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My preamp bender: A Journal.
- Thread starter el murdoque
- Start date
Playing some more with the Studio One, I think I want to backpedal on the red knob thing. I still think it is a cork sniffer's thing, but the pedal does something I can't put my finger on.
Both the Q\Strip and the Colour Box had a very similar set of features, to an extend even the Trickfish Minnow could be mentioned. All these pedals sounded somewhat bland to my ears and felt kind of boring.
All of them could provide a "good" sound with minimal effort, but the feeling bit was kind of numb and it was just that: Good.
I had it marked down to the fact that all these devices sound very transparent when set to flat - but the Studio One is capable of that feat, too. I am at a loss at why the Studio One sounds and feels so much better, but it does.
Yesterday I played my Bongo into the mini board (it's a Limited Edition Bongo 6 with single humbucker and 3 band EQ, think of it more as a Stingray than an actual Bongo) and raised the LPF very far, but then used the treble knob to limit the upper range. To counteract some of it, I boosted the parametric mids in the upper region of the knob's range.
This had two effects:
1. I lost the Stingray bite in the tone, but still had a snappy tone
2. By swapping the Blackstone back for the RMI Sonic Spark, I could dial in some treble into the drive and get a sound with more treble content (that would otherwise have been eaten by the LPF) and sonic sparks by stepping on that switch.
Both the Q\Strip and the Colour Box had a very similar set of features, to an extend even the Trickfish Minnow could be mentioned. All these pedals sounded somewhat bland to my ears and felt kind of boring.
All of them could provide a "good" sound with minimal effort, but the feeling bit was kind of numb and it was just that: Good.
I had it marked down to the fact that all these devices sound very transparent when set to flat - but the Studio One is capable of that feat, too. I am at a loss at why the Studio One sounds and feels so much better, but it does.
Yesterday I played my Bongo into the mini board (it's a Limited Edition Bongo 6 with single humbucker and 3 band EQ, think of it more as a Stingray than an actual Bongo) and raised the LPF very far, but then used the treble knob to limit the upper range. To counteract some of it, I boosted the parametric mids in the upper region of the knob's range.
This had two effects:
1. I lost the Stingray bite in the tone, but still had a snappy tone
2. By swapping the Blackstone back for the RMI Sonic Spark, I could dial in some treble into the drive and get a sound with more treble content (that would otherwise have been eaten by the LPF) and sonic sparks by stepping on that switch.
As it the whole RMI/Lehle line has been discontinued I talked to Jacques Ruppert of RMI and he suggested the Cali76 Compact B.
I really like that one as well !
The small board is taking shape!
I took some time and did a much needed velcro job. Back in the day when I acquired the PT Nano, I decided to put the hook side of the velcro on the board and the fluffy side on the pedals. My reasoning was that the pedals would not stick to things when I used them off the board, but the world seems to think differently and I eventually went with the flow - buying and selling so many pedals it was a PITA to reverse the velcro all the time.
So I ripped off the velcro from the Nano's rails and applied the fluffy side, plus velcro'ing the newer pedals that came without.
And the reverb of my choice arrived. It was actually easy. I'm a die hard Strymon fanboy when it comes to reverb.
My big board has a BigSky. My medium board has a BlueSky. The Nano is too small for a BlueSky. So the choice was obvious:
To be honest, I wanted a Cloudburst ever since I saw the first preview/demo on the Anderton's channel.
All I need to accommodate with the rest of the real estate is a tuner and a second switch to get the Cloudburts' "Favorite" option - but I think I have that figured out - the stuff should arrive later that week.
Playing around with that board as is, I found myself delighted. I can squeeze a lot of function from these few pedals, and the interactions between pedals are simple enough so I can quickly and easily turn some knobs to go for the sound I need.
No fragile equilibrium that has to be reached by carefully balancing gain stages of different pedal chains.
Simplicity can be blissful!
I took some time and did a much needed velcro job. Back in the day when I acquired the PT Nano, I decided to put the hook side of the velcro on the board and the fluffy side on the pedals. My reasoning was that the pedals would not stick to things when I used them off the board, but the world seems to think differently and I eventually went with the flow - buying and selling so many pedals it was a PITA to reverse the velcro all the time.
So I ripped off the velcro from the Nano's rails and applied the fluffy side, plus velcro'ing the newer pedals that came without.
And the reverb of my choice arrived. It was actually easy. I'm a die hard Strymon fanboy when it comes to reverb.
My big board has a BigSky. My medium board has a BlueSky. The Nano is too small for a BlueSky. So the choice was obvious:
To be honest, I wanted a Cloudburst ever since I saw the first preview/demo on the Anderton's channel.
All I need to accommodate with the rest of the real estate is a tuner and a second switch to get the Cloudburts' "Favorite" option - but I think I have that figured out - the stuff should arrive later that week.
Playing around with that board as is, I found myself delighted. I can squeeze a lot of function from these few pedals, and the interactions between pedals are simple enough so I can quickly and easily turn some knobs to go for the sound I need.
