Thoughts on non-DIY reverb
- Thread starter JamieJ
- Start date
Alan W
Well-known member
I’d also give a serious look at the Free the Tone AmbI Space. I had the SA bigger reverb (bad name recall, nemesis? Or maybe that’s the delay) which had tons of weird shimmer, etc. reverbs. Tons of controls available via the control interface. Sounded good to me, not great.
The FTT unit has the best plate I’ve heard (haven’t heard them all!) and really good hall and spring reverbs. The interface is strange, until you understand it, and then it’s lovely. This sounds much more like a rack unit than a pedal to me.
The FTT unit has the best plate I’ve heard (haven’t heard them all!) and really good hall and spring reverbs. The interface is strange, until you understand it, and then it’s lovely. This sounds much more like a rack unit than a pedal to me.
Feral Feline
Well-known member
I voted UA, just 'cause :
Not the best criteria to choose by, but there's my proverbial 2¢, modified to 0.0002¢ for inflation and 0.00000000000002¢ for CAD.
Since Alan W suggested waiting for a Free the Tone unit to come up on EekFlay, I'll suggest you...
... wait for an Empress.
Might be a long wait. I don't see many wanting to give up their Empress Reverb, but a Blem sale from Empress could save you shipping to the UK and you'd have a warranty.
- UA's newish to me, haven't seen/heard any demos yet
- I like Chase Bliss pedals, but not the marketing
- Source Audio would be cool, but seen/heard a lot of demos
Strymon... no, just NO. Sick to death of Strymon. (Never owned one, but several friends have had them)
Not the best criteria to choose by, but there's my proverbial 2¢, modified to 0.0002¢ for inflation and 0.00000000000002¢ for CAD.
Since Alan W suggested waiting for a Free the Tone unit to come up on EekFlay, I'll suggest you...
... wait for an Empress.
Might be a long wait. I don't see many wanting to give up their Empress Reverb, but a Blem sale from Empress could save you shipping to the UK and you'd have a warranty.
Joben Magooch
Well-known member
As in the previous thread my vote would still be the Bigsky as it's just the best of the best in my experience.
I have not played the Chase Bliss or UA yet.
Actually come to think of it, I've not had a collider either, but HAVE owned both the Nemesis and Ventris which I believe it's more or less a mashup of?
I know the UA stuff can be kind of divisive for some - I see a lot of folks with a sentiment that's something to the effect of "Why would I spend that kind of money for one preset and no midi when for the same price I could get something with midi and 256 presets and a billion different options?" And I get that for sure. I have kind of taken both approaches in my life. I see the UA pedals as being kind of like the equivalent of the chef's tasting menu at a fancy restaurant. Sometimes you want to pick every option yourself...sometimes you just want to trust the "chef" to make those choices for you and know that they'll be really, really good. I haven't specifically played the Golden reverb yet, but I've been super impressed with all the other UA pedals. It's perhaps also worth mentioning that UA has a smaller/cheaper line of pedals out now that uses some of the same algorithms as the bigger ones, albeit more limited still. "Heavenly" is three plate algos from the Golden reverb and "Evermore" is three hall algos. Both are $170 new at Sweetwater right now, don't know if that would be something to look at or not.
I'm probably repeating myself so apologies in advance.
Second choice of the above listed options would probably be the Flint. Similar to the UA it's more "limited" but it's awfully hard to get a bad sound out of. The secondary controls open up a ton of options beyond what you might expect. I would put that close to the SA as well. Like I said, haven't played the Collider specifically but I really like both the Nemesis and Ventris. Again, haven't played the CBA Dark World myself, but personally found it underwhelming from what I've seen/heard of it. Anecdotally speaking I feel like it had one of the faster "turnarounds" of many pedals I've seen recently - saw a ton of guys buying them up (cuz, CBA, to be fair) and then having a VERY short honeymoon before turning around and bailing on it. YMMV.
