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Catalinbread Teaser Stallion Review

xan

xan

Sep 10, 2004
865
1
42
Perth, Australia
#1
So I finally got it! Here is a quick review based on first impressions and about an hours worth of playing.

First off let me say this is the first pedal I have played straight out of the box for an hour. This is a pretty good noise making machine with the bonus of a decent distortion sound.

First Impression:

Came well wrapped and in a Catalinbread box. This thing is tiny (which is good for those of you without a lot of spare space on your board). Its practically the same size as a grey korg guitar/bass tuner... roughly the same size as a DOD 250 but slightly narrower. Bear in mind the TS has 4 pots, 2 LEDs, and two stomps. This thing is very well contructed. It has great, smooth but tight pots, switchcraft jacks, and the LEDs are a spooky green. Has nice graphics to boot, feels solid as a rock. Takes a standard boss 9v adapter.

How does it sound?

Distortion channel

Well the distortion channel is surprisingly good. This IS a guitar pedal, but it retains a fair bit of low end especially at lower distortion levels. I would equate the the bass retention to the DOD 250 (another factor here is that my amp is broken and i was forced to test this on my old peavey which pretty much sucks). The interesting thing about the distortion is that its pretty unique as far as i know. It sounds gritty and yet smooth, and oddly, depending on playing dynamics, seems to have a compression type squishy sound. With my active ibanez sr400 it sounded very throaty and sounded like a very faint envelope filter! I dont know, maybe i was hearing things, but this is a very unique pedal. The manual says this channel is good for subtle OD or blistering gain.. i would agree with that though i didnt like the higher distortion settings that much on bass.

Chaos Channel

This is where it really gets fun, it oscillates like crazy. The problem, as you might assume, is cutting through the feedback. Still, this channel is fun.. it can really give you that Matt Bellamy of Muse musical feedback. It gets really synthy. It gets lofi, it breaks up, squeals, distorts... it also makes some spooky sounds, reverb, and seems to echo at times. How does it do all that? Its really sensitive to the tone/volume pots and pickup switches on your bass... the really cool synthy sounds come from rotating the distortion and feedback pots on the pedal itself. I would love to have this thing built into my bass (or a TIP 3rd hand). As i said before, it can be hard to cut through the oscillation with the bass, but at certain settings, the bass does cut through with more clarity.

Other comments:

Surprisingly, the pedal isnt hard to learn, a few minutes playing with the pots and you can pretty easily figure out whats going on. The learning curve will really be more about finding settings you like and remembering which pot/switch on ur bass has what effect on the sound. The TS in chaos mode is really going to be more useful in intros and outros and maybe in some kind of crazy bass solo. Customer support from Catalinbread is good... I have been in contact with Nicholas there for months before I purchased it.

It seems to work just as well with active as passive basses.

All in all I am happy for this purchase, it is going to provide hours of interesting noise making. I am going to try running it before and after an aphex bass exciter to see if it leads to better bass retention. I shall post some clips in a few days when I get back from my holiday. Please feel free to ask any questions!

Cheers

Mike
 
#3
Finally, I though you were never gonna get this.

I have one question and one question alone.

Is it worth getting if you have:

Zoom Ultra Fuzz
Really Good Bass Overdrive
Custom 2 Channel Dist box
Prunes and Custard
MXR M-80

(I'm taking the French Toast and SB-7 off)

Does it do anything those 5 Boxes don't, if so I might look into getting one, but it will have to be pretty damn good I wanted a dd-20 to be honest but another dirt box won't hurt, will it?

Ok suppose I have one more question.

Does it make you wanna jump up the neck and pretend to be a lead guitarist or does it make you wanna create low down rumbling groove laded dirt?

Cheers

And send me some sound clips before you go on holiday :D
 
#5
heh believe me i thought it was never going to arrive!

i really need to give this thing a go with a better amp (albeit a behringer) before i advise you on whether or not to get it. further, i imagine that the p&c would be the closest comparison, but i havent played the p&c...

but heres what i think anyway:

1. it really does get pretty high pitched when you play high up the neck, especially when your playing with ur tone knobs. its quite unpredictable, but there are certain sweet spots, such as turning your master volume to just about zero makes it oscillate like crazy... it really is very sensitive to the impedence of your instrument and playing with the pots on the pedal has a big effect on the sound, it changes the pitch of the feedback.

2. the rumbling groove: well i cant say that i hit that. as its a guitar pedal the bass does lack slightly especially in chaos mode. i need some more time to play around with it and check out the lowend a bit more.. i imagine that using something like an aphex bass exciter will make the bass stand out more clearly (i briefly tried this and it did seem to have a positive effect but my adaptor hums too much for a fair test).

i feel that the p&c probably gives you more a of a synthy distortion tone, let me be clear that when you hit the chaos switch, you really do enter noisemaking mode and from then on, at least for me, the first urge is to sustain some notes and start turning pots.

hope this helps.

PS - i will post some clips when I get back (sunday - sorry man i leave in the morning and i think my parents would complain if i struck a chord right now!), assuming that my computer soundcard can handle it.
 
#8
Righto time for some sound clips!

First some important notes:

1. in the mp3s you will hear an intermitent clicking, this is not due to the pedal but the conversion from wav to mp3 - these are not in the original wav files

2. sometimes when i kick the pedal on you can hear a volume spike. i assure you this doesnt happen when plugged into an amp, only when its plugged into the pc, not sure why.

3. there is some hissing also, again, a result of the recording equipment rather than a flaw in the pedal.

4. finally, please be careful with your volume when listening. some start out low but finish high and i wouldnt want anyone to blow a speaker or an eardrum or something!

CLIPS:

1. Clean then a more subtle distortion kicked on. An aphex bass exciter is run after the teaser stallion. Played on an active ibanez with mids cut. Link Removed

2. Same as above but without the aphex bass exciter. Link Removed

3. Distortion/fuzzy setting played on an active ibanez with treble cut. Theres a small bit at the end where treble is raised. Link Removed

4. Clean then distortion then chaos. Mids slightly boosted. Chaos channel kicked on about halfway through and played high on the neck, gives a nice synthy lo-fi sound. Link Removed

5. Clean then a crunchy distortion then brief chaos where feedback and distortion pots on TS are played with. Link Removed

6. Crunchy distortion then a droning/washing chaos. tone control turned up on TS, gives a nice sci-fi tone then feedback played with. Link Removed

**note, some of the clipping in this mp3 is caused by the pc soundcard not the TS.

7. chords played with subtle overdrive then chaos kicked on. nice feedback and synthy sound at the end. Link Removed

8. subtle OD then really nice throaty/chorusy chaos, finishes with a some droning feedback. Link Removed

9. clean then lo-fi feedback chaos. most of the sound is controlled by the tone pots and pickup selector on a passive eastwood airline with EMG style pickups. Link Removed

10. subtle OD then scratchy chaos feedback. again, most control here was done by playing with the tone knobs on the passive eastwood airline bass.Link Removed

In all, theres really just a lot of noisemaking here. the distortion isnt too bad, but it does sound a bit different through my amp. i wasnt able to get as much of the squishy distortion sound as i can on the amp. still, this pedal is so sensitive to dynamics and interactions between feedback/distortion/tone that it can make a vast array of sounds (though it might not seem like it in the clips due to my amateur playing!). Enjoy!
 

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