No fragile equilibrium that has to be reached by carefully balancing gain stages of different pedal chains.
Simplicity can be blissful!
Does Strymon make reverb/delay pedal? I've never seen one but I'm far being on top of their offerings
El Capistan and Volante are delay pedals that have a spring reverb built in, but they have not done something that is half BigSky and half TimeLine.
I suppose it'd hurt sales figures of the dedicated pedals . . .
I know reverbs are not the most popular pedals on TB - and I have a hard time accepting that.
As I mentioned multiple times, I use reverb for two things - to play bass with a big wash of ambient reverb that sounds like playing in a cathedral that was built in a cave. I can understand that this is not everyone's cup of tea. But the second use, as an always on device with just the barest hint of reverb to give you the feeling to play in a medium to large room is something valuable, especially in a setup for IEM. It makes the bass sound less dry and more roomy.
However, Cloudburst:
I've watched the Strymon in-depth video and they did not touch all the subjects that interested me. The manual provided with the pedal did not, either - but the PDF you can download finally did.
Here's a quick run down of the more or less obscure things.
Mix: Does what it says, but the 50:50 position is not at 12 o'clock, but somewhere around 3.
Decay: Does not only control how long your trails are going to be, but also influences the kind of reverb you're getting. At short settings it's a smaller room, increasing in size when you turn up. Around noon, you're getting a modified version of the Cloud algorithm from Big Sky.
Mod: Adds a shimmery warble from CCW to noon, the effect does not get stronger from here, but increases speed.
Pre Delay and Tone work as expected.
Then there are the hidden options you can access when holding down the foot switch while powering up the pedal, two of which I would have liked to know about beforehand:
1. You can select how your dry signal is treated.
The three choices are Digital dry signal, Analog dry path and dry kill - the latter only makes sense when you use it in a parallel FX loop.
All of the info I gathered about the Pedal never mentioned if there is an analog dry path and I was glad finding it.
2. The added string ensemble has a switch selecting between off - medium - strong. The medium setting can actually be adjusted seamlessly. It actually sounds very nice when you have only a hint of the string ensemble in the background.
Armed with this knowledge, it was actually quite easy to find my two go-to settings.
Now I have to wait for the Fav switch to arrive. I'm glad third party products are available for that, by the way.
Thomann asks €75 for the Strymon version, which I consider nothing short of daylight robbery.
As I mentioned multiple times, I use reverb for two things - to play bass with a big wash of ambient reverb that sounds like playing in a cathedral that was built in a cave. I can understand that this is not everyone's cup of tea. But the second use, as an always on device with just the barest hint of reverb to give you the feeling to play in a medium to large room is something valuable, especially in a setup for IEM. It makes the bass sound less dry and more roomy.
However, Cloudburst:
I've watched the Strymon in-depth video and they did not touch all the subjects that interested me. The manual provided with the pedal did not, either - but the PDF you can download finally did.
Here's a quick run down of the more or less obscure things.
Mix: Does what it says, but the 50:50 position is not at 12 o'clock, but somewhere around 3.
Decay: Does not only control how long your trails are going to be, but also influences the kind of reverb you're getting. At short settings it's a smaller room, increasing in size when you turn up. Around noon, you're getting a modified version of the Cloud algorithm from Big Sky.
Mod: Adds a shimmery warble from CCW to noon, the effect does not get stronger from here, but increases speed.
Pre Delay and Tone work as expected.
Then there are the hidden options you can access when holding down the foot switch while powering up the pedal, two of which I would have liked to know about beforehand:
1. You can select how your dry signal is treated.
The three choices are Digital dry signal, Analog dry path and dry kill - the latter only makes sense when you use it in a parallel FX loop.
All of the info I gathered about the Pedal never mentioned if there is an analog dry path and I was glad finding it.
2. The added string ensemble has a switch selecting between off - medium - strong. The medium setting can actually be adjusted seamlessly. It actually sounds very nice when you have only a hint of the string ensemble in the background.
Armed with this knowledge, it was actually quite easy to find my two go-to settings.
Now I have to wait for the Fav switch to arrive. I'm glad third party products are available for that, by the way.
Thomann asks €75 for the Strymon version, which I consider nothing short of daylight robbery.
as a colourbox v2 owner I did not want to read that Broughton unobtainium may be better. I mean ideally ild have a hellborg preamp in pedalboard format … but…
if you guys really want a neve preamp, just get this
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multiple ins and outs options. and even the the 1/4" out on the back says trs, you can use a regular guitar cable as your out into your amp
[This invalid link has been removed]
multiple ins and outs options. and even the the 1/4" out on the back says trs, you can use a regular guitar cable as your out into your amp
I love it. Two transformers so even off it’s doing something nice to your tone, it does that thing where everything seems to hold together better, quite powerful but not surgical eq - I run it at the end of my chain.
negatives would be a HPF that doesn’t go low enough for bass, and gain staging designed for fuzzy guitar - so it feels sometimes you are fighting to keep it clean.
overall I like it a lot. Ild like to try a studio one, but I wouldn’t trade them blind as I’ve not heard the s1 and would be surprised if I prefered it - if that makes sense
If you're very lucky, the S1 is a lot cheaper than the Colour Box v2. Even the used ones go for more than the S1 retail price. The obvious problem is that the used S1's are nowhere near the retail price, but a lot more expensive.
