Tone. At Home.
What do I think about a piece of new (to me) gear at first? We all know first impressions don’t last, but at least this way I can look back and see how my opinion has changed from when I first tried something.
Here’s something you don’t see every day. I recently picked up a second-hand Manticore v2, and spent a full week with it on the practice board at home.
How did I get on with it? Read on to find out.
Last week of August 2020, I bought myself one of Squier’s limited-run Esquire guitars (think single-pickup Telecaster), and I’ve been having a right blast with it.
It might be a cheap and cheerful guitar, but it’ll comfortably hang with anything out of the Fender USA factory line-up.
Continue reading “First Impressions: Squier Esquire in Butterscotch Blonde”
Earlier this week, I bought an MXR 10-band EQ pedal, and finally, the heatwave has abated enough for me to feel comfortable about having an amp on for a few hours.
How have I gotten on with it? Is it an upgrade over the Boss GE-7 that I’ve been using for the last year? Here’s my first impressions.
Continue reading “First Impressions: MXR 10-band EQ Pedal”Long-time readers might well remember me raving over a pedal I called the Little Pink Wonder (LPW for short) over on my personal Twitter feed. (As far as I know, it doesn’t have an official name). That’s a high-quality clone of a boutique boost pedal, and the clone is made by a local pedal builder and sold directly on eBay UK.
Ever since I bought the LPW, I’ve kept an eye out for his stuff on eBay, and tried to win as many of his pedals as possible. Well, except for the fuzz pedals, because fuzz isn’t my thing, and traditional fuzz pedals don’t go well with the dirty power supply we have here in the Welsh valleys.
The Champ Drive is the latest of his pedals that I picked up. From the name and control layout, I was expecting a Lovepedal Champ clone. How did I get on with it? Read on for my First Impressions.
Continue reading “First Impressions: Websmufer’s Champ Drive Pedal”Recently, I picked up a second-hand Lovepedal 5e3 Deluxe.
What did I think of it? Read on for my First Impressions.
Continue reading “First Impressions: Lovepedal 5e3 Deluxe”Recently, I bought a Lovepedal High-Powered Tweed Twin (HPTT for short) from the second-hand market.
What do I think of it? Here’s my First Impressions.
Continue reading “First Impressions: Lovepedal High Power Tweed Twin (HPTT) Overdrive Pedal”Thanks to its association with That Pedal Show, the Keeley Electronics D&M Drive has to be one of the most well-known drive pedals to launch in recent years.
I’ve finally taken the plunge and bought myself one. What do I think of it? Here’s my first impressions of this award-winning pedal.
Continue reading “First Impressions: Keeley D&M Drive”Back in May 2020, my pre-ordered Mythos Lark drive pedal arrived. It’s been on the practice board most of the time since then, sharing time with various other tweed-tone pedals that I’ve been looking at.
How has it gotten on? Here’s my First Impressions of this drive pedal. It’s a bit of a long read …
Continue reading “First Impressions: Mythos Pedals’ Lark (Rhett Shull Signature) Overdrive Pedal”The thing I hate most about digital recording? Latency. Even though I’m about as far away from a technically-accomplished player as you can get, I really struggle with coping with latency when I’m recording with Reaper. It’s the main reason that I bought my first UAD Apollo interface back in 2016.
So when Universal Audio announced LUNA, and made a huge song-and-dance about how it enables recording with virtually zero latency, I had to try it.
That was at the end of April 2020. I’ve been using it on-and-off throughout May, and scribbling down notes as I went along.
When you read this, please remember that it’s perfectly possible that some of these points may have been addressed in more recent releases of LUNA. UAD seem to be doing a great job of getting regular updates out for users.
That kinda hints that I ran into a lot of pain points with LUNA …
Continue reading “First Impressions: Universal Audio’s LUNA DAW”Above all others, there’s one tweed-tone pedal that I haven’t yet tried. It might not be the very first tweed-tone pedal, but it’s certainly the earliest one that I know about. It’s a pedal that’s rumoured to have graced the boards of many successful recording and touring artists.
And finally, after years of watching them go for very high prices, I finally won one on eBay. Was it worth the wait? Or will it remain forever in the shadow of my beloved SHOD?
Continue reading “First Impressions: Boss FBM-1 Fender 59 Bassman Overdrive Pedal”