Essence of Tremolessence

[Nychthemeron]

Ryan just sent a batch to pedalgeek.com, so try there soon.

[RossCanyonsofstatic]

thanks I will

[stonewolf]

Please please tell me how to get the "tremsynthy" sounds as posted on the sound samples for the Tremolessence...I am usually pretty good at this stuff but am stumped!

[Ryan]

Hey Gary, thanks again for picking up a Tremolessence!

I'll be happy to tell you every secret to getting those 'synthy' tones and I'm sorry in advance for the disappointment you're about to experience...

All of the sound clips on our website with the word 'synth' in them in some form were recorded using one of two analog synthesizers. We used an Alesis Andromeda and a Moog Rogue. The results are very repeatable if you have one of those synths or probably any synth really.

We figured we were being sneakily informative by naming all those clips with the word 'synth' in them but I'm sorry for the confusion/vagueness there.

[stonewolf]

..that's ok, I just thought it was one of those fortunate mishaps that occurs when driving a dr. scientist pedal into complete madness can't wait to put it under the tree for wifey.

[Blurillaz]

First off-

I had :



Fulltone

Cusack TAW

Empress

Semaphore Trem

Boss modded trem

Dr Scientist.



I now own 2 Dr Scientist Tremolescences. And gig with them both heavily.

my favorite by far .



B

now tell me about this please!

+1. I'm getting a custom dual Tremolescence made...

[Ryan]

Hey B-man! That's a pretty cool quote from Mr. Bloom, heckuva guy!

The dual Tremolessence was an idea Chase ran past me that I plan on doing for him but I don't know when.. it'll be two Tremolessences in a box and I wish I had more time for custom projects because I think that sounds pretty fun.

And just for the record, I've never personally heard any of those other trem pedals except for the Empress, which I own, and I think it's a downright incredible tremolo pedal in every way.

[WaveForm3]

Dammit! I want of of these!

[Ryan]

Yo Nicholas,

I designed the Tremolessence in the summer of 2005 as I finished up my last year of EET school. I designed all of my circuits, barring the Woofer Wailer (which we're discontinuing asap as I don't want to do clones either), over 2003 to 2005 and they all even have the same names as they did back then. I was completely immersed in electronics and had no outside influences on my circuits, other than an instructor giving me the old Craig Anderton book to fuel my passion. I mean this as no offense but I had never heard of Catalinbread back then and even to this day I didn't think you were making pedals back in 2005.

The only reason our tremolo pedals have the same features, and you know this, is because of their presumably similar op-amp oscillators. I'm an op-amp guy.. I use them in every single one of my designs, as much as possible. I've made every kind of tremolo circuit possible: transistor, 555 timer, 2206 generator, even a micro programmed with the waveforms... and my favourite way, the best way, is the op-amp.

Your boys take every opportunity to say the Tremolessence is a lame copy and you've taken many opportunites to make the Semaphore seem like a better choice too. I'm sure it's a great choice too! But I've stated multiple times that there's no intended similarities.. I've posted the guts and the pcb of the Tremolessence many times too and you guys still never let it go. You didn't invent that kind of oscillator and the real difference in a tremolo pedal is how the audio is handled anyway... I have no idea how you handle that aspect. I've tried to move away from your pedal with the new version of the Tremolessence (Treble control, different rate arrangement) but then you changed your layout/orientation like mine. I don't go around saying I invented the vertical orientation and trying to sandbag your pedal wherever possible, I'd be happy for them to just coexist and let the buyers decide.

I've been meaning to say too, since you emailed that time about the googling and the email ads and all that I've been wondering... I don't really know what you meant by all that. I don't handle those things about the site and I'm not really sure what you were saying we were doing... I just figured Sam had done something as a bad joke and it went unnoticed and I felt bad for upsetting you about something. We don't pay Google or any advertising company for anything and I'm not sure that we ever did... were you just making an assumption about something going on?

I see ads for every guitar pedal, instrument, and accessory company in the space above my Google email program, I don't call out any of them for their ethics.. we all compete in the same market and everybody knows all our names, who cares.. if that's even what's going on. I want people to know about every single other pedal option they have anyway, the spirit of competition and all.

We've never used any manipulation to sell our pedals or gain advertising... we have a 14 month lead time and make only 60ish pedals a month, I don't give a shit about securing more sales or tricking people into buying our pedals.

I have no problem with you or your crew and in fact I think we have a lot in common and could be pals. I just want you to know it's never been my intention to copy your pedal or rain on your parade in any way. And I'm sorry for commenting on your fanboys, I'm sure they're nice gents and just want to protect your honour... which I have never had any intention of besmirching.

