How much does visual appeal affect your buying of pedals and amps?

frankus

This is an interesting one - amplifiers there's a massive influence on appearance, but it's due entirely to what my wife will allow in the house..

My '74 Fender Twin lives in the garage cos my wife thinks it looks tatty

As for pedals - I don't like having too many similarly coloured pedals. Condition isn't so important.

stickyfiddle

I like things that look expensive and well made. Hence Strymon, Bad Cat and Cornell are all winners and I'd rather have a Whammy V than an EHX pitchfork despite the latter being a better pedal for my needs, but the Whammy is bright red and exciting. Equally, my Laney Lionheart is a much better amp than the Mesa 5:25 it replaced, not least because it's blue.

Blackstar (non-Artisan), Line 6, Digitech and Carlsbro are all out before I even plug them in. Similarly, I've dismissed Egnater stuff because it looks like it's made from the spare parts from everyone else.

Hughes & Kettner are a funny one though. They're pretty and reviews suggest they sound good but they remind me too much of a Saxo with so much stereo kit it take 30 seconds to get to 60.

Neil

I'm afraid visual appearance is my main criterion with amps especially.

I love blonde Fenders and turquoise Tone Kings, mmmm.


Pedals have a slightly different attraction, as well as being a delightful colour they must have a stupid name.

Fortunately many modern pedals seem to fit this criteria.

Hertz32

I love knobs and backlighting. All the high gain confusing 4 channel amps look brilliant to me, and I do like the look of BOSS pedals more than most others. Not that I have a big pedalboard, but I'll probably be biased toward buying the BOSS pedal of whatever I need, as long as it isnt distortion or OD, in the future.

I also think Pedals should look beat to shit.

holnrew

Gassage said:

samzadgan said:

one of the biggest considerations is visual appeal for me.

when it comes to pedals, no other brand gets me more excited visually than EQD...its just my luck that they make things that i like the sound of too and they arent stupid expensive.

What, you mean better looking than this?

That looks amateurish to me.

RaymondLin

I have to admit that I detest, hate and could vomit at Cornish pedals.

For 1 thing, you'd think you can get some better way of putting words on the pedal than a Dymo label machine, that's just being stingy.  If he doesn't want to spend lots of money on running costs then how about do it like Fairfield Circuitary and just stamp it on?  Massive boxes too meaning it really takes over the board visually.

So yes, visual plays a part and Cornish pedals gets 0/10.

EQD pedals are nice, they are compact, top jacks and most of them have a trend in design and pallet of colour to them.  Same goes for JHS, I like the bold colours.

 

the_jaffa

The look of pedals doesn't really bother me at all but the look of an amp is a lot more important to me and I kinda agree about the Marshall thing.

I definitely prefer the look of the classic Fender Black/Silver face amps to almost everything

RaymondLin

Neil said:

I'm afraid visual appearance is my main criterion with amps especially.

I love blonde Fenders and turquoise Tone Kings, mmmm.


Pedals have a slightly different attraction, as well as being a delightful colour they must have a stupid name.

Fortunately many modern pedals seem to fit this criteria.

Is that meant to look like a television? or an old radio from the 40's ?

 

I have to say one thing I don't like about big amplifiers is that they all look the same.  They all are around the same size, they are all rectangular, the same torlex, the same corner protector, the same kind of grill cloth, with the name of the brand smack bang in the middle and with very little actual design thought process put into how it looks.  If you remove the name, and look at it from 50ft away, a lot of them would all look the same.  Marshall, Suhr, Hiwatt, Bogner etc etc etc.

Majorscale

Pretty pedalboards just sound better ;-)

RaymondLin

What is the pedal next to the tuner and the one next to the skreddy echo and with the big M ?

 

Very nice board though, can someone say Boutique ?!

the_jaffa

Looks like the pedal with the big M is for the amp.  Left switch looks like it switches the effects loop in and the right hand switches reverb on/off.

Majorscale

RaymondLin said:

What is the pedal next to the tuner and the one next to the skreddy echo and with the big M ?

