Re: Loopers-Delight-d Digest V03 #43

[Bill Monk <billmonk@mac.com>]

>I wonder whether Line6 tried and did not succeed or whether they did 
>not think of it?

I havn't played with the DL-4 much, but the (now discontinued) 
Johnson/Digitech JM150/250 amps have, with the later OS upgrades, a 
-great- analog delay module. I call it great because it has the same 
capacity as the Memory Man to sound cool while sounding like it might 
blow up, and to be controllable while having a lot of things (way more 
than the MM) that can make it freak out and suddenly scare the bejabbers 
out of you.

Have had one of these amps since '98, but just recently discovered the 
power hidden in the "analog" delay. Auddenly it was like 1980 again, when 
my Deluxe MM (and EH "3-Phase Liner" jewelry with 6 pattern-flashing 
LEDs, now that was amazing) had just arrived direct from NYC.

The JM delay has the usual LPF for faking an analog delay, but with 
variable cutoff frequency and output gain. The LPF can be set pre-delay 
or post-delay. "Smear" makes repeats more and more spread out - so a 
short staccto note will eventually become a long, weirdly diffused note 
if repeated enough. The feedback control is continuous through both 
positive and negative feeback. Tweaking the delay time smoothly, but 
"crappily" (in a good way) alters the pitch - it sounds like a MM to 
me....

Finally, -all- of the effect params can be put under glitch-free foot 
control using their (also discontinued) J12, which allows scaling the 
range of each param, so that a toe-down foot controller might == 100% on 
one param, 25% on another, and -40% on a third. Up to 16 params can be 
controlled at once.

Jsut folling around, I can up with this: feedback set for 0 at mid-pedal, 
and increasing through positive values to HOLD at toedown, and decressing 
to -80% feedback at toe-up, The same pedal alters delay time, starting 
from 500ms at mid-pedal, decreasing delay time as pedal comes back, and 
increasing as pedal goes down.

The effect is that at mid pedal, there's a single repeat. Play a lick, 
slam the pedal down, and it drop an octave and goes into hold. Back off 
just slightly, and it starts to go nuts. Meanwhile you are playing over 
it. Stomp another switch (set to add a few points to LPF gain, say) or 
use another controller to play with the LPF frequency. Pull the first 
pedla back a bit, picth goes up, feedback does down - thing was abou to 
blow some speakers....

Pull the pedal quickly back though midpoint, not stopping at the 0 
feedback there, and the loop smoothly comes up in pitch, you can play it 
with the pedal. Meanwhile, feedback is going increasingly negative and 
lights are coming on all around the neighborhood. At this point I got my 
first taste of that first MM terror from so long ago - what will stop it? 

It's getting louder...fast. Reflex says heeldown, like a volume pedal, 
nope that's making it higher, and louder faster. Toe down - wrong, and 
the lows is haking the windows. Mid-point on the pedal - yes there's the 
zero point, all the wonderful noise gone just as my wife starts coming 
down the stairs. |-.

Sounds goofy, but that's the way I felt. And no piece of gear has made me 
feel that way in a long long time. 

Plus, with a little exploration, the effect is musically useful, and I 
stay up most the night  making more and more variations, tweaking. No 
gear has made me want to do that in a while either.

Too bad the manufacturer had little idea how to market this thing against 
Line6. If it had stereo preamp out/power amp in jacks to insert a pair of 
EDPs, it would be the perfect, self contained looping rig with (as far as 
I know) unparalleled realtime control. But Johnson Amps only put inserts 
on their -basic- models, which have almost no realtime control! 

I've seen these amps used for not a lot more than a new DL-4. Worth 
checking out at those prices; it's a deep product, not without flaws, but 
is very, very usable live.