Line 6 Helix

Teetonetal

Wow that was very painful to watch,. Informative sure, but still. Dry as.

Then the end.

Clearly a guy who loves music but clearly a guy who is not musical. 

longi

Damn! I haven't got time to watch it so it's on "Watch Later."

Is he doing the review at his nan's house? That's not very rock and roll is it?

fretmeister

@guitargeek62

As you've got one...

I see that the Helix has it's own FX loops. Could you put your own drive pedal in the loop and put that loop at the very beginning of the chain - so effectively it is completely in front of the unit in the same way as if it was just plugged between the guitar and the Helix?

I'm trying to work out whether I want to buy one - and how I could integrate it with my Darkglass drives (until Line 6 does some proper bass drives)

ta

lewisjenkins

I have one, and yes you can do that.

Teetonetal

ThorpyFX said:

lewisjenkins said:

Looks like he's still squatting them: http://fractalaudio.co.uk/

that's not in very good taste really

My favorite thing about this is:

Sometimes you have just got to GET 'THAT' TUBE AMP TONE that you have heard so many times; remember, only a tube amp 

will give you EXACTLY what you are looking for... REAL Tube Amp Tone. Get the real thing - you know it makes sense!

For completely UNBIASED Reviews of Music Equipment visit

yup. Sure. unbiased.

Idiot.

fretmeister

lewisjenkins said:

I have one, and yes you can do that.

Thank you!

fretmeister

I've been looking at it again - I have 3 pedals that I love and don't seem to have an equivalent in the modelled FX.

There are 4 FX loops so I can have those 3 pedals in 1 loop each and leave them on - with the pedals only appearing in the signal path when the loop is active.

And of course - I don't yet know whether I could combine existing modelled FX to get close enough to my physical pedals to not use them at all. As it seems the signal can be split into 4 parallel blocks it may well be possible.

I think I'd have to look at the Rack model Helix so I could leave the physical pedals in a rack tray.

I'm fast running out of excuses.

guitargeek62

@fretmesiter: As @Lewisjenkins said, it's completely doable.

 

What are the other pedals you were thinking? The included ones are very good on the whole; I've already discovered that the Minotaur (Klon) model is close enough to replace my Saucy Box, I'm still figuring out how close I can get the delays to my Strymon DIG* before I can decide to sell that too.

Btw, the UVibe is great, so your Viscous vibe can probably go if you ended up buying one!

sweepy

Just got the message that mine has been dispatched by Yamaha Fingers crossed that's on the level, if so I'll pick it up after work

fretmeister

guitargeek62 said:

@fretmesiter: As @Lewisjenkins said, it's completely doable.

 

What are the other pedals you were thinking? The included ones are very good on the whole; I've already discovered that the Minotaur (Klon) model is close enough to replace my Saucy Box, I'm still figuring out how close I can get the delays to my Strymon DIG* before I can decide to sell that too.

Btw, the UVibe is great, so your Viscous vibe can probably go if you ended up buying one!

Darkglass B7K, Darkglass Vintage Microtubes Deluxe, Digitech Bass Synth Wah

The Vintage Microtubes might be doable by slamming the front of the cranked SVT model with a carefully set EQ with some compression and a clean blend, but the B7K doesn't sound like any other drive pedal I've ever found.

The Bass Synth Wah is just awesome - I use it for keyboard bass sounds. 

guitargeek62

Did you notice the filters in there? Not sure what they're like with bass (yet... wait till Dec), but they make some neat keyboard/synth sounds to my ears at least. There's also one that almost soumds like pads - my neighbours will grow to hate that!

ThePrettyDamned

fretmeister;832252" said:

guitargeek62 said:

@fretmesiter: As @Lewisjenkins said, it's completely doable. What are the other pedals you were thinking? The included ones are very good on the whole; I've already discovered that the Minotaur (Klon) model is close enough to replace my Saucy Box, I'm still figuring out how close I can get the delays to my Strymon DIG* before I can decide to sell that too.Btw, the UVibe is great, so your Viscous vibe can probably go if you ended up buying one!







Darkglass B7K, Darkglass Vintage Microtubes Deluxe, Digitech Bass Synth Wah

The Vintage Microtubes might be doable by slamming the front of the cranked SVT model with a carefully set EQ with some compression and a clean blend, but the B7K doesn't sound like any other drive pedal I've ever found.

The Bass Synth Wah is just awesome - I use it for keyboard bass sounds. 

I'd literally give a nut for a couple of darkglass pedals.

Si_

So now that a few guys here have had their Helix for a few days. What's it like? Worth the money? As good as you hoped?? Looking to order one tomorrow (found a place with them in stock) so wanted a hands on opinion from an owner

guitargeek62

Do it, especially if you've got the choice to buy it now, try it, and return it if it turns out to not be for you.

 

I'm barely scratching the surface of what it can do yet, I've spent the last few days just using the equivalent of my "normal" rig, plus a few additions that I'd planned to add prior to the Helix being announced.   I'm now essentially running it as a dozen or so pedals, a single amp, with post-amp time & modulation fx, and then into stereo outs. 

 

The flexibility is worth every penny; the sound quality is superb (probably the best I've sounded in years tbh*), and I'm not noticing any loss of dynamics or "feel".   I've not tried doing any recording yet but I think I might tonight if I'm home at a reasonable time.  The best part for me is that I'm now able to get home, turn it on, and be up & running in seconds rather than hauling everything out; it lets you get straight on with playing.

