Principles for pedal order

[RHIZOM]

I know there are no rules for pedal order in noise and experimental music. Still, I'm curious to know if you have any principles that you adhere to.

What guiding principles do you follow?
What are the big no-no:s?
Any advice for unusual or unintuitive orders?
Any artists you consider masters at this particular craft?

[Balor/SS1535]

In general, I put reverb last in my chains, but that is typically because I am going for a dark industrial sound---I want even the distortion to sound spacey.

[Leewar]

My personal opinion but i think 'the rules' that you hear guitarists talk about for pedal order should always be ignored. I never have my pedal set up plugged the same way twice, no matter it be for vocals, synths, sampler or drum machine.

[Stipsi]

My personal opinion but i think 'the rules' that you hear guitarists talk about for pedal order should always be ignored. I never have my pedal set up plugged the same way twice, no matter it be for vocals, synths, sampler or drum machine.

Agree.
An example of this (as guitar player):put the wah first in chain.
After the fuzz or distortion is much better.

[Cementimental]

the ideal pedal order would be a gigantic matrix mixer with each pedal in its own channel for either feedback or sending to any/all other channels

[Commander15]

My personal opinion but i think 'the rules' that you hear guitarists talk about for pedal order should always be ignored. I never have my pedal set up plugged the same way twice, no matter it be for vocals, synths, sampler or drum machine.

Agree.
An example of this (as guitar player):put the wah first in chain.
After the fuzz or distortion is much better.

100% agree, at least in the context of noise.

Couple of examples come to mind where the "traditional guitarist wisdom" kinda works:

1. Fuzz, at least vintage style kind of circuit, should come pretty early in the signal chain

2. Phasers and flangers should come before the distortions if you don't want so prominent modulated sound or you want to distort the modulated signal. For example, phaser into gated fuzz or gnarly octave fuzz really does wonders to the phaser sweeps. Glorious, broken sounds galore!

[Ivan Rex]

It depends on what you are trying to do.

For example, space processing effects (delay, reverb) are usually placed at the end of the chain and this is a classic way to make the sound "wider" or "farther". However, no one forbids you to use delay, for example, before distortion - it will make the repeats "dirtier" and the character of the sound will also change. Reverb, in my opinion, is better to put at the end of the chain, before the master compressor/limiter, if you use one, but there are different types of reverb. If you want to smear your sound as much as possible, turning it into a mess - put the reverb before the distortion, some people get quite interesting results from this. If you just want to make the sound more spacious - put the reverb at the end.

With modulation effects (flanger, for example) you can deny yourself nothing and rely on your own taste. I like the sound of a flanger before overdrive, but some people like the effect to retain some dynamics that the overdrive kills.

In other words, experiment. In noise there are no rules at all, you can completely ignore everything said, create a completely crazy chain of effects and get something unexpected and interesting. All rules are just a way to achieve a certain result.

[Commander15]

It depends on what you are trying to do.

For example, space processing effects (delay, reverb) are usually placed at the end of the chain and this is a classic way to make the sound "wider" or "farther". However, no one forbids you to use delay, for example, before distortion - it will make the repeats "dirtier" and the character of the sound will also change. Reverb, in my opinion, is better to put at the end of the chain, before the master compressor/limiter, if you use one, but there are different types of reverb. If you want to smear your sound as much as possible, turning it into a mess - put the reverb before the distortion, some people get quite interesting results from this. If you just want to make the sound more spacious - put the reverb at the end.

With modulation effects (flanger, for example) you can deny yourself nothing and rely on your own taste. I like the sound of a flanger before overdrive, but some people like the effect to retain some dynamics that the overdrive kills.

In other words, experiment. In noise there are no rules at all, you can completely ignore everything said, create a completely crazy chain of effects and get something unexpected and interesting. All rules are just a way to achieve a certain result.

I've been toying with the idea of using reverb before fuzzes to create this certain "wall of noise" akin to the way that shoegaze bands used to apply the reverb pedals in their rigs. But yeah, stereo reverb before tape master really works wonders, as the tape saturation and compression smears the spatial sound in a nice way, gluing things together. It really benefits the line-in recordings that usually sound a bit flat. Delay pedals do work nicely before distortions, as the gain pedals affect the repeats and degrade them rather tastefully.

Modulation effects are interesting in noise context. I've been applying two phasers in my rig and discovered that placing the first phaser in front of the chain affects the main sound source more and the second one at the of the chain affects the whole "mix". LFO based pedals are really beneficial to the minimal setup and sound as they create movement to the drones, feedbacks and sounds that can be a bit boring and stationary without some kind of enhancement.

[Commander15]

And for those who are interested in phasers, i suggest that you skip the MXR Phase 90 and head straight to the phasers that introduce the feedback and depth controls. Even the lowly Small Stone Nano is super useful tool as it has this depth switch that introduces super deep phasing sound that affects the low end in really tasty manner. It has been my go-to phaser from the start of Commando 15 project and it has seen action in every release since the Vauhkola tape.

Phaser with powerful LFO, such as Ibanez PM7, is also wonderful addition to the noise / industrial setup. It goes from watery warble to the nauseous vocal-like oscillations as it has three different LFO waveform and manual + feedback controls.

[Ivan Rex]

And for those who are interested in phasers, i suggest that you skip the MXR Phase 90 and head straight to the phasers that introduce the feedback and depth controls. Even the lowly Small Stone Nano is super useful tool as it has this depth switch that introduces super deep phasing sound that affects the low end in really tasty manner. It has been my go-to phaser from the start of Commando 15 project and it has seen action in every release since the Vauhkola tape.

Phaser with powerful LFO, such as Ibanez PM7, is also wonderful addition to the noise / industrial setup. It goes from watery warble to the nauseous vocal-like oscillations as it has three different LFO waveform and manual + feedback controls.

This is interesting. Phasers are always a great way to make the original signal sound "gurgling" or "flowing". I really like when this effect is used in "calm" tracks, without an intense wall of noise, making the sound of synthesizer or microphone feedback sound a bit "ingratiating", due to the rather soft character of the effect itself, even at its extreme settings.

It so happened that in my recordings I used more often various flangers than phaser pedals and I had a simple and wonderful EHX Neo Mistress, in which I liked most of all to experiment with filter matrix, which perfectly changes the original signal beyond recognition. By turning the "rate" knob you can control the "movement", stopping and restarting it, while leaving the signal in a wet state. Great pedal.

[Vrenndel]

There are indeed no rules to follow when it comes to noise music and how you "should or should not" organize your pedal chain. It is all about your own taste or what you might be aiming for. Putting the reverb at the end of the pedal chain might indeed allow you to get a wider effect, but eventually also loose some details, depending on the fx level and decay, just to give an idea. I guess "conventional" musicians might put the delay after the reverb, for example, but I do think the other way sounds much better. When it comes to distorsion/OD/fuzz, it's also interesting to notice the way it will influence your sound, depending on the position. As it was stated in the previous posts, this kind of pedal fx at the end of the chain will get everything dirtier. I honestly really like to put a fuzz before a modulation pedal - flanger, chorus, phaser, etc, and even before all of that, a delay pedal with a boost not to loose some details. It's fun, it works, the results tend to change. It also depend on your sound source as well - pure feedback, no imput, contact mic, synth... and so on. Only one advice: let your imagination do the work and ignore every "rule".