Pedals

You’ve heard the rumors: Some of rock ‘n’ roll’s greatest tones were achieved without pedals. Not so fast! While that’s technically true, some of the most venerable guitar gods relied on an old tape echo unit to help achieve their legendary tones. This unit is the Maestro Echoplex EP-3. While some guitarists made great use of its echo effect, others dragged one to every gig just for its magical preamp. This preamp circuit was wired always-on, and so even those using it as an echo effect received significant tonal enhancements from the preamp circuit as well. Everyone from Eddie Van Halen to East Bay Ray of the Dead Kennedys relied on the EP-3 preamp to take their sound to previously unreachable heights. And now you can also, with our Epoch Boost.Around the shop, we refer to the Epoch Boost as a “mastering pedal,” because it sounds like your base tone, but sculpted to perfection by a mastering engineer. This is accomplished  by employing the same internal circuitry as a real EP-3, from the NOS Orange Drop capacitors to the output mixer stage that acts as a rudimentary frequency selector---it’s all there. We’ve taken the liberty of kicking the internal voltage all the way up to 22 volts, just like the original unit, giving you unparalleled headroom and clarity. Inside, we’ve included a switchable hi-Z input buffer if you’d like to use the Epoch Boost as your only pedal (don’t worry, we won’t judge). The Boost control gives you just the EP-3 tone when rolled off, but adds up to 20dB of crystal-clear boost as you crank it. And trust us, you’re gonna want to.

The Binson Echorec was so cool we had no choice but to bring it back. And we wanted to bring it back right. We wanted to take all the goodness of that huge Binson Echorec and squeeze it down into a standard sized stompbox without losing anything. In fact, in addition to not losing any of the qualities that made it such a compelling musical device, we wanted to EXTEND its capabilities because the original Binson hinted at possibilities that it couldn’t realize. We’re talking about variable delay time! We thought, “What if we had the same four playback head concept but could stretch the delay time out beyond the 300mS of the original Binson?” Then the rhythmic patterns suggested by the various combinations of those four playback heads could really come to life!

What began as an exploration of a specific '60s and '70s classic rock tone, evolved into a multidimensional gain machine capable of anything between unruly sputtery fuzz and classic rock chime. This is not meant to make you sound like a classic rock god, it is meant to inspire you from using some of the same tools they used that would otherwise be inaccessible in pedal form. The heart and soul of the Dreamcoat is a near-exact recreation of the preamp circuit from the Aiwa TP-1011 reel-to-reel deck that can be found in '60s and '70s classic rock recordings. All of the functionality of that unit is present, from sparkling cleans to powerful crunch and glassy leads, but the “Sat” control gives you an extra layer of grunt, allowing the Dreamcoat to range between near-dry tonal indifference to complete “melting-amp” Neil Young-esque tweed sounds. A certain classic rock sound wasn’t just a tape deck, though. Some players installed a passive inductor-based frequency “booster” into their guitars that cut both sides of the spectrum around the resonant frequency of their guitar, giving the appearance of frequency boost. To that end, we’ve added a frequency booster circuit that doesn’t cut anything, giving you a richer tone with a little oomph where it counts. To top it all off, we’ve included a clean blend circuit that begins after the frequency boost and ends after the tape preamp, so you can EQ the sum of your clean tone and dirt, all while preserving your pick attack and presence. The whole shebang runs at 20V, just a hair higher than the original Aiwa, expanding its capabilities and delivering tons of headroom.

Marshall amps helped supercharge the performance, and shape the sound of rock and roll. When the house lights dimmed, all you could see through the hazy darkness was the array of red pilot lights shining from a backline wall of Marshall stacks. In the absence of your own personal wall of Marshalls and the necessary road crew required to lug them around, the Dirty Little Secret (DLS) is the perfect secret weapon in your tone arsenal. This is your “always on” pedal, designed to be the “foundation” of your pedalboard, transforming any amplifier into those raging British stacks. It forms the core of your guitar sound which you can enhance and embellish by adding boosters, fuzzes, filters, and other overdrives in front of it.

