A Beginner's Guide To Guitar Effects Pedals...Effect Types Explained!

Sam gives us a complete beginners guitar to effects pedals including sound examples and pedal placement tips.

Don't know an Echo from an Octaver? Your Flange from your Big Muff? In this beginner's guide to guitar effects pedal, Sam explains and takes a listen to most of the different "types" of effects, to help you get started on your guitar effects odyssey! This is a complete novices guide to effects pedals including sound examples - so grab a cup of coffee and enjoy!

Skip to each section of this video:

00:00 - Beginners Guide To Guitar Effects Pedals

01:44 - Single Pedals vs Multi Effects

04:00 - Dynamic Effects Explained (Compressor, EQ, Boost & Volume)

08:52 - Pitch Effects Explained (Octavers, Pitch Shifters & Harmonisers)

12:39 - Drive Pedals Explained (Including difference between Overdrive, Distortion & Fuzz)

18:36 - Modulation Effects Explained (Chorus, Flange, Phaser etc)

23:34 - Delays & Echo Pedals Explained

28:42 - Reverb Pedals Explained

33:02 - Wah Pedals Explained

Outro 36:09

Other links mentioned in this video...

If you're new to the world of electric guitars and finding the thousands of effects pedals available a little bit daunting or confusing, this beginners guide should hopefully make the different genres of effect types a little easier to understand. Within this video we look at the pros and cons of both individual pedals and multi-fx units, explain signal chains and pedal placement, look at the differences between delays, echo and reverbs and answer questions such as "what is an effects loop?". We hope you find this guide useful, you can try out any of the pedals that Sam's using here for yourself at your local Professional Music Technology.

Leave any pedal based questions in the comments and we'll do our best to answer them!

Find us on social media:

[JStrange]

This might be the best rundown of pedal types that I've seen on youtube. Lots of great info and examples of all the sounds. Most vids of this type rush through and leave out crucial information or assume we already know. I learned something and it was fun, too!

[iverjosjq]

Man as an ABSOLUTE beginner, this is super helpful, thanks a lot.

[pbcwolle]

Finally someone acknowledging us guitar noobs

[mugiv]

I feel like I’m watching an animal planet documentary but with guitar pedals as the subject instead.

[lelayyyy]

Watching this because my musician boyfriend is building up his pedal board (He uses multi-effects before), and I want to understand, so I would know what to buy for him as a gift. hehe.

UPDATE: I GOT CAUGHT! Lol. I'm still getting notifications from this comment and my bf saw it. -_- But yeah, we watched this together and now I know he needs a reverb. Haha.

[moraleza]

As an absolute begginer who has no pedals or even an amp whatsoever, this is probably the best video i've ever watched explaining these pedals, more important than that, showing the difference that they make on the sound. Thank you so much :3

[anuragdeshpande]

Just looking those pedals make me feel addicted to them even though I've never touched an electric guitar in my life

[GKChandlerBooks]

As a decades-long classical guitarist, just getting into this area, I am completely ignorant and overwhelmed by the vast array of pedals. Thanks for the video. You've clarified SO much. Well put together and a very good overview of the broad categories and types of pedals. Thanks!

[ilovenycsomuch]

I feel like I just unlocked a whole world of music-making I didn't understand before after watching this video. With all the different sounds you showed I could recall examples where I heard that effect in songs & movies & it had me like that's where that sound comes from! :D THANK YOU!!

[Jaysteves]

just learnt in 35 mins what ive been trying to figure out for months! thank you!

[AE-wkdn]

21:02 he tries to do vibrato when using a vibrato pedal. much respect

[maxduvall]

18:15 me every day after school for literally no reason, not making myself any better of a guitarist

[mortachaiepstein]

Y'all just made the best intro to pedals video I've ever seen. Everything is presented simply and accurately. Anybody who needs a rundown on what pedals sound like what and where they go should watch this. Respek.

[Red-vimz]

Ive actually been using a multi-effect pedal for years, and never really understood what everything meant. The way you explain, breakdown, categorise and even demo every single effect is perfect! Clearly and easily explained, been looking for a video like this for ages! thank you!

[timthompson]

I really appreciate you using famous guitar riffs when showcasing the pedals. I'm usually not sharp enough to figure out when an artist used a specific effect and this was honestly really helpful. Thank you

[subzero]

Just got a marshall half stack, a Hendrix fuzz face and a Hendrix Wah pedal... Now I just need to get Jimis Hands and I'll be good to go.

[kbCorruption]

Hands down the best pedal tutorial on the internet! Thank you for the time and effort that went into this.

[pyroboplayer]

We all knew he was gonna play come as you are with the chorus

[hwajeongkid]

AWESOME! Everything you wanna hear and learn its all here. Clear, crisp, no BS half an hour of knowing the ifs and buts of guitar pedals.

[Delzona]

This is by far one of the best videos explaining what different pedal effects can do. As a new guitar player I found this awesome because he used bits of songs that famously used said pedal, which to me made it a lot easier to understand what the pedal can do! Great stuff! I’ll be referring back to this video many times as I grow my pedal board.