Robert William Gary Moore (* 4 April 1952 in Belfast, Northern Ireland; † 6 February 2011 in Estepona, Spain) was a Northern Irish blues, blues-rock and hard rock guitarist, composer and singer.

Moore was often described as a virtuoso and has been cited as an influence by many other guitar players. He was voted as one of the greatest guitarists of all time on respective lists by Total Guitar and Louder. Irish singer-songwriter Bob Geldof said that "without question, [Moore] was one of the great Irish bluesmen".

Over the years, Moore played many different guitars. Besides the three guitars he acquired from Bluesbreakers and Fleetwood Mac guitarist Peter Green (a 1959 Gibson Les Paul – now owned by Kirk Hammett, a 1961 Fender Stratocaster, and a Gibson Les Paul Junior), he played models by Charvel, Ibanez, Hamer, Jackson, PRS, and Heritage. Moore often used Marshall amplifiers and also Soldano amps. In his later experimental phase, when he added synthetic sound elements, he used Line 6 preamps.

Spoiler: Videos

Videos

Gary Moore - Parisienne Walkways - Live HD

Gary Moore Greatest Hits Full Album

Gary Moore - Over The Hills And Far Away (1987)

 

Thanks, I know that. I know how to copy from the web too.

But I don't need to: he was one of my best friends and we played together often. In my home, in his, later in my studio, recordings included. And a thousand other details that aren't on the web.

I still don't understand the reference. What does it have to do with this pedal?

 

Last edited: Feb 25, 2026

I'm a software guy so I may be saying stupid things.
However, from my software experience, compressors distort when:
1) Attack and/or release are too fast.
2) The input is too loud.
Try lowering the input volume and making attack/release slower and see if the problem disappears.

 

I don't know about the thread being closed, hope not. At least not at this stage until it is solved.

I did contact Keeley in the past, about the problem, and for specs (input Vpp limit for example). I got the specs. Emails went back and forth about the distortion problem. But as I didn't know what's going on exactly, I described all the problems as distortion, and wrote them when it occurs. They had no clue what causes it, replied that it is strange, agreed that as the other compressors do it as well, it may not be a pedal fault, but the offered to look into it. Before the intermodulation issue has been identified, noone knew what actually it is and when symptoms showed more than just clipping, everybody became confused by the strange behavior of the pedals, so did the Keeley support.

Now as the research has come to a stage that I know the exact problem, I have not reached out to them yet. First of all, because there are still some questions to clarify. But to tell the truth I am not rushing to contact now at all. If I get stuck with solving this, I think I will, if someone shows up with a working tweak, maybe I will not.

 

Already Outruled, just disguises the problem on the expense of optimal settings. Input signal has no effect on it below a certain level (bruought under the clipping limit). All these mentioned in the first post.

 

==>

Did you try the Keeley Compressor GC-2 Limiting Amplifier ?

http://robertkeeley.com/product/gc-2-limiting-amplifier-compressor/

It replaces my old TC Electronic Sustain + Parametric Equalizer on the pedalboard: at low (entry) levels, it had, in the "background" a strange behavior (so I sold it). This did not come from the pickups (different guitars, different pickups). Now I'd like to hear it again but it's gone.

 

Last edited: Feb 25, 2026

If you need good equipment and are a bit unsure where to start, I recommend looking at what the great guitarists use. You can't really go wrong with that, whether it's pickups or effects pedals.

Gary Moore (Thin Lizzy, blues guitar) ---> https://equipboard.com/pros/gary-moore

Boss DS-1 Distortion
DigiTech Bad Monkey Tube Overdrive
T-Rex Moller Overdrive Pedal
Electro-Harmonix Holy Grail Nano
Ibanez TS808 Tube Screamer
MXR M193 GT-OD
Radial Tonebone Classic Tube Distortion Pedal
Ibanez TS10 Tube Screamer Classic
Boss DM-2 Delay
Boss OC-2 Octaver
Boss BF-2 Flanger
T-Rex Engineering Gristle Luxury Drive
Boss FRV-1 '63 Fender Reverb
Ibanez CS9 Stereo Chorus
Boss TU-2 Chromatic Tuner
Boss RV-5 Digital Reverb
Line 6 DL4 Delay Modeler

 

If this post is for me: I don't need good equipment. I have it since 40 years. Gifts from GM included ( and reciprocally ).

