Does it matter ......

[bombtek]

....what order your pedals are in front of an amp if there is no effects loop?

My pedals to be used are
Phaser
Chorus
Graphic EQ
Flanger
Distortion
Wah
and an RP50

I am sure that there should be an order, especially if they are being plugged in from guitar to pedals to amp, but I am not sure what that order should be.

Thanks,
Bill

[VitaminG]

it does matter, but there are no hard and fast rules. In the end, it comes down to what sound you're after and what sounds good to you.

It also depends on how you're using your gear. Are you using your amps overdrive/distortion or running it clean? What are you using the RP50 for? Is the EQ for tone-shaping or lead boost? Do you want to use the EQ to shape your sound prior to your distortion or to sculpt your sound after you've processed the signal?

Most commonly, you'll see folks running wah/volume before distortion (amp or effect) with modulation effects next and time-based effects like delay & reverb last.

How I would run the pedals you've listed is:
Guitar -> wah -> distortion -> EQ (for lead boost) -> flanger -> phaser -> chorus

although I'm currently using my amp's loop and am actually running my flanger after my overdrive but before the amp. I did have it in the loop but on someone's recommendation here, I tried it in front of the amp and found that it sounded better there. So try different configs and see which sounds best to you

[JACKSONFREAK]

I run my pedals volume/wah first. then into distortions and gate, then to phase, flanger, chorus, then into delays. I typicaly like to run pedals into the front of the amp and racks into the loop. Im funny that way.
Gil

[AlexL]

Pretty much what everyone else said.

Don't put EQs before gain-increasing devices (like distortion pedals), because you just end up amplifying noise when boosting signals with the EQ.

Put modulation effects after distortion, it just sounds better.

I put delay and reverb at the end.

I'm not sure what the rule is for compression; I'm about to experiment a bit with that. I have my compressor after ditortion, but I'm going to try it before.


- E.