Pedalboard!

This board has taken final shape. The journey lasted approximately 7 years. My very first pedal was an EHX Big Muff Pi Tone Wicker. My first board was 24 x 12. Countless hours of research, buying, selling and playing has led me here. Will each pedal last forever on it? Likely not. But these are the best pedals I have played within their categories. Perhaps I can save someone some time by explaining some of the process I went through. I thought it might be interesting to document what’s going on here as a sort of summation. But – in the end, each board is a personal journey and means of expression.

This board is 32 x 16. I actually don’t understand why 24 x 12 is a standard size. It leaves a couple inch gap between 2 rows of pedals. Pedals are about 4 to 5 inches tall. I was at first hesitant to ever assemble this many pedals together, but as it turns out a lot of them were sitting around unplayed since I lacked the space. I have quite a few more not on this board, that may be swapped in eventually for a few moments of glory.

We can start from the inside out, so to speak. This is a Hands Board. Underneath it all is a rising platform that has pistons that lift the whole top. Quite useful for hands-free tinkering underneath. It also happens to be a rat’s nest of cables, but the good part is all of that is hidden away. There’s also a DSM Humboldt Simplifier which is a an amp/cab simulator, which outputs all of the signal to an audio interface (MOTU M4), all leading to a DAW on the computer. The other nice thing about the Hands Board is having power and input and output ports on the board itself, so you connect all your instrument and power cables to the board and then connect them to the pedals underneath, discretely.

Cables – to briefly mention. There are patch cables of all sizes connecting everything. A mix of TS and TRS when called for with the stereo pedals. Ernie Ball and Boss are making some nice ones these days. The Simplifier outputs through XLR which is nice, so the output is already balanced. On that note, the Simplifier also contains an effects loop, so it essentially works as a I/O hub for all the pedal routing.

As many know, a very important part of pedals is how to power them. I have a Walrus Audio 15 and a Strymon Ojai linked to each other for a total of 20 500mA outputs. mA is milliamps, and all pedals come with instructions on how many they require for power. Typically analog dirt and modulation don’t need that many, whereas digital delay and reverb need quite a bit. Regardless, having more than enough is always better.

Onto the pedals themselves – quite a lot going on here. Maybe to start with the basic routing. The guitar input goes into the board and then into the Chase Bliss Bliss Factory. Next in line is the Hotone Soul Press 2. It is a volume pedal as well as a way and expression pedal. It also has a tuner out port, which goes to the TC Electronic Polytune. This tuner can be set to be always on, which is very useful. Combined with the volume pedal, you can still tune without passing signal.

From there the routing goes left then up. Everything here is a dirt or drive pedal, except the Chase Bliss Wombtone, which is a phaser. The 2 Thorpy pedals are limited edition – a Tacit Blue and Boneyard, or fuzz face and tonebender style pedals, respectively.

Then, the Dirt Bird feeds in the DSM input. Then, it goes to a send output to the next section of pedals. It starts with an Analogman Stereo Chorus, then continues to the Walus Meraki, then down to the row of Chase Bliss, up to the Strymons, up to the Walrus Monuments, and ends with the Big Sky MX. That outputs to the stereo returns in the DSM. From there it’s 2 XLR outs to the recording setup.

When it comes to this many pedals, lots of people turn to switchers and / or MIDI. I don’t really mind the tap dancing so the switcher is out, at least for now. MIDI is too complicated for my feeble brain right now as well. Maybe someday I will take the dive into it, since I have basically ended my tone search. I’ll always be on the lookout for new and cool pedals, but it feels like I don’t have much left to accomplish in terms of keeping the cycle of buying and selling going. Maybe I’ll miss it a little.

TC Electronic Polytune: https://amzn.to/4isYhzp

Hotone Soul Press: https://amzn.to/41NJDM4

Walrus Audio Meraki: https://amzn.to/4kLH1XB

Strymon Audio Big Sky MX: https://amzn.to/4kMcVDn

Strymon Deco: https://amzn.to/41O39Ie

Ernie Ball Patch Cables: https://amzn.to/41KSbDn

Rockboard Y splitter cable: https://amzn.to/4isYhzp