TC Wiretap review and Johan's Boogie

Johan Allard

Power User
I recently purchased a TC Wiretap. I know it's targeted as a songwriters tool, but I wanted to use it for something else. I'm a bit of a pickup collector. For some reason I've just started collecting heaps of pickups and it feels like I'm almost constantly swapping pickups in and out of my guitars. Recently I went through and recorded a bunch of different neck pickups so I could go back and listed to each one afterwards as no doubt I will forget how the sound in the future. But, unfortunately I only recorded a wet signal (I have an Ax8) so there's no chance of re-amping in the future. But I started looking at different options and this lead me to the TC Wiretap.

The TC Wiretap is a riff recorder that can record up to 8 hours of riffs and it has an IOS (at least) app that can control it. You can also copy riffs off the Wiretap but unfortunately not on to the Wiretap. I emailed TC support about this so hopefully they will add this functionality in the future. With each Riff you can record you can tag it and name it whatever you want. Using the IOS app you can then select and play whatever riff you want.

So, what I've started doing now is to make myself a raw pickup library on the Wiretap. I've created myself an at home pedalboard with some stuff that's fun to play with but I can't be bothered actually using with my band and the Wiretap is now the first pedal in that chain. So now I can play a recording of a raw recorded pickup and select whatever amp model and effect I want, and quickly switch between different pickups and so on. I've created very short clips playing either some lead lines or chords and some sections from songs.

And just before I started writing this I discovered Johan's Boogie, my take on Cliffs Boogie. Cliffs Boogie is apparently what Cliff using when checking amp models in the Axe Fx. By doing a tone match of the real amp vs the Axe Fx model, playing every single note up the fretboard and if the model is accurate the tone match is completely flat. Johan's Boogie is playing a continuous A on a loop. It's very annoying to listen to :) What I use it for is creating a base level for amp models. I'm sure a lot of you just play something random, looking at the VU meter to get a rough level when creating a preset. I've just been playing an A chord on the bridge pickup. The problem is that I've been using different guitars with different pickups and that will of course lead to different results. And I don't play with the same intensity each time either. But now I've created myself Johan's Boogie - a reference loop I can use as a base levelling for amps and scenes.

Now, I'm sure at least some of you are saying to yourself right now that it won't be accurate and you have to tweak at gig volume, yadayadayada... And this is only to get a starting point. For me it's also very handy when tweaking scenes and blocks. I usually setup my scenes with scene 1 as the base sound, scene 2 as an alternative base sound, scene 3 wet lead and scene 4 dryish lead. Usually I want scene 2 to be +2db and scene 3/4 +4dB. The problem is that adding drive or boost for lead will sometimes also increase volume depending on how clean the amp is and how much drive you add so for each scene you still have to adjust the volume individually. You can't just add +4dB in the output block and trust that the end result is +4dB in output volume if you're also adding drives and other effects (some of which lower the resulting output volume). But now for me with Johan's Boogie, it's a simple way to just play my reference loop and being able to simply levelling my different scenes. It also makes it simple to adjust the effect block so if I find that my wet vibe is causing a -2dB drop in volume, I can increase the vibe block level +2dB, or +4dB if I want to use it to increase volume by +2dB. The point is that it's a neutral reference that won't change. Effectively like white noise. And it's easy to recall and play using the TC Wiretap. When it gets too annoying, you can also just turn off the speakers. The VU meter will work just fine anyway.

I'm sure the TC Wiretap will also work fine as a riff recorder, sharing ideas with band mates and similar. And I'd thought I'd write about a couple of different use cases for me. It's definitely a keeper.

Here's my current home setup.
IMG_6450.jpg
 
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