Seems I need to read all sono's posts now. And a Doliprane .

 

Last edited: Feb 25, 2026

Not yet. I might add it to my list though, but first I will read what they write on the page. Also need to check the features in detail. Thanks for mentioning anyway!

 

Opinion :

=> http://www.ovnilab.com/reviews/keeleygc2.shtml

Your Carl Martin Comp-Limiter is mentioned.

 

Last edited: Feb 25, 2026

That's a good sign. The only problem with that is the Carl Martin is not suitable for my needs. It is an old-fashioned pedal. As it turned out, that is the best in dealing with many different guitar signals, but a huge problem for me is the lack of the blend knob. That way the knocking sound on transients cut can cause a lot of issues, makes the sound annoying. At least for me.For country players it might be an advantage though, or for funky. So usually I am looking for ones with a blend knob. But if the system of the two pedals are the same, that is sure that the intermodulation will not appear on that Keeley. So from that point of view it is suitable.

 

@sono
There are parallel loop pedals that will let you add a blend knob to any stomp box.

 

Hello @ sono.

With blend knob : would you know...

* the TC HyperGravity Compressor ? " Multiband Compression Pedal with Vintage Compressor Mode and Built-In TonePrints " :

* The JHS Pedals Pulp N Peel V4 Compressor / Preamp ?

* JHS Pedals / Keeley Electronics Steak and Eggs :

* The Frank Marino Audio Sus IV pedal with a little demo :

http://www.frankmarinoaudio.com/fx-bundle/#susiv

http://www.frankmarinoaudio.com/fr/store/pedales/sus-iv/

' a tool for achieving clean, extended sustain without compromising tone. Utilizing compression and gain technology, the Sus IV ensures your clean notes last longer while maintaining clarity and stability '

( aouch : 495.00 $USD; 'Custom designed and hand-signed and assembled by Frank Marino' )

 

Last edited: Feb 26, 2026

INTERLUDE - about tubes, solid-state and pedals - :

Frank Marino : 'In My Ways' – Live At The Agora Theatre - 2019

http://limewire.com/d/GRJcB#IGKu84yY2a

( click above link to view or download )



​

' As for amplification, Marino uses a rack system that includes a preamp he built, a wireless receiver, another preamp, a Crown power amp with an Ashley backup, and a preamp/power amp/speaker-selector system.



“It’s a very large box, but everything in it is doubled,” Marino detailed.

On stage left, a Marshall amplifier modified by Tommy Folkesson sits atop a 4×12″ cabinet.

“Tommy has re-done three Marshalls for me. I like to say it’s the last Marshall you’ll ever need,” the guitarist chuckled. “And I do use it for recording.” But as much as Marino likes the amp, onstage it serves only as a backup; attached to a relay, kicks in if his main amp goes kaput.

On stage right, a cabinet with two 15″ speakers is powered by Marino’s primary amp, and a 4 x12″ cab (formerly owned by Aerosmith’s Joe Perry) works with his Marshall. The speakers have Fane baskets, and the voice coils and cones are built for Marino by a shop in Montreal. '

( http://www.vintageguitar.com/3484/frank-marino-2/ )

Asked to share his opinion on tube amps vs solid-state when it comes to pedals, the guitarist said:

"It's definitely a better platform for pedals. I proved that throughout the '70s when everyone thought I was using tubes. I did a gig once with Black Sabbath, and Tony Iommi, of course, played through tubes."

"For some reason, they were having a really bad problem with grounding, and the crowd was sitting there listening to this huge noise. I walked up to Tony and said, 'Why don't you just use my amp? It's still sitting there, plugged in.'"

"He saw it was a transistor amp and basically, he refused. He said, 'No, I'm not going to use that,' not realizing it worked. The bottom line was that it worked."

As for why people tend to hold tube amps in such high regard, Marino offered:

"They like the compression you can get. But it's not so much from the tube as it is from the fact that, by definition, tube amplifiers have transformers on the output. So they're playing through transformers. That's the magic of a tube amplifier."

