The All Nude New Gear Announcements 2023'd

[cosmicevan]

I'm just amused imagining someone at CBA going on ebay to buy Tamagotchis and old ipods just for a pedal photo shoot.

Let's be real...I'm sure the presence of those items sitting on folks desks is what inspired this whole thing.

[Seance]

[Dowi]

Can't wait to have mine and let the ring mod Symphony begin



What about the new BOSS AMP-CAB SIM? seems like the smallest offer on the market in that realm. I wonder of It the patches are somehow derivative from the algorithms in the Katana amps

https://www.boss.info/us/products/ir-2

[echorec]

These ALABS pedals just dropped about a week ago, and there aren't many demos. (factory + 60 Cycle Hum + Mike Hermans) For $100, they seem like fun and have some interesting feedback/ramping options with momentary engagement.

https://www.amazon.com/hz/mobile/missio ... d_wg=98iDb

https://www.alabsaudio.com/Pedal

https://www.youtube.com/@ALABSAUDIO/videos

Delay: tape, granular, swell (9 total modes), stereo
Pitch: digital character, but that would probably be less invasive in a chain of similar effects (Eventide, Meris, Strymon). I'd probably put it in the FX chain of an analog delay.
Reverb: I was intrigued by the Wave algo. It's almost like a vintage sleep machine driven by white noise. ( https://youtu.be/Bcxts9nHOyk?si=rN6e6cKdtieUmQAI&t=2012 )
Modulation: Tremolo is nice. The RM has some useful stuff for drum machines or other signals.

All in all, the Singapore team at ALABS isn't making the same vanilla stuff that has dominated the Chinese scene of recycled algorithms with new brand names. I don't see people replacing a Particle 2 with an ALABS Timeslip, but I think these would fare quite well against a lot of pedals in the $50-150 range. Also, it's a cheapie option, where you won't have to feel as icky as supporting Behringer.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bcxts9nHOyk

[dubkitty]

this stuff is nuts. i'm actually going to watch the whole thing. those ramping functions are mad.

[dubkitty]

it's too early in the morning to listen to those two guys doing demos. 60 Cycle irritates me. he reminds me of the annoyingly cheerful guy at work who's not quite as smart as he thinks he is and won't shut the fuck up. the "Two Princes" bit in every fucking video about his 2 Princeton Reverbs would be funnier if he didn't let the video-game version run one cycle too long. Hermans doesn't talk which is a plus, but he seems to spend more time thinking up clever re-arrangements of familiar tracks than he does actually demonstrating the functions. i tried to watch his demo of the reverb, but was like "the world didn't need an ambient-Americana version of 'Dancing Queen' played on slide guitar, and i'm still not entirely clear what it does." Lanois? more like Lan-NO. oddly for this sort of thing, the builder videos are the best demos so far. they're not wonderful, but at least you can hear what they sound like.

[dubkitty]

preliminary verdict: mixed. there's a sort of slightly cold, digitized feel throughout. what else would you expect from inexpensive multi-function digital gear?

reverb: pretty decent digital reverb, except for the Spring setting which is awful. i'd say it's a tidge better than the reverbs on the Muza FD900.

delay: again comparing to the Muza unit, the delays are more natural-sounding but not in the same ballpark as stuff like the Flashback and Canyon. points deducted for only having 1.1 seconds max time. come on, guys, it's the 21st century and you're making a digital delay. give me at least two seconds or fuck off.

modulation: if i was looking to dump my pile of analog modulation units and wanted a single-space solution i'd seriously consider this. the univibe, chorus, multi-chorus, flanger, and phaser are all quite good though there's that slight digital artificiality and a certain lack of warmth. the tremolo is really pretty--it sounds like there's a bit of harmonic tremolo thing going on there--and allows you to adjust the duty cycle of the waveform but doesn't do full hard chop as far as i can tell. the filter is squishier than you might expect, but the Leslie sound isn't great. and the ring modulator setting is weird. nowadays it seems like animating frequency sweeps and having the carrier frequency follow your pitch is the new thing in ring mods, but to me that loses the kind of weird stillness and spatial quality that make a good ring mod interesting and this unit doesn't appear to allow you to set the frequency to remain stationary. this makes it better if you want the effect to follow along with your playing, but worse for the things i use a ring mod for. and its tone is rather flat and metallic. but if you're satisfied with digital versions of the classic modulations and want to save 4 or 5 spaces on a board, you could do a lot worse for 2 or 3 times the cost.

pitch shifter: even in a field marked by unpleasantly artificial pitch-shifted tones, this box stands out for its thin, fake quality. makes the Rainbow Machine seem like a Phase 90. avoid.

the ramping functions in the demos are mostly used for tricks and racket, but some of them could be useful if you explore them.