Exact EP-3 circuitry, from the 22 volt power rail, to the JFET preamp (later spec), to the mixer stage, to the high gain silicon transistor based record and playback amplifiers, to the feedback loop. All circuitry is faithfully reproduced and fine-tuned from the original EP-3 specifications. The only thing missing are the record and playback heads, with a 24-bit high-fidelity digital delay line taking the place of the tape.All-discrete, through-hole construction with orange drop 225P capacitors, carbon composition resistors, germanium diodes, and other premium parts.

 The Catalinbread Belle Epoch Tape Echo, has tape echo sounds so authentic you’d swear there was tape inside the pedal! Inspired by the Maestro Echoplex, EP-3 model, perhaps the most famous tape delay ever, the Belle Epoch features everything we love about the EP-3 in a small, maintenance free pedal format. We felt that a “tape echo” pedal was much more than just a standard digital delay with some “filtering” on the repeats. There are a lot of subtle and not-so-subtle traits of the Echoplex that needed to be implemented in order to be authentic. The preamp, the self-oscillation character, the ability to control the “record level” of the signal hitting “tape”, the wow and flutter, the way the repeats decay, the way the circuit interfaces with the amp and other pedals – all these things were important to get right. The original unit was used as a musical instrument unto itself and this is what we captured with the Belle Epoch.

 Oil can delay units were manufactured by a company named Tel-Ray who later became better known as Morley. Tel-Ray mostly focused on being the OEM utilizing their oil can technology (Patent US3530227 A), branding units for Gibson (GA-RE4), Fender (Dimension IV), Acoustic, etc. They employed an electro-static storage method where the signal is “recorded” to a spinning disk, a layer of oil (for years rumored to be a mysterious carcinogenic oil) prevented this signal from leaking into the air before a “pickup” moments later played back the signal recorded to the disk. Compared to the counterparts of the day (tape, drum, wire delay machines), their sound was more low fidelity, murky, often with a more consistent musical vibrato that correlated to the spinning disk speed. We like to describe the sound as mysterious. The Catalinbread ADINEKO pedal is an echo, reverb, vibrato pedal that faithfully models the sonic experience of these oil can units.

