You guys do such a good job with this. I'm a double-Van Gogh when it comes to music, but even I can make out the different guitar sounds.

Ha! Double-van-Gogh. That's excellent. I'll have to remember that. Thanks for the encouragement, Ricardo. Glad you enjoyed the new one.

Very enjoyable.

Another excellent addition to the podcast list, I'm particularly thrilled to hear one about guitar effects because I recieved a pedal board for Christmas with many of the effects mentioned. This gave me some good songs to choose from to practice the new stuff out with.

Very cool. Did you get the full board as one piece, or separate stompboxes that you're linking together?

Again..........Amazing

don't "delay" with the next podcast because this one was just like a "whoa-whoa"

Another good entry!

Would have appreciated a little reference to vibrato, which is often confused with tremolo, which as you point out is a variation in volume; vibrato being a modulation in frequency. Some amps that have a tremolo effect errantly refer to the effect as vibrato (which is most often applied with a whammy bar, rather than electronics).

Chorus, by the way, is technically a time based effect combining short delay with the frequency modulation of vibrato.

This is turning into a terrific series- glad to see it happening on a regular basis!

Funny that you mention vibrato. We originally had vibrato/whammy in the script, but decided it was less of an effect that you turn on or engage, and more of a technique. Whammy is not an electronic effect you just activate, as you mentioned; it's a performance technique which requires its own approach and study.

That said, whammy/vibrato should turn up in a future episode, as will other techniques like slide playing, playing with harmonics, etc.

And of course there are other effects we've yet to hit, like phaser, flanger, reverb, ring modulation, and many more.

(It bugs me too when tremolo is referred to as vibrato.)

Another great (and i mean GREAT) podcast. Cant wait till next one.

keep up with the good job.

Thanks! Very happy to hear it. We're going to post a new podcast every two weeks. So every other Wednesday, expect a new one.

Thanks for the comments everyone! I had a lot of fun making the podcast with Kevin. Let me know if you have any questions, and I'll try to answer them to the best of my abilities.

btw, double van gough! LOL

I really enjoy your podcasts. All of them have been great. I've been a passive consumer of music all my life and learning about what goes into making the music adds a whole new dimension to the music. You make it all so interesting and accessible. Thanks so much.
barney

You're welcome, Barney! That makes us very happy to hear that.

Great job! I downloaded these and played them for my composition class, and they've been very useful! Thanks so much, looking forwards to many more

Nathan

You teach a composition class? That's excellent. What could we do to make it easier to use these shows in classes? Are there additional materials or information we could provide?

Hey you guys left out the most monumental and ground breaking guitar effect ever created. It's when the guitarist plays the guitar while it is behind his/her back. It has the most bizarre and fascinating effect upon the listener I have ever witnessed.

Hmmm...

Kevin, I believe I would render that a "technique" as apposed to an "effect", wouldn't you say?

greast stuff,great stuff. Keep up the good work.Question? are you going to combine all of this info and let us hear how you put together a complete song? Thank,s again giovanni cardinali...

I would have to agree with you, Pat. Behind-the-head playing, along with teeth playing, are "techniques."

Giovanni, to answer your question: Yes, we will. There's a show in the works that takes the various elements and puts them all together into a song form. We have to cover a few more elements before we can get there, but it is definitely on its way. Thanks for asking.

What a great series! Informative and entertaining. I listen to a lot of different styles of music thanks to Pandora (over 40 stations). I'm into jazz, any plans for a podcast on horns, particularly saxophones be it thru styles (bepop, hardbop, WestCoast) or specific musicians Cannonball Adderley, John Coltrane, Stan Getz) explained by a professional saxophonist.

Thanks

P.S. Could you put short definitions next to the terms you listed.

Hi, Marc,
There are two episodes we're preparing that will hopefully appeal to you -- one on jazz improvisation and another on horn arrangements. We don't have a saxophone-specific show on the books quite yet, but it is an interesting idea... I'd certainly like to hear that myself.

kudos to the pandora team for putting up this podcast!
tremolo and wawa are just so cool. though i would say i grew up in the age of distortion.
would be looking forward to the vocal podcast.
let push pandora higher guys :) use stumbled upon and delicious bookmark eh? :)
once again, kevin, you rock~

No, YOU rock, Saklas. And yeah, there is just something about that distortion... kind of an animal growl to it.

