Monday, December 29, 2014

Holiday Post #3- Modtone Aqua Chorus

Ok, so I love the Buzz Boy. I was eager to try out their other pedals. I'm going to cut out any suspense and say this is nowhere near as good. Oh, it's still a decent chorus- but that's all it is. It's voiced similarly to, and functions like a Boss CE-2. So, considering you can easily purchase it for much less than the CE-2, and it definitely looks cooler than the CE-2- so it's worth what it costs, and if you're looking for a perfunctory Chorus, here you go. I, however, am looking for magic. I was raised on Dave  Fielding and his Roland RE-301, and Geordie Walker and his Bell  ADT - both of which are basically high end delay units, but both of which had chorusing features. They say that tone is in the fingers, and yes, there's a lot of truth to that. But, closer to the truth is the notion that sound is created by humans finding a perfect tool for their purpose. So, I'm still looking for my magic tool. I partially have it- I have a Danelectro Fab Chorus that has the perfect amount of depth and sweep. It just has a volume boost and horrible form factor. I'm working on perfecting it- but, in the meantime, I'll try out anything. Between the Modtone and the Donner, I've got decent Chorus tones. Again, if that is what you seek, I would seek no further. So, call it a three out of five.

Sunday, December 28, 2014

2nd of the Holiday posts- The Little Bear R.Attack

You know that debate about Chinese pedals, clones and counterfeiting? This is pretty much the whole shebang in one pedal.
I mean, first there's the name of the "company"- Little Bear. This is a pretty transparent reference to Small Bear Electronics, a reputable company that sells components for making your own pedals. I bought all the parts, except the enclosures, for my homebrewed distortion pedals from them. The actual name for the company is unknown, and efforts have been made to make it appear to be a single individual, hand making these. If that were true, the guy drives himself like a sweatshop worker- he's always got 25-30 offerings on Ebay, Amazon, and Aliexpress. I have a feeling it's a front for a company that doesn't want trouble for obvious copyright infringement. Based upon components, I think it may be Motorola.  Then, there's the pedal, itself. It's a Proco Rat- toggling between the "You Dirty Rat" "Turbo Rat" and "Vintage Rat" modes means this is a clone of the Mooer clone of the Rat- with a key difference- it looks like a Turbo Rat, and it has a Motorola LM308 chip- the exact chip used by Proco in the late 1980's and early 1990's. So, this is a no-bones-about-it clone.
On top of that, I tried to buy one on Ebay for quite awhile and was thwarted by last second bids- literally within the last 10 seconds a bid would come in that brought the price to just above the "buy it now" price on a parallel auction. This would, again, indicate to me that there's something dishonest going on.
But, I had indicated my interest, and the person who bought it for me is a much more masterful wizard at the Electronic Auctions, so I suspect that this was purchased for less than thirty bucks.
So, before I talk about the pedal, itself, there's a discussion to be continued, here. So far, I have sided pretty heavily with the Chinese, and the Cloners. The continuation would be if a blatant rip off of an already mid-priced device would change how I felt, in any way. Truthfully- it doesn't, but it does strike me as something different. Now, if I'm wrong, and this really is one dude in China, making and selling clones of various pieces of gear to satisfy his creative urges- then all this is moot. The majority of the evidence points more towards piracy and counterfeit. I don't think that's what Joyo, Donner, Biyang, Mooer, or  Modtone is about. I think they're more about the same thing as every other company on the market- make money by building a better "mousetrap". The difference is that this is building somebody else's mousetrap, behind their back to sell in place of their mousetrap.
So, will I give my pedal up? Nope. It was a gift, and quite frankly, it's better at being a Rat pedal than most Rats out there. About the only thing a Rat can do, that this won't is that highly compressed nasal sound that Mike Campbell got on his back in the 1980's. I'm really good without that, thanks!
So, what should I do? I've decided to just be dead honest about it- It's a Rat clone- both words.
I cannot find fault with the build quality. This sucker really is a flat out tank, probably better than most Boss pedals. The powder coat is even applied better than most automotive parts. The LED's which are key for the optical clipping on the Turbo Rat setting ( my favorite setting- it's like a Rat on Mid frequency steroids) are hearty and strong.The battery compartment is snug and sturdy- heck the dials are firm, and metal. I will put this thing up against ANY pedal out there in terms of build. To get the hype out of the way- yes, like almost every pedal out there, it's point-to-point hand wired, and hand soldered. The difference is the shielding on the leads is thicker than most, and the solder points are finer. Truthfully, this is better work than I've seen on most electronics. If the "Little Bear" folks got it together to do their own designs, they'd be sought after, easily.
How does it sound? Well, depending upon the mode, I have everything from Jeff Beck to Johnny Greenwood. It's a hard clipping distortion with some fuzz characteristics. Which means- you've got more articulation than, say, a Fuzz face, or Tone Bender, but still not so much clarity and piano tone as a modern distortion pedal. Like my Buzz Boy, the MXR Distortion +, or a Metal Muff, it's in that strange place between fuzz and distortion. Which means I can't get enough of that sound. But, in all modes, Violin tone is easily reachable, and full bore molten crunch is a no brainer. The only curveball is that, like a good rat- there's no "tone" control, per se- instead there is a Filter dial, which filters out brightness by shaving off treble frequencies- in a stacking fashion- so, when you have the filter all the way down- no frequencies are filtered out. As you dial up the filter, you are cutting frequency after frequency off, starting at the highest , and working your way down, until, at full filter, you've just got the lowest end mids, and bass frequencies left. I prefer just to filter out the very top, so I've rarely got the filter up past the third position.
I'm not saying you should go out and get one- but, I am saying I'm glad I've got mine.

