A Wacky Idea?

Bobby Lee · From: Cloverdale, California, USA

Two recent inventions suddenly converged in my head the other day:

1. The Variax guitar, which emulates a lot of different guitars. Instead of a traditional pickup the Variax has 6 individual pickups embedded in the bridge saddles. These feed into a electronics system that does the guitar emulations.

2. Ed Packard's new Sierra, which features string tuning as part of the changer finger design. The other end of the string is simply clamped down.

If you combine these two inventions, you could have a pedal steel with the changer and tuners at the nut and the Line6 bridge saddles and electronics. The pedal steel could get a wide variety of tones including acoustic and "12 string" octave effects.

I'm not knocking the traditional pedal steel sound that we all know and love. The guitar could even have a traditional passive pickup as an option that could be switched on.

For those of us who need to change tones a lot this would beat pickup swapping, Pods and other external solutions. The controls would be right on the guitar.

What do you think? Is this just another of my wacky ideas, or is it viable? The latest MF catalog has Variax guitars for $500...

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Bobby Lee - email: quasar@b0b.com - gigs - CDs, Open Hearts
Sierra SD-12 (Ext E9), Williams D-12 Crossover, Sierra S-12 (F Diatonic)
Sierra Laptop 8 (E6add9), Fender Stringmaster (E13, C6, A6)

Fred Shannon · From: Rocking "S" Ranch, Comancheria, Texas, R.I.P.

b0b, definitely out of the box thinking. Sounds logical and profitable to this fat cat. When are you gonna' try it?

Saw Ed Packard's Beast yesterday at the Dallas bash and man it's really something.
fred

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"From Truth, Justice is Born"--Quanah Parker-1904

Rick Schmidt · From: Prescott AZ, USA

Now your cookin' b0b!!!

Can't the Variax change pitches too?

Bobby Lee · From: Cloverdale, California, USA

Mine doesn't change pitches. I think the "acoustic" Variax does. Electronic pitch shifting never sounds very good IMHO. I'd rather pull the string.

Rick Schmidt · From: Prescott AZ, USA

I hear you b0b, although who knows, that technology might get better too. They do have that future upgrade port right?

I was just thinking it might be nice to change a couple notes in the tuning every once and awhile for certain songs. You know....too many changes, not enough knees. Maybe have one KL dedicated to changeable "virtual pulls".

The thought of an acoustic PSG or maybe a pull string L5 is almost too much to think about. I say Dare to Dream!!!

Frank Parish · From: Nashville,Tn. USA

I've always thought of some kind of box that would automatically transpose the song for you so you could play in the fret of your choice. That would be very cool for the Dobro. How hard could that be? Kieth Hilton, are you listening?

Mike Wheeler · From: Delaware, Ohio, USA

That has been a serious dream among 6 string guitarists for many years. Remember the Midi converters? The technology just has to develop a little further to be able to make such a device a practical reality. Of course, with enough money it could be constructed now....but the cost would be outrageous. We'll just have to be patient a little longer.

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Every day is a Great day,
Mike
(aka Sideman)

Bobby Lee · From: Cloverdale, California, USA

The thing that the Variax does very well is change the timbre of the instrument. I can go from a Les Paul to a Martin flat top with the flick of a switch, and everything in between including Strat, Tele, Gretsch, etc. I know that these sounds would be very useful and unique coming from a pedal steel.

For pitch changing, I use pedals or retune the string. The Variax is like a very sophisticated parametric equalizer with well designed presets. It is not a synthesizer.

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Bobby Lee - email: quasar@b0b.com - gigs - CDs, Open Hearts
Sierra SD-12 (Ext E9), Williams D-12 Crossover, Sierra S-12 (F Diatonic)
Sierra Laptop 8 (E6add9), Fender Stringmaster (E13, C6, A6)

Tony Dingus · From: Kingsport, Tennessee, USA

Bobby you could get that banjo sound that you've always wanted. ha ha I couldn't resist
so please don't blackball me from the forum.
I've picked with a guy who had a variax and sounded like a tele when he wanted a tele sound. Bobby forgive me I was just pickin' at you a little.

