the_last_factory's Reviews

tone shaping beauty

The Westwood is a translucent overdrive brought to us by the amazing people at Earthquaker Devices. It is hands down one of the most affordable and versatile overdrive pedals I have ever owned and played. People debate whether this pedal is based off the preamp of a Moog MF-101 or a BB preamp. Whatever it is, it makes the wide active EQ of the Westwood sound amazing. It can push your amp into a tight and balanced overdrive, warm up your signal and boost it. You can even place a vibrato before it and turn up the drive knob and dial back the treble to create lo-fi tones. I predominantly use it on my board to add warmth, sustain and to take out some of the low end coming from my parallel effects mixer.

Overall, it is a phenomenal piece of gear and highly recommend it to anyone

I have the Deco v2 and it's so much better.

I love the Deco so much. It's really helped with warming up my signal chain and having the v2 has really improved things with the tone knob and the stereo input switch on the back instead of inside the pedal.

Goodbye tube amps!

Strymon IRIDIUM: Goodbye Tube Amps!!!!

I know I'm going to irk some purists with this review. So please be nice. As a person who for the longest time has played through solid state amps exclusively and has never been able to decide, let alone afford a tube amp this is a dream come true. I've always wanted a tube amp, but could never decide which one to invest in. Because at the end of the day they’re an investment. But I also never really committed to buying one for five reasons: 1) Cost: I don't want to spend $300-$1000+ on a amp(s) and then have to drop $100-$200+ on a set of tubes for when they die. 2) Maintenance: I don't want to have to upkeep this or accidentally kill myself via electrocution. 3) Weight: A lot of tube combos and heads are really heavy and that isn't good for my bad back or my toddler who likes to pull things down (you’d be surprised how strong he is). 4) Tone: Every amp has its own unique tone and lends itself to different things and as a musician who plays and incorporates multiple genres into their music, one amp is not enough. 5) Learning curve: I DO NOT want to put what little time I have into the commitment of learning about tube amp maintenance. The amp that I used the most throughout my time playing shows and recording was always a Line 6 Flextone III and that amp had some great cab and amp models inside of it. It was so good that people who owned tube amps thought that I was using an actual tube amp when I would play live. But I sold it, because times are tough and I was in the market looking for a new amp and when Strymon released the Iridium and I heard it for what it was I was blown away. I’ve been playing with this thing since the 26th of December and I am in love with it. I’ve ran a bunch of my pedals through it and it is one of the best things I could vouch for using to warm up your signal and give it some grit. It sounds like a real amp, it feels (sonically) like a real amp and most importantly it is easy to use. There’s no learning curve to it. I got it all right in front of me and now every time I want to jam with waking up my son I just plug in my headphones and go to town. If you’re looking for something light and simple as a substitute to tube amps or other modeling amps I recommend buying one for yourself, because with this thing anything is possible.

The best reverb & delay combo that I've ever owned.

This pedal is what I have been looking for in a reverb pedal. It's got the best plate reverb I've ever heard in my life. It has an all encompassing algorithm called Spatium that can be any big reverb you want it to be (which I have no idea how to pronounce that word). It's got amazing atmospheric reverbs like Vortex which I think is amazing for drums, bass, synths and my glitchtar. It's also got this deep algo called Anti-Shimmer that yields itself to becoming a beautiful pad for Dark Ambient soundscapes which I use constantly. The reverb delay and diffuse delays are to die for. The delay algorithms are just as amazing and I love the sounds that I can generate from the Ambiental algo (shimmer reverb-esque delay), the Transposer algo is an amazing pitch-shifted delay that adds more color to my palette with chromatic echoes! I'm only scratching the surface in here describing the pedal, but if you are looking for a high-quality reverb for live sets and studio use this in my humble opinion one of the best.

