Lexicon Vortex Shimmer in a pedal?

[Text_Edifice]

Hi all,

here's one for the guitar players amongst you. I have a lexicon vortex that I really love for creating unusual delay + modulation textures. One of the built in sounds in particular 'Shimmer' is really really cool when used in-line for performance. Apparently the patch is described as "A cross-resonance modulator feeds a stereo tremolo, which in turn feeds two echo blocks panned left and right; Envelope increases the tremolo rate. "

In practice it means the effect is very sensitive to performance dynamic - if you play softly you get a lovely tremolo effect, dig in hard or snap the strings and you get more of a slap-back type effect, with a lot of expression in between. The problem is it's a bit fiddly to get set up and, although I've used it live, the vortex isn't especially robust.

So the question is - does anyone know of a similar effect in a pedal?

[audioio]

So the question is - does anyone know of a similar effect in a pedal?

No, but for everyone's references... from here

Right-brain review (Mike Metlay)

...there has been a lot of reply mail on this, including a marvelous summation of the unit's features and capabilities by my esteemed co-moderator. So rather than rehash all that dry left-brain stuff, I thought I'd step out of character for a moment and go totally right-brained. Please bear with me for a moment....

Ya HEEEEE!!!!!

You MUST own one of these boxes. It has no MIDI. It uses a wall wart. It's a royal PAIN in the ARSE to program ("twiddle, twiddle....poit... twiddle, frob....forget to push STORE, lose everything....scream...cry... repeat as needed"). This does not MATTER. You must own one of these boxes. If they are really and truly going out the door for under $200, there can be no excuse not to own one of these boxes. BLEEN for $149!

I got one of the early ones. Paid a bit over $200 for it. Would have paid $500. It's awesome. Don't use it as much as Joe does....too much of it tends to fry my brains. It needs MIDI, at least for tempo sync, and a better front panel. This will never ever EVER happen. Lexicon says so. The Vortex was a FAILURE! It challenged musicians to think, to create, to experiment, to break out of the mold, and it didn't give the lazy fat slobs a way to use a computer to create random patches until something sounded good. Ergo it had to DIE. So take advantage of the idiocy of the sheep out there. BUY ONE and AEROSOL!

I have problems with mine. I do not breedle effectively with my feet. Ergo the realtime control is non-pleasant. This requires a DIY project! I shall build a leetle teensy box with a knob and four buttons on it that gives me pedal control, tap tempo, A/B switching, bypass, etc., that I can mount someplace easy to reach. I have no time to do this. I suffer. Roland EV-5 is the recommended pedal; it costs more than a root canal and is almost as fun to use. The dual switch Lex gives you is only useful if you play barefoot. How can one CYCLOID while barefoot? It is a mystery, and most queer and disturbing to my head.

No reverb. Who gives the posterior of rattus norvegicus about this? You can buy any of 4.6 billion available products to give you reverb. In fact, you can do this and run the Vortex through it. Or run it through the Vortex! Which is worse, a huge hall full of ATMOSPHERE or a MAZE full of faux EMT plate? My mind boggles. The Haas Effect is bottled up inside the Vortex. Make tiny little narrow monophonic thingies suddenly EXPLODE outward in stereo scattering bits of ones and zeroes everywhere and staining the rug! This is good. Aieeee YES!

I am in control of my faculties. I make sense. I urge the esteemed members of this list to dare to try a Vortex before the blowout sales are no more and this precious lil' box is gone gone GONE for ever and ever. Do not reward slickness and cute features. Reward POWER and ORIGINALITY. Burn your CD-ROM beat loop libraries. Cover vanilla sample players with analog HOT SAUCE and digital CHEESE. Away with General MIDI and sound cards full of cliches! "What sells" is EVIL-- make what is GOOD...DEJA VU and Richard Basehart! Cause serious harm to established modes of thought! Will you be part of the problem, or part of the solution? Be part of the problem, and make 'em tremble in your presence! FRACTAL MOSAIC!

Ah YEEEEE!

Got to get mine back from a muso who borrowed it!

[ether]

Without hearing your sound I can't give any specific recommendations, but you're probably in the Strymon or Electro Harmonix ball pack.

[Futureman]

The strymon timeline ....may.... Have what your after.. It has delay with amplitude modulation also throw in a bunch of other stuff.

