Wah

[dezb1]

Not entirely sure where this falls on the Bonamassa / Mascis scale but I finally got round to buying a wah - went for the Vox V845 and it has a lot less hiss than the Crybaby I used to have had.

[NickS]

Pédale Wah Wah Classique
I haven't done a side-by-side comparison of my wah pedals for noise, I must admit, but I do remember the vintage CryBaby being noisy back in the day; I swapped out the transistors for some low-noise epitaxial ones about 1976 but it didn't really help. I suppose I should see if I still have the original transistors in my junk box and swap them back in for vintage mojo.

[dezb1]

Going to have to adjust the pot a wee bit as it gets a bit trebley for my liking so needs darkend down a bit

[plopswagon]

Go for the Dave Gilmore end of the Wah spectrum and plug it in backwards

[dezb1]

Go for the Dave Gilmore end of the Wah spectrum and plug it in backwards

What dose this achieve? Haw haw haw haw?

[NickS]

Seagull effects. Used on "Echoes". I discovered this by accident plugging my Strat into the CryBaby the wrong way round.

[plopswagon]

Also made famous (not) by Course of Empire on Gear



Skip ahead to 2:25 if’n you don’t want to hear the song.

We discovered it the same way.

[BearBoy]

I finally got round to buying a wah - went for the Vox V845

Noice!

it has a lot less hiss than the Crybaby I used to have had.

My Crybaby (bought new c1991 - no idea what more recent ones are like) is noisy as fuck. Never used to bother me back in the day but these days I generally stick with my Boss PW-10. Doesn't have the mojo arrows of a "proper" wah but is actually really good.

[ekwatts]

My brother owned a Vox wah for years. I say "owned", but he actually never bought it, he seemed to just acquire it from out of the blue and nobody ever asked for it back. I think he hated wah in general to be honest, but once he started playing with his covers band, he needed one and seemed to end up liking it.

I saw EHX's budget one recently in a shop, picked it up and FUCKING HATED IT. It's made out of some weird composite plastic and the whole look and feel of the thing put my teeth on edge and made me feel weird. No idea how it sounded.

I truly love my Snarling Dogs Wonder Wah. I modded it so it has three different modes, and because I've never owned another wah, I have no idea which, if any, of those modes represents the sound of a more traditional wah, because I use it very sparingly (actually, since I've had most of my stuff in boxes for the past 12 months, I probably haven't used it for over a year now). It's also an absurdly massive pedal and hilariously heavy. And it has that foot-shaped pedal on top that makes me feel like I'm jerking a cadillac around as I push it back and forwards.

I always see "proper" wah pedals and wonder what it must be like to not be such a weird troglodyte when it comes to buying the absolute weirdest pedals I can find, but I guess I'll never know.

As for noise, aren't they all basically pretty noisy anyway? We're all playing them through a distortion pedal, right?

[paul_]

To me kicking on wah-wah is like doing shots of vodka: fun spontaneously with friends (used tons of wah in my band) but undeniably more of a worrying moment when you find yourself doing it at home by yourself for a couple hours on a weekday.

I've had the '90s Vox V847 reissue since around 1997. The only difference between it and the current V847A (that's the one with the chrome treadle) is the lack of an AC jack, so there's a hole in the side where I used to use an adapter cable with a battery snap on it. That was noisy so I only use batteries with it now, and put a Dymo "UNPLUG ME" label on the input side. I painted the VOX letters with glow-in-the-dark paint back in 2000 after missing it with my foot a couple times on dark stages/in the garage, but it doesn't glow in the dark anymore so they just looks a bit gross. There's also no rubber feet on it due to years of velcro pedalboard mounting and it has domed screws so it's very annoying to use OFF a pedalboard because those hard bypass presses make it slide around. Fuck, maybe I DO hate wah.