I always paid more attention to the way acoustic guitars were played. Thanks to this section I discovered that the electric guitars have their own special art and skill . It is just like getting out of a car and start riding a motorcycle.
Thanks for opening my eyes (Should I say ears?)

Electric guitars definitely have their own whole set of concerns and required skills. I'd like to do shows on acoustic guitar performance as well. They're different beasts, for sure, and both have a lot of subtle nuances about them.

GREAT!

The best thing is that you ask for suggestions and you listen... Thanks a lot...

I think that the VIDEO idea will be even better. I think will be very helpful to see the instruments being played...

How about to analyze the music (instruments, vocals...) of a famous band or even a famous song... what make a song a good SONG?

I hope you guys have a great success.

Thank you again!!!

Carlos

We're looking into the possibility of video production, actually. It's something we'd all like to try. I agree that much of this would be easier to take in if you could hear AND see it. We'll keep you posted as that idea develops. Thanks for listening, Carlos.

INFORMATION IS WONDERFUL, BLESS ALL WHO WORK AT YOUR WEBSITE.

I've been enjoying these podcasts, and this one especially. Knowing what some of the basic effects are, and trying to pick them out, has really enhanced my enjoyment of some music that I have already been listening to for years. (So THAT'S how the Cure got that jangly guitar sound...) I'm a long time acoustic guitar player, but this has made me think about getting an electric. Thanks, and keep it coming!

please... please... please...

When talking of "Electric Guitar Effects" do not forget the god, the one.... DAVID GILMOUR.

I just felt that, as a loyal fan I had to remember this to you!!

Hey Kevin,
is there any possibility to play ripped DVDs as mp3s at pandora, I mean, some rare tracks are only recorded at live DVDs for example. It would be nice to have those tracks included... think about it! hope licenses allow this!

But of course! Check out the examples above -- under Delay, the very first example is David Gilmour. I'd never forget Gilmour.

I will pass your question about live DVDs on to our music curator. Interesting thought... speaking of Gilmour, it would be great to have those clips from Live At Pompeii included from that DVD.

hello i love listining to the gitare thas i decaided too ajoute my name

If you do another podcast on guitar effects, don't forget the ever-popular talk box.

Mr. Kevin Thanks Man I am a lefty like Jimmy H.
Mad respect to Tim and the rest of the Pandora Crew!

I´m just so impressed with your knowledge, your level of ambition to teach others what you know and the genuine altruism of this project. Rare and precious in this day and age of capitalism... ;) Today I learned a lot about guitar effects - thank you!

I found it a bit difficult to distinguish between "chorus" and "distortion" sometimes? How are the technically related? (I don´t play the guitar myself)

/Jessica

Ooooh, talk box. Good idea, Jay. I'll gladly include the "Framptifier" next time out.

And Jessica: Chorus and distortion can be difficult to identify sometimes, certainly. As far as how they are technically related, it's challenging to say how they are similar. It's easier to say what they do.

Chorus basically 'doubles' the guitar's tone. If you were to record the same exact guitar part twice, and play those two recordings simultaneously, that would sound similar to a chorus effect.

Distortion adds crunch and overdrive by degrading the 'pure tone' natural signal that the guitar produces. Think of a sine wave: it looks like a smooth curve, riding up and down. When you distort a tone, you clip off those curves -- and by clipping, you're compressing the wave, flattening the highs and lows.

Here's a site that goes into more detail involving waveforms and how they can distort:
http://www.geofex.com/effxfaq/distn101.htm

It is important to note, also, that chorus and distortion are frequently employed at the same time. It's very common to hear a guitar tone with chorus AND distortion on it.

I suppose should point out a name that been considered the grandfather of distortion before any of these guys that were mentioned. Link Wrey, from what I understand he really wasn't using a pedal effect so much as altering his amps before there were pedal effects. Any thoughts on that name?

Whoa, whoa. Are you forgetting Link Wray, father of the power chord and distortion? Davies was imitating Wray when he would screw with speakers to get a dirtier sound. Davies started doing it in the 60's. Wray was doing it in the 50's.

Definitely open to debate. I'd always heard of Link Wray as the father of the power chord, but also the first to distort his amp?

