Need advice on harmonisers......

sted

I assume that's what they are called anyway!

My band has just gone down to one guitarist (Moi!) but we do a fair few lizzy numbers that involve some harmony work, is there *Something* out there that can give me these harmonies with one guitar (Other than a backing track like! Lol!) I dont mind throwing a few quid at the right piece of kit but it has to be able to do the job live and effectively.

Ta very much.

Grunfeld

sted said:

 is there *Something* out there that can give me these harmonies with one guitar

Yep, Boss PS-6.

Very fast and accurate tracking, and perfect for Lizzy harmonies.  The only fiddly thing about it is that the controls are a bit cramped, and you need to dial in the correct key and major/ minor scale, and/ or interval, and under low light your eyesight needs to be good enough (mine isn't) but I've learned where the controls look and feel right, so it's not a deal breaker.  Your singer has to be trained to talk waffly-bollocks to the audience for a few seconds while you set it up live.

The other thing the PS-6 is brilliant for is doing an octave below, which if you mix it in subtly and sparingly really fattens out a lead break quite tastefully.  Completely at the other end, if you put the sub octave into a Big Muff running flat out, with oodles of delay added like a rich sauce, you get quite the most wonderful monster sound of supreme fuzzy gain heaven. 

hubobulous

Quite a few. Eventide H9 or second hand PitchFactor are great and give a lot more besides. Pitch factors are cheaper second hand now due to H9 release

sted

Checking demos now, thx guys.

rich75

Digitech Harmonyman works well, and can automatically detect the key you're playing in. You can also set the key by holding down the footswitch and playing a chord, so it's quicker than manually changing the key.

Paulo

Remember that although it will play a pleasing maj 3rd for instance, above the note you play eg Boys Are Back In Town, this won't be appropriate for every note. If you play the 5th interval then if the harmoniser is set s 3rd above, you will get a nasty (in this context) maj 7. This would be where a 4th above might be the correct harmony depending on the chord you are playing over In other words you will need 3rds and 4ths (or a 5th below).

Grunfeld

Paulo said:

Remember that although it will play a pleasing maj 3rd for instance, above the note you play eg Boys Are Back In Town, this won't be appropriate for every note. If you play the 5th interval then if the harmoniser is set s 3rd above, you will get a nasty (in this context) maj 7. This would be where a 4th above might be the correct harmony depending on the chord you are playing over In other words you will need 3rds and 4ths (or a 5th below).

As it happens with "Boys Are Back in Town" I set it for an A major scale*, and a 3rd below, and I play the top line.  Works well throughout.  My theory is sketchy so it's a bit trial and error at first but my ears are okay so it doesn't take long to work out the necessary notes. 

* or "Ab" if playing in a flat tuning... the results are like bad jazz if you forget to do this

sted

Paulo said:

Remember that although it will play a pleasing maj 3rd for instance, above the note you play eg Boys Are Back In Town, this won't be appropriate for every note. If you play the 5th interval then if the harmoniser is set s 3rd above, you will get a nasty (in this context) maj 7. This would be where a 4th above might be the correct harmony depending on the chord you are playing over In other words you will need 3rds and 4ths (or a 5th below).

Yeah, I thought that might be the case as a lot of the harmonies aren't consistently a fixed interval above or below like you say, I'll just trial and error it, see what works best.

gjonesy

Whammy? Not sure, it might work

Danny1969

I'm in a Lizzy tribute band and we always have to have a really good listen to the harmonies as some of them aren't conventional at all. The middle harmoney bit in Boys are back contains a G and Db for example when you would expect the G to be a A ..... A normal harmonizer is gonna sound a bit weird 

You can actually play both parts at once on a lot of em though, Boys are back, Rosalie, Jail break etc

thecolourbox

I have a stomp box form expression pedal that I had built for me for a harmoniser. It has a momentary switch, and two pots. I used it to set one pot to major 3rd, one to minor 3rd. Then the momentary switch would engage the second one while I held it down, the other one when not. Of course, You can set it to any combination of two different intervals. Worked very well for Brian May esque harmonies, however it found I had to be thinking and coordinating at lightening speeds to use it!

steamabacus

thecolourbox said:

I have a stomp box form expression pedal that I had built for me for a harmoniser. It has a momentary switch, and two pots. I used it to set one pot to major 3rd, one to minor 3rd. Then the momentary switch would engage the second one while I held it down, the other one when not. Of course, You can set it to any combination of two different intervals. Worked very well for Brian May esque harmonies, however it found I had to be thinking and coordinating at lightening speeds to use it!

I've seen a video of Adrian Belew demonstrating a similar idea with his (rather complicated) set-up. He uses an expression pedal and flips between toe-down and toe-up for major and minor harmonies (or whatever he has programmed).

vasselmeyer

You can do it with a Line 6 or Zoom box. Then all you need to do is change patches so that you're in the right key and have set the right interval. No bending down and messing about.

ThePrettyDamned

Paulo;286654" said:

Remember that although it will play a pleasing maj 3rd for instance, above the note you play eg Boys Are Back In Town, this won't be appropriate for every note. If you play the 5th interval then if the harmoniser is set s 3rd above, you will get a nasty (in this context) maj 7. This would be where a 4th above might be the correct harmony depending on the chord you are playing over

In other words you will need 3rds and 4ths (or a 5th below).

There are intelligent harmonisers that avoid this - you dial in the correct key and it does the work for you, mostly.

Synyster gates uses an axe fx ii with several pre programmed patches, but I suspect the boss intelligent harmoniser is a really good compromise. Actually, pgs have a demo of it - watch the demo of the boss power stack, and they use one on it - sounds great!

Power stack sounded good to me too but was a bit noisy when it was up to higher than room volume

dunstanmus

H9 core with the right scale dialled in will work a treat.

Beexter

Not sure about the harmonies particularly but I use Digitech EX7 on the whammy setting, octave up for Are you gonna go my Way. It's the best option I've tried so far and that includes Boss and Zoom pitch shifters.

ElectroDan

I used the harmoniser on a GT8 to play the second solo of "Show must go on" by Queen. I used the Expression pedal to bring the harmony in and out, then the Control pedal to change the interval. Sounded pretty good.

I still play "Show must go on", but have gone to a simple guitar and amp set up. I'm not sure anyone notices. But for Lizzy, you could really do with a wing man!

thecolourbox

ThePrettyDamned said:

There are intelligent harmonisers that avoid this

Yeah but then you have no control, you can set it to any combination of intervals, and you choose when you'd like to play them, I found intelligent harmonizers only harmonize in a very set way (as you'd expect) so the harmony line is not very interesting or flexible - for example any chord changes mess it up completely. However, yes, they are easier to use, but in the same way that it's easier to  use a Harmonizer instead of a 2nd guitarist! Compromise