In 2012, I had a crazy idea for a tone shaping device that had never been done before in the world of guitar pedals. I wanted to create an effects pedal that replicated the hard-to-achieve sounds of "direct-in" electric guitar recordings that I loved.  Bands like the Beatles, Spoon, Wilco, and Steely Dan had used this technique for years, but it was nearly impossible to recreate live. I wanted this pedal to transform my guitar rig into the tonal equivalent of a Neve studio console, and that was no small task. After lots of trial and error, experimentation, and re-works, this concept evolved into something far beyond what we had imagined. In 2014 as we filmed the first demo videos at Abbey Road Studios in London and this idea had evolved into the most unique product we had ever made. The Colour Box was a full-fledged studio-grade preamplifier, EQ, and distortion generator with multi-instrument compatibility. It did what I had always wanted it to do, but it did so much more! On its release day, I wasn't quite sure how it would be accepted, but I knew that I loved it. As a few months went by, we saw something amazing begin to happen; this pedal was showing up in all types of environments. Producers, engineers, and artists were emailing us, tagging us on socials and showing how they had put the Colour Box to use. Studio vocals, live vocals, kick drums, acoustic guitars, bass, keys, overhead drums, stereo buses, room mics, synths, re-amps, and some incredibly large stage setups had it on almost every instrument! This unit can be heard on dozens of recordings from U2, Wilco, The National, Spoon, Collective Soul, Muse, the War on Drugs, and Phantogram amongst others. As proud of this pedal as we were, we wanted to make it better, so we did.  VERSION 2 EMERGES The Colour Box V2 has all the same functionality of the V1 with many new and improved additions like expanded EQ controls, a Hi/Lo switch for massive clean headroom, and the ability to pass phantom power to your condenser mics.  The most significant improvements are: Addition of an Output transformer Safely Passes 48V Phantom Power EQ Shift Knobs for precision EQ control Hi/Lo Switch for ultra clean headroom 100% available clean signal even on acoustic guitar Silent switching, aka no "switch-pop" Runs on standard 9V DC Neg power FEATURES & CONTROLS The Gain section in red has three controls: Master, Pre-Vol, and Step. The Master volume controls the overall volume of the unit. The Pre-Vol controls the amount of gain between the two internal gain stages. This acts as a "drive" or "gain" control, adding more grit, distortion, and even fuzz as you increase the gain. The Step control increases the gain of each preamp stage in five stages. Rotating the Step knob from left-to-right will increase the gain by the following: 1st is +18 dB, 2nd is +23 dB, 3rd is +28 dB, 4th is +33 dB, 5th is +39 dB. The Colour Box V2 has a new Hi / Lo switch to control the amount of clean headroom you have available. In the Lo mode, you will easily be able to get ultra clean sounds without breakup. Lo Mode is excellent for tone shaping when distortion is not needed. In the Hi mode, the Colour Box V2 will distort much more readily, giving you a broad spectrum of overdrive, distortion, and fuzz sounds. In addition to the Hi / Lo gain switch, there is a -20dB pad switch on the right side of the Colour Box V2. This function only works when in XLR input mode and can help tame the volume for high output microphones. MOST POWERFUL EQ YET The EQ section in blue has three new Shift controls correlating to its standard Treble, Middle and Bass controls. The classically labeled EQ knobs adjust the amount of frequencies that get boosted and cut, while the Shift knobs adjust the range of frequencies that the Treble, Middle, and Bass knobs control. EQ Functions Treble Knob - Cut/Boost Control     +/-15dB  flat at noon.  CCW cuts, CW boosts. Middle Knob - Cut/Boost Control    +/- 10dB  flat at noon.  CCW cuts, CW boosts. Bass Knob -   Cut/Boost Control   +/-15dB  flat at noon.  CCW cuts, CW boosts. Frequencies controlled by EQ Shift Knobs: Treble Shift - 2kHz to 30kHz –  CCW lowers the center Freq, CW raises the center Freq. Middle Shift - 150Hz to 2.4kHz –  CCW lowers the center Freq, CW raises the center Freq. Bass Shift - 20Hz to 440Hz –  CCW lowers the center Freq, CW raises the center Freq. The Hi-Pass section is enabled by the toggle switch below the Hi-Pass knob. Just flip it up to engage the Hi-Pass knob. The HPF is a 2nd order 6dB per octave highpass filter. The -3dB cutoff freq (the frequency at which the filter starts to act) can be adjusted from 160Hz to 650Hz. XLR AND OUTPUT The Colour Box V2 has a combination XLR and 1/4" input jack to use either an instrument or microphone. Select your input with the input selector switch on the right side of the pedal labeled INST/XLR. VERSION HISTORY V1 = Smaller enclosure; no “shift” EQ knobs; seven knobs total. V2 = Larger enclosure; ten knobs total; added Hi/Lo Toggle; passes phantom power. Output transformer addition.

Rossie is a dynamic multi-filter pedal, encompassing 3 essential tone-enriching filter effects: * Envelope Filter - a colourful resonant filter that follows your picking dynamics.* Step Filter - a groovy, arpeggiated filter with fully adjustable steps.* Manual Filter - great for static tone shaping or sweep-able wah-like effect using an expression pedal.Each filter mode offers 4 filter types: lowpass, bandpass, highpass, and peaking. Sweep range and resonance width are also adjustable. And on top of all of these, a dedicated Mix knob allows blending of wet and dry signal, this gives you total control of how much filtering effect is imparted on your guitar or bass signal.

