My now good friend Rich Cattell came along at just the right time, as I was having issues with my TheGigRig Wetter Box at that very moment, and still somewhat in the market for a top-notch Parallel Blender.

Superficially those pedals look quite similar, but they’re quite different animals. The Wetter Box is an excellent Full Stereo (TRS) Parallel Blender - where everything can be Stereo - including the Main Core Input. All the Send & Return Loops are full stereo here in both directions - ...

Essentially you have both full-size 5-Pin MIDI and 1/8" Mini MIDI connections - along with Ports for up to 4 devices at a time.

The Two Knobs set the various Parameters for the system - Time signatures etc., and the A & B assignable Footswitches allow you to set different functions - step through different song tempos, tap tempo etc.

Controls - Preset / Menu, Tempo / Save, A Footswitch, B Footswitch.

Ports - MIDI In, 1/4" Sync 1, 1/4" Sync 2, 1/4" MIDI Out, 1/4" Sync 3, Sync 4, USB-...

So I was one of the 300-odd who watched GigRig’s Pedalboard launch on the TGR Podcast. And like many, I was blown away by how smartly these are designed and constructed. Hitherto the go-to smart pedalboard system has typically been Schmidt Array - admittedly beautiful mostly wooden boards - but relatively heavy, and reassuringly expensive! That’s not to say these featured boards are in any way low-cost - while when you factor in exactly what you’re getting here - the prices are very fair and ...

Solar reveals an elegant brushed-finish Chug EQ Boost - featuring 11 controls - 5 of which are dual-concentric.

The Low and Mid Frequency Bands are fully Parametric - with Highs being Semi-Parametric, and featuring additional Output Level, Input Level and High Pass Filter / Shelving controls.

Controls : Q Bandwidth [Low Frequency], Q Bandwidth [Mid Frequency], High Level [High Frequency], Low Level [Output Level], Mid Level, High Pass Shelving [Input Level].

Had I not the Empress ...

So February, as expected, turned out to be quite the slow moving month - with not too many featured releases. You always get the big announcements at NAMM - and then it takes a few months typically for those pedals to filter through.

There were a few heavy hitters that emerged in February or sooner - including the Kernom Elipse Modulation Playground, and the Polyend Step Drum Machine Pedal - both of which went on the board this month.

I also made the Plutoneium Chi-Wah-Wah a permanent ...

I’ve had my Polyend Step for around 3 weeks now - thank you to the excellent customer support at Polyend - in particular Borsuk and Mitch. Great customer support is always a sign of good things!

So I’m 3 weeks in now, while I’m largely still fairly just scratching the surface! If you look at the topline statistics we’re talking about 2000+ Samples, 1000 Song Presets, 332 Beats, 245 Kits, 65 Punch-in Effects, 16 Steps, 15-20 Parameters per Step, and 4 Tracks of Drums, Percussion, Pads, and ...

I think most of you know this one already - that classic double dose of Cali76 Compression - for those who want more flavour, and use the compressor as a special effect. The pedal has been shrunken down, and enhanced at the same time - where previously you had 9/18V power, but now get 24V from a 9V input!

Controls - Dry, Out, In, Attack/Release 2, << Thru << Attack/Release 1.

Because of the nature of the effect, you don’t get that cool floating point meter that first appeared on the ...

You often hear me talking of 90’s style enclosure pedals (1590BB), and here we have late 60’s style enclosure pedals a la Sola Sound MKIII type. The selection comes across as very ’Macaris’ in those enclosures - which are along very similar lines. Actually that Germanium Fuzz was originally OEM’d by Sola Sound for Rotosound back in the day (1967). The Rotosound  Fuzz was supposedly a MKIII prototype - which emerged the year before the official Tone Bender MKIII release.

"After years of ...

So this is something of an odd one, and I question some of the launch and marketing decisions made / not made for this unveiling. It’s very rare that a brand new and wholly unknown pedal brand launches with a full range right from the get-go - the normal path is to establish a reputation with 1 finely honed pedal - and then build on that success and reputation and add further pedals once each one has become properly ’embedded’ in the public conscience. 

Launching so many pedals all at ones ...