Tony

David L. Donald · From: Koh Samui Island, Thailand

I like it, it would be perfect on a 12 string, just put on two 6 string pickups.

You can always STILL have the trad sounds, but add a lot more.

Rich Weiss · From: Woodland Hills, CA, USA

I have a Variax acoustic. It does emulate a banjo, as well as a sitar, a mandola, a shamisen, and a dozen other vintage guitar models. But I would have to say that the banjo sounds more banjo-like than an actual banjo. Same with the sitar. The acoustic guitars that it models are pretty good, but none of the models have the kind of complexity, ie, overtones and resonance, as does a real acoustic guitar. But it still works well in the context of a mix, or a recording.

David Mason · From: Cambridge, MD, USA

Guitar Player magazine did a big feature on the Variax when it came out with reviews from several top players, and a few of them (including uber-tone master Steve Morse) mentioned that no matter what they did, the Variax always had a certain "piezo" sound to it. Although many people seem to have accepted that as a necessary modern cost of playing music, I think that acoustic guitars with peizo pickups usually sound gruesome. Those Takamines you hear all over the Grand Ole Opry - god, whatever happened to Martins and microphones? That used to work just fine. Now people have gotten so used to that buzzy, plasticine "acoustic" tone they even use them on records, because it sounds "normal"?!? Have you ever heard Dave Matthews' actual tone? Eeek! I can't for the life of me figure out why, if he wants to play in an rock band, he doesn't just buy a Strat and a Twin Reverb and take a stab at actually sounding good.

I am a big fan of carefully-applied electronics - I mean, it's all boards and wires and circuitry, trying to talk about a "natural" electric sound coming out of the wires and circuits of your amp or stereo is eminent foofooism - but I guess if I ever start seeing Variaxes (or their descendants) in the hands of Morse, Eric Johnson, Jeff Beck, Carlos Santana, Steve Vai and other known tone monsters I'll be more inclined to crack open my closed little mind a tad.

Mike Perlowin · From: Los Angeles CA

I hate to rain on the parade, but there's a problem here. The Variax uses peizo pickups, which on a pedal steel, pick up and amplify all the mechanical noise of the pedals.

I have experimented with putting peizos on the steel, and no matter where you place them, they still pick up all the noise, even of they are not in contact with the changer.

It might be possible to build an interface between the old IVL MIDI pickups and the Line 6 electronics (which are not MIDI based). If that will work, it would the only way to combine the Variax's electronics with a pedal steel guitar.

Sorry b0b. It's a great idea, but the obsticals are pretty insurmnountable.

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So many guitars, so little time....

Drew Howard · From: 48854

I used a Variax in a local studio and the tracking wasn't 100%.

ADD: On some of the sounds there was an ever so slight delay between playing and audio playback.

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Drew Howard - website - Fessy D-10 8/8, Magnatone S-8, N400's, BOSS RV-3

[This message was edited by Drew Howard on 06 March 2005 at 11:34 AM.]

Bobby Lee · From: Cloverdale, California, USA

tracking? What tracking? The audio signal stays in the analog domain. I don't hear any tracking going on, except maybe for the 12 string effect. I think that the octave strings are synthesized.

Piezo noise. I hadn't thought of that. Oh well... Maybe with the Roland hex pickups.

[This message was edited by Bobby Lee on 06 March 2005 at 10:06 AM.]

Webb Kline · From: Orangeville, PA

Awesome idea. I'll own one.

Garth Highsmith · Posted 6 Mar 2005 11:21 am

.

[This message was edited by Garth Highsmith on 09 January 2006 at 08:41 PM.]

