Robert Fripp

Pedals: Big Muff (Russian), Pro Co The Rat, Fender Blender (vintage), Robotalk (envelope follower/filter), MXR Dynacomp & Dunlop Crybaby.

Used live with King Crimson, as can be seen on page 16 of the March 1982 issue of Guitar World and as specified on page 17.

ROBERT FRIPP—

Clockwise from left

a—Roland GR-300 control panel

b—Foxx Tone Machine

c—Pete Cornish pedalboard with vintage Electro-Harmonix Big Muff, volume, and Cry Baby Wah

d—A/DA Harmony Synthesizer

e—Proprietary pedalboard with Roland FX (SP-1, DS-1, CE-1)

Pedals: Big Muff (Russian), Pro Co The Rat, Fender Blender (vintage), Robotalk (envelope follower/filter), MXR Dynacomp & Dunlop Crybaby.

"A 13-pin cable comes out of the guitar and goes into this [AB/Y] splitter, which goes to the Roland GR-1 Guitar Synth and to the Axon AX100 [rack-mounted guitar-to-MIDI controller]."

"A standard jack then runs out the back of the GR-1 to the Axe-FX II XLs at the top of the rack."

RF writes: Attached to one is the first volume pedal I used & my only effect with KC live in 1969 (in the studio, I used fuzz as well). The volume pedal was fitted to the first Cornish pedalboard in 1970, along with fuzz & wah-wah. My contribution to the technology was to fit a by-pass switch for the effects when not in use: too much tone was lost going through pedals that were not in go mode. On top of the other board is the Univibe given to me by pal Robin Trower in 1975

Two are mentioned in this May 1974 Guitar Player interview, transcribed to the Elephant Talk wiki on November 11, 1997.

What type of volume pedal is it?

It's the cheapest one I found, and the only one I could afford at the time that seemed any good. I think it's a Farfisa [by C.M.I.] pedal. It's still the finest volume pedal I've found anywhere. It's the only one that goes off and still has a wide movement. It's quite incredible. On stage I use three pedals on a pedal board: A volume pedal, fuzz-tone, and wah-wah. The fuzz-tone and wah-wah are pretty rubbishy. I'm not sure what type of wah-wah it is. The best fuzz-box to use is a Burn's Buzz-around which they discontinued making in England about six years ago. I have two of them, but they're not at the moment attached to my pedal board. The more pedals you go through, the longer leads you need, and in turn the less volume you get. You lose gain along the way. To lessen that, the wah-wah and the fuzz are on the knock-off circuit. In other words, when I'm playing, all the time I'm going through the volume, but when I'm using either fuzz or wah-wah, I knock a different pedal which brings in a different circuit for the fuzz and the wah-wah. When I'm not using them I press a button and knock them out of the circuit so that the circuit shortens, and I keep up my gain. I also use a Watkins Kopy Kat echo unit. It's all right, but it's not particularly good. It suffices for what I want, which is not really a lot of echo effects but just a slight edge, because the sound on stage is very dead in a lot of halls I play in. It really doesn't matter what kind of fuzz box you use. It has more to do with the state of mind.

But if somebody wanted to obtain the same sound you got, wouldn't it be important to know what type of fuzz you were using?

No. I can get that same sound with every kind of fuzz box I've ever used. It's not a question of equipment.

Mentioned in the January 1986 issue of Guitar Player and the June 1987 issue of Electronic Musician.

Guitar Player, January 1986

GP – When did Frippertronics originate?

RF – Originally, the system was introduced to me by Brian Eno. I worked with him on it for the piece of music that became No Pussyfooting, which was recorded in July 1972 and released I 1973. I began working on it on my own in June and July 1977, when I was living in New York. Frippertronics as such went public for the first time in February 1978 at The Kitchen [a New York arts and performance gallery], where I was giving a solo concert. I needed a name for it, so I came up with "Frippertronics" because it was silly. Then it went very, very public in 1979 with a four-month solo tour – two months in Europe and two in America. And it was there, actually in front of people – in record shops, pizza parlors, record offices, small cinemas, museums, all matter of places – that I began to learn to work with it pretty well. I would run the tape back and improvise on top of it. The original form was with two Revox tape recorders, but now I'm working with the Electro-Harmonix 16 second Digital Delay. It was advertised as a Fripp In The Box. It's far smaller, quicker, and easier to set up than two Revoxes. Although, the sounds one gets are quite different. The quality I nowhere near the same as the two Revoxes.