Something to warm up or incinerate your signal with

I have two dirt pedals that I utilize to either beef up my signal or absolutely destroy it, but when I don't want to go through the trouble of hooking up my outboard gear to setup I just open up Decapitator. It's one of those saturation/dirt plug-ins that can be used with subtlety to add warmth to your tracks or you can be abrasive by initiating the "punish" button and turn your signal into a glitchy fuzzed out mess. It goes great with everything and I'll probably be using it in place of my Life Pedal when I tour or play shows in town.

DEEP BASS

When I made my first album I used two VSTs exclusively. Xpand!2 for my pads, leads, and world instruments and Vacuum for SFX and bass. Sadly, I couldn't get Vacuum since it was exclusive to ProTools, but in recent years they released it as an individual plug-in that you could use on any DAW. I love this thing so much for it's killer emulation of analog mono synths and how rich the harmonics are on it. It is still to this day one of my go to synth plug-ins. My favorite sounds on it are bass and this preset that emulates vinyl crackling that you can create glitching and feedback with.

Useful for studio and live use

I mainly use this as a controller for when I'm mixing something in the studio, but since I sometimes bring my Mac with me to shows I also use it to trigger the samples I have during my sets. It's very intuitive and straightforward. It's not as good the Ableton controller, but it works.

A perfect substitute

I don't use this as a DAW, but rather as a sequencer and effects processor for my backing tracks and samples during my live sets when I'm playing a more minimal set. I love it mainly for it's bitcrusher, reverb, and tremolo. Also it's amp simulators aren't the best, but it does make Xynthesizer sound really degraded. I'm not going to lie though I have made one song on my upcoming album with GarageBand. It's got great pianos and synths, effects, and drum machines. I recommend it to anyone who wants a beginner DAW or cheap and affordable sequencer. Especially if you got IOS.

Smash and crush

I don't want to blow my speakers by clipping my gear all the time. The Devil-Loc as well as the Decapitator help me achieve that sound. I love the crunchy drums on Tame Impala records and on Ben Frost albums, but since I can't find a Level-Loc available and I'm very selective about what I buy, the Devil-Loc is a great alternative and is a near-perfect emulation.

More than I could ask for

Ever since my gear was stolen two years ago I've been very wary of bringing my gear to shows all the time. So instead of taking my RE-20 or Rubberneck everywhere with me I instead just use the Echoboy as a substitute for those units. I love the Echoplex preset on it and I put tape saturation on all my samples and to give my DI guitar more warmth. It's very simple and intuitive and I recommend to any lovers of tape echo. Trust me, you'll get what you paid for and your back will thank you.

It may not be analog, but it gets the job done

I bought this mixer for the sole purpose of recording my live sets, but I've mainly been using it to sub mix all my keyboards and samples. I like to use it's long delay in conjunction with my F. 13 flanger and dirt pedals in the FX loop, because it creates somewhat of a glitchy/tape sound (videos posted on 4/11 and 4/14 on instagram if you want an example). I also like overloading the FX loop to get a brunting chaos sound out of it to process through my Infinite Jets. It's a reliable mixer and I recommend it to any musician on a budget.

A great solid state pedal platform amp

Everyone from Fripp, Slowdive, Adam Jones, Alex Scally, Adrian Belew and many other guitarists who use effects have had this amp for it's clean tone and compatibility with pedals. I've had mine for 2 years now and it isn't going to be leaving my studio or live rig any time soon.

A flexible flanger

I have the Neo Series F.13 and I love this pedal so much for it's versatility. I use the step sequencer function in the FX loop of my mixer for evolving soundscapes with my synthesizers and I also use the Dynamic mode as an envelope controlled vibrato when I play guitar. That's right, to vibrato set the regen knob at noon. The Echo preset is also really great, especially with bass. If EQD pyramids is outside of your budget, the F. 13 is a great alternative.

Amazing analog emulation

I own the Vacuum Mono synth and mainly use it for bass and SFX and I didn't even know the polysynth existed. I use this as a substitute since I sold my analog synths and while it isn't an actual analog synthesizer, it gets the job done for me. I love this plug-ins lush pads and it really hits the mark for me on intuitive interaction and expression.

