Do I Need an E-Bow?

Ravenous

Back in the 90s I built myself a sustainer - it was just using little coils ripped out of Tandy single earphones that were available at the time. Each coil had a little chip amp (LM386 or something).  The coils were taped under each string, past the end of the fretboard.

In theory it would work for chords, though I only ever built 2 channels before giving up and ripping it to bits. (Reliability wise, it was a half baked pile of crap...)

I've thought of getting an E-bow occasionally, but I don't think I could be bothered with having to hold the thing. The idea's fine, but I'd much rather have some sort of sustainiac thing myself...

fretmeister

Use 2 at once.

Here is Michael Manring using them on the 2 outer strings.

steamabacus

I bought a second-hand ebow (about £50, I think) about 15 years ago and it's been one of my best ever purchases. They do take a bit of practice to get the hang of - there is a fair amount of 'technique' to learn in order to control the feisty nature of the resonant sound they create - but there's nothing quite like them for ambient excursions (especially combined with a looper).

I used mine extensively on the last FretBoard Composition Challenge, 'Guitar Soundscapes'
http://www.thefretboard.co.uk/discussion/comment/1287330/#Comment_1287330

https://soundcloud.com/thefretboard/steamabacus-elohim?in=thefretboard/sets/fretboard-challenge-15

Snap

fretmeister said:

Use 2 at once.

Here is Michael Manring using them on the 2 outer strings.

I love this vid. Its just amazing it really is, and it makes me feel massively crap at playing!!!

Sassafras

I've just seen PGS Andy demoing that Freqout pedal.
Looks like a far more usable solution for infinite sustain.

And before you ask, I am not Andy of PGS fame, unfortunately.

vale

your blue peter make for the weekend.

thermionic

I always wondered how the Ebow could "know" what note you're playing when it all it did was was excite the string electromechanically... After some background reading, I see there's a pickup coil, an amplifier and an excitation coil. Ah, right.

Still, the harmonic mode is very clever, it's something to do with phase or polarity which I haven't worked out yet. Might be something like the octave-up fuzzes which use a transformer to duplicate the signal and cheat the ear to think it's at double the frequency.

ewal

e-bow on bass, a-bow on guitar Very adventurous use of ebow from about 7mins in

Bellycaster

Had time to give it a good go today, I can get tons of sustain out of the Bogner Blue with the Keeley 4 knob Comp on. Neck pick up selected "Toanz for Days"

Might pick up an e bow in future when I have more spends.

PolarityMan

impmann said:

Sporky said:

Sassafras said:

Damn, that's made me want to get an ebow.
I can finally bin the kazoo.

How are you going to do Final Countdown without a kazoo?

The best way.

Silently.

What about crosstown traffic then?