As for the other options mentioned: I really wanna try the FTT. I've not played their verb but all of their other pedals are fantastic. I expect it would be the same. Empress Reverb is really nice too if you can get used to the interface/layout/etc. I just saw a guy selling his on FB for $250 the other day which is a great deal IMO. Haven't played an Immerse yet, but I love the Neunaber verb sound. In fact the Neunaber stereo wet/expanse is probably my #2 most-used reverb pedal I've had behind the bigsky.
All in all we are pretty spoiled for choice these days
I have not played the Chase Bliss or UA yet.
Actually come to think of it, I've not had a collider either, but HAVE owned both the Nemesis and Ventris which I believe it's more or less a mashup of?
I know the UA stuff can be kind of divisive for some - I see a lot of folks with a sentiment that's something to the effect of "Why would I spend that kind of money for one preset and no midi when for the same price I could get something with midi and 256 presets and a billion different options?" And I get that for sure. I have kind of taken both approaches in my life. I see the UA pedals as being kind of like the equivalent of the chef's tasting menu at a fancy restaurant. Sometimes you want to pick every option yourself...sometimes you just want to trust the "chef" to make those choices for you and know that they'll be really, really good. I haven't specifically played the Golden reverb yet, but I've been super impressed with all the other UA pedals. It's perhaps also worth mentioning that UA has a smaller/cheaper line of pedals out now that uses some of the same algorithms as the bigger ones, albeit more limited still. "Heavenly" is three plate algos from the Golden reverb and "Evermore" is three hall algos. Both are $170 new at Sweetwater right now, don't know if that would be something to look at or not.
I'm probably repeating myself so apologies in advance.
Second choice of the above listed options would probably be the Flint. Similar to the UA it's more "limited" but it's awfully hard to get a bad sound out of. The secondary controls open up a ton of options beyond what you might expect. I would put that close to the SA as well. Like I said, haven't played the Collider specifically but I really like both the Nemesis and Ventris. Again, haven't played the CBA Dark World myself, but personally found it underwhelming from what I've seen/heard of it. Anecdotally speaking I feel like it had one of the faster "turnarounds" of many pedals I've seen recently - saw a ton of guys buying them up (cuz, CBA, to be fair) and then having a VERY short honeymoon before turning around and bailing on it. YMMV.
As for the other options mentioned: I really wanna try the FTT. I've not played their verb but all of their other pedals are fantastic. I expect it would be the same. Empress Reverb is really nice too if you can get used to the interface/layout/etc. I just saw a guy selling his on FB for $250 the other day which is a great deal IMO. Haven't played an Immerse yet, but I love the Neunaber verb sound. In fact the Neunaber stereo wet/expanse is probably my #2 most-used reverb pedal I've had behind the bigsky.
All in all we are pretty spoiled for choice these days
Feral Feline
Well-known member
Wow! No love for the Chase Bliss whatsoever.
Harry Klippton
Well-known member
More like dork world
If your after neunaber, the Illumine is probably best if you can spring the dough(~320 on reverb)
Has a greatest hits of their algorithms.
I recently had a similar post here.
I settled on an oceans 12 for now, with an illumine on my wish list still.
Also, I have the context 2, which I love. It is designed to sound like the famous 80s rack verbs(lexicon, Yamaha). A bit niche, but good.
But reverb is very dependent on what workflow you desire. Do you want menus and submenus and a shift button where every knob has 2 functions? Or just a few options? Be sure to get one that fits your workflow and will inspire, not frustrate you.
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passtheducky
Active member
BigSky is kind of the DL4 of reverb pedals at this point. I gave it away after I ruined too many things by using too much of it. It's sort of addictive but extremely distinctive sounding, and so I think it's something you can tire of. The Source reverbs are equally excellent but perhaps a bit more neutral sounding.
The UA Golden is the most authentic of the recent crop of Lexicon 224 style reverbs, but ... I don't really get it. The 224 hall sounds dumb on guitar to me, and it's not a sound that was ever really used in the 80s when the 224 was being used on literally everything else. Definitely that in mono in front of an amp is a sound that doesn't really make sense to me. But the spring and the EMT plate are so absurdly usable and timeless that the golden gets my vote.
