Most gear does one job well and then asks you to buy something else for the next job. Spark PEDAL works the other way around. It stays the same rig whether you are standing on a stage, sitting at a desk, or hiding in a spare bedroom at one in the morning, and the only thing that really changes is what you plug it into.
Here are six ways to set it up, and what each one actually gets you.
Your entire rig, in one box
Think about everything you normally carry just to sound like yourself. You bring the amp, then the board, then the patch cables, then the power supply that never sits flat in the bag. Positive Grid's Spark PEDAL holds all of that inside a single enclosure, so the amps and effects you would have spent years assembling a pedalboard around are already sitting in front of you, tuner included. There is a strong argument that the gear you reach for most is the gear that asks the least of you before you get to play, and this takes that about as far as it goes.
On the pedalboard you already love
Plenty of us have an amp we are not giving up, and there is no reason to give it up. Switch off the cab sim in the Spark app and Spark PEDAL slots into your existing board as a dedicated effects processor running into the front of your amp. What you get out of it is a pedal that changes shape whenever you want it to, so the board you have been slowly building for years can move from one sound to a completely different one without buying another stompbox to get there.
Straight to front of house
Some rooms do not have an amp waiting for you, and some nights your amp does not survive the drive. It happens. Spark PEDAL sends a full cabinet-emulated stereo signal straight to the front of house desk the same way any amp sim pedal would, so soundcheck takes about as long as it takes to plug in. It also makes silent stages easy, which your engineer will appreciate and the people in the front row (and your bass player!) will appreciate even more. If you want that signal landing right, getting your EQ sorted for live sound is worth ten minutes of your time.
Into Spark CAB when you need to feel it
Going direct is clean, but some of us need to feel air moving behind us, and there is nothing wrong with that. Run Spark PEDAL into Spark CAB and you have a complete rig that does not depend on the venue having anything to offer you. Spark CAB is an FRFR cabinet, which in practice means it reproduces whatever you send it without adding a voice of its own, so the sound you built on the pedal is the sound that arrives in the room instead of a version of it filtered through a speaker with opinions. That gives you a backline for rehearsals and small rooms, or anywhere you want to show up and just be loud. If the room does want a feed, the cabinet's balanced output can send one to the desk while your tone stays right behind you. We have written before about how that setup holds up on an actual stage.
Recording straight into your computer
Connect Spark PEDAL to your computer over USB-C and your DAW sees it as an audio interface. The tone you dialed in on the floor is the tone that lands in the session, with no microphone to place and no room noise to fight your take. That speed matters more than it sounds like it should, because catching an idea in the ten minutes you actually have is usually the difference between finishing something and letting another song sit unfinished.
Late night, headphones only
Good ideas rarely show up at a convenient hour. Plug a set of headphones into Spark PEDAL and you have a full amp and effects rig that nobody else in the house can hear, which is the whole difference between playing at midnight and promising yourself you will remember the riff in the morning. Pair your phone over Bluetooth and you can play along to whatever you are learning, or lay down a loop and play over yourself instead. Practicing alone does more for your playing than most people give it credit for.
Quick Reference: 6 Ways to Play Spark PEDAL
- All-in-one rig. Guitar straight in, every amp and effect onboard, nothing else to pack.
- On your pedalboard. Cab sim off, into the front of your amp, used as a dedicated effects processor.
- Direct to front of house. Stereo line outputs feed the desk for fast soundchecks and silent stages.
- Into Spark CAB. PEDAL into an FRFR cabinet for a standalone rig that needs no PA, with a balanced output to the desk if you want one.
- Audio interface. USB-C into your computer, your tone straight into any DAW.
- Headphone practice. Private full-rig practice at any hour, with Bluetooth jam-along.
The point of all six is the same. You should not have to rebuild your sound every time the room changes.