This Washington Post article on Wray says that he punched through the speaker with a pencil for his song "Rumble" in 1958:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/21/AR2005112101625.html

I stand corrected. Charles and Eric, thanks for giving Link Wray the credit he deserves.

wow, it's Kevin Seal! In a chemistry class I'm in I just saw you host a video from long ago about air pollution. You looked familiar so I looked you up and saw that you hosted 120 Minutes. Then I got an email from Pandora and you are doing this, too. It isn't often that Kevin Seal shows up twice in one week. Nice podcast.

Thanks, Todd -- I'm not the same Kevin Seal from MTV, though. I also grew up watching the other Kevin Seal on 120 Minutes. He's the brunette Kevin, I'm the blonde.

Very nice. Keep these podcasts up.

This is the first of your podcasts I have heard, and I enjoyed it. I have a suggestion. When demonstrating one of the effects, I'd like to hear the guitar without the effect first, then with the effect. That transition would probably make the effect even more obvious.

Keep up the good work!

About the history of distortion: I seem to remember the first use of distortion was in a country music song. The bias on a tube amp used in a recording session was out of whack which will quickly and asymmetrically distort the signal. When the song was played through the amp, the musician, whose name I cannot recall, liked the sound so much he refused to get the bias adjusted for the recording.

BTW, enjoyed the guitar playing. However, key effects that I missed that were/are important to psychedelica were/are phasing and flanging. Before pedals, they had to be done with the tape machines.

Keep up the good work.

Brilliant! Thank You!

Dear Kevin of Pandora radio station.

I want to say thank you for the news letter. Have

a great evening.From one of your listers; Monda

Spence.

I remember, when I was in College School, I had a hard-rock group but our great problem was the guitar electric effects, and here in Romania don't find nowhere(in yhear 1985-1987).
I'm happy 'cause now I see the best expression for today's electric guitars groups
Thanx a lot for your work!

Indeed, Dave, there are several other effects we'd like to cover: phaser, flanger, talkbox, ring modulation, and reverb. I'm a huge fan of those psychedelic tape effects myself. Echoplex and the like.

Whammy/vibrato should also turn up in a future episode, as will other techniques like slide playing, playing with harmonics.

Thanks for listening, guys.

tried to listen, clicked on listen but nothing happpened

That's a great job guys! I couldn't listen to any radio at all with pandora and these podcasts are really making the whole picture more attractive to everyone! You are all good musicians and you show it through those great ideas!

Thank you!
Keep new ideas coming around!
hehe!

Cheers!

Clear, concise and easy to follow without a hint of either of you talking down to the listener. That's 9 minutes of my life well spent. Thanks guys.

Thank you, hornerrp. I'm very lucky to be producing these for a service that resists condescension at every step. Yay Pandora.

Can we pleeeeeease have this type of discussion for different types and styles of playing drums. I do play piano and guitar but would love to learn drums and don't know the types yet. later

Could you do any of that on an acoustic guitar that has a built in volume and bass setter?

This should totally be a segment on NPR! Good job, guys. I really enjoyed the info. and look forward to checking out your other podcasts.

Sunshine: You're in luck! We have two episodes on different drum styles. If you click on the "Podcast Home Page" link at the top, you'll go to the page that shows every episode so far, including both "Drums & Drumming" shows.

Kiki: I don't quite understand. You want a show about an acoustic guitar on which you can set the volume and bass? I don't mean to be dense, I'm just not sure what you're asking to hear.

Wait -- are you asking if you can use these effects on an acoustic guitar? If so, then, yes, absolutely, any of these effects can be used on an acoustic if you have a pick-up. If it's an acoustic that you have to mic, then no, but any acoustic with a 1/4" jack on it can plug through any of these effects into an amp.

Thanks for the great piece! Looking forward to putting some new sounds to work. Can't wait for the next session. Cheers!

Hello. I was trying to get the guitar podcast that you sent to me. But I could only get the sound. Is there supposed to be audio? Please let me know. Thank you. Ronni

Thanx, guys. Learned a lot.

You're welcome! Thanks for listening. Ronni, these shows are audio only (for now, at least). Don't worry, you're not missing any video content.

hi guys i wanna learn more about the technicalities of music. so it will be great if u could explain such things in more detail, i mean for a lay man like me.

thank you for real good information

You're welcome, Matsook. Sarvpreet, what kind of technicalities are you hoping to see?