The UA Golden is the most authentic of the recent crop of Lexicon 224 style reverbs, but ... I don't really get it. The 224 hall sounds dumb on guitar to me, and it's not a sound that was ever really used in the 80s when the 224 was being used on literally everything else. Definitely that in mono in front of an amp is a sound that doesn't really make sense to me. But the spring and the EMT plate are so absurdly usable and timeless that the golden gets my vote.
I've been using a Nemesis and Ventris for years now and I absolutely love them. I'm sure the Collider is amazing. The spring, hall, plate and e dome modes are just perfect, and sound as good to my ears as the Strymon (which I've used quite a lot), just perfect really. And having a few really well voiced delays on the side is always helpful.
I agree with the feeling about the BigSky. So many musicians around me are using it, I feel at this point I wouldn't want to use it again, although it does sound fantastic!
mdc
Well-known member
The 3 algos on the keeley side of the dark world are all extremely nice, clean, hifi reverbs. The ramping functions are legitimately kind of interesting and musical, and the routing functions with the Cooper side are pretty novel. That said, it’s expensive and unless you’re committed to the CB ecosystem it’s really hard to access the features in a way that’s repeatable and useful in a live setting. I imagine the reason you don’t see it on a tonne of boards isn’t because people who bought it were super disappointed, but more that it’s not a great all-purpose reverb that can easily do a bunch of things in a live setting, and is better suited for “that one cool part in that one song” studio duty.
I really liked mine, but I sold it after I bought the pladask draume because I didn’t really want or need two insanely expensive reverb pedals and the draume worked better for what I wanted out of an (almost) always on verb.
I really liked mine, but I sold it after I bought the pladask draume because I didn’t really want or need two insanely expensive reverb pedals and the draume worked better for what I wanted out of an (almost) always on verb.
mdc
Well-known member
Also, fwiw, I see more eventide reverbs on touring musicians’ boards than anything else.
I saw blonde redhead last week and there were at least 4 H9s on stage, and I think maybe a black hole or something too. Jessy Lanza had 4 or 5 eventide pedals as well.
Strymon definitely seems more popular in the p&w world than anywhere else.
I saw blonde redhead last week and there were at least 4 H9s on stage, and I think maybe a black hole or something too. Jessy Lanza had 4 or 5 eventide pedals as well.
Strymon definitely seems more popular in the p&w world than anywhere else.
Bricksnbeatles
Member known well
The dark world is an incredible sounding pedal but it's too niche as an only reverb - it's like asking for the best non-diy delay pedal and saying the Mtl.Asm Count To 5 - great pedal, but far from a normal use case. I voted the source audio since its algorithms are comparable in sound to the big sky while having a smaller form factor and more intuitive UI. Also unlike some of the other options, it has full stereo capabilities which make it great as outboard studio gear in addition to a pedalboard friendly option
I didn't know that Strymon is popular in the p&w crowd. It's a world I know little about, although whenever I try a Neunaber it instantly sounds like p&w to me!
I had a Collider and while it ticks a lot of boxes and does sound good it just didn't click with me. It did everything I could have asked of it (although the way it saves presets is a bit inconvenient - if you change reverb presets it changes the delay as well) I didn't feel all that connected to it. Weird.
I bought a Strymon Flint MkII thinking it would make me sell my MkI but although it is better it's not making me sell MkI. Both are excellent. The main differences for me are that the newer one has predelay available to adjust on the reverb and the spring reverb is a bit better. I just use plate 99% of the time. And the bias tremolo is the best trem in a pedal I have tried - either version of Flint.
I haven't tried the UA Reverb but LOVE the Starlight Delay. Quite tempted by their stand-alone plate reverb but don't really need it.
passtheducky
Active member
Keep talking … this is free market research for my pedal. 
SillyOctpuss
Well-known member
Well you'll definitely get some great sounds cause there's not a bad pedal among them.
I'm trying to guess which one you went for which is proving difficult cause I'm struggling to decide which one I'd actually put money down for.
I'm trying to guess which one you went for which is proving difficult cause I'm struggling to decide which one I'd actually put money down for.