Bengt Erlandsen · From: Brekstad, NORWAY

And what if the Line6 people could tweak the electronics a little bit towards the PSG so instead of having tele, strat ,les paul or whatever sounds, instead one could choose between L.Green, B. Emmons , P.Franklin , ZumSteels, MSA, ShoBuds and such.
That would really be something

John Billings · From: Ohio, USA

I had a friend's Variax for a couple of days. I came away thinkin' "Not yet." Although the sounds were interesting, to me, they all sounded VERY piezo/digital. No comparison to the real thing. I suppose they'd be great if you were in a cover band, and needed to have lots of "OK" sounds available.
Does anyone here remember The Condor unit?
JB

Mike Perlowin · From: Los Angeles CA

Drew, if the variax you tried had a problem, it was withing that specific guitar. I have NEVER had any kind of tracking problem with my Variax.

Some of the sounds are quite convincing. Others could be improved upon. But one thing most people don't take into account is that as you change setting on the guitar, in order to get the full benefit of the different models, you also need to change the settings on your amp.

I've taken the Variax out to a few jam sessions, and people have frequently commented on how good it sounds. (I like to think my choce of models has something to do with that.) It IS a very happening guitar, and perfect for the player who needs a lot of different sounds, and who otherwise would have to take a bunch of different guitars to a gig.

If there were some way to eliminate the mechanical noise, a variax pedal steel guitar would be a formidable instrument. I wish it could be done.

BTW there is now a unit that allows Variax owners to add different sounds to their guitars. I don't know of we can add any sound we want, or if we must choose from a library of sounds offered by line 6. Personally, I can't think of anything I'd want that's not already in the guitar.

Bobby Lee · From: Cloverdale, California, USA

It's funny that it sounds "digital" to you, John, because it's not a digital instrument. People assume that you could only do this sort of thing by converting the signal into the digital domain and back again. That's simply not the way that the Variax works.

On "piezo", I've never noticed that bright piezo sound on the electric models. I think that it might depend on what you are running it into. I have a small PA and a Boogie in my music room and the models sound fine through those amps (PA for acoustic, Boogie for electric).

Mike, if the changer was at the nut end, maybe there would be a way to acoustically isolate the bridge saddles without sacrificing sustain.

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Bobby Lee - email: quasar@b0b.com - gigs - CDs, Open Hearts
Sierra SD-12 (Ext E9), Williams D-12 Crossover, Sierra S-12 (F Diatonic)
Sierra Laptop 8 (E6add9), Fender Stringmaster (E13, C6, A6)

[This message was edited by Bobby Lee on 07 March 2005 at 01:29 PM.]

Bobby Lee · From: Cloverdale, California, USA

Mike Perlowin · From: Los Angeles CA

Bobby, I've tried placing Peizo pickups in different places on my steel, and no matter where I placed them, even on the neck under the first fret, every time I stepped on a pedal, the Peizo picked up the noise.

I have reluctantly come to the conclusion that peizo pickups can not be used on a pedal steel guitar.

However as I said earlier, I see no reason why an interface cannot be built to allow the Variax electronics can be triggered by a MIDI pickup. Theoretically it should work.

And if it does, our existing steels could be retrofitted. I'd love to see that happen, and I'd definately jump on the bandwagon.

Travis Bernhardt · From: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

Could a pedal steel be built specifically to accomodate Variax type technology? I'm thinking along the lines of that Harmos pedal steel with the mechanics at the nut end and cables (Harmos pedal steel thread).

Perhaps the cables could run directly into the changer (i.e. no pull rods underneath), leaving no mechanical bits and pieces to scrape against each other. Then, with all the moving parts in one little floating clump by the nut, the creaking and grinding could possibly be isolated entirely from the piezo pickup which would sit at the bridge end.

-Travis

David Mason · From: Cambridge, MD, USA

It does seem as though you could run cables as Travis said, and use lubricated delrin or nylon contact bits to really cut down on noise. Then again, you could try and talk Roland into making a ten string pickup (decaphonic?) that would work with their existing guitar synthesizer units. Then again, if you just want the steel guitar to sit in a different place in a mix, you can use different bars, effects and most particularly a graphic equalizer to drastically change the sonic profile of the instrument. Have you ever tried playing your steel with a ping-pong ball through an autowah envelope follower? Cartoon fury! And, it'll sure wake up a lethargic house cat.

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