Electronic Musician, June 1987

In 1972, Fripp began working with a tape-loop system he learned from Brian Eno, but which had also been used earlier by composers such as Terry Riley. His albums with Eno, No Pussyfooting and Evening Star are inner meditations, soul-searing inroads into the musical psyche of Fripp. The sound-generating system was dubbed "Frippertronics" and he took it on the road in the late '70s. He currently uses an Electro-Harmonix 16-second digital delay for a similar effect, played in conjunction with a Roland Space Echo, fuzz boxes, wah-wah and volume pedal, and occasionally an Ibanez digital delay.

(...) And now you you've replaced the tape-loop system with the Electro-Harmonix box.

No! With 208 guitarists. Regarding the Electro-Harmonix, we read this advert for the Electro-Harmonix 16-second digital delay with this phrase in it, and the quote is "A Fripp in the box." So we got in the touch with them and said, you know, Fripp would like one for nothing. And they said no. So I bought one. You can't get them anymore.

Yeah I have a lot of fun with it. What I would do at the David Sylvian sessions, for example, is I'd set the equipment up and just for fun punch something in to the "Fripp in the box," and leave it playing in the studio. I did it on some Crimson sessions too, walk out and come back some three or four hours later and there it was still going except the sound had changed in the three or four hours in between. And with Sylvian, he really liked what was coming out so he recorded lots and lots and lots of these little soundscape pieces and they're all over his Gone to Earth album.

Mentioned in this January 1986 Guitar Player interview (transcribed on the website of interviewer Tom Mulhern) and visible on page 16 of the March 1982 issue of Guitar World. It is specified on page 17.

Guitar Player January 1981. "Frippertronics - A mini-interview with Robert Fripp"

I generally use a small pedalboard with a volume, wah-wah and fuzz. It never really mattered what types they were, except the volume pedal I used was the cheapest one, the first one I ever bought, in 1967. And until Roland out volume pedals in 1981, which are now the best I've found, I had to use the original one, which had a good on/off sweep. The Roland volume pedals let you adjust the on and off range. All of my electronic equipment is built into rack mounted modules by Tony Arnold of Arny's Shack. It's all custom equipment. He takes a small effect, builds it into a rack-mounting module, and slots it in. Besides the Roland Space Echo, I also have am Ibanez digital delay. The specific kinds of fuzz boxes I've used are Electro-Harmonix Big Muffs and Foxey Ladys, which were good – the old ones. You can't get fuzz boxes like that anymore; I've tried. All you can come up with, if you're lucky, are the old ones. Tony Arnold is planning to take a number of old buzz box circuits and put them all in one module with a switching rank, so you can switch around to any one of five or six traditional, old circuits. You can then go to Big Muff to Foxey Lady to Burns Buzzaround to Color-Sound and so on.

Guitar World, March 1982, "The Gear of the Crimson King"

ROBERT FRIPP—

Clockwise from left

a—Roland GR-300 control panel

b—Foxx Tone Machine

c—Pete Cornish pedalboard with vintage Electro-Harmonix Big Muff, volume, and Cry Baby Wah

d—A/DA Harmony Synthesizer

e—Proprietary pedalboard with Roland FX (SP-1, DS-1, CE-1)

This image from Pinterest shows Robert Fripp’s stage setup from 1999.

Pedals: Big Muff (Russian), Pro Co The Rat, Fender Blender (vintage), Robotalk (envelope follower/filter), MXR Dynacomp & Dunlop Crybaby.

In a MusicRadar rig tour article by Matt Parker, Robert Fripp is shown using the Roland US-20, an effects pedal accessory, as part of his guitar setup.

