Oh look, a lovely Pedaltrain PT-JR Hardcase:
I wonder what could be inside...?
Signal chain:
Bass
Sonic Research ST-200 Strobe Tuner
Tech 21 VT Bass (Used for overdrive, not sole preamp)
3-Leaf Audio Groove Regulator (Envelope filter)
Rothwell Love Squeeze (compressor)
EHX #1 Echo (delay)
EHX Holy Grail (reverb)
Mounted underneath is a VooDoo Lab Pedal Power 2+. Not much to say about it other than that it does it's job and isn't noisy. Good stuff.
The tuner does its job and does it well. Not much more to say about that.
The VT Bass was formerly used as a preamp, but I'm now using it for overdrive.
The Groove Regulator sounds incredible. My favorite envelope filter to date. I've been told I should put this before the VT so the envelope drives the overdrive circuit as it sweeps, but with the VT in front of the Groove Regulator I can get a cool fuzzy synth tone that's not possible with the GR in front of the VT. The two together remind me a bit of the EHX Bassballs with the distortion turned on, only WAY WAY WAY better sounding to my ears.
The Love Squeeze is a wonderfully subtle compressor that doesn't add or subtract anything from your tone other than evening out your playing dynamic. Bongo's review of it is absolutely dead on. Pristine sound, no noise, no tone suck, pretty subtle compression. It's really ideal as an always-on type compressor if you're not looking for tons of squish or massive peak limiting.
The #1 Echo does what I need it to and nothing else. It's simple, sounds basically the same coming in and going out, just adds some delay. I use it for a slap-back type delay in conjunction with the Holy Grail for a spacey jam we do.
The Holy Grail is great as long as you leave it on the spring setting. The Hall setting has tons of artifacts and I just can't find a use for flerb as fun as it is to screw around with. In spring mode it adds a splash of reverb, provided you keep it below 12 o'clock. Anything higher than that isn't really usable to me. Right around 10 o'clock it adds just the right amount of reverb for my purposes without any goofy artifacts.
I also keep a Radial JDI in the case as a backup in the result of an amp failure or if I'm on a stage where it makes more sense to go ampless. I had it on the board and in the signal path, but things were getting too crowded in the top row so I pulled it off. I'm getting new patch cables tomorrow. I'll see if I can make it work on the board once those are in place.
There ya go. Thanks for reading about my first pedal board.
