Old Blood Noise Endeavor's BL-44 is a Simple Pure Reverse Playback Effect with some Smart Interactive Controls including Variable Clock

The first thing that has to be said here is that this is not in any way one of the more typical Reverse Delays or Reverbs. This is rather a pure Reverse Playback pedal which samples your input and flips it around before output!

Controls - Mix : Dry > Wet, Volume, Clock Slider : Sample Rate and Length, Speed : Playback Speed.

Mix lets you introduce some of your Dry signal back into the mix for further signal balance, and Volume is of course the level of output.

The Variable Clock Slider is the most interesting control here - which allows you to vary the length and sample rate of the effect. The blurb talks about ’brain speed’ or speed of reaction - which I would assume would slow down with the length of the sample - as the circuit needs to record / sample, process and play back in reverse. The longer the sample, the longer the lag one would have thought.

Changing the slider during playback obviously introduces a degree of warble - and at lower sample rates you start to get distortion artefacts appearing - again longer is surely slower and lower resolution.

Finally the Speed knob allows you to manipulate the Playback rate - so you can stretch or compress the sample. This introduces changes in Pitch too, and is highly interactive with the Clock Slider.

It seems very much like another classic OBNE pedal - and I think there’s a lot of fun to be had with this.

It’s something I will definitely look to add in the new year. It’s an interesting incidental effect - more for occasional use I would presume, but undeniably cool!

Available right now on the Old Blood Noise Endeavor’s Webstore for $179, and open for pre-orders at most dealers, including Andertons in the UK - at £185.