In an article by Matt Parker for MusicRadar, it's noted that Robert Fripp uses the BOSS FV 300L volume effects pedal to control the final output levels from his Switchblade system. This setup allows him to manage audio in stereo, quad, or even a six-channel mix, giving him comprehensive control over his sound distribution.

This image from Pinterest shows Robert Fripp’s stage setup from 1999.

Pedals: Big Muff (Russian), Pro Co The Rat, Fender Blender (vintage), Robotalk (envelope follower/filter), MXR Dynacomp & Dunlop Crybaby.

Part of the Lunar Module Soundscapes System used on all work between 1994 to 2005 (RF Soundscapes, RFSQ, KC, Sylvian & Fripp, Eno's Nerve Net, etc)

This image from Pinterest shows Robert Fripp’s stage setup from 1999.

Used with King Crimson in the 1980s, as known from the following sources:

Guitar World, March 1982 (pictured)

Guitar Player, June 1986, "Interview with Robert Fripp" by Tom Mullen

Since 1981, Robert Fripp has used Roland guitar synthesizers - the GR-300 and recently the GR-700. He recorded with them on King Crimson’s Warner Bros. albums (Discipline, BSK-3629; Beat, 23692-1; and Three Of A Perfect Pair, 925071-1), accompanied by fellow Roland synthesist Adrian Belew. He also played synth on two LPs with Andy Summers (see story beginning on page 113), and employed a GR-700 on the January 86 Guitar Player Sound-page, "Easter Sunday."

After five years with guitar synths, what are your feelings?

I have major reservations about the guitar as an effective synthesizer controller. With the keyboard synth, the response of the "fingerboards" is now developed to a point where a good pianist - or a good electric pianist - is not likely to have any reservations. For example, the original Moogs limited a player’s performing capacity. I don’t think that’s an issue anymore. But if you come to the guitar, there are two difficulties. One has to do with its inherent limitations; the other is the problem of the guitarist’s. Let’s begin with the guitar’s limitations as a device for triggering the synthesizer. If you pick any one string, then there is a likelihood that at least two more are going to vibrate. If the response of the synthesizer is going to be very keen, then you’re going to be getting three notes responding instead of one. On a keyboard, it would be something like every time you played one note, you would "ghost" between two and five more around it, which wouldn't be acceptable.

Then the guitar synth would create strong superfluous notes simply by picking up the sympathetic vibrations of the overtones.

That’s it. So, in other words, one has to find a way of damping the other strings while picking the one. In practice, that’s going to be very, very limiting for right-hand technique. Now let’s look at the performer’s end of it. There’s currently no truly accepted school of picking for the plectrum guitar. We have two approaches: the suspended hand, where the right hand doesn't actually touch the string at all, and the pivotal method, where the hand is pivoted off the ball of the thumb, which rests generally on the bass strings. The problem from both these points of view is, first, the sympathetic responses. Second, if you use the pivotal method, then you’re very likely to rub the strings and set off glitches that way. However, if you find a way of overcoming this - and it’s possible, to a degree, by being very careful - then you find that the tracking response of the synthesizer, even on the best that I've tried, is about a tenth of a second late. If your aim as a player is to be able to work in the area of semi quavers [sixteenth-notes] at 152 beats a minute, say, that’s 10 notes a second. So the response is always behind your picking. And in fact, I don’t believe that a synthesizer can track with that level of accuracy.

How have you dealt with these shortcomings?

I abandon my technique and view it as essentially a new instrument. In other words, I can’t approach it as a guitar player with the emphasis on playing. I use it to extend the tone and pitch ranges of the instrument. For example, I can get an octave higher simply by setting the oscillators. So, if I'm prepared to accept the restrictions on my own performance capacity, I can have an extended range in timbre and in register. That’s the good side of it.

What attracted you to an instrument with apparent shortcomings?

