Boss has really been showing Bass Players a lot of love recently - with superb dedicated devices for the lower range of playback. For April we get a Bass Edition of the ME-90 - wholly re-designed with Bass Players in mind and the precise effects they favour in their rig. There may be some superficial similarities to the ME-90, but the ME-90B has been wholly re-engineered for Bass. In my describing all the effects, features and functions - it’s almost overwhelming just how much you get on the ...

For some reason I didn’t get a press release for this one - which is unusual for J Rockett, as I’ve collaborated quite closely with that brand of late - it turns out my main connection Zac was not overseeing this release - and hence I got overlooked! And while in the other release materials, and in the manual in particular - much is made of the legacy of that most favoured 60’s studio compressor inspiration, there is no proper mention of how J Rockett managed to replicate such a complex circuit...

I’m not sure it was Brian’s intention to become a Compressor specialist - but he now has 3 full size offerings covering all the different basis.

This time around it’s his UREI 1176 FET Studio Compressor - and for me comes with the perfect complement of controls. Those are pretty much exactly the control parameters that I would specify for a compressor :

Controls - Tone, Attack, Release, Level, Blend, Compress.

On the stock EGO variety (supposedly based on Ross Compressor), he has ...

Misha Mannsoor’s Horizon Devices has quietly made its way to 4 superior modern tone enhancers. It kind of set the mould with its specialist Metal tone enhancing Precision Drive, then came its Apex High Gain Preamp, then the Flux Echo/Reverb - and here we have a very unique take on a Compressor.

Horizon Devices’ slogan is "Sound great, and be easy to use" and that theme is very clearly carried through all 4 pedals which are about as straightforward a pedals as you might expect to encounter -...

So a couple of years after the Valvenergy Series launch - Vox has 4 more NuTube candidates for your consideration, where the template has supposedly been somewhat refined and simplified. I believe the first 4 were originally priced at around £169 (c. $215), where currently they go for £119 / $129.

The original quartet consisted of VE-CD Copperhead Drive Distortion (Plexi), VE-CE Cutting Edge Distortion (Tight Metal), VE-ME Mystic Edge (AC30), and VE-SD Silk Drive (Fender Black Face). Of ...

We’re steadily seeing the Boss 20-Series pedals being replaced now, and the VE-20 is the latest to get a very significant upgrade. The new VE-22 moves things on pretty massively and completely revamps and enhances the form factor, switches, knobs and overall control interface - with 3 core switches now in place of the former 2 - and really smart dedicated controls for each of the core functions - all served by a highly visibly and usable LED screen.

If you’re a singer or vocal performer of ...

Rivne Compressor (fun naming - as the Rivne city name could be translated as ’Flat’). It’s Vitalii’s take on classic Dyna Comp / Ross Compressor circuits with some necessary mods : clean signal blend, better high impedance input buffer, must-have attack switch (classic / shorter / longer), and a tone control to get back the highs usually lost due to compression itself.

A few interesting design choices here. After much research Vitalii found that Japanese versions of that classic circuit (...

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

The Modutility roundup combines Modulation, Utility and Pitch type pedals - it also includes Multi-FX and Multi-Modulation pedals of course. Some years this selection is relatively sparse - while this year it’s totally chock-a-block! In fact it was a struggle to whittle the Longlist down - and inevitably some pedals I wanted to feature did not make the cut - including the Endorphin.es Ghost Pedal Multi-FX and Subdecay Prometheus 3 Dual Super Filter.

I still feel that this selection of 26 is...