[coupleonapkins]

it's too early in the morning to listen to those two guys doing demos. 60 Cycle irritates me. he reminds me of the annoyingly cheerful guy at work who's not quite as smart as he thinks he is and won't shut the fuck up. the "Two Princes" bit in every fucking video about his 2 Princeton Reverbs would be funnier if he didn't let the video-game version run one cycle too long. Hermans doesn't talk which is a plus, but he seems to spend more time thinking up clever re-arrangements of familiar tracks than he does actually demonstrating the functions. i tried to watch his demo of the reverb, but was like "the world didn't need an ambient-Americana version of 'Dancing Queen' played on slide guitar, and i'm still not entirely clear what it does." Lanois? more like Lan-NO. oddly for this sort of thing, the builder videos are the best demos so far. they're not wonderful, but at least you can hear what they sound like.

Ryan's actually mellowed out, but IIRC he's microdosing psychedelics now, and I appreciate his Cheap Gear supremacy, even if he is one of the worst guitar players I've ever heard.

However, I appreciate how his beautiful wife feels just as annoyed with him as we are:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XfRMIckCq4A

Also, I want to cut off Mike Hermans' hands, since when he eventually will have to re-learn how to play with his toes, at least his excruciating style will gain some kinda substance.

As for that cheapie series of peddles, somethymmes ya gotta just pay the man for the box with the anime wimmen onna frying pan that jif duz juan or tew thangz.

[coupleonapkins]

HM-2 + RAT is the eternal cheese slice + apple pie, so why not try another serving?


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3dvnGQoPE0

[echorec]

Here's the first plugin (a looper) from a brand new developer.

https://aqeelaadam.gumroad.com/l/weeping-wall/uhl6d36

It's on sale for $35 (regularly $50) until tomorrow. (free trial available here: https://aqeelaadam.gumroad.com/l/weeping-wall-trial) The trick is to set the Threshold volume, in order to trigger the looper. You can do a lot of splicing and chaotic sounds, or it could be more subtle. I just started using it a few minutes ago. There's no presets pack at this time, so it's all up to you to start building your own templates.

For composing/cinematic stuff/experimental+ambient, it's quite promising. I'm already mangling and beautifying lots of strings & piano loops.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aO6QbWbHfk4



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0ERzQUpJRU

[Heraclitus Akimbo]

Ah jeeze, why did no one tell me that this exists? Bastl Kastle ARP

[coupleonapkins]

Ah jeeze, why did no one tell me that this exists? Bastl Kastle ARP

Thee trio was on sale inna bundle deal from Bastl direct (still is!), but shipping may be a dealbreaker

I had a few of the first Kastles and loved 'em, but they also were just 2 smol fer me fingers

Bastl rules, always, however!

Also I'm glad Starskycarr has succumbed 2 Sharktooth-style JPG gimmes at this point (elf onna shelf!):


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PldhZ4g0aGk

2 Lyras instead of this boodle mite not look as kewl, but pointed ears are still cheep inn these woods

[echorec]

Verbs (by Poly) dropped last week, offering a touch-activated UI. It has 48 factory profiles in its convolution pool, but I don't see any max time specs in the manual. (users can import 8 custom reverb captures)

I like the light show, but I'm not sure I'd choose this over other $400-500 reverbs.

https://www.polyeffects.com/polyeffects/p/verbs
https://storage.googleapis.com/poly_eff ... manual.pdf



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R6AOKpBcQr0

[Paul_C]

Verbs (by Poly) dropped last week, offering a touch-activated UI. It has 48 factory profiles in its convolution pool, but I don't see any max time specs in the manual. (users can import 8 custom reverb captures)

I like the light show, but I'm not sure I'd choose this over other $400-500 reverbs.

https://www.polyeffects.com/polyeffects/p/verbs
https://storage.googleapis.com/poly_eff ... manual.pdf



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R6AOKpBcQr0

If it's anything like the Flat V then the touch screen is nowhere as useful as knobs are when it comes to fine adjustment.

I love my Beebos but I think that all Poly products have to be approached with care, as they are not like other devices (often this is good, but it can be frustrating too).

[Tall Walls]

It has 48 factory profiles in its convolution pool, but I don't see any max time specs in the manual.

The designer has said that the max reverb time is 40 seconds. Pretty substantial, especially compared to Beebo's ~3 seconds.