Featured Neuro Artist (August 2020): @jbt333

Congratulations to Jarrod Taylor (a.k.a. @jbt333). Because of all the awesome Neuro presets and sound clips he created, we sent Jarrod a free Ventris Dual Reverb and made him our Featured Nuero Artist for the month of August, 2020. Jarrod is one of two guitarists from an excellent psych rock out of Oakland, CA called The Chaw. We first noticed Jarrod's work back in April, 2020 during our Neuro Cover Song Challenge. His cover version of “Crying Lightning” by Arctic Monkeys was sensational. Since that time he recorded an outstanding original tune titled, “Down To The Leather,” which was adorned with a wonderful collection of Nemesis Delay drenched guitar lines - each track has a Nemesis preset available in the Neuro Editor. 

We will be picking a new Featured Neuro Artist every month for the foreseeable future, so we urge all of you to keep publishing those cool presets with embedded YouTube or SoundCloud clips! We love hearing what all of y’all are doing with our One Series pedals. Let's check out Jarrod's presets and feel free to hit the download buttons and try any of these sounds in your Nemesis Delay...

"Vibroctave Carnival"

JB Taylor · Vibroctave Carnival (2 Takes:Panned)

​The next few sound clips are the isolated guitar tracks from Jarrod's song "Down To The Leather." Jarrod was cool enough to talk with us about the inspiration and building process of the Nemesis Delay presets he created for each tracks:

@jbt333's Comments on "Vibroctave Carnival": "When I’m working on a recording and something doesn’t feel quite right, sometimes it’s not a part that’s missing, it’s a frequency. In the case of the tune "Down to the Leather" the music felt like it was missing some higher frequencies. Adding an octave up on the Compound Shifter, and giving the effect a Vibrato like quality with Mod and Wow & Flutter, seemed to do the trick. When I first put it on the track it reminded me of an overdriven calliope with an octave on it (hence name "Vibroctave Carnival"). After going back and listening to an actual calliope, I realized it  sounded nothing like the preset. Nonetheless, it’s a super fun patch."

DOWNLOAD "VIBROCTAVE CARNIVAL"

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"Futuristic Echo Room"

JB Taylor · Futuristic Echo Room

@jbt333's Comments: "This clip of my "Futuristic Echo Room" preset is from the song, "Down To The Leather," but I originally made the patch for a tune The Chaw was working on. We’d been working on our new record for about 6 months and I was at home on my couch, playing guitar and watching Blade Runner 2049. There was a scene where Ryan Gosling’s character goes to his apartment - there's a really cool shot of the building with these massive neon advertisements projected on it as the camera pans down to street level. You also hear this reverberated speaking and the cars passing by - it’s just a great shot. I had previously recorded this intro to the song with kind of a “lone person in a room playing guitar with ambient noises going on,” thing. I felt like I had a nugget of a cool idea, but it was ultimately kind of lame. This scene made me rethink the kind of room this person would be playing in. I re-recorded the part with this preset and it totally changed the vibe. The Warped Record engine can really put the guitar in a brand new place, I love it."

DOWNLOAD "FUTURISTIC ECHO ROOM"

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"​Rainbow-Esque Machine"

JB Taylor · Rainbow - Esque Machine (2 Tracks:Panned With Reverb)

@jbt333's Comments: "The pitch shifting engines on the Nemesis are incredible for dozens of reasons, but the big one for me is having all the pitch intervals available. Being a huge fan of the 100% wet reverb sound, I wanted to make a patch that would up the queasy levels, coupled with my Supermoon Reverb. It’s a super fun patch to play with clean, but add tons of reverb and it starts to sound like a horror movie; all bees and violins."

DOWNLOAD "RAINBOW-ESQUE MACHINE"

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"​Analog Echo (DM-2 Style)"

JB Taylor · Analog Echo (DM - 2 Style)

@jbt333's Comments: "I love the Boss DM-2 for it’s murky delay sound. I made this patch to be similar, but added some modulation to create more gooey space. On "Down to the Leather" there are sometimes up to 3 guitars playing an identical rhythm, so each part had to have it’s own pocket. I used the Nemesis to do that, with different slapbacks/frequencies."

DOWNLOAD "ANALOG ECHO (DM-2 STYLE)"

...and speaking of "Down To The Leather," Jarrod sent us an mp3 of the completed track - great tune! It's fun to hear how all the individual guitar parts come together to form a sonic tapestry of beautifully warped guitar lines. Dig... 

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“Fast Oil Can Slap” & “Washy Oil Can”

JB Taylor · #neurocoverchallenge - Crying Lighting

Jarrod's cover of "Crying Lightning" by Arctic Monkeys incorporates a couple of great Oil Can delay presets from the Nemesis Delay. We have some pretty huge Monkeys fans at Source Audio, so this killer cover really caught our ears. We've got some left speaker <-> right speaker action happening in the clip - Jarrod will explain:

@jbt333's Comments: "Fast Oil Can Slap" - "Oil Can is probably my favorite engine on the Nemesis. It’s kind of like hearing a drop of water in a parking garage, it’s very reflective and dark. It’s perfect to create slapbacks for the depth. For Alex Turner’s guitar on my "Crying Lightning" cover, it’s pretty much on the whole time."

"Washy Oil Can" - "For Jamie Cook’s slide part on the second verse, I originally went with a Space Echo sound, as I’m pretty sure that’s what was used, but the Oil Can just sounded too good. At the end of each sustaining note, as oscillation starts kicking in, there’s this little warble that gives it an extra splash of eerie."

DOWNLOAD "FAST OIL CAN SLAP"

DOWNLOAD "WASHY OIL CAN"

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"Lemon" & "Supermoon"

JB Taylor · Lemon

This is cool. Since receiving his Ventris Dual Reverb, Jarrod published some very creative presets. The first was inspired by the The Edge's choppy guitar effect in the U2 song, "Lemon." This preset cascades the Swell Reverb engine into the Modverb engine with its tremolo set to maximum depth. 

DOWNLOAD "LEMON"

JB Taylor · Supermoon

This one is interesting. Jarrod was trying to replicate his go-to settings on the Mr. Black Supermoon pedal. He used the E-Dome Reverb engine (one of the Ventris' most popular engines), but set the SIZE option to Metal Box (in the Neuro Desktop Editor). Metal Box is basically a room sound that attempts to replicate the sound of your amplifier sitting inside a metal storage container. It's a superbly trashy effect that is actually a little known carry-over from our Soundblox 2 Dimension Reverb. Jarrod also turns up the reverb modulation controls to really accentuate the eerie ambiance. 

DOWNLOAD "SUPERMOON"

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The Chaw: Livestream at Parkway Sounds

The Chaw Livestream Replay From Parkway Sounds from Parkway Sounds on Vimeo.

Finally, let's check out Jarrod's band, The Chaw - excellent band! We love the tunes and the vibe and sound quality of this video are extraordinary!

@jtb333's Comments: "We had the opportunity to go up to Bend, OR and do a livestream at the incredible Parkway Sounds with our friends in The Color Study.  We had to re-learn how to play live after being in the studio for ages, which was kinda brutal. The set features 4 new tunes (Boil In Blood, I’ll Row, Driving Your Car, Iron Shoes), and some tunes from our other two records. We hope to have the new record out this fall!"

Big, big THANKS to Jarrod for talking with us and for creating all these excellent Nemesis Delay presets. Be sure to keep your eyes on the Neuro Presets Feed for forthcoming Ventris Dual Reverb presets from @jtb333! We'll see all of you next month. Stay safe!