First of the Holiday posts- two Donner Pedals

So, my family knows what I do, and sometimes, they even support it. They got me stuff for Christmas. Good stuff, mind you. But, it does give me a quandary- can I be respectful to my friends and family, and still give a fair assessment of the stuff? That's why I'm starting out easy-
my son bought a Donner Jet Convolution and a Donner Harmony Tri Chorus.
Now, I have already gone on record for how much I like their Yellow Fallout delay pedal. The Jet Convolution is, essentially to flanger pedals as the Yellow Fallout is to delay pedals. You've got your Mooer/Eno/TWA/ TC Electronics mini-pedal form- which is awesome, and possibly my favorite form factor for effect pedals. At about 32 bucks, it's definitely on the low end of the price spectrum, so the sacrifice you make is that two of the dials are plastic, and... that's about it. I'd put this up with Boss, EHX, Ibanez and MXR in terms of build quality. The small form factor  eliminates some areas of error- primarily, the power source must be via an external DC adaptor. But, that's not what makes this an equivalent to one of my favorites- it's the range of sounds. I've had a vintage Ross Flanger for 25 years, that I modified quite extensively, and this little pedal reminds me of what that Ross sounded like. There is a subtle, and slight delay on the effect to simulate a "stereo" sound, the sweep and range deep and full, and the noise is minimal. It does everything a vintage analog effect does, but, because it's digital, it's far more reliable and convenient than any analog pedal ever will be. Basically, I can get first album Chameleons on it, no problem.
The Harmony pedal, on the other hand... Well, let's get the negatives out of the way-
- Build quality is nowhere near up to snuff. The footswitch is weak, the knobs are loose, and the selector switch is nearly unusably tiny.
- For all the switches and dials, there are few effects that are both musical and forceful.
- Several of the dials have no purpose at all.
- In one of the settings, the volume cut is enough to make it nearly a kill switch.
Significant problems, yes, but, even this has two really good uses- when coupled with a volume boosting distortion pedal- I can dial up some "Geordie" tones. As in- that watery "Eighties/ Come As You Are" tone and "The Beautiful Dead/ Black Moon" heavy Gothic tone. Those are some useful sounds to have in the arsenal. Unfortunately, there are cheaper, and more direct routes to that sound. So, while I appreciate the gift, this will be a back up pedal for me.