I won't bore you with my opinion on the matter. We guitarists are all individuals and like what we like. Sometimes you don't know what you like until you hear it and then it's all or nothing
The phase pedal or phase sifter has been use by many a guitar player. Eddie Van Halen notoriously used one to enhance his solos. The sweeping shift of frequencies in and out of phase with each other seems other worldly.
But where do you put it in the signal chain? Only you know for sure.
Check out my demo of phase pedals before and after distortion.
The Danelectro Chicken Salad vibe pedal is an inexpensive, yet decent sounding pedal. For very little money you can get the swirly goodness of a Univibe and jam on some Hendrix or Robin Trower.
I did a video demoing the stock Chicken Salad which is not true bypass. Some would argue that a better tone could be achieved if only the pedal did not have those annoying buffers in the way.
I decided to rehouse a chicken salad eliminating the switching mechanism and adding a proper mechanical switch making the circuit true bypass. Below is the comparison of the stock buffered unit versus the rehouse true bypass unit.
Out of context one could argue that some Phase pedals and Vibe pedals sound the same. Granted they both provide tons of swirly tones and some do a faux Leslie better than others. Still,the vibe and the phase pedal have similar qualities.
Eddie Van Halen certainly solidified the potential for phase pedals. The likes of Jimi Hnedrix and Robin Trower certainly used the Uni-Vibe very effectively. So what's the difference.
Phaser, or Phase shifter pedals tend to use transistors and resistors to blend a dry signal with an out of phase wet signal. Vibe or the original Uni-Vibe used a photo resister and lamp to achieve a similar but usually more dramatic effect. In fact, the Uni-Vibe was first designed to emulate a Leslie rotating speaker. While it did not achieve the exact desired effect, it did achieve a sound all it's own
I decided to take my phase and vibe pedals and compare them side by side to demonstrate the similarities and the differences.
Check out the Phase and Vibe pedal comparison and see for yourself what each pedal does.