Sometimes I need some space...A LOT of space.

I love the Transmisser for what it is: An unapologetically, abrasive reverb. Why do I say its abrasive? Because it doesn't do subtle. I have played this as a pad underneath my guitar with my DOD Rubberneck (they're best friends by the way), as a cosmic call to the Elder Ones with my Blue Box (I haven't been the same since), and as wormhole to blast my synths through. As with most pedals, the Transmisser only has so much headroom before you start clipping it, however though, what I'm about to suggest to any owners or people interested in getting one: The artifacts generated from said clipping are effected by the reverb and create a sound that I find pleasant and constantly use in my own music. Though the only gripe I have about it is that you can't bypass the resonant filter. Other than that this is my favorite spaceship.

I think I might have to sell all my pedals....

This is one of those limited run of pedals that, in this economy (2020), will cost you an arm and a leg. However, if you got the cash and you love creating soundscapes or just getting weird with your guitar and pedals than this is the pedal for you. What would've taken three or five pedals to make the sounds in this thing you can do with one of sixteen presets. I've only played it three times since I've gotten it, but it is amazing and I'm so happy with the sounds I can generate from it. I own a Infinite Jets and have played it in parallel with the microcosm and it only makes since that these two siblings would play well together. I won't get into to much detail or go over every preset and I know not everyone likes menu diving pedals, but if I could describe this pedal: It's like the bait you take fishing with you to catch ideas and you will always get a bite.

What can I say that everyone else hasn't?

This is a beautiful delay pedal that I use mainly for swells since I lack a volume pedal, but I also use it for extending copies of my tape and analog delay repeats since I like how the copies degrade with time. I used to own a DD-500, but it was stolen and I used to think that this was a piece of shit pedal just because of the way that it looked, but as you can see I was so wrong and it is now crucial to my overall sound.

Serious saturation beyond saturation.

This pedal will peel the paint off of your walls and piss off your neighbors if you live in an apartment. It's based off the classic White Face Rat pedals and the chain and enclosure is based off of a pedal that Stephen O'Malley used during the early Sunn O))) concerts before Life Metal and is based off said signal chain (Oct.->Dist.->Boost). If you have a tube amp this will push your tubes harder than any dirt pedal you've used before. If you use solid state like myself then you can adapt this pedal to your rig and still sound just as amazing. While the initial reissues don't feature ocatve expression control like on the limited reissues the first releases still stand on their own. It's great for shoegaze, punk, metal, anything. Your imagination is the limit.

One of the best analog delays ever put out

I've had the Rubberneck Delay for almost two years and it is an ambient guitarists wet dream. An analog delay that goes up to 1 second with an effects loop and pitch shifting capabilities and knobs to fully control oscillation and pitchshifting? Count me in. This thing can be a faux reverb and it can even act as a modulation pedal if you use minimal settings on the time and repeats. Also having a gain knob really helps give my repeats more weight and punch, so that's cool too. I recommend it to anyone looking for an experimental analog delay for their setup.

For glitchy, Tim Hecker-like soundscapes, Noise rock chaos, and psychedelic bliss.

I've had my Syntax Error for over a year now and it is still one of my favorite pedals. I love every preset on this thing from the Ring Mod preset which can be a standard ring modulator to a harmonic tremolo. Stretch is my go to preset for making "Haunt Me" soundscapes. It can be a reverse delay or if you place the buffer length and the play-back knobs past noon you'll get granular-esque/shimmer delay. The cubic distortion in conjunction with the bitcrushing can create a fuzz-like sound and comes with an LPF resonant filter to act as the tone knob (which you can also bypass turning it CCW). I can't even describe the Frequency Shifter, because it was just too weird for me, but I have been experimenting with it more and it's great for awesome ambient tones and when you dial in the redux it gets nasty and gnarly. I highly reccomend this pedal to anyone who wants to take their guitar down a more experimental route.