I personally find it sightly infuriating when demoers announce something as gamechanging which is anything but. In this sense TONEX is largely playing catch-up with the industry’s current leaders in that space - Boss, Fender and Nux.

Each of their solutions has compelling reasons for acquisition - but in truth it’s mostly about what core platform you’re mainly subcribed to. If you largely play though Boss Katana Amps like I do - then the Katana : GO is the natural extension for that ...

So I attended Boss’s inaugural workshop / masterclass event at the Roland Store on Denmark Street. Hosted by Matt Knight, and featuring Guitarist / Creator / Social Media superstar Sophie Burrell - who just happens to be a major Boss Katana Ambassador for around 10 years now, where she featured very prominently in Boss’s recent Katana Gen 3 rollout.

I’ve been peripherally aware of her for several years now - while early on I used to occasionally confuse her for Sophie Lloyd! I do remember ...

Whenever I see a pedal like this, I immediately think of the many ’Headphone’ only pedal shows that I attend - for which this ’Easy Listening’ mini pedal would be the perfect headphone amp at the end of any of those pedal-chains.

Inside you have an Analog Amp Simulator circuit - which is voiced to sound like that most classic of Fender ’65 Deluxe Amps. You have just the one control - a Master Volume - and you can connected the pedal direct to a set of headphones, a mixer, or front of house ...

When I first saw this pedal I thought it could be decent competition for my Poly Ample (which has 56 different Amp Types onboard), while it turns out that the Nux Amp Core Studio is more like that - with the below selection of 26 Amp Types : 

Jazz Clean, Deluxe Rvb, Bassmate, Tweedy, Twin Rvb, Hiwire, Cali Crunch, Class 15, Class 30, Plexi 100, Plexi 45, Brit 800, 1987 X50, SLO 100, Fireman HBE, Dual Rect, Die VH4, Vibro King, Budda, MR.Z.38, Super Rvb, Brit Blues, Match, Brit 200, Uber ...

I would like to start by saying that the best feature set doesn’t necessarily result in the best tones - while a more intuitive interface can be a major motivator for many. It seems like Valeton read my critique of the ToneX One and set about solving those challenges and recommendations that I set, which it seems to have done admirably with this GP-5 unit. I suggested for instance that the ToneX One would benefit from a small screen, and Bluetooth-App connectivity - which the Valeton GP-5 has!...

These pedals have been really impressive right from the start - with the original 11-controls No.5 Distortion from 2017 beautifully setting the scene for this series. I’ve acquired each of those 6 previous models, and will obviously be getting this MGAT-5 SRAA too - I have of course contacted Tina - to confirm my intentions! The incredible thing here is that Mr Wu consistently finds new ways to evolve this series - where I was sure it had reached its peak about 3 pedals ago - but it continues ...

Mooer was due to be at the recent London Synth and Pedal Expo that I attended over the weekend, but ended up being a casualty of the Heathrow Substation Fire - the only pedal that got there in time was its GS1000 Intelligent Amp Profiling Processor and there was some kind of power supply issue with that - so it needed to be retired on the very first day!

I was hoping to see the GL100 Looper and this Prime M2 at the show - while alas neither of those pedals made it in the end! 

The Prime...

Maybury Guitars - Jason

mayburyguitars.co.uk

So here are the highlights from the very first Woking Boutique Guitar Show - which  took place this past Saturday at the Fiery Bird venue - just 5 minutes walk from the train station / town centre.

The show was organised by my good friend Jason Snelling of Maybury Guitars, alongside John Smith of JAS Guitars. The venue was perfectly centrally located, and was spacious - with a lot of natural light - which did make some of the photography somewhat...

You should know by now that I’m a huge fan of Lichtlaerm Audio and have a special relationship with Joe’s Pedals here in the UK as well as Lichtlaerm’s Daniel Ringl. I own five Licthlaerm pedals to date as per my January update, and there are now two further candidates here - a 2-way Octave and Shimmer Reverb, alongside a really potent 60W Pedalboard Power Amp.

The As Above So Below Reverb is a fairly expansive and full fat Octave Shimmer type unit with FX Loop and ports for Ramping and ...