Grateful Dead Music Forum

Wondering if you can use a GE-7 or other EQ pedal to boost certain frequencies and give a Strat the same kind of qualities as engaging an onboard Alembic blaster/ strat-o-blaster.
Anyone experiment with this?

you need to know what blaster boosts and find out if you can nail down those frequencies with the EQ you have

IMO buffers and blasters is 80% feel and 20% tone.

EQ can get in the tonal neighborhood. But not the feel.

There's something as a guitarist when you hear and feel note articulation and separation that let's you play differently and more relaxed. Buffers help with them.

Yes and no. A blaster doesn't seem to boost any frequencies much. So, an EQ pedal with a good buffer placed really close to the guitar (very short cable run) will mostly do the job. The problem is even a 10 foot cable before the buffer will make a difference.

The other issue is the slight JFET distortion you can get from a pushed blaster is not going to be duplicated by an EQ pedal.

Personally, I prefer the buffer in the guitar, but not necessarily a blaster. There are better newer designs that don't pick up noise and just do their simple job better.

I prefer the Blaster set at about unity gain. More about tone than volume.

Bill, tgo