 

In terms of negatives: 

• The interface is good, but could be slightly more flexible - I don't think you can instantly move a block from Signal path A, to B for instance; only from a mono to stereo path within the same path. Someone can correct me on this if I'm doing it wrong?!
• No POG / HOG type effects.... yet. Hopefully they're coming.
• The tuner seems fine to me, but is generating complaints online in places.
• Amp models have very different output levels when browsing between them - it would be nice if these levels were normalised by default to assist with tone matching etc.
• No PC/Mac/iOS editor available yet - could be very useful at a later date.
• Looper doesn't quantize to tap-tempo
• Quite a few time/mod effects don't offer tap-tempo control (yet)
• No 3.5mm aux in jack - seems like an oversight for backing tracks/iPods etc. I could setup signal path B to do this, but that seems like a hell of a waste of one signal path. Perhaps I could run the signal in via a return block and place it at the end of my normal chain?

 

*Doesn't matter if I'm running purely into an amp model, or through a slew of fx first - it sounds & feels right.

lewisjenkins

I haven't got time to write a full review right now, but I've had mine for 5 days and it's amazing. I previously held on to a few of my special pedals 'just in case' but the Helix has surpassed them so they're ALL up for sale. I haven't gone as deep as @guitargeek62 but let's just say it's so easy to create and edit patches that I haven't even read the manual. My guitar tone sounds so much more alive than it did when I had a chain of pedals, and I'm hearing harmonics and clarity that wasn't there previously. My favourite patch right now is a Hiway 100 amp / cab combo with a Muff and some delay / reverb. It's a kind of Gimour-like tone I've spent months trying to get with pedals, and never succeeded until now. I'm so happy with it, and most importantly I'm playing music with it and getting song ideas and inspiration, so it's worth every penny. By the way, I've had multiFX units in the past (Boss GT's, Pod HD 500X) and they are not even in the same league as this. It doesn't feel like a multieffects unit, it feels more like a bunch of cool pedals and amps that are easy to tweak and save for future use. It's seriously amazing, and everyone should buy one, even if only to try for 30 days before returning - because you WON'T return it

DesVegas

Hoorar's all round, sounds like it's a hit.

fretmeister

If anyone feels like it - I'd love to hear some bass demos.

Nowt posh, just flat EQ on the bass amp models with a bit of finger style and pick playing.

Pretty please!

guitargeek62

lewisjenkins said:

I haven't got time to write a full review right now, but I've had mine for 5 days and it's amazing. I previously held on to a few of my special pedals 'just in case' but the Helix has surpassed them so they're ALL up for sale.

 

I haven't gone as deep as @guitargeek62 but let's just say it's so easy to create and edit patches that I haven't even read the manual. My guitar tone sounds so much more alive than it did when I had a chain of pedals, and I'm hearing harmonics and clarity that wasn't there previously.

 

My favourite patch right now is a Hiway 100 amp / cab combo with a Muff and some delay / reverb. It's a kind of Gimour-like tone I've spent months trying to get with pedals, and never succeeded until now. I'm so happy with it, and most importantly I'm playing music with it and getting song ideas and inspiration, so it's worth every penny.

 

By the way, I've had multiFX units in the past (Boss GT's, Pod HD 500X) and they are not even in the same league as this. It doesn't feel like a multieffects unit, it feels more like a bunch of cool pedals and amps that are easy to tweak and save for future use. It's seriously amazing, and everyone should buy one, even if only to try for 30 days before returning - because you WON'T return it

Completely agree with all of this, highlighted points in particular. I'm dialling in tones that I've been struggling to reach for quite some time.

 

I've not had a multi of the "last" generation, but I've been through a fair few (Boss, Line 6 XT's, TC, Digitech, Zoom G3, etc) and none of them feel as easy as this - the M series had a good interface, but this is easily a step above them.

 

Paul - afraid I don't have one to play through it atm, I can run the whammy a -1 octave into a bass rig though if that's any use?! Or if you're in/near London you're more than welcome to bring one over and play.

Aidanspaghetti

Just at the end before he starts playing he says "here's the playing, i'll see you soon"..

The sadness in that mans eyes holy moly.

Check it out. He knows what hes about to inflict on us....1:19;54...

On man.

But i do like him

Heartfeltdawn

Drew_fx said:

Moltisanti said:

in his defence falling out with the Axe FX mob is not difficult, they get sand in their manginas almost as fast as the Ernie Ball forum guys

According to Cliff, Mr. McKenzie was squatting Fractalaudio.co.uk and Fractalaudio.eu which is apparently illegal, and when they asked him to desist, he demanded money.

After that, Tony went all "I hate Fractal" ... well of course he does... they wouldn't cough up the ransom!!

It wasn't just Fractal. Here's a few others and some of his spam sites. 

http://www.englamps.co.uk/index.html

http://www.splawnamps.co.uk/index-3.html

http://www.richieblackmore.com/

http://www.vintagevibeamps.com/

http://www.customshopguitar.com/

I remember other ones associated with him as well. DomainIQ reports that tonymckenzie@com is associated with 193 associated domains.

His Helix review was as expected. Far too much of him talking, thankfully very little playing as he is truly godawful. At least the Tone King has some humility to go with his shitty playing.