MODULATION PEDALS

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Modulation means “to move,” so every effect that falls under that description moves the pitch or the sound of your guitar. Deciding what kind of modulation effect to buy can feel overwhelming.
Going over the differences between every single type of modulation effect, should make it much easier.

MODULATION EFFECT TYPES

Tremolo

The very first modulation heard in modern music was tremolo. Tremolo is not always seen as a modulation effect, because it doesn’t modulate the pitch; instead, tremolo is modulation of volume. Imagine you’re in your car, you’re cruising down the road, listening to Def Leppard, and you reach over to the volume knob and turn it up, down, up, down, up, down. You are modulating the volume between a low volume and a high volume, which is exactly what a tremolo does.

SONICAKE Modulation

The very first tremolo unit ever dropped in 1946: the DeArmond Tremolo Control. It’s actually the first ever standalone effect in history (though not the first pedal; that claim goes to the Maestro Fuzztone FZ-1). Tons of tremolos followed, one of the most iconic being the BOSS TR-2. If you go back and watch the JHS Show episode we based this article on, you’ll hear Nick and I jam with the TR-2, and if so, you’ll instantly recognize this sound– it’s all over the radio, and tons of artists have used it to build riffs and makes chords move.

Rotating Speaker Effect

The next modulation effect that was released was the rotating speaker effect. The most popular version of his effect comes from the Hammond organ and the rotating Leslie speaker. The rotating Leslie speaker is basically a big wooden cabinet with two speakers. The top speaker is a treble horn speaker, and it rotates, throwing the sound out in a 360 degree form, which is a type of Doppler modulation. Doppler modulation is what happens when you’re standing on the street and an ambulance passes. The sound of the siren itself modulates because of distance and movement.

Wampler Terraform Multi-Modulation

Strymon Lex Rotary

One of my favorite DSP pedals that captures this effect is the Strymon Lex Rotary. It even has speed settings that allow you to go between fast and slow very smoothly, naturally ramping up and down just like a Hammond organ and a Leslie speaker.

Univibe

Our third modulation effect is the univibe. This came to us in 1968. The enclosure on this one is bigger than usual, with an easy-to-use foot controller. You’ve seen it on stage alongside guitarists like Jimi Hendrix and Robin Trower. It’s a really beautiful sound. A lot of the players who originally played it used it to replicate the rotary speaker effect, but that’s not actually what it does well. It does something completely unique.

Boss MD-500 Modulation Pedal

The Chemist V2 Modulation

The inventor Fumio Mieda is a brilliant engineer from Japan who designed this for a company called Honey that eventually changed its name to Shin-Ei. Full disclosure: his inspiration for this sound is a little trippy. Mieda wanted to recreate the sound of radio waves bouncing off the atmosphere, kicking them in and out of phase, the way he heard them as a child in Japan. Russian signals would phase across the airwaves and cause a strange “washing” sound. He simply wanted to replicate the effect.

More than just a complicated phaser, the univibe is the mother of all modern modulation effects. This effect started it all. The original pedal was called the Univibe Chorus Vibrato, which is a little confusing. It’s not really a chorus. It’s not quite a phaser. It’s something completely different. When you go to vibrato mode, it simply removes any dry clean signal from the mix and you have a true, will-make-you-seasick, back and forth phasing sound.

Phaser

Modulation technically started in the forties and peaked in the seventies. It’s been fifty years, but everything we know about modulation really hasn’t changed much in that time.

the phaser effect had to come out in the seventies, because it fits the aesthetic of this decade beautifully. The 1970s brought us President Nixon, Saturday Night Fever, the Runaways and Star Wars. In 1974, a company from Rochester, New York called MXR came to the market with the Phase 90, their first product. Now, there were a couple other phasers released before the Phase 90, but at the end of the day, this is the most recognizable phaser ever made.

Caline CP-506 Multimod

Boss MD-200 Modulation Pedal

Basically, you have two waveforms. The top line represents your clean signal. You can see the mountain and the valleys in that waveform that are created when you strum a chord or hit a note on your guitar. Now, phasing creates a 180 degree version of the wave form (represented on the bottom line) which is actually silent, but phasing has an LFO, which is a type of oscillator that’s going to move this bottom waveform. Imagine this bottom line, this waveform, is sliding back and forth underneath the clean signal. As it does, it produces the swooshing and whooshing sound we think of with the phaser effect.

