And here we have the GRAND FINAL- with all 36 Award Winners from the Group Stages - across all 5 categories!

The first two places have kind of been obvious for a while, where the 3rd / BRONZE position was actually the hardest to decide on - it was between the eventual recipient - the Tubesteader Gainlord, Boss’s XS-100 Poly Shifter, Blue FX Devices Fuzz Fields and Gamechanger’s Motor Synth - all of whom would have been worthy runners-up - while in the end I went for the one that overall ...

In many ways this is the most straightforward category with singular award nominees - GOLD, SILVER and BRONZE.

It’s the second smallest category after Distortions - and the one where I own the least number of pedals in proportion to the whole - just 10 out of these 26.

The order pretty much set itself - with the Cornerstone Nucleo being the clear winner from the start. I’m so impressed with every aspect of that pedal - it’s a perfect Trifecta of Design, Feaures and Playability - pretty ...

What we have here is a killer Trifecta of potent shoegazer-enhanced compact editions - where two of them are fully Stereo capable.

Conventional wisdom would decree the order of : Treble Overload > Moonbeam Phaser > Dream Station.

While for shoegazer optimisation you need to reverse the order and put the reverb at the front of the chain - as several demoers have done below. I quite like Ian Pritchard’s setup too - with the Dream Station in the middle, and Thee Treble Overlaod in front! ...

Set up by 2 former Gamechanger Audio alumni - Toms Lazdovskis and Matiss Tazans - with a Team steeped in Darkglass Electronics / Neural DSP and Marshall.

The pedigree and provenance is pretty clear here, and Menha.Works have understandably come up with an ulra modern killer aesthetic for heir very unique new Monk Echo + Reverb. The Monk Echo is inspired by  Baltic Choirs and Mystical Spiritual Spaces.

Apart from the gorgeous design here, the Monk Echo has a unique Human Formant Voicing ...

This pedal reminds me a little of the recent EHX Pico Atomic Cluster Sonic De-Rezzer and Atomic Frequencies Oscillator. Both are a little Lo-Fi and essentially drop the Resolution of the output in slightly different ways.

This SMPLoFi features 2 Core Modes - Mode 1 is a Bitchrusher - and if you hit the Red Button - you get Mode 2 Reverb and Band Pass Filter. Both Modes have the Blue Knob Dry > Wet Mix as a common element.

This pedal is very much 80’s / Nintendo inspired - sort of chip-...

I’ve had my eyes on Cian ’Moose’ Megannety’s output for a while. In truth I was just biding my time until these were finally available closer to hand - and that’s exactly the case now. Since my good friend Joe Light from Joe’s Pedals has picked up this range.

5 Pedals are currently available on the Joe’s Pedals Webstore - and all are sill in stock as of my writing this. The gold-hued Electric Elk caught my eye in particular - which I thought for sure was based on the Japanese Triangle Muff ...

DBA has rolled out a really cool stretched out, endless, and cavernous stereo reverberator here - making use of TRS ports, and with 3 increasingly intense Modes onboard.

It’s a fairly simple pedal in many ways - but super smart too with its dual footswitches, and Low Pass Filter. It’s perfect for those who want to deliver a ’Big’ reverb sound in Stereo - in the most straightforward of manners. And the Modes and 2nd Footswitch throw in some useful variations.

External Controls - Dry>Wet Mix...

SHOKR Pedals is Newbridge, Ireland native Dan O’Shaugnessy - who has previous form with his earlier A-51 EFX brand - which consisted of pedals like the Uranus Boost, Plasmodial Slime Bass Overdrive, and Warped Worm Distortion.

He felt he had kind of boxed himself in a little with the A-51 EFX Brand, and wanted to pivot in a different fresher, and more modern direction. So it made sense to launch a new brand - SHOKR Pedals - for which the KRUSH Fuzz-Verb is its launch pedal.

What you ...

All the new dealers - including Joe’s Pedals and Effekt Boutique will feature the two most recent Colortone Pedals - the Vibroverb (£219 / €289), and ZeroSum (£219 / €289), while some - like Joe’s Pedals will also have the Lo-Fi Delay (£239) and Spring Reverb II (€179).

All 4 of those pedals sound every bit as good as they look!

Northern Stomps’ new website is due to go live on this coming Friday (31st) - with those Colortone Pedals featured for launch.

There’s a few more dealers ...