Hi, I'm not sure I've ever been to this forum before. I tend to only read and post in the old Sonar Producer (not X1/X2) forum which is pretty much a ghost town. I think half the posts are people who post there by mistake. Maybe someday I'll upgrade and then venture into more popular places. In the meantime I have a non-sonar question so here I am!
 

I don't ever play live and have no experience doing it. Also I'm a keyboard player and know nothing about guitars. But I'm playing live for this "American Chopper: Live" show in Vegas next month at the Hard Rock. The band is B3, two guitars, bass, drums. Last year I played harmonica and that was fun but this year I want to beef up the sound a bit and make it more edgy so I'm handing over harmonica duties to someone else and bringing some synths with me.

 
I've set up a very small rig which consists of a midi keyboard, a Novation MiniNova, a Moog Slim Phatty, and a small Mackie 402-VLZ3 mixer. I'm really happy with it and I'm having a ton of fun tweaking the sounds in real time.

Not 100% happy though... what I really want is some sort of pedal that will twist/distort/mangle the output even more. Does this exist for synths? I'm looking for distortion pedals and they are all for guitar... can you run a synth through a guitar pedal or does it not work like that? The Slim Phatty is a mono output, the Novation MiniNova is stereo but I assume I could just use a mono output...? I'm looking primarily for distortion but I wouldn't mind have anything else that is cool and/or gritty, mangled, twisted, etc. What about the Korg Kaoss Pad Quad? Is that something that could do what I'm looking for?

 
If you have any idea/suggestions I'd love to hear them. I have pretty much free reign to bring whatever sound I want. And as I said I have zero experience with any of this stuff. Thanks.

Sure you can

The synth output level will likely be many times greater amplitude that any guitar pickup so you'll have to set the pedal levels accordingly. The good news is that the signal to noise ratio will be better.

Just do it and have fun.

At some point it will dawn on you that a typical guitar pedal board with a few pedals interconnected is basically a simple modular synth.



best regards,
mike

Try to get this vintage Boss ROD-10 on Ebay.
It has overdrive, fuzz and distortion and a paramatric EQ.
And it's sounds great for synths.  
 

Thanks for the input.  Anyone have other recommendations for guitar pedals?  It's a bit overwhelming for someone who's never bought one before.  Any brands better than other brands?

I see the Boss ROD-10 is on ebay but this particular listing is in Japan and they want $40 to ship it...