The Keeley Delay Workstation is a powerful, dual DSP processor delay and reverb machine.  Combining Keeley’s unique delay and reverb patches in an incredibly small package, the Delay Workstation is an extremely creative tool. With the Delay Workstation you can combine vintage slapback and multi-head tape echoes with Spring or plate reverbs to create some instantly classic sound spaces.  You can set the Delay Workstation for warm sounding analog delays and then use the chamber or hall reverbs to create a huge warm and endless space.  Need rhythmic delays with some shimmer?  It’s here.  Always wanted to have the perfect ducking delay?  One that backs out of the way until your done with your notes, then the echoes fill in. “Ducking” is a very intelligent way for clearing the clutter in a sound that would normally be overrun with delays and echoes.   Wanna get twisted?  Try the Pitch delay into our Flanged Reverb. The Reverb side of the Delay Workstation contains all of the most common reverbs and some delays. The Morph control allows users to put creative twists on the reverb patches like spring tension, shimmer, and random flanging.  There are two delays included in the reverb bank.  You can use these to setup very cool ping-pong delays and many other creative rhythmic patterns. Two banks of eight legendary effects.  Super Fidelity.  Super Compact. The Delay Workstation has on-board tap tempo on the Delay side and external expression control on the Reverb side. Effects Include: Slapback w/reverb Tape Delay w/tone control Multi-Head Echo w/3 head control Analog Delay w/dynamic modulation Digital Delay w/inverse dynamic modulation Subdivided Delay w/dotted eighth, eighth, triplet, sixteenth Ducking w/compression ratio Pitch Shifting delay with w/octave up/down control Spring Reverb w/tension control Chamber Reverb w/filter control Hall Reverb w/tone control Plate Reverb w/tone control Shimmer w/octave up control Flanged Reverb w/vibrato or random modulation

The R1 is an extremely powerful and versatile multi-function reverb that can quickly go from small intimate room sounds to massive washes of experimental euphoria with six customized, studio-quality programs - Spring, Hall, Plate, BFR, RFRCT (Refract), and Air. Every program can be tuned and tweaked and then saved to one of nine on-board presets. The R1 boasts a volume swell effect that can be applied to any program, sustain and latching momentary features, stereo in and out, MIDI control, and up to nine on-board presets (128 via MIDI). Players of all styles and genres will be able to find eternal inspiration with the R1.   Programs   Spring - The Spring program emulates an excited spring reverb commonly found in tube amps with loads of transducing drip. Easily go from subtle to full-on surf rock. Experiment with the decay knob to get more than average amounts of reverb not found in traditional amp spring reverb tanks.    X knob adds a warm grit to the reverb decay.   Hall - The Hall program provides the acoustics of large live sound spaces like concert halls to arenas. Longer decays and higher X knob settings result in a massive wash of ambiance. Shorter decay and lower X settings allow for a more intimate reverb expression.   X knob controls the room's size; smaller at lower settings to larger room sizes as you increase X.   Plate – The Plate program emulates a smooth analog plate reverb with nice even diffusion inspired by famous plates like the EMT 140.   X knob adds in gentle warm grit to the front end of the program simulating driving a hot signal into the plate.   BFR - BFR is a no holds barred, big, f____, reverb. This is more than a giant arena reverb. It's a hall-esque reverb with rich and lush decay in a vast cavern filled with choirs of angels. X knob controls the amount of diffusion applied to the multi-tap delays used to form the program. At lower X settings, you'll hear these delays bouncing around for a more textured sound. As you increase the X knob, the delays are diffused, creating a smooth texture, and lifting your riffs and chords into the atmosphere. See ya.   RFRCT (Refract) - The RFRCT program allows for lovely, charming, and glitch-like textures hovering over a largely diffused reverb. The Rate controls on RFRCT change how often the glitch effects occur while Depth controls the overall volume of the glitch effect.   X knob is used to shape the tone of the glitch effect. At zero, the glitch effect will have a lo-fi, almost tape-like sound to them. Increasing the X knob brightens these elements with more pristine details.   Air - The Air program offers a larger diffused reverb with a subtle shimmer but has a more “crisp” clarity to its decay. Explore slow-building sounds that don’t get in the way of your playing. Air complements keys and synths as well.   X knob controls the amount of the wind and shimmer elements in the Air program. At zero the effect will be off. Turning clockwise will increase the volume of the air effect.   Presets The R1 can save up to nine on-board presets, and up to 128 are accessible via MIDI. On-board presets are accessible with the bank switch. Cycle between presets in each bank by pressing Bypass and tap at the same time. You will see the right LED change from Red to Green to Blue. Any adjustments made in a preset will change the tap LED to purple, indicating you have edited the preset. The R1 employs a powerful reverb engine that allows for the true preset spill over. When you switch presets, the new preset loads, and the previous preset is allowed to decay naturally.   Tune  Use the Tune knob to shape the amount of low and high frequencies in the reverb signal. The X position is unique to program-specific features listed above.   Tweak Each program can be fully customized to your taste and playing style with the Tweak knob. • Rate: Controls the rate of the LFO applied to the wet reverb signal. • Depth: Controls the Depth of the LFO applied to the reverb signal. • Pre Delay: Controls how long it takes after you play for the reverb to become audible.   Bypass Modes The R1 has three different bypass modes. True Bypass DSP+True Bypass (trails) DSP Bypass (trails)    Momentary Functions Press and hold the SUS/LATCH (Sustain/Latch) switch to momentarily sustain the current reverb and continue to play over it through the same reverb algorithm. No dry signal here! Clicking the SUS/LATCH switch lets you latch the present reverb decay while you play over it.

