6 Harmony

once you get your head around harmonisers, they’re a lot of fun!

These effects also fall under the pitch shifter umbrella, but harmonisers blend the shifted sound with your clean guitar signal to produce two notes at once. So, you could set it to add notes a 5th up for instant one-fret powerchords – or do the reverse for the seven-string-esque tones Steve Vai wields on TheAnimal.

Harmonisers can be extremely useful for lone guitarists who need to pull off some more complex guitar parts without the help of another axeman. Plus (spoiler alert), since chorus is your original signal doubled by a pitch-varied version, harmonisers can often produce this effect, too. For players with high IQs, intelligent harmonisers work within a specific scale and key, doubling your playing with the relevant notes – cue instant Thin Lizzy twin-lead action. You’ll need to know your scales, mind: one note out of key can spell disaster for the intelligent harmoniser newcomer! That said, once you get your head around using them, harmonisers can be a lot of fun.

Thin Lizzy’s Scott Gorham needed Brian Robertson to help their harmonies sing – but you can cheat!