Building an inexpensive effects chain - help appreciated

geetarguy85

Hello all,

I’m considering building up an inexpensive pedal board mainly for home use and I’d love to get your expert opinions on some of my choices. My budget is somewhere around the £200 mark including a PSU, and I’m happy to go for good condition used stuff rather than brand new. The board itself will be DIY. I’ve got some of the pedals already as indicated in the list.

I play a wide range of styles including blues (typically Eric Clapton, Gary Moore, Joe Bonamassa), pop rock (often with an 80s vibe such as The 1975 and Walk the Moon), hard rock (e.g. Black Stone Cherry) and metal (stuff like Trivium, Bullet for my Valentine, Atreyu). So the board will need to serve all of these genres

I will be playing into Bias Amp or ToneStack.

Here it goes:

Wah - Morley Tremonti Wah (already have)

Compressor - TC Electronic Forcefield ?

Drive - Blackstar LT Drive ?

Distortion - Digitech DF-7 (already have)

Fuzz - Big Muff Pi Nano (already have)

Chorus - ?

Phaser - ? (I think this’ll be lowest priority so if it doesn’t fit into the budget, no biggie)

Delay - ? (I’m expecting to spend the most here)

Looper - Digitech Jamman Solo XT (already have)

Alternatively, would I be better off spending that £200 on a decent multi effects pedal such as a Boss ME80 or Zoom G5n?

Thanks!

meltedbuzzbox

I would buy an used Line 6 M9 for under £150. 
The worst things on it are the drive pedals (The tube driver is usable though) but you have enough stuff already to sort that. 
You then have £50 for a PSU of some sorts. Maybe a one spot or something (Sorry PSU pricing is not my thing). 

Rocker

Rather than hoping that people will tell you what you should have, you must decide what sound(s) you want. Then, having told us, you will get an avalanche of suggestions here. IMHO your best option is to visit your local music shop and try these things for yourself. A small/limited budget is not a big issue - you may need to prioritise your intended purchases.

boogieman

The M9 is a good shout, most of the effects are good (although I agree the drives are its weak spot). Otherwise you could go for something like Mooer or Rowin pedals which are pretty cheap but still sound decent. Most of them are clones of classic pedals. 

ToneControl

PSU = Thomann Harley Benton powerplant Junior

ToneControl

to save lots of cash, look at the Joyo clones

pintspiller

Are you in a hurry? You can probably pick up a decent collection of Boss pedals for less than £50 each.

clarkefan

A Boss multi fx is an easy answer, plenty of them well in your reach on eBay, each with tons of sounds, rather than take the same money and spend it on like three pedals you might end up not liking/being unable to shift.

geetarguy85

Thanks everyone.

To answer @Rocker 's question, I'd be looking for enough tonal versatility to cover the genres a listed but some particular sounds I'd be interested include:

1. A twangy, compressed 80s style clean (e.g. as heard on Aquaman by Walk the Moon)

2. Compressed cleans with chorus, as often heard with bands like The 1975

3. Straightforward low gain and higher gain blues tones

4. Classic metal tones (think Metallica and Megadeth late 80s)

5. Modern metal tones (e.g. Trivium, Periphery)

6. Saturated high gain leads

LuttiS

If its bedroom use i'd go for a swish mfx unit, you can they experiment with the bazillions of effects there and have a bit of fun. Something like the line 6 HD500 would cover what you want and they should be under £200 used. The reverbs & delays (imo) are really fantastic on it. If your willing to tweak (the software is very good for it) you can dial in the high gain stuff too - or you can go on the L6 website and just download the 1000's of patches users have uploaded. 

mfin

For the blues tones on the dead cheap, try a Mosky Obsessive Drive (£17) and a Donner Blues Drive (£25). Run them low to medium gain and stack them for the higher gain stuff.

Cols

I’m a pedal guy, but for your requirements I’d have to say a decent multifx would be most appropriate.  A Boss GT8 or GT10 should come in well within budget and cover all the bases.