You know, Nicholas, things really went sideways for us early on maybe thanks to both of our mouthpieces... I remember Sam and Erksin butting heads in a totally unintended way a long time ago on HCFX and it's just seemed like there's been friction ever since. I'd much rather you be a peer and a pal, I've got no hard feelings.

Thanks for the welcome to your forum and apologies for the harsh words I said. You're of course welcome around here too and I completely believe in not saying negative things about other builders, I'm sorry for it.

-Ryan

[Gunner Recall]

If I buy a semaphore and a tremolessence will mom and dad get back together? (Please, I love you both )

I kinda wish I hadn't started this thread

[Ryan]

Well Nicholas, I did some digging and you're right... we did have a Google Adwords list and it did have Catalinbread on it, although that was the only company... the list is just stuff like 'fuzz' 'reverb pedal' 'guitar pedal' generic stuff like that. Sam swears he did it right after the initial Tremolessence vs Semaphore fight on HCFX back in the fall of 2006 and it was just supposed to be a goof but it slipped past me and was forgotten... I'd never have intended to do that! (As far as I can tell, and Sam agrees, we've never had anything to do with Amazon in any way.. Amazon isn't very big in Canada, that's not a name we throw around ever, never sold pedals or anything there either.) And we weren't trying to build the name of our company based purely on relying on searches for your business name, stop saying it like we made a mistake in our ethical decision making.. Sam did it to fuck with you guys because you and/or your guy were being assholes. I'm not saying that's right, in fact I flat out think it's wrong, but we're not a well known and successful operation because we made our name come up on searches for your name. **EDIT** I said that part wrong, it's not that you guys were being assholes.. it's that there was a miscommunication, possibly over a bad joke, and a situation got heated when it shouldn't have. Sorry for making that sound harsher/pissier than it should have.**

You make it sound like we're the kind of company that is just trying to compete and win by any means necessary and it's just not true... we're two people, one who loves art and working with vinyl and one who loves electronics and circuit tinkering. We're not malicious or mean spirited and we don't want to be the winner of any boutique pedal contests, we just want to get to do our thing which is make our pedals.

I'm not going to say the names of who I think is always bagging on our pedals in your defense, I don't feel like doing this drama over and over. I agree that it's not cool to make a big generalization like that though and I don't think you have a crew of evil doers out there trying to take us down, but you do have one very opinionated person who has made multiple negative comments about our pedals. I'm not spending my day digging up his posts, I'm sure the next one won't be too far off anyway.

I get what you're saying about being annoyed by seeing a similar tremolo pedal and I can relate, but a circuit is so much more than just its controls or apparent function. I think a lot of time people who don't know much about electronics make assumptions and think of things as clones even if they have nothing to do with each other. I didn't love when people started making PT2399 delays, but I know they weren't copying my 2005 SDD design, they were just doing their thing. I don't get upset when I hear that a badass distortion pedal uses an LM386, I know they're not copying my 2003 Frazz. Think about all the op-amp clippers like Klons and Timmys etc that get called Tubescreamers by people who know just enough about electronics to make an incorrect assumption. Or a pedal like the Cleanness that has gain, vol, bass, mid, treble.. I don't get annoyed seeing other pedals with those controls and you know there's a ton out there, I know they're all doing their own thing and it's no big deal. I'd only get annoyed if I saw a pcb that was a copy of my art or a circuit that was indeed the same parts/schematic. I don't want to play 'one up' games with you at all but I didn't feel even a hint of annoyance at your Silver Kiss.. it had the exact same 5 controls as my Cleanness pedal that was out way earlier... I knew it wasn't a clone or even influenced by my pedal in any way. Same with the Pigtronix Philosopher's Tone.. same exact controls... I betcha it ain't a clone either though. Save the annoyance for when somebody's actually done you wrong, not possibly done you wrong.

Jon, don't sweat it pal, this is obviously something we've needed to discuss for awhile and I don't feel that either one of us is upset or angry at the other, we're just hashing out an awkward long term situation that we've side-stepped the last few years maybe.

I agree with everything Nicholas is saying anyway, I just hate him thinking we're a company of desperate corner-cutters, clawing their way to the top... Tanya and I couldn't be farther from that. And he's right to hate that I made a generalization like he has a team of thugs out talking down my pedals.

-Ryan

[WaveForm3]

...what just happened?

[Nychthemeron]

...what just happened?

Ryan and Nick (of Catalinbread) had a little squabble - they both had things that had to be said. Things should be fine, hopefully.

[Ryan]

Well said, Nychy. Just two modern gentlemen having a dialogue and solving some problems... kinda like Tango and Cash.

[Gunner Recall]

I was kinda hoping it would end in a gentlemans duel, but instead of pistols, they chucked pedlols at each other...and I could swoop in and score the spent rounds.