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Hello guys, a question for users of the Fairfield Shallow Water. I loved the demos I heard, esp. Knobs'. But FC stuff is very, very expensive over here, and the Mid-Fi Random Vibrato and Random Phase Vibrato seem to do most of what I want. Anyone with hands-on on these random modulators able to offer perspective? Best, NP

I used to have a Shallow Water and I found it too... shallow. Sorry for obvious joke. I just thought it was too subtle on most settings, but this is more a factor of what I do which is normally plenty of fuzz in noisy bands where nuanced subtle sounds are pointless. It sounded like a better idea and it sounds great when other people play it.

So... maybe I'm not the best placed to comment lol. I haven't played either of the other two. Mid fi also sounds too subtle for me from demos, don't know anything about the random phase vibrato.

The Earthquaker Aqueduct has a "random" mode so might be worth having a look at that one too.

coldbrightsunlight wrote: The Earthquaker Aqueduct has a "random" mode so might be worth having a look at that one too.

came here to post about this!! love the random mode, wanted a shallow water for ages but all the demos seemed too subtle and also too dark~ for my taste, the aqueduct scratches that itch and also has a shitload of other really cool modes

Dude get a woozy it replaced my clarinot for what I use it for!

goosekevin wrote:

coldbrightsunlight wrote: The Earthquaker Aqueduct has a "random" mode so might be worth having a look at that one too.

came here to post about this!! love the random mode, wanted a shallow water for ages but all the demos seemed too subtle and also too dark~ for my taste, the aqueduct scratches that itch and also has a shitload of other really cool modes

Also this too!

Shallow water is very, very subtle. The transparent overdrive of modulation. I personally didn't like it at all, but I know some people swear by it.

yeah that.

Forgot about the woozy that thing looks fun in demos too

The magic of the Shallow Water is mostly two things: the randomness of the warble, and the Low Pass Gate.
I pretty much never use it less than 100% wet (ie. not a chorus), but just as a warbly filter.
The LPG should be a pedal in itself. It's brilliant and no other pedal can do what it does for some reason.

I had a Shallow Water and also didn't like it because it was too subtle.
An alternative is the Cooper FX style that you can find in the Generation Loss or CBA Dark World. They're kind of different in how mid-focused they are. I don't like them very much.
My favorite alternative is the Pladask Taken. Also pretty pricey but it's got my favorite combination of tone controls, random modulation sounds, and feedback control.
The Copilot Kinkillin can also get some similar sounds; not as clean, though.
Those two are both delays, at their hearts, and maybe you want something more immediate. Maybe the Boss MD500?
The Alexander Colour Theory can be set up to modulate randomly in weird and interesting ways but it can take some work if you're not familiar with the interface.

I hated the low pass gate because it made my guitar tone less bright and that's almost never what I want. did I buy the wrong pedal? I bought the wrong pedal.

Alexander marshmallow has randomized pitch shifting, it isn't subtle. The super neo-matic does it unsubtly too but more traditional time modulation ...if it is still available that is, I think it was like 100 units or something? But yeah marshmallow is awesome UNSUBTLE PITCH MODULATION and does lofi things too if you can live playing with tens of milliseconds of latency.

I guess it depends on what you want it for?

Of pedals that do similar things, I've tried a Warped Vinyl mkII, Shallow Water, Instant Lo-Fi Junky, and now use a warped vinyl setting on my Nemesis (all of these went into a Fuck OD with reverb either before or after). Shallow Water was the best *sounding* of those options, but I agree with others who've posted - it sounded amazing at 100% wet, but it was a one-trick pony for me and took up quite a bit of space for that one trick. I also found it didn't play with other effects very well.

Oh yeah Warped Vinyl that's a good one. Doesn't actually do random but I've played with a friend's and using the ramp on speed and wave shaping you can a similar effect to what I was looking for on the Shallow Water but with a much deeper vibrato/chorus. The modulation isn't random but it can sound unpredictable enough for my purposes.

Woozy could be a good choice. I often use it in random mode for subtle movement, but it's more focused on the weird than on the subtle side of things. You can do very heavy pitch flutter easily, but it can be quiet if you keep the Sway knob low.

Dowi wrote:Woozy could be a good choice. I often use it in random mode for subtle movement, but it's more focused on the weird than on the subtle side of things. You can do very heavy pitch flutter easily, but it can be quiet if you keep the Sway knob low.

So much this!