So Fractal Audio Systems has thrown its hat in the ring with its first non-modelling device / unit - the VP4 Virtual Pedalboard Multi-FX Processor - which is quite a departure for the brand.
It’s obviously gunning for Line 6 and Eventide in particular, but also looking to knock out Boss and Strymon Workstation pedals. It has several of its own advantages, but with a number of caveats too. Overall it’s well priced for what it delivers - but for my own preferences it’s still somewhat over-...
Electro-Harmonix often does superb introductory demos for its new pedals, and I must admit I was totally blown away by the vast Multi-FX territory covered by this launch. This POG III takes the Polyphonic Octave Generator circuit into entirely new territory - and has you covered for all kinds of other advanced effects.
Watching the demo, the following key territories are touched on :
I’ve long been a fan of DigiTech in all its guises - Mainline, DOD, and HardWire editions. Since a number of these are now discontinued I thought it a good time to review some of my favourites and nearly-weres.
In fact from this selection of 9, I own 4 - Dirty Robot, The Drop, Ventura Vibe, and Whammy Ricochet - all of which have seen fairly regular use in the pedal-chain. The Dirty Robot was my favourite Synth pedal pretty much before the Boss SY-1 and SY-200 materialised. And the Whammy ...
Sparked by a few recent acquisitions, this seems the perfect time to round up the best of Pitch-Shifter, Octaver and Harmonizer Pedals. I most recently secured a Boss PS-6, EHX Pitch Fork, and CopperSound Triplegraph.
The Triplegraph was acquired from Martel Music - I’m just waiting for CopperSound to hand-deliver stock there next week, which means I should get mine early April.
There’s two fairly recent arrivals here I have yet to snap up - the Pitch Fork+ and ...
I’ll jump straight to the obvious here in calling this Boss’s contender to go against current category leader and long-term reigning champ - the Line 6 Helix HX STOMP Multi Effects Processor and Amp Modeller - which interestingly retails for $599 in the USA, but only around £399 on this side of the pond. While starting RRP tag for the GT-1000 CORE will be £615 (vs GT-1000 currently retailing at £799UK/$999USA). In fact prices are weirdly quite disparate between UK,...
Readers of this blog should be well aware by now of Skindred’s Lead Guitarist and Redbeard Effects Head Honcho Mikey Demus. And while I had been very familiar with his band Skindred for a number of years - my focus didn’t shift fully to Mikey himself until he got into partnership with Adrian Thorpe and started producing his own range of signature pedals.
The first release was an exceptional take on Mikey’s core signature Orange Rockerverb 100 Amp sound - the Red Mist MKIV Distortion. Mikey ...
We’ve been waiting for the full reveal on this one for a while as the first teaser image for this was Insta’d on the 14th of September last year. There were some expectations that this might feature at Winter NAMM, but it seems it’s only now fully formed.
What we have here then is all of TC Electronic’s TonePrint-enabled pedals in a single unit and available across 5 any way configurable slots. This means you get all the different variations of effects from the ...
Now definitively defined as a Pedal-format Modular Synthesizer, Sequencer and Multi-Effects unit. The control interface consists of a small OLED screen accompanied by a grid of 40 (5x8) 7-coloured LED backlit soft-touch buttons, 4 further control buttons for Secondary Functions, and a large Menu scroll dial. There are 3 footswitches to activate live playback and scroll through presets.
Essentially you have a building-block interface-led hybrid-modular-synthesiser where you chain ...
It’s always amusing to set your pedal goals and targets right at the start of the year, and then have to amend them right after the various Winter NAMM announcements. In fact I did a status update at the end of last year, and at the start of this one - which is not a whole lot of days really, but so much as happened in the interim!
I kind of got inspired by heavier tones over Christmas - which prompted me to acquire another heavy distortion pedal - in the shape of the MI Audio Megalith ...
There’s both more and less to guitar tuning than most people might consider. At its most basic, guitar tuning can be done by ear - if you’re blessed to have perfect pitch you can hum to yourself the lower E and then tune the other strings relative to that - fretting each preceding string on the 5 or 4th(G) Fret. I have a pitch pipe for such a process - no electronics involved - simple but not particularly quick or efficient.
Then there is the various guitar tuners - which I would say were ...