( http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/news/gear/its_not_so_much_from_the_tube_frank_marino_names_real_reason_why_people_idolize_tube_amps_reveals_case_in_which_solid-state_amps_are_better.html )

 

Last edited: Feb 26, 2026

Now, with that review it definately interests me. I will bookmark this too. Thanks!

His stage rig can only be a distant dream for me, moneywise.

 

It seems I managed to find what element causes the problems in the Keeley:

The pedal has a Blend knob shown below. The instruction says if you turn it fully to the left you have 50% wet - 50% dry signal. When you turn it fully to the right, you got 100% wet signal. The situation is: if you make sure that the input signal is below the input limit ( 9V input - 2.5Vpp / 12V input - 3.5Vpp), then if the Blend knob is turned fully to the left, the outcoming signal is crytsall clear even if you set heavy settings on the Sustain or Tone knobs. When you turn the Blend just a tiny bit clockwise, the intermodulation is already there, and it extends more and more towards the headstock causing problem in more and more frets as you turn the Blend knob more and more clockwise towards 100% wet.


Does it help anything to solve the problem? I am asking those who can interpret schematics.

 

Some new additions to the problem: some of the replies here were about focusing on settings of compressors and relating the distortion problem to those settings or settings on various different compressors.

Now, I am not sure if I mentioned it or not, but this is not only a compressor issue. I had some other pedals in the past that had distortion problems, but I sold them long ago for the same reason. Recently I came across one that I owned, and purchased it for testing. You can see the result here: Behringer UC100 chorus, both clipping and intermodulation distortion is present when testing with a Schecter Omen guitar:

For people who are ready to blame the quality of the pedal: I also had a Visual Sound H2O Chorus/Echo back in the days. Had the same problem. So no, it is not a good pedal bad pedal problem. That pedal is just much more expensive for me to buy it again to present the proof to skeptics.

There is something in common in the circuit of the Keeley Compressor Plus and the Behringer UC100 that is not an effect type related issue, but something more general, and causes issues in both.

 

I would like to reflect to this comment with a recent discovery that we have just made with my friends who are helping me investigate the intermodulation problem. I got this advice from others, too, that changing to digital devices may be a solution, it was also a suggestion of the AI that someone posted here, to go digital because digital devices does not suffer from this intermodulation.

Today I visited a friend who has some single coil guitars, and I noticed: for some mysterious reason this intermodulation problem doesn't really affect single coils when using my pedals with them. The result of the test today:

1. The Alnico 5 guitar, that has the lowest signal of all the guitars I tried sounded okay with the Keeley compressor. Knowing what the phenomenon is (intermodulation), and how it behaves, having my ears got used to it, I could identify it in case of the Alnico 5 pickup as well, it is definately there, but silent, so average listeners won't really notice it. So just for reminding you of the circuit, the Keeley is OTA.

2. Guess what: we tried the relatively newer Zoom G1 Four, that has been released not very long ago as I know. A digital multieffect. Has lots of great sounds. BUT!!! If you added its compressors or choruses to the effect chain, you could hear the intermodulation with the Alnico 5 pickups very well, much louder than on the Keeley!!! This was something very strange, because I also experienced earlier, that Multieffects might have a less interesting, but cleaner sound than pedals. But this discovery totally made the situation turn upside down. Actually this time it was the OTA Keeley that sounded better, less problematic. Moreover, the interesting thing was that if you sent the signal to the Keeley from the guitar, switched compression on and then sent the signal into the multieffect, the intermodulation got reduced. The Keeley even improved the sound of the digital multieffect.


Another test with PAF pickups:
Interestingly the Keeley behaves the same with PAF pickups as with my high gain humbuckers. I went to a studio on monday to consult a local sound engineer about the problem. His guitar had the PAF pickups, and the intermodulation was audible very well, even if those pickups are lower gain than my humbuckers. We also tried his old Ibanez SC 10 chorus. The intermodulation also appeared on that pedal, and we noticed when it comes to choruses, the same intermodulation is much louder and easier to notice than on compressors.

