Well...
There was no gig at a local venue last night and I'm friendly with the soundman so I took the Octamizer and the meat box along with my rig to the venue to test these out through a real PA with subs. The venues subs are mental, we've played there before and the low end is devastating. They roll off very little until you hit 20Hz....
I've been singing the Octamizers praise for a while for the sub duty (in honesty I'm not a fan of it as a regular octave pedal, but love the sub) and have used it in the past at this venue so we knew what to expect. MASSIVE. Real thump in the ribs and throat. At full on volume from the PA it's uncomfortably low. I love it, the soundman loves it.
Onto the Meatbox. OK, firstly the thump is now in the stomach. Through a GOOD bass rig you can hear the MB is a little lower in it's core sound that the Aggies with that filter rolled back, but through a PA it has a HUGE hump around 30Hz with a Q that makes it reach frequencies much lower. This makes the venue move more. No doubt about it, your feet start to tingle a little it's that low.
BUT - and there is a but here, the Octamizer's frequencies can be heard better. The pay off for room movement is small - It shakes the place, but the fact of the matter is that the frequency response of the Octamizer is not only a little more musical, the way that it 'hits you' from a PA like that makes you 'feel' as though it's more sub and having a bigger effect on you.
The Aggie also has the added bonus that it tracks better, over lower notes and doe snot distort as the MB does on lower notes. Man behind the desk agrees they are both brutal and was pretty surprised by how low the MB goes for such an old bit of kit. If he could own one and only one to drive his venue subs he'd pick the Octamizer. As a primary sub tone - I'd pick the Octamizer too!
Interestingly we tried these not only direct to the PA routed to the subs, but also through the DI of my Genz amp head and a really decent bass responsive mic on the cab to test the 'you really need a PA sub to get the most out of this' - To my ear, and the ear of the sound man there was VERY little difference. The mic had a tiny loss of floor shaking, which is likely the response of the mic as opposed to the cab, but the DI was amazing... a good nod for Genz DI's! Also worth noting that any venue worth it's weight that has high powered subs also has the required power, EQ and filtering to drive them amazingly without you needing to bring your own pedal to do it for them (with the exceptions of on/off dynamics).
I'm rebuilding my board over the coming weeks and hope to get both pedals on there so the MB is available for single 'sub blast' moments on those few resonant notes it really loves and in smaller venues without PA support. If I can only fit one then it will be the Aggie without a doubt as the MB can't track low enough and stay smooth and clean.
PS... Ste - I'm interested to hear your experience when you put it against some serious PA action. If you make it over to our studio as you expressed you might soon I'll show you the different effects side by side but I think you'll agree that the differences are very slight.
I guess street cred aware goes to the MB though....
Shep