I've had the same impression about the gain stages - I felt there was a slim area where the transformer magic bled in, but there was no audible distortion.
In my personal case, throwing a low B from worn flats at it, it felt a bit like a tightrope ride, with too narrow a margin between adding something and having too much of it.
S1 does a much better job of it, the gain of the red knob feels much more robust when throwing low frequencies at it. The point where audible distortion vanishes and the point where it sounds sterile are far apart - on the Colour Box it felt like 0.001 on the scale was the sweet spot. And I could not bend my mind about the three gain options.
I've had the same impression about the gain stages - I felt there was a slim area where the transformer magic bled in, but there was no audible distortion.
In my personal case, throwing a low B from worn flats at it, it felt a bit like a tightrope ride, with too narrow a margin between adding something and having too much of it.
S1 does a much better job of it, the gain of the red knob feels much more robust when throwing low frequencies at it. The point where audible distortion vanishes and the point where it sounds sterile are far apart - on the Colour Box it felt like 0.001 on the scale was the sweet spot. And I could not bend my mind about the three gain options.
yeah I've not quite worked out how the three knobs interact properly - it just sounds nice. For me the transformer in the chain with it off is good enough. The downside is I really have to keep gain staging in the pedals before it under control!
I fed some pink noise in mine and did some eq curves - the mid and treble behave exactly how you would expect but the bass is something like +- 24dB or something crazy!
Transformers are weird!
That Audio Kitchen The Small Trees DI that I had borrowed a while was the same. With the pedal off, it was just a transformer driven DI box and the sound I got out of it was clear as crystal, somewhat baffling. I actually preferred that to the tube driven sound, but keeping a $500 tube pedal as an always-off pedal feels a bit weird ;-)
That Audio Kitchen The Small Trees DI that I had borrowed a while was the same. With the pedal off, it was just a transformer driven DI box and the sound I got out of it was clear as crystal, somewhat baffling. I actually preferred that to the tube driven sound, but keeping a $500 tube pedal as an always-off pedal feels a bit weird ;-)
which is annoying right - my fave preamp I stupidly sold was the Warwick hellborg one - it was lovely… but I liked it with the eq off, and the preamp bit was a Uber clean design (not neve etc) - so the tone was all in the transformers…. I tried the early API tranzformer and that transformer and circuit I didn’t like ….
So somewhere out there there’s the knowledge of the (high end) transformers that will sound amazing and most of my pedals and preamps can be replaced by something with them in…
The last bit arrived today and I was able to finish the Nano Project:
To the right, you see the latest additions, a Korg Pitchblack XS tuner and a DS Customs Fav switch (does the same as the Strymon switch, but costs half of it and has the input jack in a more convenient orientation)
This, indeed, is a "finished" pedalboard.
The only thing on there that has a standard sized enclosure is the Broughton Studio One - and I doubt that I'm gonna replace that, because I basically built the entire board around that pedal.
The others would be hard to swap out because I completely maxed out the Pedaltrain Nano with not a millimeter to spare.
To the right, you see the latest additions, a Korg Pitchblack XS tuner and a DS Customs Fav switch (does the same as the Strymon switch, but costs half of it and has the input jack in a more convenient orientation)
This, indeed, is a "finished" pedalboard.
The only thing on there that has a standard sized enclosure is the Broughton Studio One - and I doubt that I'm gonna replace that, because I basically built the entire board around that pedal.
The others would be hard to swap out because I completely maxed out the Pedaltrain Nano with not a millimeter to spare.
...when you compare it to the mock up I built on PedalPlayground
...you would have thought there'd be more room. I don't know if they changed the size of the Nano, mine is 11 years old, or if the software is not accurate enough. I left a tiny space between all the pedals and it all fit well on the app, but in reality, the Studio one has about 1mm overhang on the left, all pedals are touching and it barely fits.
...you would have thought there'd be more room. I don't know if they changed the size of the Nano, mine is 11 years old, or if the software is not accurate enough. I left a tiny space between all the pedals and it all fit well on the app, but in reality, the Studio one has about 1mm overhang on the left, all pedals are touching and it barely fits.
Board looks great! I have learned not to trust Pedal Playground fully; I did something similar with my Nano (the board hasn't changed size), and was similarly disappointed to find it didn't fit as tidily as the mock up suggested. I expect not all their enclosure sizes are completely accurate; seen some supposedly identical 125B enclosures which don't match on there before.