 

Very nice board though, can someone say Boutique ?!

@RaymondLin, the pedal next to the tuner is a first anniversary special edition of the Bearfoot HoneyBee, gains an extra presence control and is nicknamed a HoneyBeeatch! The big "M" pedal is the footswitch for my Magnatone Twilighter amp (reverb and vibrato).

Bucket

Hertz32 said:

I love knobs

Haha

frankus

Majorscale said:

Pretty pedalboards just sound better ;-)

@Majorscale what is that 2nd in on the top left next to the tuner?

Bucket

Anyway, I think aesthetics are important - often with guitars it is the look that draws me in first. Not sure how to explain this, but I find myself visually drawn to guitars with particular features that I like, regardless of the aesthetic appeal of those features. For example, I tend to prefer the look of 24 fret guitars just because they have 24 frets and that is a useful feature to me, not for any genuine aesthetic reason.

Also, a guitar could be a piece of shit but if it looks great, I'll probably still at least be prepared to give it the benefit of the doubt. Hence my continued desire to have a spin on an SG with the sideways vibrato

Neil

RaymondLin said:

Neil said:

I'm afraid visual appearance is my main criterion with amps especially.

I love blonde Fenders and turquoise Tone Kings, mmmm.


Pedals have a slightly different attraction, as well as being a delightful colour they must have a stupid name.

Fortunately many modern pedals seem to fit this criteria.

Is that meant to look like a television? or an old radio from the 40's ?

 

A little from column A, a little from column B.

Either way it doesn't look like anything else - which is good.

ThePrettyDamned

Looks are not that important to me. 

That said, no pedals look as good as Boss ones.  They're the perfect size, reliable, easy to hit, and (mostly) easy to identify because of the (usually) consistent colour scheming. 

I would *love* an all Boss board. 

GavRichList

RaymondLin said:

I have to admit that I detest, hate and could vomit at Cornish pedals.

For 1 thing, you'd think you can get some better way of putting words on the pedal than a Dymo label machine, that's just being stingy.  If he doesn't want to spend lots of money on running costs then how about do it like Fairfield Circuitary and just stamp it on?  Massive boxes too meaning it really takes over the board visually.

So yes, visual plays a part and Cornish pedals gets 0/10.

EQD pedals are nice, they are compact, top jacks and most of them have a trend in design and pallet of colour to them.  Same goes for JHS, I like the bold colours.

 

Fairfields aesthetic divides opinion just as much though; can think of a few who think they look lazy and amateurish too... Though to me, this looks great

http://i238.photobucket.com/albums/ff193/guitarsforminnaars/Mobile Uploads/BA312777-4CD0-4379-B88F-982FCBB5FCBC.jpg

ThePrettyDamned

GavHaus said:

RaymondLin said:

I have to admit that I detest, hate and could vomit at Cornish pedals.

For 1 thing, you'd think you can get some better way of putting words on the pedal than a Dymo label machine, that's just being stingy.  If he doesn't want to spend lots of money on running costs then how about do it like Fairfield Circuitary and just stamp it on?  Massive boxes too meaning it really takes over the board visually.

So yes, visual plays a part and Cornish pedals gets 0/10.

EQD pedals are nice, they are compact, top jacks and most of them have a trend in design and pallet of colour to them.  Same goes for JHS, I like the bold colours.

 

Fairfields aesthetic divides opinion just as much though; can think of a few who think they look lazy and amateurish too... Though to me, this looks great

http://i238.photobucket.com/albums/ff193/guitarsforminnaars/Mobile Uploads/BA312777-4CD0-4379-B88F-982FCBB5FCBC.jpg

Yeah, they do divide opinion.  I think that looks cheap - the letters don't align right, and it's just a metal box. 

I know all of this is intentional... But all that matters to me is the sound and the bypass scheme.  If they're both good, I'm interested  

ThePrettyDamned

I would love an amp that sounds exactly like a 200 watt Marshall Major on the edge of breakup, but 1x12 and pretty enough to not look out of place in the living room.