I've worked with the GR-300/G-303 system just about from the day that it came out, and I found it very useful. It's limited, but within its limitations, it’s very broad. It’s quite a good player’s instrument; the response isn't bad, although there is a delay. As with any guitar synthesizer, it’s not good for someone who is very interested in picking. So if one’s approach tends more toward being left-hand active, it’s useful. The next stage, the GR-700, I like to a degree, but the response was so bad in the tradeoff between performance and efficiency, on the one hand, and the extended range that I wasn't prepared to go for it. It would have meant losing too much in the performance ability. I didn't like the new guitar, either. The guitar I'm using at the moment to trigger the 300 is a Tokai Les Paul copy with its electronics modified by an Englishman named Ted Lees He also fitted it with a Kahler tremolo. It’s a very fine guitar, and it’s a useful synthesizer.

[...]

Perhaps it’s not so much a question of enhancing the pitch-to-voltage tracking, but rather of adding artificial intelligence so that the controller can somehow predict what you’re going to play.

I suppose a good example of how Adrian Belew and I used the Roland GR-300 with King Crimson is "The Sheltering Sky." Although it’s available on the Discipline album, it was infinitely better live. When we were in Japan, Roland met with Adrian and told him that we were using their guitar synthesizers in a way that they had never anticipated. I think they expected, if you like, beginner guitarists or less proficient guitarists to play fairly simple things that sounded relatively amazing. Whereas we took them really as new instruments and tried coming up with something that was quite novel.

Did you make any suggestions for improving them?

I made the same comment about the response, and they were aware of the general problem. The guitar itself was quite excellent, and probably the most accessible for players. But it didn’t overcome what I felt needed to be overcome: the immediate response. And the difficulty is that if you come up with a pickup that responds with the sensitivity that I would like as a player, then the glitches, the bad harmonics, the sympathetic notes, and odd resonances that creep in really overwhelm the fundamental. So we’re back to the problem that I don’t think guitar technique and synthesizers really go together. Unless you’re prepared to come up with an entirely new approach to an entirely new instrument.

Is it important for a controller to be able to double as a standard guitar?

For the working musician, yes, it’s very important. For the person in the studio, it’s not quite as important. The other approach is going the analog route, where there are so many effects available to the guitarist and where the control capacity from the guitar is so much better than from a synthesizer. It’s so extended the range of the electric guitar, it’s almost better to go the route of straight electric guitar with effects. The disadvantage is that you have a limited range, because the Harmonizer an octave higher won’t give you the same effect as the oscillator tuned up. I use the synthesizer to power the whole range of normal guitar effects - distortion, flanging, all the bit. For example, heavy chorus works very effectively on what normally passes for a high string sound. Or if you put a very heavy chorus and fuzz on the 300 when the fundamental is tuned to a root and a fifth, you get something very close to heavy ring modulation. It’s a very wonderful ripping, chainsaw sound.

Roland US, "Adrian Belew: Taking Guitar Tone to the VG-99th Power" by Tiffany Schirz (July 22, 2008)

As one of the first guitarists to embrace guitar synthesis in the early ’80s with Roland’s GR-300, Adrian Belew has taken guitar tone to the moon and back.

Guitar World, "“David Bowie and Brian Eno used to laugh at me, saying: ‘You’re not supposed to be able to play that!’” Adrian Belew on Frank Zappa’s lessons, Robert Fripp’s synth guitar, and what’s coming up with Steve Vai" by Andrew Daly (May 14, 2024)

How did you take the rig you used with Bowie and push it forward with King Crimson?

“The main thing that changed from that first period from David to Talking Heads to King Crimson was that I went to Japan. I met the people at Roland and they said, ‘We have a new thing – a guitar synthesizer.’ I’d been dying to have something akin to what keyboard players could do for 10 years, and they gave me one.”

You were one of the earliest adopters of the guitar synth, right?

“I’m not certain but I’m pretty sure I had the first one in New York, as they weren’t available there yet. When I joined King Crimson, Robert had a Roland JC-120 and also the synthesizer; it was actually the second one they made, but it was the first one that anyone ever used.

“The first one has been a bit too much – it was like a big Farfisa organ. The second one is the blue one, the GR-300. So much of the King Crimson sound of the ‘80s came from that one device.

Used live with King Crimson, as can be seen on page 16 of the March 1982 issue of Guitar World and as specified on page 17.

