Digitech RP200

[Richard Hunter <turtlehill@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I played a record release party yesterday for a New hampshire
singer-songwriter named John Garvey.  It was the second time I've used
my studio setup, which includes the Digitech RP200, onstage, and it was
completely successful.

The setup includes the following:
- - Labtec AM-22 microphone; this is a lightweight mic designed for
computer use, with a big low end and the highs rolled off
- - Morley 3-way switcher pedal
- - Akai Headrush delay pedal
- - Digitech RP-200
- - Peavey KB/A 100 keyboard amp

The mic goes into the Morley pedal.  The Morley offer a connection to
the keyboard amp through the Akai Headrush delay on one channel, and
through the RP200 on a second channel.  I didn't connect the third
channel for this gig.

I used the Morley to switch between 1) a clean sound with or without
delay, and 2) the RP200 for a variety of effected sounds, including amp
modeling.  The Peavey keyboard amp was used for onstage monitoring, and
the preamp out jack on the Peavey was used to send a direct signal to
the PA board.  I had the engineer put a little reverb on the signal,
because I dislike the reverbs in the RP200 and the Peavey amp, and I
didn't bring an outboard reverb.

I was tremendously pleased with the versatility and power of this
setup.  Playing with a full band that included drums, electric guitar,
pedal steel, bass, and occasional keyboards, I had tons of volume on
stage and through the PA, and I could have pumped it up higher without
feedback.  The clean sounds were clean and the effected sounds had
amazing character.   The RP200 did a great job of producing bluesy amped
sounds as well as dreamy, synthy tones.    

One remarkable tone it produced consisted of a clean guitar amp model
paired with an octave doubler (an octave down, that is).  The octave
doubler in the RP200, as noted previously on this list by myself and
Mike Curtis, works great with harp, and reproduces chords as well as
single notes cleanly.  In this case, it sounded uncannily like an
accordian, which was perfect for the more country-oriented tunes in
Garvey's repertoire. 

Another brilliant sound produced by the RP200 was a patch called
"Police" that I downloaded from Digitech's site not long ago.  This is a
dreamy clean amp patch with chorus and delay, sounding much like the
guitar on the Police's "Every breath you take".  When paired with a
chorused guitar, the effect was magical.

For raunchy amped tones, I mainly used a patch I worked up based on the
"Texas Blues" preset in the RP200.  It's a Boutique amp model with a
slapback analog delay.  It sounded plenty tough, and I had no feedback
problems at all.

It ain't a bad thing to get everything you want in a single box that
costs less than $150 and weighs less than two pounds.  Caveats: I spent
over 50 hours working the RP200 to get the sounds to this point.  The
original presets were guitar-friendly, not harp-friendly at all.  Also,
the RP200's patch-switching pedals are very close together. I had to be
very careful about using the expression pedal, or I'd change the patch
accidentally. On my first gig with the RP200, I accidentally triggered
the built-in drum machine on a song, which basically ruined the song for
everyone and made the other players angry.  I now make a point of
zeroing out the volume on the drum machine every time I power up the
RP200 on stage.

Peter Ruth has written to this list about the brilliance of his Peavey
Transformer 112 amp.  I had the opportunity to try one last week, and I
agree that it's a very nice rig, though I prefer the chorus and flange
effects in the RP200 to the same effects in the Peavey Transformer, at
least at first hearing.  (The Peavey does have a nice phaser, and I've
spent a lot of time tweaking the RP200 to get the flanger and chorus to
sound the way I want them to.)  In any case, the day of amp modelers is
clearly here for harmonica players.  Yesterday I had exactly the sound I
wanted on every song, with as much power in reserve as I needed.  The
other musicians were clearly impressed with what they were hearing too. 

I still have a good tube amp setup when I want it, but this is my gig
rig for everything but straight Chicago blues for the foreseeable
future.