Flanger Pedals

About

What can a Flanger Pedal do? Creating rich and swirling jet plane-like guitar tones is easy with a flanger pedal. Flanger pedals work by duplicating your instrument’s signal, delaying one part slightly, then modulating its delay time while mixing it back with the original signal. This produces a series of intense peaks and troughs in your instrument’s frequency spectrum, resulting in the signature flanger swooshing tone. You can control a flanger pedal with its depth, rate, and feedback knobs to tailor its speed and intensity to your liking. Tweaking the pedal can get you anywhere from subtle flanging to extreme, otherworldly modulated guitar tones. History of the Flanger Pedal The earliest recorded flanger effect was in the late 1940s when studio engineers manually manipulated tape machines to produce a sweeping sound. Recording engineers would play identical recordings on two tape decks, press on one machine’s reel flange to slow it down slightly, and then mix both signals to create the signature flanger swooshing sound. The technique became popular in the 1960s at the height of psychedelic and rock music with bands like The Beatles and Jimi Hendrix utilizing the flanger effect in their records. By the 70s, early iterations of flanger stompboxes like the Electro-Harmonix Electric Mistress and the MXR Flanger made the effect easily accessible to guitarists wanting a compact version of the jet plane sound. Flanger pedals have evolved over the decades with the incorporation of digital technology. This expanded the capabilities of the signature guitar effect while still preserving its iconic, sought-after modulated soundscape. Who uses Flanger Pedals? The use of flanger pedals transcends genres because of their unique modulation. The flanger’s versatility allows musicians to use it subtly or intensely according to their preference. Rock guitarists like Graham Coxon and Brian May employ flangers to add character and depth to their iconic guitar riffs. They even use it