ROBERT FRIPP—

Clockwise from left

a—Roland GR-300 control panel

b—Foxx Tone Machine

c—Pete Cornish pedalboard with vintage Electro-Harmonix Big Muff, volume, and Cry Baby Wah

d—A/DA Harmony Synthesizer

e—Proprietary pedalboard with Roland FX (SP-1, DS-1, CE-1)

Used live with King Crimson, as can be seen on page 16 of the March 1982 issue of Guitar World. It is listed erroneously as a CE-1 on page 17.

ROBERT FRIPP—

Clockwise from left

a—Roland GR-300 control panel

b—Foxx Tone Machine

c—Pete Cornish pedalboard with vintage Electro-Harmonix Big Muff, volume, and Cry Baby Wah

d—A/DA Harmony Synthesizer

e—Proprietary pedalboard with Roland FX (SP-1, DS-1, CE-1)

Seen in this rig rundown video at 5:46.

Mentioned in this January 1986 Guitar Player interview, transcribed on the website of interviewer Tom Mulhern. The version is unspecified, but an eyewitness account of the V4 is given in this January 5, 2014 The Gear Page forum post by user Jumblefingers.

Guitar Player January 1981

I generally use a small pedalboard with a volume, wah-wah and fuzz. It never really mattered what types they were, except the volume pedal I used was the cheapest one, the first one I ever bought, in 1967. And until Roland out volume pedals in 1981, which are now the best I've found, I had to use the original one, which had a good on/off sweep. The Roland volume pedals let you adjust the on and off range. All of my electronic equipment is built into rack mounted modules by Tony Arnold of Arny's Shack. It's all custom equipment. He takes a small effect, builds it into a rack-mounting module, and slots it in. Besides the Roland Space Echo, I also have am Ibanez digital delay. The specific kinds of fuzz boxes I've used are Electro-Harmonix Big Muffs and Foxey Ladys, which were good – the old ones. You can't get fuzz boxes like that anymore; I've tried. All you can come up with, if you're lucky, are the old ones. Tony Arnold is planning to take a number of old buzz box circuits and put them all in one module with a switching rank, so you can switch around to any one of five or six traditional, old circuits. You can then go to Big Muff to Foxey Lady to Burns Buzzaround to Color-Sound and so on.

The Gear Page, January 25, 2014

I saw Fripp and Crimson many times in the early 70's and his small pedal board consisted of a Wah, Three Knob Guild Foxey Lady and a Volume Pedal. I had an original Foxey Lady back in the day and would like to try to get as close as possible to the original Triangle Muff/Foxey Lady sound with a new clone.

Used live with King Crimson, as can be seen on page 16 of the March 1982 issue of Guitar World and as specified on page 17.

ROBERT FRIPP—

Clockwise from left

a—Roland GR-300 control panel

b—Foxx Tone Machine

c—Pete Cornish pedalboard with vintage Electro-Harmonix Big Muff, volume, and Cry Baby Wah

d—A/DA Harmony Synthesizer

e—Proprietary pedalboard with Roland FX (SP-1, DS-1, CE-1)

Pedals: Big Muff (Russian), Pro Co The Rat, Fender Blender (vintage), Robotalk (envelope follower/filter), MXR Dynacomp & Dunlop Crybaby.

Pedals: Big Muff (Russian), Pro Co The Rat, Fender Blender (vintage), Robotalk (envelope follower/filter), MXR Dynacomp & Dunlop Crybaby.

For "Easter Sunday, " which was recorded on Easter Sunday, 1983, in Toronto, Fripp improvised with a Roland GR-700 synthesizer, and soloed on top of that with a Takamine acoustic, followed by a Les Paul with a fuzz box played through a Fender Princeton amp.

Used live with King Crimson, as can be seen on page 16 of the March 1982 issue of Guitar World and as specified on page 17.

ROBERT FRIPP—

Clockwise from left

a—Roland GR-300 control panel

b—Foxx Tone Machine

c—Pete Cornish pedalboard with vintage Electro-Harmonix Big Muff, volume, and Cry Baby Wah

d—A/DA Harmony Synthesizer

e—Proprietary pedalboard with Roland FX (SP-1, DS-1, CE-1)