control it has separate through and effect levels, which is nice. If I never used it again I would say it was worth the money for the fun I have had from it already, but I am sure as hell going to be using it until everyone else is sick of it. I will do some more recordings when I get some good sounds to show. -- edit the other thing to note is in all the pictures, it is a blue. it isn't blue, it is purple!

Yes, just down to what styles were popular.

Why? A Fender P is a slab of wood roughly shaped with a neck bolted on. This is very well crafted guitar using old techniques to create a fine semi acoustic body with neck built in. It would be crazy if a P had been anything like the price of this in 64.

Hey lads, I see you are having some sort of tiff or something, but you know, this is the Boss SY1 thread, and I know threads are supposed to drift but could you take it to PMs or something because am actually really interested in the Boss SY1 as I have one just here and have enough of that at band practices. Ta mutchly.

Ignore it, and get on with the fun stuff.

Oh that makes sense, obviously if you put the effect before the SY1, it would affect the synth triggering, and if you put it after the SY1, it would have the effect on the synth tones, so the send return just gets the source signal and isn't affected by the synth.

Its a boss pedal, it acts like a boss pedal. you press the pedal and it turns on and does stuff. You can also hold the pedal and it holds whatever is playing, I think that is genuinely useful. It does chords fine, even low ones (haven't tried it with a guitar or stick yet). The effect / direct know, pretty obvious does what you think. The rate / depth is mostly like a filter depth like the big knob on a moog or bass station, and a speed. Pretty obvious The switch with names on it says what it does, but basically, its that and the variations that you flip around for fun sounds, then try and remember what you found! Reading the manual, apparently there is a switch on the back for bass / guitar. I didn't use that as I didn't notice it. Dont know what it is set for but I assume guitar. So good it works. Yep, clear and fast, and the tapewounds aren't good for pitch, so I expect better on an ibby. Even a chord with the B works.

If I look around the living room it is loads better. Just 4 basses, 2 guitars, 1 Chapman stick, 1 Yamaha reface (so small it doesn't count), one Roli keyboard (but its just a keyboard, so that doesn't count). Barely anything. Oh and a Yamaha TRH10 amp.