What Was Your First Pedal/Effect?

[vigilante398]

No wonder you cram tubes in everything, I'd do the same if this was my first foray into guitar effects. RIP your tone

Yup, my tragic backstory explains everything. For years my "rig" was RP50 into old computer speakers. My parents threw money at my siblings' hobbies, but I was stuck with whatever I could scrape together myself, because guitar is never going to get me anywhere in life My gross income from pedals last year was as much as my parents' first house cost. SUCK IT, MOM AND DAD!

 

[Mentaltossflycoon]

Nice! I'm assuming I arrived a couple years later, so my first was the PODxt.

I eventually got the floor-board which made it great to use live as a kid, but as soon as I had an amp that didn't sound like trash, I knew I'd have to upgrade the POD as well..

I think these multi-effects, no-matter-how-horrible-sounding, are great gateway drugs for learning musicians- they teach an example of what different effects are out there so that you know which sounds are important to YOU when it's time to upgrade.

They're also a great gateway drug to drugs. My rp7 sounded almost OK with a little weed.

 

[spi]

Oh my this question takes me back, I bought it brand new with my summer work money in the 11th grade because I wanted all the FX but didn't want to mess with a bunch of boxes and batteries (lazy and cheap)....The digitech RP-1! It served me well for quite a while with only a crybaby to compliment it. Rocked it for about a decade. Shoulda kept it, my 93 strat plus and a sliver Getzen #1 trumpet. Hindsight being 20/20, I prolly wouldn't of done it the same.
View attachment 24668

I said my first was an RP-10, but now that you posted this, I realize it may have been the RP-1. I think they are similar with RP-10 having an expression pedal. But I may have used an external expression pedal, so more likely it's this one. Hmmm, memories are fuzzy these days.

 

[Harry Klippton]

SUCK IT, MOM AND DAD!

Timeless sentiment right there.


This was my first pedal. I had to go and get a screenshot from reverb from when I sold it. A friend who worked for analogman added the bass switch and LED long before I was into building pedals.

 

[dawson]

This was my first stand-alone pedal- mid 2000's Russian Big Muff:

I played really violently as a kid, and the POTs in this thing are suuper loose so I'd lose my setting just my clicking the switch. My solution was to fashion this.. knob-stopper out of a scrap of leather that was on the floor in my dad's garage. Worked great!

 

[spi]

While my first effects was the digitech multi-fx, my first standalone pedal was built from a kit (Paia Axe Grinder).

 

[Flying]

I'd literally just started working so had some spare cash, and got these two… I later picked up the saxophone and sold them… Today I’m still beating myself up for letting them go, the Voodoo Vibe especially!

 

[jeffwhitfield]

Probably 1999 or so. Sam Ash was having a sale, so
I convinced my parents to drive me there where I picked up a DS-1, an SD-1, and a DOD “Ice Box” Chorus for $40USD each.

I still have the DS-1, but it looks like this (for now).

MOD THAT SUCKA!

 

[Coda]

DS-1 in 2001. I think it’s somewhere at my parents house right now. I remember it had stopped working. My wife bought be a newer one for xmas a few years ago. I should try and fix my first one…

Oh, and my amp at that time was either a late 70’s SS Sears amp, with built-in distortion, or a 1967 Super Reverb that blew a fuse every 10 mins…

 

[PapaBear]

Correction Digi-Tech RP200 I think it was

 

[chongmagic]

Boss ME-6

 

[music6000]

Purchased New in 1980, was into Waylon Jennings!!!
Still on my Board!!!

 

[fig]

My first effect was a torn speaker. The problem was you couldn't dial in a clean tone. I blame the designer for that one.

I think it was the same as @music6000 above. It may have been a wah.

 

[music6000]

This was my first stand-alone pedal- mid 2000's Russian Big Muff:
I played really violently as a kid, and the POTs in this thing are suuper loose so I'd lose my setting just my clicking the switch. My solution was to fashion this.. knob-stopper out of a scrap of leather that was on the floor in my dad's garage. Worked great!

Neat Trick, I use 1 or 2 6mm rubber ''O'' rings between knob & pot shaft, Slide Knob down till it feels firm & tighten, works Great!!!

 

[HamishR]

Boss DM-2. Long gone, so now I have a Boss DM-2W, which sounds really good but I never use it because of tone suck. A real shame, because it is a great sounding delay.

 

[cwsquared]

Also RIP your tone

I am pretty sure my crap technique and mid-90's 15w solid state amp did more damage to my tone than it did.

 

[jubal81]

 

[Betty Wont]

@Betty Wont doesn't drive in the slow lane!

I'm a voice over artist more than a musician and the Meatbox was initially for a cartoon gig. It is an amazing vocal processor. It makes the most natural and clear demon timbres. I was still playing mostly acoustic in those days, on an Ovation a/e. The day I plugged the Ovation into the Meatbox and a PA was a formative moment in my music. I got an amp and electric bass soon after. My second pedal was the DOD flanger, which sucked in every possibly way. Voice pedals still make me the happiest.

 

[grabo99]

I played bass in bands in high school and no one was into pedals so I knew nothing about them. In 2011 I bought the Zoom G1N to learn more about effects, but at this time I no longer had an amp and plugged in my headphones to the line-out and got a weak signal. Sold my bass 6 months later and didn't play anything for 10 years. Got into guitar in 2020 and coincidentally ended up buying my first real pedal, the , exactly 10 years after getting the Zoom. Then I fell into the black hole of DIY.

 

[szukalski]

DOD FX53 Classic Tube!

I didn't know what I had and was disappointed I couldn't make it sound like a high gain stack.