New Non-BOSS Pedals

Discuss all non-Boss pedals here!
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Pepe
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New Non-BOSS Pedals

Post by Pepe » Sat Sep 01, 2018 6:11 pm

Yesterday I received a parcel from England. Our dear nathanscribe, who was a very active SBZ and BossArea forum member years ago, repaired a vintage KORG SD-200 Signal Delay for me. And the parcel also contained the sought-after Pearl OC-07 Octaver. I was able to grab one for a reasonable price at Gumtree/UK and nathanscribe forwarded it to me.

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The analog delay is really good at doing that typical slap-echo sound. The tone knob offers some sonic variations. It has a pretty high maximum delay time which comes along with a nice aliasing sound. Feedback can go to self-oscillation. All in all a solid early BBD unit which has (to my big surprise) originally been designed by Maxon (-> Maxon AD200). To my knowledge there haven't been any other collaborations between KORG and Maxon (I might be wrong, though).

The concept of the Pearl OC-07 is very similar to that of my beloved KORG KOT-401 module "Octave V". The Pearl Octaver offers two octave down modes plus an upper octave mode, which is generated by an octave up fuzz or something very close to that (the KORG KOT-401 works in the same way). The sound is really nice and warm in the low octaves and the upper octave is really cool and it freaks out in a great way if you play polyphonic stuff. Like the BOSS OC-2 it tracks best beginning at the D of a bass guitar in standard tuning. Overall tracking is very solid. Like all the other analog octavers the OC-07 cannot beat the tracking of the KORG KOT-401, which goes all the way down to the low E of a bass guitar and offers overall superb tracking and it responds to the guitar's dynamics in a beautiful way. So it cannot replace my "Octave V" at all. But it's a great early compact pedal and those who don't know the KORG unit are allowed to say that the OC-07 is the best octaver ever built.
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fuzzbuzzfuzz
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Re: New Non-BOSS Pedals

Post by fuzzbuzzfuzz » Mon Sep 03, 2018 3:50 am

Wow, very nice Pepe!

The OC-07 is absolutely on my list but over here its about 20,000 yen used. I thought it was very clean when I tried one even on the upper octaves, and therefore very different to my MutliOctaver Guyatone (which is all fuzz).

Nice Maxon too :D

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natthu
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Re: New Non-BOSS Pedals

Post by natthu » Wed Sep 12, 2018 10:02 am

I had an OC-07 many years ago. Definitely one of the best octave pedals out there. Extremely rare here too...

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Pepe
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Re: New Non-BOSS Pedals

Post by Pepe » Fri Sep 14, 2018 5:02 pm

Big and vintage and usually horribly expensive pedal incoming! :o
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chromandre
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Re: New Non-BOSS Pedals

Post by chromandre » Fri Sep 14, 2018 6:00 pm

Pepe wrote:
Fri Sep 14, 2018 5:02 pm
Big and vintage and usually horribly expensive pedal incoming! :o
wild guesses..... ehx microsynth?

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Pepe
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Re: New Non-BOSS Pedals

Post by Pepe » Fri Sep 14, 2018 6:20 pm

Nope. Something totally Pepe-typical. I'll wait for the parcel and send pics and more information once it arrives.
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Gasgano
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Re: New Non-BOSS Pedals

Post by Gasgano » Fri Sep 14, 2018 6:58 pm

Not another one of these Korg modular multi-effect units? :lol:
"People who are late are usually in a better mood than the people waiting for them to show up."

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Pepe
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Re: New Non-BOSS Pedals

Post by Pepe » Sat Sep 15, 2018 12:10 pm

It's not really a KORG pedal to be exact. But it's the most expensive pedal that I have ever bought.
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Ptak
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Re: New Non-BOSS Pedals

Post by Ptak » Sun Sep 16, 2018 3:52 am

Pepe's most expensive pedal ever... I have to see this one! :lol:

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Pepe
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Re: New Non-BOSS Pedals

Post by Pepe » Fri Sep 21, 2018 3:26 pm

The big and expensive pedal has arrived today!

This is the ultra-rare Keio "Synthesizer Traveler" from 1973. Keio Electronic Laboratories was the original name of KORG (Keio Organ). So it's indeed some kind of KORG pedal again. ;)

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It has the size of three BF-1 pedals - or almost 9 BOSS compact pedals!

The so-called "Traveler" is a tone filter that was already built into the first Keio organ prototype in 1970. The first KORG synthesizer generation did also have the Traveler filter system (my awesome KORG 800dv has two low-pass-filters and two high-pass-filters that sound like a dream!). In this case it's a low-pass-filter that can be combined with the fuzz. It produces cool wah sounds, especially with a good dirt pedal after it (the fuzz is first in the chain). The "Singing" mode is an oscillating sound that can also be combined with the fuzz, but not with the filter. It sounds pretty much like a Theremin. The knobs control the volume of each mode and the "Peak" knob controls the filter resonance.

Overall it's a great sounding early pedal. There aren't many of these around today and I doubt that Keio produced them in large numbers. I'm absolutely happy that I'm able to finally try one out for myself.

BTW: the French pedal maker Jaques did a limited clone years ago, called "Singing Geisha".
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