Pedals plus gigs plus setting up fast? What are you doing?!

What are you guys doing to set up your pedals really really fast? I have played more than my fair share of shows where you got 10 minutes tops for the band before you to break down and for you to set up. Because of things like this I never liked too much of a complicated set up. If you have a small problem that takes 5 minutes, there is 5 out of your already short set time.



So I want to run a single pedal in the loop, and a single pedal on the front end. Thats a total of plugging in 6-10 (depending if you use power supply's or not) extra things that could potentially go wrong over just plugging straight into the amp. I want to simplify this. The pedal I throw in the effects loop stays on steady so I do not need floor access to it. I am wondering if and of you guys have a fast cheap way of keeping it steadily hooked up so there is no fumbling around at shows? I had to sell all my road cases and I jsut used to have them sitting on a shelf in my rack ready to go... take the lids off, plug in, and let her rip. I don't have it that easy anymore though.


What are you guys doing to help your set ups go more smoothly for live gigs?


In case you guys are curious, I will be boosting the front end with a custom pedal I made, and using some sort of noise gate in the loop. all that will be going through my 5150.

well, I was gonna say road case, til I read the entire post. its just the quickest way to go about things(and the safest).
my rig is pretty complex. 2 heads & cabs, switching system, rack mounted pedals, pedalboard mounted pedals, midi switching -the whole 9 yards.
I've had one problem I couldn't solve on the spot in the past 6 years. In that case it was just plug into the front of one amp and let rip. dry as a bone. brings you back to center REAL quick on that first song to get your shit together and play your ass off since you've got no icing for the cake.
now I have a separate back up pedal board with just a footswitch, wah, chorus, envelope filter and delay. covers the bases in a basic format without going effectless.

not sure what to suggest for ya here.

yeah a road case without a doubt is the way to go. I jsut can't swing the cash right now. I had to sell them, my second 5150, and both of my vader cabs. Now I am trying to rebuild. Picked up a genz benz 2x12 and a case for it, a couple new guitars, rack tuner, and a rack pwoer supply and my pedals. Now I jsut want to make it all go together as smooth as possible. I'd gladly velcro the noise gate to the 5150, but it literally is like store baught new condition so I don't want to get gunk from velcro all over it. I am trying to think of a way to mount it to the things you wrap the cords around in the back. I'd like to just install it and forget it. Maybe even internally install it with some velcro haha.

Setup is tough. My rig is fairly simple with one amp a reverb unit and a pedalboard. I spent some time refineing the setup recently and can set up in five minutes and then have some time to get the guitar tuned and up to temp in the room. The pedaltrain board really works good for me and all my cables, power supplies and interconnects are in a nice neat package with the cables and power supplies under the pedalboard. One cable in one out and an AC line to a filtered power supply and its ready to use. If I really go crazy and bring my Leslie cabinet its much more time and a lot more to haul. Keep it simple but effective.

When I did my gigs, I had an extremely simple rig. Guitar -> Wah -> Boost -> Amp. It was never a problem setting up. However, now I got a 12 space rack with all kinds of crap in it. The best thing would be to have a pre-wired pedalboard so you only need to plug in the input and output to it. My rack effects are plugged into the effects loop at all times so that never really changes. The biggest time saver is the pre-wired pedalboard. You can buy a flight-case on Ebay and get a nice pedalboard to go with it. Then you can use velcro or whatever to strap down the pedals.

You could get as much stuff done beforehand to the side of the stage, get your pedals and cords out and semi hooked up etc. 10 minutes should be plenty of time to wire up an amp and a couple of pedals then.

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ENDITOL":330fe said:

You could get as much stuff done beforehand to the side of the stage, get your pedals and cords out and semi hooked up etc. 10 minutes should be plenty of time to wire up an amp and a couple of pedals then.

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+1 No matter where I play, I find time and space to get everything set up and hooked up before it goes on stage. When I go up on stage, I place my baord out front, and plug in power and my guitar. I've been able to do this at every show, just gotta make time and find some room to do it.

Since I only run 2 pedals one of which I am not going to touch I am not 100% sure a pedalboard would be a logical purchase.


Taking time off to the side would be my only option with the way I am now. I am trying to stop that step. I really need to invest in another rack case. This is killing me.

I built myself a pedal board, and tie (plastic zip ties) my cables together, and color coded the plugs and jacks. So all I have to do is take off the lid, and unroll the cable, and match the colors. It usuall takes me longer to unload my vehicle and find power than it does for the actual setup.

If the pedal in the loop isn't going to be switched off and on, I'd use a couple of 3 foot cords, and just put the pedal on top of the amp then run your two cords out to the pedal and guitar and all you have let is to hook your speaker cable to your amp/cab.

You could wrap leave the two short cords plugged into the pedal, and wrap them around it. Then all you'd have to do is walk to your amp, uncoil, plug the cords into your amp and you're set to go.

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ENDITOL":797d8 said:

You could get as much stuff done beforehand to the side of the stage, get your pedals and cords out and semi hooked up etc. 10 minutes should be plenty of time to wire up an amp and a couple of pedals then.

Click to expand...

+1
this is true. I can set up my rig in 10 minutes if I have to. staging your gear before getting stuff up on the stage is essential though. get everything in order and put on stage in the most logical order.