Synthesize your waves... BOSS SYB-3 Bass Synthesizer

My first synthesizer pedal was the BOSS SYB-3 Bass Synthesizer. Its voiced for bass guitar but it worked fine on guitars. I got this on EBAY for around $100 + s/h and now retails for $159.00. BOSS SYB-5 now available for the same price. For people who are new to synth sounds, this pedal will serve to be quite tricky. Its really hard to dial in a good synth sound but when you do have the proper settings, you'll see yourself playing for hours and in my case, for days.

Its a buzzy pedal when you're dialing different settings. This is close enough to having a Moog synth pedal without spending 3-4x as much. I always ask myself when testing pedals "Does it help in making good music?" . Answer: It makes good synth sounds and noise. Background music. Background noise. Layered noise? It didn't help me write anything but it sure was fun just dialing various synth sounds. I did plug it in with my ALESIS SR-16 Drum Module and was making industrial funk, techno, electronica and some raunchy 80s soundtracks with it.

heres a demo:



FROM VINTAGESYNTH.COM:

This is the literal version of a Synth-Bass! This bass-guitar-pedal is a monophonic bass synthesizer with simple controls but a genuine analog synth bass sound. It transforms your bass-guitar's sound into a synth sound, complete with a resonant filter with cutoff, decay control and a hold function.
The SYB-3 has 11 synthesizer modes: 7 Internal Sound Modes in which the bass guitar triggers and controls the built-in oscillator. 2 Wave shape modes that tweak your actual bass sound into something synth-like. And 2 T-Wah modes that give you a wah-wah bass sound. Two outputs facilitate individual synth and direct bass signals.

FROM MANUFACTURER:

Boss's new SYB3 Bass Synthesizer is the first of its kind: a high-quality bass synthesizer in a compact floor pedal design. The SYB3 can turn any electric bass guitar into a dance, techno, hip-hop, funk, or R&B machine - molding a "straight" bass sound into any number of today's popular synth bass sounds.

Features

• 11 different modes for various synthesizer bass sounds: Internal Sound Modes (1-7); Wave Shaping Modes (8,9); T Wah Modes (10,11)
• Processes input bass sound to create synth bass sound.
• Uses input bass sound as a trigger to control built-in oscillator.
• Adds auto wah effects to the original bass sound.
• Decay/Sensitivity knob adjusts decay time of synthesizer sound (Mode 1-7) and sensitivity of direct sound (Mode 8-11).
• Frequency and Resonance knobs control cutoff frequency and resonance.
• Effect and Direct knobs allow for independent level adjustment of synthesizer and direct sounds.
• 2 outputs (A and B) individually output synth and direct sounds
• Hold function sustains synth sound, allowing bassists to play over the "held" sound.