Most people think that in order to sound good, they need to have the most expensive gear. But that’s not true at all.
In fact, there are a lot of great guitar pedals out there that are affordable and perfect for worship!
So we made a video series highlighting 8 affordable guitar pedals and how to approach each type of pedal in worship.
It’s more than a quick look at 8 different guitar pedals.
This series is an in-depth look at the role each type of pedal plays in a worship guitar setting and how to dial in the right sound.
It’s hosted by guitarist and producer Chad Carouthers, who has played for Kari Jobe and Israel Houghton.
In episode 1, Chad shows you how to make a cheap amp simulator pedal sound great.
CLICK HERE TO WATCH PART 2!
What Chad Covers in Episode 1
Your gear is not the problem
Chad started touring at about 16. He was broke, so he had to get the most out of the little gear he had. He remembers pulling out a guitar that wasn’t as nice as his bandmates’ and a pedalboard that looked like a rat’s nest next to a friend’s spaceship of a board.
It made him insecure. But in his words, no artist he worked with ever checked what pedals he had. The pressure was all self-projected. That’s the point of this series: use what’s in your hands.
The rig in this episode is stripped down to the essentials and cheap on purpose. Chad plays a guitar from Vintage, a brand he compares to Epiphone’s mid-range guitars, and later his favorite guitar, an Epiphone.
Why an amp in a box?
So many churches, stages and production companies ask guitarists for a silent option. An amp in a box gives you an amp sound straight into a direct box, with no amp on stage.
The big name here is the Strymon Iridium, which sells for $399 on Strymon’s site. For this series Chad wanted something almost anyone can afford, so he picked the Caline CP-56 “The Mayday”. New ones on Reverb start at about $47 at the time of writing.
He chose it because it’s based on a Vox AC30, a chimey amp he calls one of his favorites, and a go-to sound for worship and CCM.
The controls
- Low, Mid and High: a 3-band EQ, so you can shape the pedal to the guitar you’re playing. Chad points out this is one way it differs from an AC30.
- Volume: the output to your next pedal or the direct box.
- Voice: Chad wasn’t sure what it did at first. After playing with it, he found it works like the normal and bright channels on an AC30.
- Drive: the gain.
How Chad dials it in
- Hear it bypassed first. A bone-dry electric straight into a DI sounds bad. That’s your starting point.
- Turn it on and add a little reverb. Just enough space that nobody gets “sonically nauseous.”
- Tame the harsh top. Amps in a box can sound brash, a mix of bright and harsh. Turn the high end down and bump the mids a little.
- Set the low end for your guitar. His strat-style guitar has little low end, so he gives it a small bump.
- Hunt for the edge of breakup with Drive. It gets fuzzy fast. With a real amp, the sweet spot is easier to find. With an amp in a box, you have to go looking. Aim for a tone that cleans up when you roll your guitar volume back and gets a little dirty when you dig in on the bridge pickup.
- Don’t starve it. Too little drive sounds weak, anemic and flabby, because there are no power tubes or speaker in the chain. It needs “enough fuel in the tank.”
- Leave room for your drive pedals. Chad sets it closer to clean than distorted, so anything he adds later pushes it into overdrive.
- Re-check when you switch guitars. His Epiphone has a hotter output and more low end, so he turns the Drive down and moves the Voice knob. The upside: you make that change on your board, not at an amp across the stage.
- Keep your output level the same. Change the drive and EQ all you want. If you change the volume, your sound engineer either loses your guitar or gets blasted.
- Check it at soundcheck. Make sure the tone is the best it can be for the guitar you’re playing and the room you’re in.
His verdict on the Mayday: a little stiff, but very usable. With a solid base tone set, episode 2 adds compression, overdrive and boost on top of it. Use the Part 2 link to get it.
Once your tone is set, the next job is knowing the part. Our worship guitar tutorials teach the exact electric and acoustic parts from the album for 800+ songs, and you can try them with a free, no-risk 14-day trial.
CLICK HERE TO WATCH PART 2!
Check out these similar posts!
- Nick Mayer (Zach Williams) Guitar Rig Rundown
- Worship Guitar Tone Master Class VIDEO SERIES
- The Most Surprising Guitar Secret for Sounding Massive
- Overdrive Pedals: Finding Your Tone
- The Ultimate Guide to Instrument Cables
- Bass Rig Setup & Building an Affordable Pedalboard with Tom Furby (Hillsong Y&F)
- How to Build Creative Guitar Sounds for Worship
