You very rarely see a Tremolo pedal without a Rate / Speed function - yet here we have exactly one such variant.

As Tremolos go this is about as simple as it gets, with just 3 simple controls at your command :

Controls - Level, Depth, Shape : Sine > Square Wave.

I can’t help thinking that this pedal could do with one or two more controls. As it is, it’s a really cool effect - but really very one note - as all you can really do here is vary the intensity of the effect.

You can ...

An interesting fact is that this collaboration almost happened several years ago, but evidently the timing wasn’t right then for various reasons. This time around though there was an added ingredient in the mix - ’Yours Truly!’ - and I was somewhat instrumental in bringing the two sides together and finally making this happen!

It’s great news for us Brits - as these Lastgasp Art Laboratories Pedals have always been somewhat beyond our reach until now.

I obviously recently covered my 9 ...

A collaboration between AC Noises and Andrea Degli Esposti from BunkerNoise using a powerful modular synth DSP for AC Noises’ first ever stereo pedal.

This is a unique confection of conventional reverb with diffused and reflected grains - essentially adding further texture and dimension to the Reverb ambience.

The clear knobs are the conventional reverb, and the mini black ones control various aspects of the Grains. That mini-knob row is then  followed by 3 switches - which set further ...

I’ve followed tkog / The King of Gear for many years now - and have had the Mini Glitch in the reference collection for quite a while - a really cool and relatively simple but impactful Micro-Sampler. I believe that first materialised properly in 2018 - where I’m aware there were a few earlier sort of prototype versions before then - while I think the final design occurred some time in and around 2018.

Around a year later, tkog then introduced its Oxford Drive - which I understand is an ...

The final arrangement for the year - all the pedals that impressed the most!

These are just different enclosure artwork editions where all else is the same as for the standard editions - just the graphics are different. Note that my background visual here is very apt gold confetti!

Both limited edition anniversary pedals retail for the same standard price of $399 and equivalent in your local currency. Of course available for order right now from the Chase Bliss Webstore. Generally there is a 10% Anniversary discount on most pedals on the site - while some exceptions...

This article was originally suggested by my now good friend Henry Kaiser - leading guitar and guitar effects experimentalist and prolific producer and recording artist. He’s been a long-term friend of Toshihiko Tanabe - of Tanabe.TV fame and thought I should do one of my pedal roundups on Japanese Boutique Pedal Builders.

I had long intended to do a feature on Japanese Pedal Makers - but could not decide on the context or format - as there are so many notable brands. Upon Henry’s suggestion...

Since the Mood is Chase Bliss’s all-time bestseller as far as I’m aware - it makes perfect sense that they would do the same kitchen-sink exercise on this device as was fairly recently done for the Generation Loss MKII.

Superficially - at least facia-wise everything seems to look largely the same bar the major colour-change - with still the same labels present on the pedal’s front :

Controls - Time, Mix (Ramp), Length, Modify (Spatial / Wet), Clock : 2K-64K, Modify (Looper), Modifiers (...

What a magnificent start to the year -  I don’t think I’ve ever had such a strong January selection - I could almost stick a pin in it and take the rest of the year off! Several of these slots won’t see much change between now and the end of the year - and so impressive is this latest batch of additions - that I can’t really see what might be improved in order to replace most of those.

I was not expecting to add the Eventide H90 quite so quickly - while the Hologram Microcosm has always ...