This Week’s Preset: TimeLine – “Hell Float Trip”

Here is something a little weird and spooky I made for Halloween: a TimeLine preset I call “Hell Float Trip.” It uses the Ice delay machine to create an eerie wash of smeared repeats that fall in pitch with each regeneration. At first I’d considered calling it “Drag Me to Hell,” but I thought the preset sounded more relaxed than that, like floating down a lazy river of sulfurous smoke and torment in Hades. In the audio example below I play a few notes on the lower frets of the guitar at the beginning, pause, and then play a few high notes so you can hear how the effect sounds when processing different frequency ranges.

Listen here:

Preset details:

The image below shows the knob settings and parameters that I used in the audio clip.

The Ice delay machine slices up the input signal and plays back the slices after pitch-shifting them at selectable intervals. In this preset, the slices are being pitched down by 25 cents. I have the BLEND parameter set all the way to ICE, so only the Ice delay lines are heard, and not the regular (dry) delay lines (which can also be blended into the sound when using the Ice delay machine if desired). With the Blend parameter set all the way to ICE, the SPEED and DEPTH knobs have no effect, since they only modulate the regular (dry) delay lines, which are not heard in this preset. The Ice delay lines are not modulated by the MOD controls.

Other notes: I have the SMEAR parameter set at maximum to soften the attack of the repeats. I’ll also mention that if you want to hear some really chaotic strangeness, try changing the SLICE setting to LONG, and experiment with increasing the delay time. At longer delay times I tried setting the INTERVAL for -50 cents, and I thought it sounded cool. By the way, if you also happen to have a BigSky reverb pedal, this Hell Float Trip preset could be complimented nicely by the Falling Angel BigSky preset posted here a few weeks ago, which uses the Shimmer reverb machine to create a ghostly ever-falling-pitch effect.

Download the preset:

Using the Strymon Librarian? Download the “Hell Float Trip” preset and load it into your TimeLine.

What do you think?

Made your own tweaks to this preset? Post them below or tag them #StrymonPreset online. Are there other preset types that you’d like to see in upcoming blog posts? Let us know what you think. Thanks!