Radial BigShot ABY

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EarthQuaker Devices

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UAFX Astra Modulation

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Flanger

Next up is the effect called Flanger, one of the most popular effects of the seventies. Basically, the flanger effect is created when the same signal is mixed together, and one of the signals is a little bit delayed, usually by about 20 milliseconds. That’s one fiftieth of a second. It’s just barely off. The two combined signals feed into each other, which creates a delay line feedback loop which more or less layers the sound. As you adjust things like rate, range or color, it intensifies this sonic modulation. You could think of it as a sonic modulation sandwich with layers of delicious filling– layers of sound– in the middle. Some of it’s moving. Some of it’s still. But it all comes together for one delicious experience.

TC Electronic THE DREAMSCAPE

Chorus

Now, let’s take a look at the chorus effect. This is most connected with the term modulation, which means that when I say “modulation pedal,” you’re probably picturing a chorus pedal. It was also the sound of the eighties, to the point where we all got a little sick of it. Fortunately, time heals all wounds.

Rowin VIBROCK Chorus Modulation

Maestro Comet Chorus Pedal

Compared to phaser or especially flanger, the chorus is pretty simple. Basically, you have your clean signal mixed with a modulating signal. The result is pitch modulating. Unlike tremolo, which moves volume, the chorus just moves the pitch of your note ever so slightly, at a speed that you set with a rate and a depth that controls how much of the modulating signal there is in comparison to the clean signal. It’s really simple.

Vibrato

What happens when you take a chorus and remove the dry signal? If you’re willing to massively oversimplify things– just for educational purposes –the result is vibrato. Basically, chorus is the combination of the two waveforms, and vibrato is just the modulation. That’s pretty much it. A lot of people associate vibrato with the vibrato arm they have on their electric guitar, which does the same thing.

DigiTech -ventura-vibe

Ring Modulation

Ring modulation is a different style of modulation than a chorus or a flanger. It originated in the seventies, as in the Electro-Harmonix Frequency Analyzer. Mutron and Way Huge have released some solid versions of this as well, but they’re surprisingly hard to find. In my pedal collection of literally thousands, I only pulled out a handful of ring modulations.

Aural Dream Super Ring

MOOER MOD Factory MKII

It’s weird enough to almost defy description. Honestly, it’s the wild card of the modulation family. You don’t even have to know how it works. You just need to know it’s crazy; with layers and layers of madness, warbles, pitches, ringing sounds, goblin-like tones. You can’t beat it.

Recommended Modulation Pedals

Way Huge WHE707 Supa-Puss

Tripps equipped the Supa-Puss with a total of six bucket-brigade chips, delivering up to 900 milliseconds of delay time. With the Tap Tempo switch, you can program in real time up to three full seconds of delay time for ethereal ambience.

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Strymon Mobius Modulation

Mobius gives you twelve legendary, versatile, and inspirational modulation machines, all in an easy-to-use package. Go from lush, mouthwatering, vintage chorus sounds all the way to syrupy psychedelic phasers. Get classic, pulsating tremolos all the way to warbling crushed bits.

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CNZ Audio Time Warp

Each of the CNZ Audio Effect Pedals bring a fun, unique and fantastic sound to enhance your playstyle. When you find the sound you like, give it a stomp and its yours!

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Dunlop WHE702S Echo-Puss

The Way Huge Echo-Puss was designed by delay expert Jeorge Tripps for players who want an organic analog delay pedal that allows them to fine-tune their delay sound with a simple user interface. It serves up 600ms of delay with a pair of gravelly-voiced bucket-brigade chips. Additionally, a fully tweakable LFO modulation circuit allows you to add a liquid texture to the sound of the repeats.

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EarthQuaker Devices The Depths V2

The Depths is our take on the classic optical vibe circuit. Now you can swab the decks with the same lush, pulsating, three-dimensional swirling sound you know and love, with some modern accouterments for all you land-lubbers out there.

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Alexander Pedals Wavelength

It’s a true all-in-wonder for your modulation needs. The sonic scientists at Alexander Pedals have been working overtime to cram the most pedal into the smallest box, and we now present the Neo Series!

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Matthews Effects Astronomer V2

The Astronomer V2 is a unique three-knob reverb pedal that harnesses the power of the celestial bodies. Two sets of identical controls allow you to jump between the top and bottom row of knobs effortlessly.

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NUX Melvin Lee Davis NBP-5

You can connect the pedal to your Windows / MAC computer to use the editor software. You can load your own IR files and control various other settings.

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To really understand these effects, you need to play around with them. You can hear people demo their brains out, but you’re never going to experience what modulation does and really feels like unless you play tit yourself. They can seem super similar when they’re heard through your phone or computer speakers, but when you play them, they are significantly different. It’s really important to know that where pedals are concerned, some things have to be experienced. You have to feel how your guitar responds to it, the way it moves with your amp, the way it moves you.

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