The boards behindthe records

The most copied board in the history of the instrument, and the one that proves ambience is a compositional choice rather than a coat of paint. Big Muff into a modulated, heavily delayed clean amp, with a compressor keeping every bent note singing.

Electro-Harmonix Big Muff Pi

5 pedals · 3 records · 5 tracks

One treble booster, one AC30, and a guitar he built with his father out of a fireplace mantel. The whole orchestral guitar sound on those records comes from stacking that single voice, not from a big board.

Dallas Rangemaster Treble Booster

3 pedals · 3 records · 5 tracks

The brown sound is mostly a Marshall run through a Variac and a guitar he assembled himself, but the board is what people actually hear as the signature: a phaser sitting slow underneath everything and a flanger doing the descending sweep on Unchained.

MXR Phase 90

4 pedals · 3 records · 7 tracks

Classical phrasing over a cranked Marshall, and a board built for precision rather than texture. The Distortion+ tightens the amp instead of adding gain to it, which is what keeps the fast neoclassical runs articulate.

MXR Distortion+

4 pedals · 2 records · 5 tracks

The most influential use of delay by anyone, and the clearest case of an effect being part of the composition. The dotted-eighth repeat is not decoration on the Where the Streets Have No Name riff, it is half the notes in it.

Korg SDD-3000

4 pedals · 3 records · 6 tracks

A Boss-heavy board used with unusual discipline. The flanger is on almost every clean rhythm part, which is what gives those records their metallic shimmer, and the distortion only appears when a solo needs it.

Boss BF-2 Flanger

4 pedals · 3 records · 7 tracks

A Les Paul into a Marshall with almost nothing in between, which is the point. The wah is the only effect most listeners could name, and it is used as punctuation rather than as a texture.

Dunlop Cry Baby

4 pedals · 2 records · 4 tracks

Proof that a cheap orange distortion pedal is a legitimate main gain source. The DS-1 has been on the board for decades, and the smoothness people credit to expensive gear is mostly the compressor and the playing.

Boss DS-1 Distortion

4 pedals · 2 records · 5 tracks

A deliberately small board used in ways nobody intended. The Whammy set to two octaves up is a scratch effect and a siren rather than a pitch shifter, and the toggle-switch stutter needs no pedal at all.

DigiTech Whammy

5 pedals · 3 records · 7 tracks

A board with one genuinely unusual box on it. The talk box routes the guitar through a tube into his mouth, so the vowel shapes come from his own vocal tract rather than from a filter circuit trying to imitate one.

Heil Sound Talk Box

4 pedals · 3 records · 7 tracks

Two Tube Screamers back to back, which sounds like a mistake and is not. Stacking two moderate gain stages gives far more sustain and far less fizz than turning one of them up, and a jam band needs notes that hold.

Ibanez TS9 Tube Screamer

4 pedals · 2 records · 4 tracks

The Fuzz Factory is mounted inside the guitar body, which turns an unstable, barely controllable fuzz into a playable instrument: the knobs are under his hand while he is still holding a chord.

Z.Vex Fuzz Factory

4 pedals · 3 records · 7 tracks

A midrange-forward board that ignores the usual advice to scoop the mids out of a heavy tone. Boosting a narrow band instead of cutting one is what gives those riffs their honk, and it is why they cut through on a small speaker.

Maestro Parametric Filter

4 pedals · 2 records · 5 tracks

A delay pedal used as a sound-design tool rather than an echo. Half-speed, reverse and looping are the point; the actual repeats are almost incidental, and most of what you hear is the pedal being abused in real time.

Line 6 DL4

4 pedals · 2 records · 4 tracks