New Toy!

[AndyR]

Oh yes...



I saw Hugh Lloyd-Langton using one in Hawkwind years ago and I pretty much thought "meh... so what?" at the time.

But the other week I saw Florence + The Machine three times at Alexandra Palace.

After I'd managed to wrest my gaze from Florence herself (took about a gig and a half ), I was able to watch her guitarist Rob Ackroyd to see what he does. I was particularly interested because I'd been puzzling over the albums and trying to figure out what was going on. Watching him I realised he was using an EBow. And suddenly I understood that a lot of sounds I thought were keyboards/strings/etc on the albums are... guitar.

I gotta get me some of this, I thought...

Loving it, not as difficult to use as I thought... parts already worked out for next recording

[AndyR]

oops, double post!

[Kiichi]

Oh nice, that is such a fun toy. Congrats. Loving mine a lot. Great for adding atmosphere especially. I even use it on acoustic these days for lovely effects.

I was converted by this song. https://youtu.be/UaEW8PHOTH4
Love the interaction with the other instruments and general atmosphere & backbone. The parts around 2 and especially 4min are great.

[littleredguitars2]

i bought one recently as well. havent had much use for it at the moment but its gonna be a handy tool for the right situations! really fun to use.

[PhilKing]

I've had one since the 70's.  Mine's a chrome one, with a leather belt or strap holder.  You need it for Bowie's Heroes and if you like 10,000 Maniacs, Hateful Hate is also a song that needs it.   You can try moving it closer to the pickups to get more attack and you can hold it backwards to get the bridge pickup pushing more.

[Plenum n Heather]

I have the 'special' version of the E-bow that adds the upper harmonic to the sustained note; sounds really cool. I RARELY use it, if at all, but it's a nice effect to layer in when doing something lush. I have a song on the first As Follows album that has about 12 tracks of E-bow guitars making a synth-like pad. Since I am now more into synths and programming them, I haven't touched the E-bow in a long time.

[Kiichi]

I have the 'special' version of the E-bow that adds the upper harmonic to the sustained note; sounds really cool. I RARELY use it, if at all, but it's a nice effect to layer in when doing something lush. I have a song on the first As Follows album that has about 12 tracks of E-bow guitars making a synth-like pad. Since I am now more into synths and programming them, I haven't touched the E-bow in a long time.

That is a special version? I have what I thought was the normal one and the switch goes two ways. Left is normal mode and right gives me that harmonic mode.

[AndyR]

Same here Kiichi - it's called the EBow Plus. Looks like it's the "standard" or possibly only model available.

I'm loving this little thing - SO versatile, and so many different sounds you can get from it. Not recorded with it yet, but I'm definitely using it on the next recording. Possibly as a harmony pad (replacing my usual guitar "string sections"), but I'm also working up a "cello part"

[gwEm]

i've always been a bit sceptical of the ebow, but as a result of this thread i've been checking some demonstrations out.

i thought i'd be better off practising my volume knob swell technique rather than getting an ebow. but in fact, it does sound different and also its not possible to do volume swells on every guitar.

congrats on the purchase Andy, it'll be interesting to see what you do with it.

[AndyR]

i've always been a bit sceptical of the ebow, but as a result of this thread i've been checking some demonstrations out.

i thought i'd be better off practising my volume knob swell technique rather than getting an ebow. but in fact, it does sound different and also its not possible to do volume swells on every guitar.

I must admit, that's exactly what I'd thought about EBows for last 30 years! But seeing the guy in Florence + The Machine using it close up, I kinda changed my opinion quite quickly!

I did some web searching and found the EBow site with its demo clips and lessons. Some of that is way ahead of what the FATM guy does, but what he does is what is often in my head when arranging stuff during recordings. I think if I was more of a synth user, I probably wouldn't be so interested but, even so, EBow + Guitar (electric or acoustic!) gives you a peculiarly organic and slightly unpredictable vibe to things.

The other thing it's done - I'm suddenly using effects more. EBow on its own is interesting to start with, but start adding time-based effects and you're off somewhere else.

[JJretroTONEGOD]

I bought one around 15 years ago, and have used it only a handful of times since lol but I might dig it out again and try it through the soundtoys 5 rack