Aguilar TLC, AGRO, FILTER TWIN

TheDialog · #1 12-09-2010, 06:24 PM

I just placed my order through Aguilar for these pedals. Pretty excited to check them out. I'm going to make videos on each and post. Updates coming shortly

drnknmstr · #2 12-09-2010, 07:27 PM

LOVE the Filter Twin.

Smurf-o-Deth · #3 12-09-2010, 08:06 PM

I'd let the Agro do me in the butt.

TheDialog · #4 12-09-2010, 10:11 PM

Haha, good to hear all.

Eublet · #5 12-10-2010, 05:40 AM

I've not tried the Filter Twin, but the Agro and TLC each are my favorite pedals in their respective genres.

luccabf · #6 12-10-2010, 06:04 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by drnknmstr

LOVE the Filter Twin.

+1

Great pedals. Never tried the Agro or the TLC, but I have the Tone Hammer and the Filter Twin.
The Octamizer is pretty cool too!

metalinthenight · #7 12-10-2010, 07:56 AM

i love the Tone Hammer and the Octamizer, can't wait for the review!

Fran Diaz · #8 12-10-2010, 08:26 AM

I just got a TLC and I'm loving it (home testing only). can't wait to use it with my rig and band.

TheDialog · #9 12-10-2010, 08:37 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fran Diaz

I just got a TLC and I'm loving it (home testing only). can't wait to use it with my rig and band.

Agreed. I'm excited to try it both ways. Although, I've never tried a comp. pedal live that I've kept.

Fran Diaz · #10 12-10-2010, 08:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheDialog

Agreed. I'm excited to try it both ways. Although, I've never tried a comp. pedal live that I've kept.

After my first tests at home I can see the blue light of the TLC always shining for me

: It's very transparent, but it tames the peaks with ease while the tone remains the same. I think that it's going to give me the freedom that I need when playing live so I don't have to worry much if in the 'heat of the moment' I dig in too hard.

Eublet · #11 12-10-2010, 09:23 AM

There are a few compressor pedals I've used that work well for bass, but the TLC is my favorite. The thing I think that is most important is to set it up correctly so that you aren't overcompressing your signal. Unless you have a very discerning ear and have used compressors a lot, this is a bit hard to do at first because a properly setup compressor is very difficult to hear at all.

To me, the most important thing to know is where the Threshold needs to be set. To find this, I suggest setting the Attack fully counterclockwise, and then set the Slope fully clockwise at infinity. Then start with the Threshold fully counter clockwise. Unless you have a REALLY hot bass, you shouldn't be getting any compression at this point because the threshold is so high. As you play NORMALLY, slowly turn up the threshold until you notice some gain reduction every so slightly. Remember the knobs location because that's the start of your threshold setting. You might go a little higher than this if you want. Next set your Slope. A good conservative setting is 3:1, which is somewhere around 9 o'clock on the TLC. You might want to put it a noon for slap. Then adjust your Attack to let the amount of transients through that you like.

TheDialog · #12 01-15-2011, 08:12 AM

I still have yet to use the pedals in band setting, which seems crazy to me! I was finishing up marathon training for Disney, which was this past Sunday. Now that that's over it's back to business.

I can say that Fran nailed it. TLC is extremely transparent. It's a silent beast. When engaged it takes the slight imperfections of my '78 SVT and tames them completely. The higher freqs seemed to "spike" here and there, not bad, just a bit; especially when using a pick. I had never had this problem with other heads. The old school SVT is a monster

. TLC totally tames this imperfection while preserving tone. It's a keeper.

The Filter Twin is what's up. An extremely simple, up and down filter that has a nice sound to it. Aguilar did not re-write the book with this one, but it does the trick well on bass and that's all I need. For the music I play (Indie/Pop/Rock) it's not something I'll be using, but I have don't Electronic/Pop/Dub etc. before and this would be perfect for it. Generally speaking, I sell pedals that don't find immediate application to what I'm doing, but I think I'll hang on to this pedal until my Akai Deep Impact comes in today

and see how they work together. I can use the pair on a rainy day!

On to the AGRO. This thing is a beast. I was an early adopter of the AGRO pre and loved it. I've heart the pedal is supposed to be able to reproduce a nice overdrive and can be pushed all the way to a heavy distortion, but I don't find the nice overdrive anywhere with the Agro. The pedal is very progressive from the get go. I was able to tame the beast preamp on recording sessions, but not so much in live application. The pedal was pretty much the same. I dig the tone and find it very unique: a very saturated over-driven distortion to very gritty distortion, but the pedal is just not for me. I sold this one and am going to keep the other two.

If anyone has questions I'd be glad to try to answer them

gillento · #13 01-15-2011, 09:00 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheDialog

I just placed my order through Aguilar for these pedals. Pretty excited to check them out. I'm going to make videos on each and post. Updates coming shortly

Got the Filter a week ago and I really like it. I think it does the filter up and down stuff better than my Akai DI.
As for the Octamizer, I compared it to the MXR288 and I like the MXR better because it can do both the smooth Octamizer thing very well and it also does the more raw OC2 thing.

TheDialog · #14 01-15-2011, 09:29 AM

I had the Octamizer as well, but I really wish it would have been able to handle a lower freq. than it actually could. I sold it a few months ago.

Smurf-o-Deth · #15 01-15-2011, 09:32 AM

The Octamizer tracks quite evenly down to F#1 (like most analogue octavers, give or take some quirks), which would divide down to F#0--what are you doing that needs notes lower than that, if I might inquire?

TheDialog · #16 01-15-2011, 09:41 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Smurf-o-Deth

The Octamizer tracks quite evenly down to F#1 (like most analogue octavers, give or take some quirks), which would divide down to F#0--what are you doing that needs notes lower than that, if I might inquire?

With the rig I am using ('78 SVT/'00 810/'71 Fender P) I couldn't get it to track lower than an A on the E string. Nothing in the first position was tracking smoothly. I've tried other Octave pedals that could go lower and it was necessary when I was doing electronic/pop: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgB5oxKc3qc

Not the best example of what we did, but it'll do. Check out the bangin' lightshow/stage props haha!

Smurf-o-Deth · #17 01-15-2011, 09:56 AM

Those lights and props are indeed bangin'.

TheDialog · #18 01-15-2011, 10:02 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Smurf-o-Deth

Those lights and props are indeed bangin'.

Haha, thank you sir. It was fun for sure. The only amps onstage were bass and we often had went with 2 810's like in that video. Pretty insane.