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Have any guys ever used one of these??? or have one? they seem really interesting
and i liked the sounds from it on the REM song e-bow the letter.

The Amazing E-bow

I was drumming for a guy that used one a few years back. He was getting some cool sounds out of it and could arrange a decent pattern to make a song of it. It kinda seemed a one trick pony though.

I have one. They're tricky to use if you want to play something that goes from string to string. On one string you can get some interesting harmonics going, and then shift the harmonics around by fretting notes. For some reason, I mainly get a clarinet-like sound. Nothing wrong with clarinets, but that's usually not what I'm going for with guitar.

Yeah, I've got an EBow plus. The guy makes some craaaazy sounds on the demo, never got that good with it but never tried really.

ive got a friend who uses one in his band.

It does sound cool, gets some nice synthy sounds, but yes it is a bit of a "toy" (an expensive one at £100!) and can only really be used in one song in the set.

Ebow are great I like to use mine with delay and do the strumming thing.

Do they still make them? I hear mixed things. Explosions in the Sky do a lot with one,
if you don't turn the volume in 1/2 or go over the pickup directly the sound becomes deadly.

A new one called 'PlusEBow' has just been made available. I don't know if it's just the same as the Ebow plus and made by someone else but you can get them from amazon.com for $99

i still have to get one, good use in "my iron lung" by radiohead, strat trem + ebw

I would like to think they allow you to do more with a guitar than just strumming.
Just another way to get cool sounds out of it.

in my opinion these things are shit
get a volume pedal, and a sustainer, be happier

Im curious as to what kind of sustainer you mean, like the one thats installed on that velvet revolver guy's guitar? thats not really practical at all, it's expensive and you have to dig your guitar apart, and power it with a battery and shit.


Ebows are great, the "one trick pony" club just doesn't have the patience to put some fucking work into developing new skills, I guess.

For the fringe comp on Swing Hailey's song "The Mechanical Thinker" I used the Ebow on the bass combined with the Wooly Mammoth. It gave me some awesome feedback as opposed to making it sound like a cello or classical stringed instrument.

Actually got an E-Bow first then started looking for a guitar to use it with/on. If you can get to try have a go with a volume pedal and delay/reverb, some very interesting tonallities in there.

I have used ebow for over a decade.. i'd be lost without one

I used to use an eBow through an EHX POG - absolutely awesome. Also borrowed a ZVex SeekWah (auto filter effect) for something that sounded more synthy than guitar (think NIN...)

It's one of my aims to buy a gate with a side chain input and an ebow. I've done it in the studio, but never live.

This is the sort of thing I mean. mp3 download (700kb)

This is a lame example but I just did it to explain what I mean. The the second half I put a gate on the synth. The gate is controlled by the snare, so it follows that rhythm.

IRL you could have an ebow on your guitar, playing whatever notes you like. Have a gate attached with the input coming from a microphone, stick the mic under a snare, hihat or anywhere really, and no matter what they do you'll follow the rhythm of it.

Excuse the distorted file, it crashes while bouncing and I hadn't saved so I can't be arsed to make it again.

aen wrote:

Ebows are great

agreed!!

mine stopped working randomly.

fragile piece of poo.

they're nice. and fretting a chord while waving the ebow across all the strings with a delay does make some really flutey and awesome tones.

skipping strings is kinda tough, but with practice you can get it. the only issue i have is the note cutting off before you have time to get to the next due to the unit balancing on adjacent strings.

but a delay and reverb helps that.

and sustainer pickups are not impractical. they're completely worthwhile in my opinion to put together a cheap guitar with a nice strong bridge pickup so you can sacrifice the neck slot.

there's also the various sustainiac mechanisms.

I updated the above link with a different sample. I doubt anyone's interested but the other one wasn't very clear at all.