Obrigado,man.É sempre bom 1 pouco de cultura geral.God be with you.See you.

Simplesmente demais, voces do pandora eu adoro voces, suas musicas, o seu jeito de ser, continuem assim.
Sorry by to be in portuguese, I am brazilian. My English is very bad, I m study with a teather of California, that live on salvador, Bahia at three yars

Great overview of key pedals in a guitarist's arsenal. I've been playing with pedals for years and still learned some new approaches today. I've noticed that pedal order has an affect on sound due to how the signal is being modified along the chain. What is your recommendation on how to link pedals, starting from the guitar input to the output to the amp?

Oooh, good question, Andrew. I've wondered that myself. Patrick's the expert on this one -- Patrick?

You know Andrew, anyone I've ever asked that question gives me a different answer. I know that you want your wah pedal before your overdrive, and your compressor before everything else. There are other variables to consider. (rack mount units, effect loops) I wish I could be of more help.

A great place for gear questions is here:

http://www.thegearpage.net/board/index.php

let me know what you find out!

thanks

Patrick

sweet keep the tips cummin!!!!

Cool!
In the caption of the second picture above, I think the identfication of the distortion and delay are swapped. Looks like a green Tube Screamer (distortion) after the wah, and a white Digital Delay last in line.

Per the question from Andrew, it makes more sense to have the delay at the end, so you are echoing the already distorted sound, not distorting an echoed sound.

Very nice podcasts, it really helps a lot to those who want to know a little more about how the music is developed. I am a classical musician (pianist, composer and conductor), and although I listen a lot to rock, jazz & pop, knowing how to write a pop song is really than knowing how to write a symphony.
It was really good to know how drums are used in a pop song, and listening to all the different timbres a guitar can produce is a great experience. Thanks a lot, and keep the good information flowing! :D

I think you're right, Mark -- I just corrected it.

And Otto, we're thrilled that pop-music approaches are of interest to classical musicians such as yourself. Thanks for listening.

y are realy open my eyes for thing i wasnt aweare!!!!
just give us more.....

It was Wonderfull !

The pic(s) included also caught my eye - it does look to me (as ruby soho mentions above) - to be perhaps mislabled, Also wondering...there's 5 boxes in the pic.....only four items are noted, What is the 5th box?

Good eye, Zoot. You are Mark are right. The delay is, in the immortal words of Ronnie James Dio, "the last in line." Better to delay a distorted signal than distort a delayed signal.

Let's ask the man himself -- Patrick, what is the silver pedal connected to the white delay box?

That pedal allows you to tap out the rate of delay (fast or slow) you want with your foot. good question!

OMFG I ttly learnd alot more about guitar from this I wanna go out & buy some of thes petals 4 my guitar & play around a bit....but hey ya know how there are diffrent typs of electric guitars & they all have their own sound would the effects of the pedals sound diffrent on diffrent styles of guitar & do they have a typ of guitar that brings out their sound more? :P ^_^

Sounds like a question for Mr. P.G. Dr. Greene?

How to answer this one?... hmm.. There definitely are classic match ups that guitarists talk about. The Strat and the Tube Screamer being one of them.
Different guitars can sound as different through an effect as they do from each other plugged straight into the amp. One's ability to distinguish the difference from two different guitars may be lessened by the extent to which the effect is saturating or dominating the tone. i.e. you may not be able to tell much difference using a metal distortion pedal cranked all the way up, whereas with a slight reverb effect each guitar's characteristics are easier to identify. My advice is to identify the sound you're going for, then research those players and their gear.

well
I have a question about a tone that still I dont find
yep, I listened but seems that I dont have the right rig to do that

my rig: Gretsch 6120 plugged to a Danelectro Daddy- o overdrive to an Electro Harmonix deluxe memory man to a Fender twin reverb

the tone I want is:(i ll try to describe it) fat, roaring, warm, powerfull (you know turn up the middles), thick rawkin tone
that I can still play chords (not only power chords)

thank you for your input

keep up the good work!

cheers

well my friend, "tremoulo" or "tremulo", i don't know how i should write it in English, is a Greek word and it means: "shaking". This is when somebody is shaking, like when it's very cold,or he is scared. It hapens my self to be Greek and so i know!! It is cool when i see Greek words to be used by other Nations to give special meenings for their own langwege!!!