 

If that's the case, I'm guessing that there's something on the input of the Keeley comp that reacts non-linearly, like a JFET or something. Hotter pickups would distort the input more which leads to more IMD. Weaker pickups distort the input less which leads to less IMD. You could test this by placing another pedal in front of the Keeley and dial down the output of the pedal in front and play with higher output humbuckers. If the IMD decreases when you dial back the output of the pedal in front, then it's something on the input of the Keeley that contributes to more IMD.

I wouldn't say that the Zoom G1 Four is the best option for a clean digital compressor. AFAIK, most of the compressor models are emulations of various classic compressor pedals and rack units. For example: Gray Comp is an emulation of the ROSS Compressor, which the Keeley is based on. I'm guessing that the cleanest comp in the G1 Four is the Rack Compressor, but even that one is probably much dirtier than the most basic free VST plugin compressors. The DSP chip in these Zoom pedals aren't powerful enough to have any kind of anti-aliasing, so any non-linear effect will have a lot of aliasing, which in turn creates IMD. If you have something like a Neural DSP Quad Cortex (VCA Compressor), BOSS GT-1000/Core (Stereo Comp), Fender ToneMaster Pro (Studio Compressor), HoTone Ampero II (Squeezer) or Line 6 Helix (Deluxe Comp) to try with I think you could get a better result. I know that all of them have at least one compressor model that is just a straight digital clean compressor.

IMD in analog choruses is a common problem. It's because BBD chips are non-linear devices, so you need to carefully set the DC voltage bias to remove as much of the IMD as possible. Since most chorus pedal don't have a trimmer for the bias, you usually have to mod them to do this. It also depends on the level of the input signal as well, so you usually have to change this every time you switch to a different guitar with higher output or make changes to the pedals that are in front of the chorus. You can also use a brickwall limiter or distortion in front of the chorus so that the signal never exceeds the clean headroom of the BBD chip. Digital choruses can also have a lot of IMD, but that's usually because they are emulating analog BBD choruses. Super clean digital chorus pedals and plugins should practically have no IMD.

 

Actually right now it seems those are the JFets that don't create the intermodulation. I have one of those Jfet based pedals, and it absolutely has no problem like that. The devices with bipolar transistors, they tend to do it in my collection.

Well, I was very satisfied with the sound of the new Zoom. Maybe not the best multieffect, but definately better than the old G1. However someone posted a summary about the IMD problem by the AI, and it seemed from that that digital is a kind of Joker card when it comes to IMD. Based on the new Zoom it is not. I regret however because it sounds nice.

Meanwhile I also got to know about the solution in choruses in connection with the bias trimmer. I have just solved this issue on a Behringer UC100, the place for the trimmer was there in the circuit, but it was not added in the factory, instead a resistor was soldered on that set the bias wrongly. I soldered the trimmer on and could get rid of the intermodulation. Yet the other problem you referred to remained: the headroom for clean sound is tight, something should still be modded to improve on that. I am gonna post about it, I am just experimenting with the correct settings at the moment.

About trying pedals, multieffects, compressors, my main interest is compressors. I have purchased several expensive ones already, they dissatisfied me, in spite of that many of them were referred to as top premium compressors in reviews and articles. I noticed another big problem with them besides the IMD (some don't suffer from IMD though) is that only a bunch of them lack serious compressor artifacts. Actually I found only 2 on the market, where the manufacturer statement mentioned that they tried to optimize the pedal in a way to get rid of this and this compressor artifact. So by now I am interested in trying those first of all, about trying others I am a bit demotivated, maybe I will build one for myself instead of spending even more money just to learn they are not good for me. I still have several ones that were expensive but I was not satisfied with, but I have been unable to sell them for a long time. I could only sell them with significant money loss, and I cannot let that happen too many times in the future, to burn money like that. I am also more interested in building one or modding one because the other problem is that whether you are satisfied with the sound character or not is another problem. I have tried multieffects that were respected but were a disappointment for me, other were a surprise, though. So will see. At the moment modding one 1 have seems to be a safer bet for me, provided it can be done. If not, I will look for another solution.

Thanks for the advices!

PS: The limiter or compressor before the low headroom effects is an option I am considering, but the studio type compressor I have is not suitable for this purpose. You cannot set it to respect the threshold. Do you know any DIY one that could be built and could serve this purpose? Actually the range to limit is not very wide, it could be a fairly easy task to set it for optimal sound.