Can you use modulation to thicken your sound?

[newpedals]

Yesterday I stumbled across some rig rundown video on youtube. I only watched a few seconds of it. My phone browser was acting up, so I couldn't even focus on the player's name. I think it had some guitar magazine's logo and the video quality was grainy.

I saw that he mentioned that he uses modulation (I vaguely remember seeing a phase 90 amongst other pedals) to thicken his sound.

Does anyone here also do this?

I am curious about it. There is so much to learn about effects and music in general. Every day I hear something new.

Will you please point me to a sound clip or a video where a guitarist uses some form of modulation this way?

 

[Aelred]

Chorus is the obvious one. There are a lot of videos, but Boss CE-2 is classic.

 

[2112]

A chorus/phaser/flanger with a low rate is a popular choice to run in front of an amp as a tonal enhancer, as opposed to with a high rate/depth for more pronounced "wobbly" effects.

I did a video a while ago comparing a chorus, flanger & phaser for various styles.



Here's a comparison between some stereo modulation effect types to make the guitar sound wider

 

[mchad]

Will you please point me to a sound clip or a video where a guitarist uses some form of modulation this way?

We're all gonna have different examples but this guy lives in my heart. Now no longer with us but Geordie Walker was a monster in terms of achieving a big guitar sound. He used a Bell Electrolabs A.D.T Module System delay pedal in stereo to two Burman amps.

 

[Diary Of An Axeman]

On some of my presets, I like to use a combo of chorus and flanger to thicken things up.

Like how Randy Rhoads used both those Modulations to get the tone on SATO from Diary Of A Madman.

John Sykes got a huge sound with a Quad Chorus on White Snake's 1987 album.

Zakk Wylde, got a huge sound on Crazy Babies from No Rest For The Wicked. The simple chords and overdrive was perfect to allow the chord's notes breath with the chorus jell from your speakers into your ears.

 

[0XI0]

there was an old Mark Morton Lamb of God rig rundown years ago with the Mark IV rig where he mentioned using a phase 90 for leads to thicken the tone. thicken is one way to describe it but in all actuality the moving phase shift makes it go back and forth from thick to thin, what you get is a movement, like synth filter sweep movement, adds a sonic layer of "thick" to the actual notes. like a wah you don't have to manipulate. Zakk Wylde uses a super chorus after the SD-1 and sends the stereo outs to two heads, that's really thick, cause the phase shift in the modulation isn't collapsed to mono in front of the distortion, basically auto double tracking that's always on. but stereo chorus is more imaging, less eq/filtering movement, with phase 90 you ultimately get more of frequency movement, in front of distortion it's really cutting cause the shifting eq shapes the gain as it moves. Adam Jones uses chorus in front of distortion too but runs mono, its kind of a smearing washy effect. chorus in the effects loop gives imaging and spread but without changing the distortion