Delay Pedals - Let's Talk Favorites!

[Bogner]

What are your favorite delay pedals? Maybe the talk here can help somebody find what they are looking for the first time and save them some cash!

 

[Bill SAS 513]

Big fan of the Wampler Faux Echo, and pretty much every delay they make.
Also like the (Way Huge) Aqua Puss...but just the plain one, not the one that gives you all those crazy underwater sounds...

 

[Senor Verde]

I haven't had a whole bunch of delay pedals, but one I like a lot is JHS Lucky Cat. It isn't too big and has a built in tap tempo. Plus it just sounds good.

 

[shinksma]

Maybe the talk here can help somebody find what they are looking for the first time and save them some cash!

So, like how we help people to find the one PRS guitar so they never have to buy another?



I have a bunch of delays. It really depends on what you are going for, and the budget you want to set, and the pedalboard footprint you have available.

If just looking for clean delays, go either digital delay or analog delay via the trusty Boss models. I have a DD-2 and a DM-2w.

If you want some tape warble or be able to imitate other weirdness, there are tons of pedals in varying form factors and feature sets. I have a Catalinbread Echorec for that.

If you want it all and can afford the room, get a Strymon Timeline. That seems to appear on many of the pedal boards of my favorite artists. I don't have one of those.

I also have a tiny Donner Yellow Fall delay for one of my ultra-small boards.

And of course I use the delay built into my FlyRig when using that.

 

[Bogner]

So, like how we help people to find the one PRS guitar so they never have to buy another?

Yeah! Just like that!!

 

[Bogner]

I haven't had a whole bunch of delay pedals, but one I like a lot is JHS Lucky Cat. It isn't too big and has a built in tap tempo. Plus it just sounds good.

I haven't tried that one.

 

[Bogner]

Big fan of the Wampler Faux Echo, and pretty much every delay they make.
Also like the (Way Huge) Aqua Puss...but just the plain one, not the one that gives you all those crazy underwater sounds...

The Way Huge pedal (Simpler blue pedal) is cool. I have that one. Got it a long time ago and it just works...has a lot of great sounds.

 

[FragileThunder]

The Way Huge Supa Puss I've been very happy with (the blue one @Bogner is talking about I assume). Had it a couple years now and it does what I need, sounds good and can give you some deep, eerie sounds if you want.

 

[Bogner]

I have a bunch of delays and enjoy them all for various reasons. I find it fascinating how certain pedals excel at one type of effect while other pedals excel at a variant of that same effect. There are so many nice ones out there that can do amazing things.

My favorite just might be the Free The Tone Flight Time Delay....(Green Pedal). It is absolutely fantastic sounding! It is easy to get sounds out of and it just works beautifully.

Some of the others I have and love I will list below.

- Source Audio Nemesis - An absolute beast of a delay. Smaller footprint than the big box pedals and packed with features and options. Bang for the buck it is very tough to beat.

- Strymon Timeline - Is it the king of the delays? I could say yes and I could say no depending on the conversation. Regardless, it does it all and with excellence.

- Empress Echo System - Full of great sounds, no menus and has some weird but cool algos to boot. You have to read the manual and get an understanding of the why of the pedal. Once learned, it is super fun to play with.

- Mad Professor Dual Blue Delay - Fantastic delay, straight forward, easy to use and sounds terrific!

- Boss DD-500 - This pedal has some great modern and vintage delays in it. Fairly simple to navigate and get complex sounds out of easily.

- J Rockett Clockwork - Modern day features and spin off of the Deluxe Memory Man. Enough said! This pedal is cool.

- Electro Harmonix Deluxe Memory Man 1100 - Old School Memory Man with tap tempo. Great subdivisions. Really fun pedal without being a deep menu dive and full of tons of preset banks.

- Pigtronix Echolution III - A very modern yet simple delay with a smaller footprint and big sound and practical options. Easy to use, sounds right, sits right and just works. Under the radar pedal but shouldn't be.

- Diamond Memory Lane - Legendary analog pedal for many folks. Such a nice sounding pedal that doesn't get in the way and compliments nicely. In a word...Superb!

- Dawner Prince Boonar - If you are looking at the multi head Binson Echorec sound this one is a gem of a pedal. Easy to use, full of incredible sounds. You can get lost playing it and realize 2 hours just flew by!

- Universal Audio Starlight - Some legendary sounds captured in this pedal. Not as feature rich as some others but a beautiful sound quality. Slightly bigger footprint that the typical single pedal but again, a beautiful sounding delay with very usable and straightforward controls/settings.

- Meris Polymoon - Cascading multiple rack units in a pedal for unique sounds? If that is your thing you will love this pedal. It is really unlike anything I have. I love the simpler side of it as well. It has very round edges on some settings and is not harsh/sharp or staccato like in the repeats. It very much can be out of your way and do some really great things. Very Unique!

 

[Bogner]

The Way Huge Supa Puss I've been very happy with (the blue one @Bogner is talking about I assume). Had it a couple years now and it does what I need, sounds good and can give you some deep, eerie sounds if you want.

Yes! It is a cool pedal for sure.

 

[Tony M.]

Emma Electronics Navigator
and Source Audio Nemesis.

I own both.

 

[László]

My two faves:

Fulltone Tube Tape Echo.

Eventide H9.

Want/Need/Obsess Frequently Over:

Echo-Fix EFX-2.

 

[Lacire]

Wampler AnalogEcho, despite the name I’ve been told it’s digital, a Boss DD-3, my birthday present in 1989, still have it, still use it. a HBE Mimic, that’s a really nice analog delay and a T-Rex replica delay, another one I use all the time.

 

[Rod/]

MXR Carbon Copy with the modulation turned on
Lovepedal’s Echophonic & EPH-3 are great simple digital delays with predelay

 

[Bogner]

My two faves:

Fulltone Tube Tape Echo.

Eventide H9.

Want/Need/Obsess Frequently Over:

Echo-Fix EFX-2.

Those are some great ones! I wasn't aware of the Echo-Fix. Checked it out online and it is way cool. I would love to get one some day.

 

[Bogner]

MXR Carbon Copy with the modulation turned on
Lovepedal’s Echophonic & EPH-3

Hard to beat the Carbon Copy for what it does and price point. Good little pedal to have around for sure! I feel the same way about the MXR M300 Reverb..great little pedal as well.

 

[John F]

MXR Carbon Copy
MXR Carbon Copy Deluxe

 

[Bill SAS 513]

Yeah, the Carbon Copy is a great tool (Plain and simple!!!) at that point...and somebody mentioned HBE...
I have a couple of their Treble boosters...Germanium...and they are killer, too!!!!!!

 

[JasonE]

I am kind of a simple guy when it comes to delays. I don't run two at a time hardly ever. The two I use are;

Analog - MXR Carbon Copy.
Digital - T.C. Electronic Flashback.

I like that I can change the delays in the Flashback. I also have the editor so I can edit the delay to my liking.

 

[gush]

I have two delays. TC Electronics and Boss DD200

Both of these Pi$$ me off. I bought these because I want at least four different delay settings to choose from.
My complaint is the TC will change your delay settings if you step on button too long and while I was actually playing at my show last weekend my boss went into some strange mode and my rig went silent.

Yanked it out of the chain as quickly as I could. During break I plugged it back in which is like turning it on and it was fine.

What I didn't realize was without paying attention to my pedals, I was stepping on both buttons at the same time and switching to a loop mode.

The second time it happened the loop played during a song and it caught me 100% off guard. Had to unplug from amp to stop that from coming through, kind of a panic mode.

Now I know, but it could still happen if I'm not careful.