The first in the Mako series, the D1 is a powerful multi-function delay with five, studio grade, high-fidelity, custom tuned programs. The programs are Digital, Mod, Vintage, Dual and Reverse. Each can be tuned and tweaked with modulation, tone, age, and subdivisions. The attack knob adds another dynamic to each program, opening up a new world for creating soundscapes. The D1 boasts stereo in and out, midi control and on-board presets. A workhorse of a delay that is just as ready for the road as it is the studio. Programs Each program can be fully customized to your taste and playing style with the Tweak knob. Flip the toggle switch to Mod to bring in a tasteful modulation to your delay trails. Tone will brighten or darken your delay trails. Age will add some grit and wear reminiscent of vintage delay units. Subdivisions can be easily changed between quarter, eighth and dotted eighth. Digital - The Digital delay program offers a clean and crystal-clear delay that is perfect for rhythmic guitar parts where ultra-defined echoes are desired. Mod - The Mod delay progam has unique modulation LFOs applied to the repeats that are random and run at multiple rates to create unpredictable pitch modulation. This results in very unique sounding repeats perfect for warping minds and scattering trains of thought. Vintage – The Vintage program allows for analog delay inspired tones to be achieved with complex filtering applied to the repeats. Use the tone knob at low settings for darker filtering and at higher settings to roll off low end. Dual - The Dual program employs two delays in parallel, each with different time divisions. When connected in mono, the two delays are added together. When connected in stereo, one set of repeats is sent to the left output and one set is sent to the right. The division switch has unique functionality in Dual mode. We’ll break it down for you below: In the quarter note position, the D1 offers 1/4 note and 1/4 triplet repeats. In the eighth note position, the D1 offers 1/8 note and 1/4 triplet repeats. In the dotted eighth note position, the D1 offers 1/4 note and .1/8 repeats. Reverse - The Reverse program reads the delay memory backwards creating a unique delay repeat character known as reverse delay. Presets The D1 is capable of saving up to nine on-board presets and up to 128 are accessible via midi. Onboard presets are accessible with the bank switch. Cycle between presets in each bank by pressing bypass and tap at the same time. You will see the tap LED change from Red to Green to Blue. Any adjustments made in a preset will change the tap LED to purple to show that you have edited the preset. Refer to the manual for accessing and saving presets via midi. Attack The Attack knob will soften the attack of the echoes. Dreamy and ethereal soundscapes can be created with higher repeat and attack settings. Bypass and Tempo Modes The D1 has three different bypass modes. True bypass, DSP+True Bypass (trails), and DSP Bypass. The D1 offers global and preset tempo modes. Global mode keeps the tempo the same when changing presets. Preset tempo will use the delay time that was stored when the preset was saved. Refer to the manual for more info on switching modes.

