I have 3 primary setting that I use for delay. The first is my old standby: slap. A short delay of only 1 repeat, slapback delay is supposed to emulate the reverb effect of a small room, but it also gives you a cool doubling sound. As long as it's not set so long as to step on the toes of your next note, or so short that it isn't discernible from what you're actually playing, you should be able to really add a nice dimension to your sound.
My second setting is a standard U2-ish delay of about 300-ish milliseconds (give or take) with a 4 or 5 repeats. I use this for...ummm...U2 songs. I also like it for soloing and sometimes for playing clean arpeggiated passages.
Last, I have a setting that's just plain silly. I keep the delay at around 300 milliseconds, but crank up the repeats to just shy of the point of oscillation. I like to use this for atmospheric stuff. Also, it's what I use as an alternative to passages where I should be using a talk-box, like the beginning of Sweet Emotion.
My pedalboard has just undergone an overdrive upheaval, and there's also a delay rebellion happening simultaneously. I've been using my trusty DM-3 (the 2nd one I've owned) up until I found a great deal on an original Maxon AD-900. I'd been wanting one for a while, so I couldn't pass it up, even though I was hesitant about its footprint (much larger than the DM-3, but still smaller than the Electro-Harmonix Deluxe Memory Man I used to have).
I love analog delays. I had a Boss DD-3 for a while, as well as a Line 6 DL4 and an Ibanez DML20 III. The DD-3 was decent, but nothing special. The DL4 had some really neat features like reverse and stereo delay, but I always ended up using the analogue modeling delays on it anyway. The Ibanez could do some really weird and awesome things that I will never be able to replicate without it, but that wasn't enough to make me love it. For me, analogue delays have a certain simplicity, warmth and beauty to their tone that makes them superior to their digital brethren.
The DM-3 to me has been, for a long time, my go-to delay. I had one a while back which I traded for the Deluxe Memory Man because I wanted to give that pedal a go, and I'm glad I did because the Memory Man has a sound all its own which is beautiful and haunting, but I could never get comfortable with the pedal's size and ridiculous power requirement. I went back to another DM-3 and was happy til the Maxon showed up.
When I was A/B'ing the DM-3 and the AD900, I tried to set them as close to one another as possible, which was a bit tough because the AD900 has double the delay time of the DM-3, but I eventually got a nice slap effect from both. My first reaction was that the DM-3 was much darker than the AD900. I thought this might be more of the analogue-warmth-mojo, but the more I fiddled with settings, the more I came to the conclusion that the AD900 does a better job of replicating the original sound than the DM-3, which rolls of the highs so much that you get a very dark repeat that can easily get lost in a mix.
For now, the AD900 has usurped the DM-3's spot on the board, but I don't know for how long. The AD900 suffers the same two problems that led to the Memory Man's banishment. Too big and stupid power (it takes 12v instead of 9v, but at least it ain't 24v like the Memory Man). For the nonce, I'm gonna bask in the awesome repeats the AD900 gives me, but I might have to go back to the DM-3 again if I need the room. Maybe the third time will be the charm for the old Boss?
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