RMA TOURBOX : First Review On Page 4

[D.o.S.]

nitial impressions. Sorry for the delay but this summer has been hellishly busy on my end. Anyway, first impressions as follows, i'll try some more stuff out before it's off to Sweden on Tuesday. Clips will be coming soon once I cut down the raw recordings.

RMA TETANUS BOOSTER:

This thing is.. a booster! I'd say it was the most straightforward of the lot (save maybe the Crustacean) but, as is the case with all things RMA, it has plenty of filth on tap. It paired really nicely with the Crust Brick, and on it's own it sounded like a very tamed Doper on the mellower settings. Unfortunately since I'm playing direct at the moment I couldn't speak to amp feel or anything like that, but the distortion is excellent and pretty variable as ibarakashi mentioned. Waiting to see what it sounds like through an amp before I give final judgement, but it's off to Vidret next so he may be able to shine some light on this as well.



RMA CRUSTACEAN BRICK

I LOVE IT.

As a noise head, one of the super annoying things about a lot of "it makes noise" type boxes is that many of them don't have the right character. This is, obviously, something you can get very super subjective about but this box oozes the sort of stuff that you hear in a lot of work from people like Gerritt & John Wiese -- in fact I was getting a very "The disappearing act" vibe from it, at leas the parts of that record that aren't quite as digital (its an album that features both folks just mentioned, I think it's on spotify if you're interested). The Rumble mode is great, as is the third mode (closest to the intensity knob), since it adds a nice bit of rythmic variety. Have not tried it with the Monobius as a source yet but I have used it as as the carrier and it sounds pretty fookin' rad, mate.

Lack of a volume knob wasn't an issue for me since I have a handy Amp/Attenuator courtesy of Louise at Dwarfcraft, but if you don't have an external volume control handy this could be an issue.



RMA Stone Splitter:


Way back in the glory days of yore, I had an MXR Blue Box. It was awesome, in spite of it's flaws, and I miss it dearly. This thing is like the Blue Box on the amount of acid that lands you in the ER pretending to play it straight while you try and ignore the fact that the walls are dripping oil. Lots of great gating effects and oscillations to be found, definitely something to be fiddled with but also capable of strictly righteous tones. No dad rock is right, but fuck dad rock anyway. Very much liking the ability to offset square and sine wave forms for the modulation, leads to some deliciously tasty textures.

Definitely also holding back to see what it sounds like in front of an amplifier, but going to pair it with the Brick before I ship it off to see what sort of treasures there are to be found in those depths.


RMA Monobius:

WOOOOOOOOOO! This thing is, as they say, "the shit." I am not a ring mod person generally speaking, but this unit has made me reconsider the effect. Lots of cool trem to be found here, not much standard bell chime that I could hear. This thing is super deep, and definitely something that you need to experiment with to get the most out of.

[Chankgeez]

Clips will be coming soon once I cut down the raw recordings.

one of them better be titled:

before it's off to Sweden on Tuesday

Also, if Monobius can convert you, maybe it can convert jwar.

[crochambeau]

This thing is like the Blue Box on the amount of acid that lands you in the ER pretending to play it straight while you try and ignore the fact that the walls are dripping oil.

Sig'd

Thanks for the laugh! While I never had the opportunity to visit the ER I did straight faced talk my way out of a really bad day with the police while handcuffed and in a similar head set a quarter century ago. Ah memories.

Thank you & have fun with the amp as well!

[D.o.S.]

Did you hear what happened in Sweden today?

Vidret got the box.

[DRodriguez]

Someone post a clip of the stone splitter! I want to hear/try the thing

[crochambeau]

Someone post a clip of the stone splitter! I want to hear/try the thing

Of the three prototypes currently in existence, I only have the first (worst) version on hand. Since the middle version is taking its time with assessment I'll probably update the unit I have for the domestic leg of the tourbox journey. Once I have that sorted I'll do some demo work on it, unless someone else beats me to it. (hint hint)

[PeteeBee]

Quick shout out to RMA for being rad. Myself and three other ILF folks are working on a split cassette, and my part has my tetanus booster and crustacean all over it. The crustacean has become a huge part of my sound, like DOS said, the character of it is just so great. I do the same trick, run it into a little mixer so the volume doesn't matter. Can't wait for the tape to be done so you all can hear it!

[DRodriguez]

Couldn't agree more with all of that.

[crochambeau]

First up: The (three-way?) switch on the monobius broke in transit (

Damn switches. Is it the frequency range switch or the diode switch (I forget if I went 3 way on that one)? I can ship a replacement, but it would require soldering/digging into the build - which is not the picture of user friendliness. Though I suppose twisting the wires together dirty field surgery style is better than nothing..

Do you think it's switch failure, or being roughed up in transit failure? (AKA, would my just springing for a fucking box have prevented this?).

Apologies on that, I've been giving switches in general some thought over the past year or so. They are a weak point..

[DRodriguez]

I'll be in Oslo with vidret in a couple weeks. If UglyCasanova lends me his iron I can swap out the switch.

[crochambeau]

I'll be in Oslo with vidret in a couple weeks. If UglyCasanova lends me his iron I can swap out the switch.

Awesome, thank you! Here is what's involved (outside of opening the enclosure, which may benefit from another tutorial):



The screwdriver tip at bottom is pointing to the two pads that connect to the frequency switch, I'd be providing the switch assembly up to the two wire pigtail (orientation of which is not critical, so long as switch is installed with keyway directed toward rear/jacks).

I'm hoping it's not the diode switch (similar fix further left) because there's no way the diodes will be matched, but better a mismatch here than an inoperative switch.

I can ship the replacement switch (whichever it is) on Monday. I'll admit to liking the idea of saving a few bucks and shipping to NYC, but am happy to priority something to Sweden if vidret wants to have a go at it.

Just let me know...

[UglyCasanova]

I'll be in Oslo with vidret in a couple weeks. If UglyCasanova lends me his iron I can swap out the switch.

If that means I get to play with these boxes, then, I will put my iron in your hands, literally and metaphorically. Baby.

[UglyCasanova]

So, I have these now (well, technically Eivind has them and I'm getting them in a week or so). Looking forward to checking them out! Where are they going after that?

[crochambeau]

So, I have these now (well, technically Eivind has them and I'm getting them in a week or so). Looking forward to checking them out! Where are they going after that?

Awesome. Frodog is next on the list, I'll double check to make sure the interest/schedule is going to work out.

Any other international people interested? This is marking the end of the road for these, so unless someone wants to hop on they'll either be parceled out to buyers or shipped back to the U.S.

[Jwar]

I'm not in the EU but I'd still love to try them.