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Gear Tips
Mark Sullivan's Guitar Page - May 2008
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 Welcome to Mark’s guitar page for April.
This month at Daddy’s we are featuring Boss and Roland products. That gives me some ground to cover seeing how prolific Boss has been in offering us guitarists a rainbow of tonal colors cleverly disguised in little boxes. So let’s look at some favorites new and old.
Boss SL-20 Slicer
The newest member of the Boss family may be the farthest departure from what we think of as a guitar effects pedal. The Slicer features 50 patterns that chop-up your input signal into rhythmic grooves. You can set the time via the right tap-tempo button or sync it to midi clock. With separate level controls for Effect and Direct signal you can let it completely take over your sound or have it pulsate in the background. The attack and shape/duration of the slices are adjustable so 50 patterns is really just a starting number because these knobs can change the feel of each of them almost infinitely. Better yet any of the 4-knobs that I just mentioned can be selected for external pedal control. Changing the attack shape in real time with your foot while playing is much more dynamic than any Wah pedal could offer. Add to that multiple stereo panning modes and the motion can get intoxicating. They also included a looper so you can capture all the action. This is a very cool and creatively inspirational pedal for anyone to have. If you are playing in electronic music genres, it may become the new minimum standard.
The Boss RT-20 Rotary Ensemble
- Separate Slow and Fast speed controls.
- 4 Rotary Modes (including Univibe model)
- Adjustable Ramp speed
- Overdrive level control
- Brake function
- Expression pedal input
- Stereo or Mono I/O
This may be the coolest sounding modulation pedal on the market. In stereo the space it provides is so dramatic you may never turn it off.
I admit that just having the rotating virtual rotor color display spinning under my feet is worth the price alone. Everyone is just drawn to it. And how can that be a bad thing?
Boss RC-50 Loop Station
Touted by Boss as the ultimate looper pedal. And it would be hard to refute their claim.
The mad scientists at Boss have obviously decided to throw down the gauntlet to their competitors and put every thing in one pedal. This is for the hardcore looping musician. Because after you incorporate loops as a part of your playing style, how can just one loop at a time satisfy? I carry up to 5 loopers to some gigs. And it can be very expressive to have loops at different points of the signal chain but they all perform their tasks isolated from each other. And only a couple of the now defunct rack loopers can sync to midi clock. To have the ability to have 3 loopers in one box that can be started in time sync and accept an external midi clock so they can sync to other players, samples or video is a gigantic leap for this genre. Some of the most impressive features of the RC-50 include the following.
- 3 Stereo synced loops
- Midi sync to external or internal clock
- 49 minutes total record time
- USB import/export of loops as WAV files
- 379 pattern rhythm guide
- Real-time control of playback speed
The Boss TU-2 Tuner pedal may just be the best thing you can put under your feet. Being in proper tune can never be over stated. If you change tunings between songs, this will be your new best friend. The ability to mute the signal for silent tuning is huge. And in chromatic mode it easily reads a low B on bass up to and well beyond any guitar tuning. If you only own one pedal, this should be it.
The Boss Loop Station has a two-button layout. The left button starts record on the first tap. Another tap ends the loop and puts the unit into play. A third tap puts the loop in overdub mode. The right button is to stop the loop. A jack is provided on the back for an optional reverse switch or you can access the function from a switch on the front panel. The unit has a non-recorded click guide adjustable by a tap tempo switch. Like most samplers record start can be triggered by input level so you don’t have worry about stepping on the record button in time. The big feature in the Loop Station is the 11 storable loop locations. You can record multiple loops and save them for play back and editing later. The tap tempo allows you to perform what they call real time tempo change. With this feature you can change the timing of the loop without changing pitch. The original RC-20 featured 5-1/2 minutes of looping capacity. With the release of the RC-20XL they have increased the available recording time to 16 minutes! The RC-20XL is a dedicated looper/sampler and not a multi function pedal. But with the ability to record 4-5 full-length songs into memory why don’t you already own one?
The DD-20 is not a looping delay but rather all the other delay functions you’ve ever seen and a couple more that are unique to this pedal. The unit has 11 different delay type modes including sound-on-sound recording. Delay time can be dialed up very quickly and precise with the time advance knob and large LCD display. Or delay time can be set with tap tempo. That number that you see in the display is correct, maximum delay time is a whopping 23 seconds. Four assignable memory locations allow you to step through you favorite settings. If you want to have a powerful delay pedal in your arsenal and sound-on-sound style looping satisfies your needs, you should already own this pedal.
From Boss comes a modeling remake of the Roland RE201 Space Echo. Possibly their most important tone device aside from the original Boss CE-1 Chorus/Vibrato which is the major component of the JC120 Jazz Chorus amplifier. The RE201 when released in 1974 was an update on the Echoplex Tape Echo. The Roland unit was built a bit more road worthy and a lot more flexible than the Echoplex. It had a built in spring reverb unit And a 12 position dial to call up different combinations of playback options concerning which of the three playback heads were active with or without reverb or reverb alone. The tape could be replaced with a spliced loop instead of the always hard to obtain replacement cartridges of the Echoplex. But as my last experience reloading a RE201 from a bulk reel is recollected, I never want to do that again. The Boss RE-20 pedal reissue of the Space Echo includes all the vital controls and tone of the original in a convenient dual pedal casing. Sorry, there is no actual tape to wear out and replace. But the new pedal adds features that could never have existed on a linear format such as tape. It has a tap tempo switch that by two taps sets the time delay to the first active playback head. Remember there are three virtual playback heads set at equal intervals from the first heads time delay. And there are 11 different combinations of delays in combination with the reverb unit. Well that should be enough to satisfy most echo junkies but it doesn’t end there. With the addition of an optional Boss EV-5 expression pedal you can select to control one of the following parameters. Repeat Rate (time) Intensity (number of repeats up to and including run-away oscillations), Echo Level (the volume of the repeats, only controllable by pedal) this allows for a manually controlled ducking effect by being able to vary the mix in real time, and control of the Twist function which is a combination effect of saturated feedback oscillations and time pitch shifting. Just to give you some visual pleasure and feedback of the current settings there is of course a blinking in tempo tap led and a ‘virtual tape display’ light bar which moves at the speed of the ‘tape’. My only concern is if I can fit two of them on my pedalboard.
The warm weather is finally here. It’s time to take the music outside. For that you need a battery-powered amplifier. The Roland MicroCube is now a whole series of amps. I never leave home without one. (No, really I leave one in my trunk for a backup or for going straight to the board.) If you haven’t played one of these little critters, run, don’t walk to your nearest Daddys and try one out today.
As always I can be reached at Daddy’s Boston store 617-247-0909
Or at msullivan@daddys.com
Mark Sullivan is a well known New England guitarist, composer, recording artist and gigging musician. Mark is also Sales Manager of our flagship Boston, MA location.
Mark brings to Daddy's an incredible wealth of product knowledge, especially in the guitar, guitar amplifier, and effects areas. He truly is an "expert" in these areas.
You can contact Mark at 617.247.0909 or visit him at our Boston location!
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