GPX Blog

When Keeley released its XVIII Anniversary Space Panorama Triptych I stated at the time that the artwork was somewhat more reminiscent of Walrus Audio - and surely they (Walrus) should be doing some sort of space-themed panorama across a number of pedals, as several of their pedals already carry that kind of sci-fi theme. I don’t know how related these two events are - but it sounds like someone was listening somewhere along the way and Walrus now has its own ’Luna’ Lunar ...

Of all the pedal brands I collect - I seem to have ended up with significantly more Boss than anything else - with currently 27 Boss Pedals all told. And while it’s not always the case that Boss has the most pedals represented in my active pedal-chain - it just so happens that right now my active Boss pedals number 7 - as follows per pedal-chain order:

• SY-1 Synthesizer
• BD-2 Blues Driver Keeley Freak Fuzz + Phat Mod
• OD-200 Hybrid Overdrive
• NS-2 Noise Suppressor Alchemy Audio Modded

This article was of course inspired by Josh ’JHS’ Scott’s recent YouTube video on his own favourite TC Electronic pedals (see Honorable Mentions below). We are funnily enough largely in agreement on the core selection - but we harbour somewhat different opinions on some of the marginals.

I’ve tried to view these as being category leading first-choice pedals - at least at the time of their introduction / key active period. Meaning that the TC Electronic option ...

I’ve already largely decided what new pedals I will be targeting this year (that I know of!) - following on from the various reveals and announcements made over the last week, and other projects I’m aware of and various themes I will be pursuing in 2020.

First of all to explain the above visual - this features and extrapolation of my current pedal-chain - with the NAMM legend in front of various new / newish pedals - Green means already acquired - or at least already ...

So despite the perilous state of the world, the first NAMM of the new decade actually turned out to be pretty stellar. I had thought that last year’s exceptional show might end up as the all-time high water mark - but this one turned out just as many pleasant surprises.

Slightly different to last year there were a more significant number of pedals announced and launched in advance of the show - while a lot of pedals at the show had very little by way of collateral and some are ...

I know Rock Fabrik best for their amazing Mind Abuse High Gain Distortion pedal - which is alas still on the wishlist awaiting acquisition - I have so many different priorities in the High Gain pedal area - it takes a while to get around all of them. It’s good to see RF branch out into new areas though - and this is their first modulation pedal as far as I am aware - and a really impressive entry into that category.

The vertical 1590BB style enclosure device is an Analog Tremolo ...

The Visitor is the more interesting of the pair obviously as a brand new endeavour - while the Fault 2 seems on first glance mostly just to have cosmetic difference - but there is a lot more to it - as we shall see!

The Visitor essentially has two different Modulation Channels - the Primary with Tremolo, Chorus and Phaser options while the Secondary just has Tremolo and Chorus. For the Primary you get Rate and Depth Controls - while the Secondary only has a single knob which interacts ...

Our pal Alexandre Ernandez and his team at Anasounds have come up with 3 very complementary pedals this year - all featuring some truly smart and elegant innovations and configured around the Tremolo effect. The flagship here has to be the Ages Analog Harmonic Tremolo - which has 5 controls alongside a second Tap-Tempo footswitch :

• Out (Volume)
• Depth
• Tone
• Tap-Divisions - 2/1, 4/4, 1/2, 1/3
• 2-way Rate/Depth Attack Follower switch

This is a highly dynamic Tremolo which is designed to ...

I have long been a fan of Alexander’s slightly quirky NEO Series of pedals - with 4 onboard presets, up to 6 modes and secondary / alt functions on every knob - all in handy dual-footswitch compact enclosures. To-date I have only acquired overdrives and the La Calavera Phaser - but there are many more Alexander Pedals on my wishlist and likely at least a couple more candidates here.

The big release is the Superball Kinetic Modulator - a sort of modulated delay - which for one of ...

I have conceptually always loved DBA pedal, yet its finest flagships are always a little too large for my preferences. The Evil Filter for example has long hovered on my wishlist, but I am still stalled by its oversized footprint - which is the same for this fantastic Reverb.

The Rooms Stereo Reverberator somewhat justifies its size by having all the proper ports / jacks present, and 6 different algorithms / modes to get vibing with:

• Room
• Digital
• Peak
• Gate
• Wave
• Gong

You have...