Having seen Tenorbanjoguy's demonstration of his Kentucky 300e, I think I should look into adding a reverb pedal to my electric setup. My background is with acoustic mandos. I don't play electric guitar, and am really only dabbling in emando, so I'm not too sure what's good and what isn't (or, for that matter, what's overkill for noodling away at home rather than gigging).
My current setup is a custom-modded Epiphone Valve Jr combo, plus a Boss compression/sustain pedal, which I use mainly with my Amazing 8-string solid e-mando (Guitarfetish Lil' Wonder mini-humbucker rails pickup) and occasionally with a Strat-based 8-string electro-OM. That gives me a really nice clean tone, but it strikes me that adding reverb would make it a lot more versatile. I've also got a Line 6 Pocket-POD, but have to say that I'm somewhat underwhelmed: as a pedal in the signal path to the amp, it adds vast amounts of noise, and used through headphones, the tones all sound rather synthetic and also very rock/indie-orientated, not to mention rather unsuited for the mando range. I'd really be more keen on jazzy, country, alt-country and folk/rock type tones.
So, what's out there in terms of reverb pedals that works well with e-mandos? Should I go for a digital or an analog effect? I'd really want it to be pretty noise free -- I have effectively no hum or noise at all in my current setup (the Amazing is fully shielded and star-grounded, and the amp is modded to eliminate the hum the stock Epi has), and really want to keep it that way. I'd also be looking for something that sounds pretty naturalistic rather than heavily processed.
I saw tenorbanjoguy uses the Line-6 Verbzilla, and that looks a good option from the online reviews. Quite expensive in the UK, though, and I'm a little worried it may share the drawbacks of the Pocket-POD. Another one I've seen around is the Electro-Harmonix Holy Grail pedal. That one is clearly much simpler it its controls than the Verbzilla, and offers less flexibility. Online reviews (at Harmony Central) flatly contradict each other, as normal for that site, with some saying it's wonderful and other it's a complete waste of money. Some are saying stay away from digital effects altogether and go for an analog one.
Any advice on what's good and what's a waste of money much appreciated!
Martin
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