beeflin's Metal Pedalboard

Analog Man's Beano Boost pedal is a hand-made Rangemaster with three modes - treble boost, mid boost and bass boost. But it doesn't just make the guitar louder - it gives a special, edgy and roughened sound that cuts through like a refined cheese grater. The Rangemaster is part of the classic sound of Marc Bolan, Tony Iommi, Rory Gallagher and Brian May and is rumoured to be the secret behind Eric Clapton's revolutionary tone on the Bluesbreakers' "Beano" album (hence this pedal's name).

By the way, my particular Beano uses the 2N527 transistor.

I've never thought much of compressors as a guitarist, although I love using them in music production. They always seemed to destroy the edgy character of my guitar strings and replace it with an artificial, plastic-sounding attack. Recently however I decided I wanted the benefit of controlled volume, perhaps using it for lead boost, and could also experiment with other compression effects. I tried a Carl Martin Compressor Limiter and although it was very high quality I still couldn't get an attack I liked. Then I realised I needed a parallel compressor, to blend in the original attack, and found the Vise Grip at a very reasonable second-hand price, cheaper than other similar units. Its controls give every kind of useful option, so it does exactly what I want it to do, and it also has 3 power options: high-headroom 18v supply (my preference), standard 9v supply or 9v battery. I thoroughly recommend it as a compromise between the pros and cons of compression.

This programmable pedal has many interesting effects and facilities including flanger, through-zero flanger, chorus, reverse and kill-dry as well as all kinds of hardware emulations - digital, analog emulation, tape emulation, etc.

But it's risky to assume you'll be able to change programs during a gig without hassle, because you'll need your phone and you know what phones can be like. Probably best to pick a setting for the whole gig. And if you do need to reprogram mid-gig, you really must mute your sound if you don't want your audience to run away thinking aliens are attacking, because the burst of programming chatter sounds very nasty.

So the pedal is inspiring because of the incredible versatility for a very reasonable price, but you should probably think of it as a fixed setup that you can choose from an infinite set of possibilities, and then stick with, rather than an editable setup.

A smooth sounding overdrive which, with gain set low, sounds very close to a Marshall crunch channel. It also has tone controls which can boost treble, scoop or boost bass to create different tones.

Press the footswitch and a 24-bit 44.1KHz mono recording starts. Press again and it stops and is ready to record another one. 8 hours recording time at studio quality right on your pedalboard. To recover your recordings, plug it into your computer using a Mini USB connector. Simplicity itself. Two drawbacks: (1) the files that come over the USB cable have numbers and no dates so you have to listen to them to figure out which is which. (2) the optional Bluetooth-to-phone transfer software has the most unreliably, crashy Bluetooth connectivity I've ever seen, and is basically unusable except for a few very small files.

So, verdict: brilliantly effective as long as you ignore the app!

Very good value for money, not as all-singing, all-dancing as the Wampler Terraform or Strymon Mobius but so compact and versatile. Excellent vibrato, tremolo and harmonic tremolo, usable Uni-Vibe, good chorus, nice Leslie, and lots more. Downsides: phaser and flanger don't really match up to their analog counterparts; auto-wah, filter and harmoniser are cranky; and the controls can't hold a candle to pedals with presets - you usually need to fiddle with one or two knobs after each effect type change. But there are so many parameters you can tailor, including envelope settings, different waveforms, distortion, tone, blend and resonance that I can't really fault this little darling for the price.

I decided to get an envelope filter after seeing demos of the Source Audio Spectrum, but when I actually tried one I found it didn't have the fundamental feel I was looking for, despite all its options and controls, so I radically downsized to this little devil. It rocks! It has a little tiny bit of overdrive and dirt to smooth its way, and perfect controls for whatever response you want. The only thing it lacks is a reverse setting, but I can live without that.

I really like the volume taper of this pedal and use it extensively for volume swells. Being passive it makes no noise.I use it as my board's main mute switch, at the end of the drive section. It's also featherlight but strong.

I haven't tried it as an expression pedal but I am sure its good quality pot will work well in that mode too.

This pedal is tiny and light, taking up less than half a full treadle wah's board space. It is always switchable from active volume/swell to wah with a click of the footswitch, which is in the normal position for wah pedals, under the treadle's front half.

The wah is a little fierce and rough sounding with distortion, but it is reasonably good with clean sounds. It's excellent value for money.