The Strymon Bluesky (reverb) does have a 'shimmer' mode, but typically I thought 'shimmer' was reverb (or delay) then pitch shifter feeding back into the reverb (or delay).. That way you get this ethereal sort if reverb that climbs or decends pitch wise.. Lovely effect.. Can be very epic sounding.

I like Strymon pedals in case you hadn't noticed.

[Text_Edifice]

That's the 'classic' Lanois / Enough effect. The vortex patch is a little bit different. The main thing is having the incoming amplitude modulate.the term rate as this allows for really clear articulation when you dig in or swampy murk when you okay softly.

I got quite interested in the strymon flint as I'm shopping for a term type pedal but it doesn't really do what I want. Amptweaker swirl pool looks interesting as does the perridilo (I think) harmonic vibrato (brown face clone). Neither work like the vortex does though.

[Futureman]

Have you seen the new Strymon Mobius?

I'm not sure if it's in Australia now, but it's a fancy modulation pedal.. it also may have what you want.

May pay to check out its manual..

[Nigel99]

Valhalla shimmer plug.

[Nigel99]

Lanois and Eno achieved that effect with a Lexicon 224 reverb and AMS delay. Valhalla attempts to recreate that effect and does a good job of it. Very organic.

[Futureman]

Valhalla shimmer plug.

In a pedal?

[Nigel99]

Oops. Forgot about that little detail.haha.

Could be doable- Firstly, you need a really small computer....

[Text_Edifice]

Actually I think the strymons are just little computers. There's lots if interesting possibilities with arduino boards for dsp in pedal form too I believe.

[Text_Edifice]

Just had a closer look at the Strymon pedals and they won't do what I'm after.

[Nigel99]

What the Vortex is doing is pretty cool, I wonder if you could get close to that effect with a combination of pedals? I don't like your luck - that morphing trick is pretty specific.

Cool box tho...

[Text_Edifice]

Yeah it's got some good tricks – it's not the morph thing I want though (and lots of trems typically have a 'ramp' that works similarly), just the ability to modulate the trem rate by the amplitude of the input signal.

[Futureman]

If you can find them, the SE (Studio Electronics) put out a line of rare analogue pedals..

They put out a Phaser,Filter and RingMod .. And they each have about 20+ knobs !

They have the ability to modulate both the rate and depth of the LFO by playing dynamics..
(I've got a ring mod, but I need to fix it, it sounds a little sick)

While none are a Trem, the filter would get close with resonance at zero and the ring mod is essentially a very fast Trem, and can be slowed down to be one.


On a side note, what you want could be done in the modular world very easily.. Maybe 3-4 modules?

Pre-amp
Envelope follower
Voltage controlled LFO
Voltage controlled amp

(then a $10 FX looper to bypass it all!)

But it's probably getting a bit silly to have a eurorack modular for one effect..

[Text_Edifice]

Thanks Mike,

buying a couple of vortex's as spares and hauling them round is probably cheaper and easier than tracking down rare analog pedals or lugging a modular rack around.

I think my question's been answered with a resounding no.

As an aside - have you seen the Zvex ring mod pedals? The ringtone has a series of ring mods attached to a step sequencer – extraordinarily cool for coming up with new / off the wall melodies / parts.

[Futureman]

I just remembered it's name
Studio electronics Mod-Max or Modmax.
Keep an eBay search for it, the come up every now and again on eBay. Cool pedals.

I like pedals too! (Along with old synths,old drum machines, old FX and old samplers!)
The Zvex stuff looks cool.. Never tried their stuff tho.

My favourite pedals are my WMD Geiger counter, Frostwave filter, Mutron Anything, Chunk Systems envelope filter and Strymon Bluesky & Timeline .

Pedals are cool.

[Text_Edifice]

Thanks Mike, I'll keep an eye out.

Have you seen the KOMA pedals? http://www.koma-elektronik.com/products/ft201/

I've wanted a frostwave resonator for a long time now but unfortunately they were already out of production when I started looking. The KOMA is the first thing to peak my interest in the same way since.

[Text_Edifice]

Just a quick update – it looks like the pigtronix tremvelope might get most of the way there. Need to try it when I'm next in Syd / Melb.

http://www.pigtronix.com/products/tremvelope/