The Tube Screamer from Ibanez might be the most popular and influential of any effects pedal ever released for the guitar. While it’s most famously associated with bluesy rock guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughan, it’s been used to great effect by players in every genre, from country to metal and everything in between. Even beyond the […]

So why get an expression pedal? Well, no matter how dexterous you are or how well you have your equipment arranged, there’s no getting around the fact that you only have two hands. A good expression pedal can give you even more options, with the range of features that you can use it to control […]

So why get an EQ pedal? Well, even if you generally like the tone you get out of your guitar and amp, there are a lot of reasons you might want to have an EQ pedal in your arsenal. It can be useful in compensating for problems with the room, helping to tame a guitar […]

The octave fuzz pedal is not a new effects option. You could in fact call it a standard, since it first became available to guitarists in the late 1960s, around the same time the stompbox effect in general started to become popular. Even though they’ve been around for a while, though, the wide range of […]

The Joyo pedal brand has made their name offering affordable, high-quality emulations of classic pedals—the originals of which can sell for hundreds of dollars. For the guitarist on a budget, Joyo effects can be a godsend, opening your world to a whole host of new sound possibilities without spending all your rent money on new […]

The Leslie Rotating Speaker has got to be one of the most unique cabinet designs ever created. The sole idea behind it is genuinely impressive and was the creation of one man—Donald Leslie. Even though it was intended to be used with the organs, it was just a matter of time before guitar players around […]

An envelope filter goes by many names, including an Auto-wah or a Q-wah pedal, and is a common effect for both guitarists and bassists. It’s best known as the pedal that gave disco and funk guitar players of the ‘70s their choppy, electronic vibe. In the bass world, it remains especially popular with funk players […]

Some effects that you can get for your guitar are obvious in both their sound and purpose; a distortion or a fuzz pedal, for example, gives you a pretty clear picture of the effect right in the name. With more subtle effects, however, the line between them can be less clear. This is especially true […]