Cool, cool. I didn't know that came from Greek.

Fernando, I'll ask Patrick what he recommends for your current rig.

theres something i have trying to figure out for a long time.How dong John Mayer get his guitar to sound the way it does not only the distortions but his clean sound is amazing.Does he use like a clean boost kind of sound?I have an american stratocaster(john mayer signature)and a fender hotrod deluxe.

Fernando, I am familiar with the Danelectro Daddy-o. I used to use one. You definitely won't get a "roaring" or even fat tone from that pedal. It's more of a thin on the clean side overdrive.
Check out some other overdrive and distortion pedals at your local guitar store. I like the Tubescreamer but you may want to try some more metal-like pedals for the tone you described.

Matt, I have no idea how John Mayer gets his tone.
Remember, most of tone is in the fingers, however, string size/brand, pickups, cables, amps, preamps, and speakers are all considerations that shape tone. I'm sure there is a resource somewhere on the net where you can find out what he uses. let me know when you find out! thanks

hey guys, another great one, thanks for the jimi examples about wah-wah and distortion. Now we know how he made his guitar talk so awesomely, always a legend a very talented musician who could pull any feeling from whoever happened to be listening from his soul to yours. ssrb

Indeed. Jimi Hendrix's expressiveness on the guitar never ceases to astonish me.

Matt,I too have been trying to figure out the john mayer sound as well.Ive looked on various web sites trying to figure out how he does but I cant seem to find anything thats useful to my search.Can anyone help me with this?

Im also wondering,whats your opinion on line 6s variax and pod xt live?

During practice with my band this evening, we spent about 35 minutes trying to attain a "Cure guitar sound" also used by The Cult and Joy Division. Our guitarist was not able to appropriately approximate this sound despite repeated abstract explanations from me like, "What you're doing sounds cloudy, it needs to sound like a clear blue sky" or "It needs to sound like a balloon being blown up."

I'm a poet, not a technical musician, so these things often wind up being an issue of translating what I mean.

Any tips? He's using a POD xt live...

hi too all great information ..request in mind could we get some information on some of the modern fusion
guitar player and the effects they use to control there great tone like allan holdsworth i have a big list lets start with him master of TONE,S

Great podcast. Keep up the good work.

Great info, thanks!

Hi. My class was given the assignment to listen to a podcast of a topic we were interested in. I've been playing nearly 4 years, and guitar is always an instrument of distinct style. There are so many different effects I've learned about from your podcast. Great job.

I really would like to be able to watch the videos as they play the song.

And I too, would be interested in a sax only station. Nothing is cooler than a really wailing sax!!

Probly sounds like an odd combination, but I also would like a Boogie Woogie station, as that is what I grew up listening to my mom play. Jools Holland is pretty good, and I would like to learn or new and old players of Boogies.

Keep up the good work, I love Pandora!

Geo

Hi, Sarah and Tom,
Unfortunately, I can't really offer advice on specific song tones without knowing which songs you're trying to emulate. I know that the Cure used a lot of delay and a fair amount of reverb, but those guitar tones changed considerably from album to album and track to track.

Excellent, Wings31! Happy to hear these used in classes.

And Geo -- you can absolutely make a boogie woogie station. I have one set up for myself, actually, as I love that stuff too. Here it is:
http://www.pandora.com/stations/8bf4a0ef85b32f5b3233e77126092c22425ba2910f7abf8b

This site is interesting and very informative, nicely interface. Enjoyed browsing through the site.

thanks for the GREAT post! Very useful...

I like yours blog.

That's great.
But how do you use that same setup with a wireless sistem, since the guitar output is not going through the pedals??

Great postcast , i like your blog , Bravo , very useful

Hi. My class was given the assignment to listen to a podcast of a topic we were interested in. I've been playing nearly 4 years, and guitar is always an instrument of distinct style. There are so many different effects I've learned about from your podcast. Great job.

hello,i like guitar very much,i played it when i was study in college.it is a nice time

Good to hear! Hey there, Wow -- hopefully this show will open some doors for you, in terms of checking out new effects and sound manipulations.

Antonio, I don't have a good answer for wireless systems, as I haven't used one myself. Has anybody out there in Listenerland used pedals with a wireless rig?