Shoegaze
Kevin Shields
My Bloody Valentine, 1988 to 1991
The famous glide guitar is mostly a tremolo arm held while strumming, not a pedal, and being honest about that matters: no board will reproduce Loveless. What the board does supply is the harsh octave fuzz and the reverse reverb the arm is smeared across.
$102 for the 1 of 3 in stock right now
The chain
Shown in conventional signal order rather than the order the sources list them, so it reads the way it would be wired: guitar on the left, amp on the right.
- 1Drive / fuzzNo photo available
Fender Blender
Drive / fuzzA harsh germanium octave fuzz, and the single most recognisable ingredient in the wall of sound.
Not stocked by any store we track
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Ibanez TS9 Tube Screamer
Drive / fuzzStacked in front of the amp to thicken the rhythm layers before they are multi-tracked.
- 3ReverbNo photo available
Yamaha SPX90
Reverbrack or amp-top unitReverse reverb and pitch shifting, which is where the backwards, seasick quality comes from.
Not stocked by any store we track
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Documented on
Isn't Anything
album · 1988
- Feed Me With Your Kiss
- Soft as Snow (But Warm Inside)
Loveless
album · 1991
- Only Shallow
- When You Sleep
- Soon
Most of what sounds like an effect here is the tremolo arm moved by hand during the strum, then layered.
Editorial gear history, assembled from interviews, rig rundowns, live photography and liner notes. Kevin Shields is not affiliated with Gear Avail and nothing here is an endorsement. Rigs change between tours and between takes, so this one is scoped to 1988 to 1991 rather than presented as a career-long setup. In most cases what is documented is that a pedal was on the board during those sessions or that tour, not that it is audible on a specific bar of a specific take.