Brooklyn Stompbox Exhibit - impressions

Spent about 4 hours this afternoon at the brooklyn stompbox exhibit. It was pretty excellent. Essentially, a fairly sizeable space (for brooklyn) packed with tables filled with pedals and headphones and a bunch of people walking around with guitars and basses strapped to their bodies. For those without an instrument, guitars were available at most spots to just go and plug in, but at times those folks were left waiting while the ones with their own axes could plug in to pretty much anything at any time. Twice, I had to wait to plug in at a station and both times, there was something interesting nearby to try out while I waited. There were also synths...they were kind of separated, but along the fringes, pedal makers and synths were mixed together (I didn't notice eventide was there til I was walking out and everyone was packing up).

In any event, it kinda looked like this:


It was pretty much heaven for me. Getting to plug in and spend what felt like no pressure amount of time with pedals that aren't readily available was pretty phenomenal. I had a bunch of things I wanted to check out and although I didn't get to really know everything I wanted to, I got to spend some alone time with everything on my list and twiddle knobs. You can only uncover so much with many of the more complex pedals in such short time periods, but it was enough to fall in love with some things I wasn't so sure about and get a feel for sound quality and basic functions.

1st on the list, was something I had pretty much written off as being way beyond what I would want to delve into, but Zoia blew my mind. Just scrolling through the patches and seeing the device in person and pushing some of the buttons and hearing the range was mind blowing. I don't know if this is the kind of pedal I would get and put on my board though. Definitely a pedal I want, but I feel like I'd want to keep it off my board and play with it on it's own as opposed to a tool in my arsenal. It kinda feels like if I got a little synth...I wouldn't bring it out to jam, but I'd use it at home all the time.



Fairfield Circuitry wasn't there, but they sent a board that was situated between chase audio and empress so I had to explore. The Accountant sounds killer...really a tone enhancer, I was able to get sounds I loved out of it, but it seems to be built more for folks who like that vintage buzz more than I do, but still sounded great. Randy's Revenge sold me. One of the best sounding ring mods I've heard. There was no expression pedal, but twiddling the knobs was sonic mayhem and to be able to control that at my feet would be amazing. It was cool to try Meet Maude which sounded great and I really dug the unpleasant surprise. There were 2 others..one was a light overdrive and the other wasn't doing much of anything.



I tried checking out some chase bliss, but these pedals can't really be explored in a matter of minutes. They all sounded lush, but it wasn't the right setting to dig in on them. I tried to get a guided tour of Thermae while playing and some crazy sounds were to be had, but it just wasn't the right way to explore those pedals.



I thought I snapped some pictures of the Meris stuff as well as Red Panda, but apparently I did not. I went to the show so I could try the Hedra. It did not disappoint but it was a bit overshadowed by the ottobit jr to me. I had never tried one in person and it kinda blew me away. Enzo was also cool to try and I dug the reverb too, but ottobit jr stole the show for me. I still want a Hedra, but the ottobit was easy to get amazing sounds out of without sitting with a manual.


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Getting a chance to plug into the full strymon line in person was also a revelation. I had been considering a Mobius as a all in one modulation solution and those devices did not disappoint. I went into the show feeling that modulation wasn't practical for me, but after checking out the mobius, I may be back on that train. El Capistan was incredible too as were all of the strymon pedals.




EHX brought out a bunch of stuff as well. Nothing blew my mind, but it was cool to try some of those again that I hadn't tried in a while. Forgot how good the Q Tron sounds. It was also cool to have all the muffs side by side to try. They had broken things out into a bass board, a synth board, and a guitar board. I wasn't too impressed with the new bass synth. It sounded good and tracked fine but it felt like the sounds were very stock and overdone already.




Earthquaker was also there with a bunch of great stuff. Was great to plug into a rainbow machine in person...yep...want one! Also great to try the delays side by side as well as the organizer, pyramids (whoa that is an amazing flanger), arpenoid, and a bunch of others I had been curious about.



Tech21 was there and got to try the dUG flyboard as well as the new geddy lee pedal!

distortion was heavy on it, but I thought it sounded amazing with the drive pretty low. REALLY catches that modern geddy vibe and just sounded big and ballsy...




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Other notables were JHS...I was very impressed with the whole line, especially the bonzai and the delays.



and JAM pedals was a big highlight that I stumbled on at the very end. All of their pedals sounded phenomenal, but I really liked how they had a muff, a rat, and tube screamer on the board. All were fantastic and it was really fun to toggle back and forth to hear the nuances of distortion circuits. They all have their charm. That and the phaser and modulation pedals were very impressive as well.





another nice little surprise was this light sensitive delay...the distortions were solid as well but the light delay got all sorts of whacky sounds. I thought I took a picture of the builder's name, but seems like a bunch of pictures I thought I took I did not. I think they were called shadow something or other.




I LOVED this bit reactor from RPS...


...and it was fun to plug into walrus stuff for the first time. I dug their modulation pedals.



beyond that, I spent some time asking questions about MIDI setups and explored a bunch of other pedals. There was an MXR setup that had the new vintage bass octave. I thought it tracked fine but wasn't wild about the tone. Didn't seem very OC-2ish to me. The mini carbon copy is dope. I got to check out stuff from Two Notes, Keeley, and a bunch of others that are slipping my mind now, but definitely spent a good amount of time with Meris and Red Panda.

All in all, a very worthwhile way to spend a few hours for a pedal tweaker like myself.q

 

It was some space I had never been to a few blocks from brooklyn steel. Lytehouse studio - Brooklyn Stompbox Exhibit & Synth Expo 2019

 

That light sensitive delay was from a company called floating forest pedals

 

It was hot and sticky...yeah, but you got over it quickly. I was a bit skeeved watching some super sweaty people take headphones off and then pass them to the next sweaty person.

My bigger issue wasn't that it was urban, summer heat, and no AC...it was showing up after sitting in traffic for an hour eager to use the restroom only to be told there was none and good luck finding one in the area.

 

Did you go? What are you looking for? I tried at least 50 different pedals...many I had no awareness of before the fest. Definitely gonna snag an ottobit and hedra

 

Ah ok. Fuzz is a vast canvas to explore but Ive found that it mostly breaks down to variations on a few big themes - muff, tube screamer, rat, klon, and others that slip my mind.

Reverb to me was much simpler. For bass I found that if you want reverb to work you need to have a blend/mix or LPF or some kind of control to tame the bottom. Iron ether was amazing, but too much for me, I needed one sound so I got a HoF mini and customized a preset I liked. The iron ether nimbus w the exp switch is super amazing as are the strymons but it depends on how many flavors and tweak-ability you need.

 

Tons of pictures and stuff here - Stompbox Exhibit + Delicious Audio