THE BASICS The Germanium Fuzz is a fuzz pedal. The knobs change the sounds. IMPORTANT: after plugging it into power (9vdc only), it will take 2-3 minutes on average to sound correct. Good time to tune your guitar and grab a beverage. The color of the LED indicator light might change. Don’t turn the internal trimmer. THAT’S IT. Read on only if you want some excellent primary source material for an online fuzz thesis… This pedal is designed around two germanium 2N527 OR 2N404 Germanium Transistors. They have been graded for gain and leakage and carefully matched to sound their best. They are set up in the ubiquitous 60’s circular fuzz topology, and tuned for good sound, and include some additional oddities aimed at solving the issues that prevent more widespread use of Germanium devices....detailed below. THE FIRST FUZZ PEDAL WITH AUTOMATIC THERMAL BIAS TECHNOLOGY The bias of the transistors in this pedal is automatically regulated by a circuit that GENTLY warms the transistors to a preset operating point using analog components, and ensures a consistent sound, no matter the external temperature. When the LED is orange, the transistors are warming up to increase their hFE (transistor gain) and to shift the bias point to the correct voltage. When the LED turns green, the warmer is off because the correct bias and hFE have been set. Expect the LED to toggle back and forth every so often while the pedal is on…that is how you know its working. The heaters will warm the transistors enough to still be effective on a sunny stage, but far cooler than anything that would harm the transistors. This pedal is designed to operate between freezing and 100˚F but might still sound fine outside this range. There are two colors: Studio Black is not meant for direct sunlight, Solar White is fine with it. We have found there is a 20˚F difference between a black pedal and a white pedal in direct sunlight. INPUT IMPEDANCE The low input impedance of the classic two transistor germanium fuzz circuit is both a blessing and a curse….a blessing because it can yield a tight sparkly clean tone when guitar volume is rolled down, and a curse because it sounds nasty (in a bad way) if there are buffers or pedals before it in a signal chain. We went to some extremes to keep the blessing and lose the curse. We installed a class A buffer in the very input of the Germanium Fuzz. This buffer feeds a passive pickup simulator circuit (an audio transformer set up as an inductor, a resistor, and a capacitor). These two additions make compatibility with other pedals possible without losing the desired sound. After the pickup simulator circuit, we have added an “Impedance” control, which simulates rolling down the guitar volume to get that tight sparkly sound…without adjusting your guitar volume….which you can still do and still sounds great. GAIN RANGE The circuit has been tuned to be used as a rich sounding clean boost, an overdrive, all the way up to an aggressive fuzz with some octave overtones. It will sound different, and I think more useful, than the classic versions. There are many colors of tone available with the impedance and gain controls…they are very interactive. This is meant as a “pretty” fuzz a la 60’s-70’s classic rock/psychedelic rock. It is not a spitty, harsh experimental fuzz and more often sounds like an overdrive or distortion until the gain is turned all the way up, and the impedance is turned down. INTERNAL TRIMMER Please don’t turn the internal trimmer. It is precisely set at our factory. Turning the trimmer voids the warranty. The correct trimmer position is marked in case you get one used where a tone lord hath already turnt it. POWER SUPPLY This pedal is for use only with a 9vdc Boss syle center negative power supply...There is no battery. Please do not subject this pedal to more than 9vdc or the pedal or power supply could be destroyed. This pedal draws less than 100ma when the heater is engaged, and far less than that when it is off. It will pull those 100ma instantaneously, which most power supplies have no issue with. With substandard or non standard power supplies it is possible the pedal will start oscillating madly at the heater threshhold, where the LED changes, in which case may we suggest using a current doubler cable, or switching to a higher rated power output. WARRANTY INFORMATION: 2 years excluding modification, trim pot manipulation, or damage.

Some like their chorus tones toothache sweet. Others just want a hint of syrupy swirl. And no matter where you fall on that spectrum, Sugarcube delivers. We captured the essence of all our favourite chorus pedals from the 80s, added in a dash of rotary whirl and some crystallized pitch-shifting for good measure — and then wrapped it all up in a pedalboard-friendly package.Of course, you get the MIDI, preset and expression pedal support you’ve come to expect from Alexander Pedals, but look — sugar addiction is real. Consider this your only warning.

The FQ12 Dual Range Bastard is equipped with individual true bypass switches for both boost and frequency selections.A discreet 6 position notched filter as designed in the early 50's. Custom wound inductor with the ability to select either 50% or 100% of the coil. allowing 12 separate tonal bandwidths to choose from.The Boost control can be accessed independently. Settings range from unity or clean boost to a powerful pre-amp style drive with no original tone loss. Harmonic richness. This unit allows the player access to do anything from a Revolver-era Vox tone to a Brian May tone and all points in between. The FQ12 creates a new palate of focused frequencies enabling the player to find and create within the confines of a multi-instrument ensemble, when boosting or adding more effect to your signal path is not working. Use for chord, single note and arpeggiated passages within a large group of instruments sharing similar frequencies or add actual tonal dimensions to your to rig without compromising your original Tone. Made in America.