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Re: Boss DD-20: anyone tried it yet?

At 12:32 PM 2/7/2003, Eric Williamson wrote:
>i'm salivating over this pedal. has anyone got their mitts on one yet?

I got the full demo at NAMM, and talked with the demo guy a bit. They 
didn't have one available to play with. My take on it was, "If you're are 
too poor to afford a Line-6 DL-4, this pedal is for YOU!"

In fact, that's not just my take, that's pretty much how I heard a sales 
rep explaining it to a dealer.

otherwise, I don't see much to get excited about.

The sound on sound (aka looper) function lets you tap a loop. You can 
overdub on it. Can you control the feedback of it? No. Reverse? No. 
Half-Speed? No. Turn the delay time knob and change pitch? No. Change 
time/tempo without pitch? No. Insert-your-question-here? No. It doesn't do 
anything else in that mode. Just record loop and overdub. That's it. 23 
seconds.

As for the delay aspects, there are a few delay models. Analog delay, tape 
delay, etc. Not as many as the DL-4. Impossible to hear how good these 
models were over the din of some guy showing off a distortion pedal on the 
other side of the room with what sounded a lot like Toto songs. However, 
I'll bet the delay models are at least worth $100. Does it do that cool 
analog delay pitch change thing when you change the delay time during the 
delay mode? No. It makes some sort of glitchy farting digital noise. No 
doubt somebody will say they love things like that, but you will never 
hear 
them make any actual music with it. It won't replace your treasured EH-16. 
There is some sort of gimmicky delay effect that I don't exactly remember 
what it did, called "warp" or "hyperspace" or something. I think it just 
changed the repeat rate exponentially faster. (or maybe it did something 
else, I was bored by then.) It offers three or four presets too.

The best part of the demo was when the demo guy played "The Entertainer" 
as 
a two-handed tap solo on his guitar. I haven't seen anything like that 
since the late 80's! Retro Michael Angelo cool! Oh, but he didn't use the 
DD-20 at all for that. It's amazing what talent gets wasted in the Roland 
booth. YMMV.

kim



______________________________________________________________________
Kim Flint                     | Looper's Delight
kflint@loopers-delight.com    | http://www.loopers-delight.com