This review is for the Toneczar Echoczar analog delay pedal www.toneczareffects.com. The toneczar is Ed Rembold who I stumbled across while looking for an analogue delay pedal for my new pedalboard, at the time I was also looking at the AD900, Quicksilver & DLS Echotap. You probably wont have seen any reviews yet (my serial number is 0001E - meaning the first pedal exported outside the US). I know people have been waiting for a review (& I've had the pedal since april) but I thought I'd wait a few months so I can give a real objective opinion.

I've had the pedal on my board for the last three months & have used it live on stage for several gigs & at rehearsals, my fx chain is Guitar -> Clyde Deluxe Wah -> Zvex ooh-wah -> Zvex Fuzz-probe -> Fulldrive II -> Clone Chorus -> Echoczar -> Amp. So lets dive in!

First impressions out of the box, this is one hefty pedal!, its certainly the weightiest pedal I own and I wouldnt suggest trying to use velcro to fix it to your board!. To get round this I fixed it to my pedal board by using the bottom plate as a template and drilling through from underneath to fix the echoczar permanently. Basically the idea is to have the attaching screws pass "through" the pedal board to attach the echoczar, Pro's of this approach, its not moving anywhere fast (esp handy at gigs when beady eyes are looking at your board & believe me this pedal will get attention esp under stage lights!). Con's its fixed in one position so if you like to tinker with pedal placement you're in trouble! Not a problem for me as the Echoczar has a permanent place on my board for reasons you'll hear later.

As far as looks go its nickel plated & looks very classy indeed & the construction is rock solid which is what I expected after talking to Ed. "I know better than to rush assembly and "ship" mistakes, and after assembly/final testing, I "burn-in" for 24 hours straight- Not because it creates "vintage-mojo" but because if an electrical component is going to fail "in-service" it usually does so right away, plus, another look-over/re-scope-test, with fresh eyes, is just good quality control (IMHO)".

The Echoczar is a dual channel analog delay pedal, the instructions are minimal (1 page) but you dont really need them as the controls are pretty self explanatory. Starting from the back (right to left) we have an 18v DC input (which I power from my VoodooLabs PedalPower II), Input,, Expression Pedal, Direct Out & Effect Out. On the top we have 6 hexagonal control knobs which are (from right to left), Slide, Delay 2, Safety, Repeat, Delay 1 & Mix. In addition there are two toggle switches, mode (vintage/modern) & a phase control (in/out). Finally we have three nice solid footswitch's for feedback , delay 1/2 selector & bypass control. To finish things off there are 4 leds (red, yellow & green) so you can instantly see what settings you have on (handy in dark/smoky environments!).

Mix allows you to adjust from full dry to full wet & anywhere in between. The Delay controls adjust from 25ms of delay in modern mode to over 1 second in vintage which is pretty exceptional, Repeat controls the number of repeats from 1 to about 8, Safety controls feedback & Slide adjusts the time it takes when switching between channels. Ok now for the fun bit, so how does it sound.....

This is a very quiet pedal compared to other analog delay pedals I've tried, in bypass mode there's no noise at all & no loss of tone, very very transparent and the switching is as smooth as butter. In vintage mode the delay sound is very organic, lush & warm with lovely natural sounding repeats. There is a loss of highs (as you would expect) and initially I was worried how it would cut through with my band in vintage mode but it sounds fantastic. The modern mode is quite a bit brighter, personally I find it a bit on the harsh side but then I'm a vintage kind of guy, its nice to have the option though. In operation the Echoczar can cover the spectrum from slapback to spacey incredibly well, the demo's on the toneczar site are in the style of U2 but its capable of much more. The feedback feature is the coolest thing ever, its kind of hard to describe but it creates an undercurrent of oscillating feedback which you can control from subtle to crazy, good for that ambient feel or just something to make people look up!.

The slide feature is even stranger, it controls the amount of time it takes to change from one delay channel to the other, turned all the way to the right you get approximately 5 seconds of pitch shifting madness. This can take quite a bit of getting used to (your bandmates will love you while you're practicing ;-) but I can create some truly unique & amazing sounds. I run a ZVex fuzz probe & ooh wah in my pedal chain, combining those sounds with the echoczar is unreal.

Now at $625 this is not a cheap pedal and there's no tap tempo (I haven't found this to be an issue as the controls are large & high enough to be adjusted by foot) but if you're in the market for an analogue delay pedal you owe it to yourself to consider the Echoczar, its incredibly versatile with (to my ears) the best sound of any delay stomp-box on the market. It has unique features I haven't seen anywhere else & it really can make you stand out from the crowd, Ed's a great guy to deal with & personally I couldn't live without it.

Rock on,
Paul

Many thanks on behalf of the forum for taking the time to write such an insightful review of what appears to be an excellent piece of equipment. Makes me want to go out and buy one! I wonder how it stands up against the Fultone which imo sounds excellent but is just too big/clumsy to use/setup live? Where in Europe are you? If it is the UK does the uk power supply work correctly (no hums etc). Cheers mate.

Alright mate,

I'm in the UK & I use a PedalPower II to power my Echoczar. It really is silent in operation, there's no discernable hum at all. I haven't tried the fulltone so I cant really compare but I can tell you that the clips on the toneczar site although very good just do not do the pedal justice compared to the sound 'in the flesh' so to speak. I would also add that the feedback & slide features on the Echoczar are really outstanding, it adds a new dimension to the sound compared to just delay.

If I ever get a spare minute I'll try & record some clips. I'm happy to answer anyone's questions as I know there's been lot of interest in these pedals but few people seem to actually own them (I've got a feeling this might change!).

Cheers,
Paul