Interestingly Doug Tuttle, the mastermind at Mid-Fi Electronics, doesn’t call the clean version of the Clari(not) a defunct tape delay. His description is “an envelope controlled vibrato/chorus/wow-and-flutter simulator”. (I’m guessing that’s a holdover from the delays before the Feedback knob was added that gave the five-knob version of Clari(not) full delay features.) While the delay can do “boringly normal”, the dynamics-based modulation uniquely warps that echo into something near indescribable. And deciduously gorgeous.
We Americans think it’s a sin that we buy a wedge of Parmesan by weight and have to pay for that inedible rind. But grammas in Italy don’t waste a thing and turn that rind into a heavenly broth. Unbelievably rich, this broth can be used for soups, couscous or just on its own. It’s a great way to make use of your not-so-fresh vegetables, peels, clippings etc. Start with:
Current Pedal Obsession: Old Blood BL-44 Reverse pedal.
Get ready to be taken aback.
I’m itching to explain the concept of a reverse pedal. But Einstein and the Bootstrap Paradox are involved, so let’s forget all that. Instead this article will just help you get along with the BL-44 pedal as part of your musical workflow without too much time-space continuum talk.
The dawn of email meant the Era of Great Letters was over. But I have a few of the last ones. They’re typed on a onion-skin paper on a Coronamatic 2200 and sent from Kurt Vonnegut to my father. The Vonnegut letters are appearing here for the first time.
Frippertronics evolves loops through a long delay (4 seconds or more) with the feedback turned up (but not quite self-oscillating). Out of the box, Red Panda’s Tensor’s Ovr mode is a “normal” looper (akin to a TC Ditto, but with a shorter memory), but it’s pretty easy to turn your Tensor into a Frippertronics machine. You just need to modify the pedal’s midi setting with Red Panda’s Web editor to make the layers fade.
So why do it?
As a pseudo delay, Tensor can record from about 100 milliseconds up to 9.6 seconds. It gives you many more ways to manipulate the repeats (glitch, pitch, direction, random) than most pedals branded as Frippertronics-capable. A truly unique feature of the Tensor is that you can control speed and pitch together like a normal looper or manipulate them separately with the Time and Pitch knobs. This article shows you how to modify your Tensor and get the most out of its extensive Frippertronics capabilities.
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