Wah pedals are so much more than just wacka-wacka funk, and Jackson Brooksby from YouTube channel Dipswitch Demos knows this too. It's something we've mentioned before with our own wah pedal tips but it bears repeating. Especially this slow sweep filter tip.
Jackson went to see Chris Buck playing live with Cardinal Black on their UK tour and noticed how he used a slow sweep to add new dynamics to a song intro.
"He used a wah pedal in a way that I don't think I've seen anybody else do before," notes Jackson in the video above. "He used it almost like a volume pedal. He was swelling in his sound and his tone within the mix better than I've heard any volume pedal do."
It took me a very long time to trust myself with a wah pedal
Chris Buck
It's all about the slow sweep taking on the role of a filter. "I think it has has something to do with the frequencies sweep – how they come from low to mid to high, and really piercing" adds Jackson. "When you sweep your wah pedal, it brings it back and forwards in stages of the mix and it was a really effective way of starting that song."
Jackson illustrates the technique in the video, along with four other wah tricks, sweeping the wah slowly via the treadle for a filtered sweep. And you can check out Chris talking about his wah below.
"It took me a very long time to trust myself with a wah pedal," he admits. "Because you turn into a lot of the usual suspects that have ever used a wah pedal – not name any names. But there's a couple of moments in the set where that gets used almost as a kind of filter."
Check out more from Jackson at the Dipswitch Demos YouTube channel.
