Probably a long shot but has anyone got one or have any experience with one.It's a pedal that I've been interested in since hearing Killing Joke when I was a kid and I've recently found some bits of info on the web on.
I realised it creates a sound that can be achieved with chorus and short delay but I wondered if there is anything similar around now doing that 'doubling' effect without any chorus or octave action. The EHX Polychorus 'double' setting seems kinda close but I wasn't too impressed.
There's also the old EHX Double Tracker but finding anything on those is tough. One went on eBay in the US for something like $300 and there's a guy on YouTube selling one but I cannot understand a word he says and I don't have a YouTube account to ask him.
I'm more interested in the A.D.T.
Anything would help.
(the artist formerly known as KarlosSantos)
Comments
I designed the Bell Electrolabs ADT and based it on my experiences and unique ideas whilst working at the BBC Radiophonic Workshop in the 1970s. To my knowledge there is nothing else that can do exactly what it did. PACE bought out Electrolabs and I left as I completely disagreed with the much cheaper design of their ADT, which really was nothing at all like my original Bell Electrolabs design. There was a load of clever stuff crammed into that original design of mine, which was expensive to make, but did the job superbly well. Nobody has managed to copy it since. I am also considering a re-issue of an updated and even better version if sufficient interest is out there. Great that so many have good memories of those excellent designs that Electrolabs marketed. I was involved in the Sustain, the ADT, and the Phaser, and with a little bit of modification to the original Flanger design. I designed a custom rackmount units for John Mizarollis, Dave Brock of Hawkwind, and Peter Bennett.
You really ought to tell us some more about your thoughts re an updated version ...
@analoguetone - I'd love to know more about the circuit.
R.
Eqd Speaker Cranker clone
Monte Allums TR-2 Plus mod kit
Trading feedback: http://www.thefretboard.co.uk/discussion/60602/
The ADT was the result of much discussion with the guys at Electrolabs. Mike Bell (then owner) wanted to hit a price point that would get us sales from EH at the time, and we had to get a prototype to the Frankfurt Musik Messe ... involving a HUGE amount of work on my part. We had several recorded examples of the effect done in studios at the time using pro rack mount combinations which ran into thousands of pounds cost. I had to figure a way to avoid that sort of cost, get it into a footpedal format that would match the plugin design devised by Mike Bell, and work from batteries. In the end the battery option was a definite nono. So the prototype was a mess of crammed circuitry inside a Bell Electrolabs footpedal enclosure. It had to work from batteries, so in the end, I did a bodge that allowed it to run on batteries for as long as they could hold the needed voltage, then cut out. Sadly, that happened before they had any time to demo it at Frankfurt. However, the concept and design had been proven. We used BB delay lines, the most expensive .. Reticon (no longer made) literally 4 times as many as the Electric Mistress Flanger. This gave me the ability to program a delay sweep modulation with a unique characteristic, not understood or copied in the single delay line PACE version to come later ( which was really a long delay flanger ). The whole concept was to make a sound that did exactly what it said. Make one guitar sound like several playing in near unison, with separate pitch drift, timing, dynamic, and random, but most essentially musical. This had to work for vocal, and keyboard, as well as work with a bass guitar. I had, as previously mentioned, worked for a while at the Radiophonic Workshop on attachment from BBC TV News, where I was designing broadcast audio stuff, as well as being a cameraman, video editor etc etc. The incredible innovative junk that was lurking around the Maida Vale premises could do almost anything, and produce sounds and effects that are still unique to this day. It really kicked me into the imaginative design mode, and that's why the ADT was so successful as a complex unit, as it was literally a nonstop brainwave from start to finish. The main directive was that this had to do the job correctly and not sound like anything else at the time. To be unique. I tried to be self critical at all stages, and it was only when I was really pleased with the sound that I took it to the team for comments. A great experience - they were amazed, and with someone else playing it - for the first time, I could appreciate how versatile it was. I remember at the London Music show in the Hotel Russell a few months later, a DJ playing around with it and managing to go OTT to make some really scary voices and Darth Vader sound-alikes - things I never imagined when designing it. That's the story, the description, and forgive me - but I am totally biased - so take it as that ! I would love to make some modern day equivalent, in fact the 1980s designs that I did for Dave Brock and Peter Bennett (album: The Old Pals Act) were really professional extensions of the ADT concept utilising much higher cost delay lines and pro audio interfacing. I thoroughly enjoy designing FX pedals (as a guitarist myself) and also did the in-guitar eq and preamp designs for Peter Cook (The Axis Guitar and Bass - and also some of John Entwistle's basses) and Doug Chandler, later founder of Chandler Guitars. Sorry for the ramble .. those were great days of incredible things.
Ever thought of re-creating the effect in code?
R.
Eqd Speaker Cranker clone
Monte Allums TR-2 Plus mod kit
Trading feedback: http://www.thefretboard.co.uk/discussion/60602/
Hi, yes it is Tony ... the idea of using a pulse response code emulation is theoretical, but there is a complex dynamic, spatial and delay variation that cannot be quantified in code.... and this was a stereo option device which further complicates. I have discussed it with a designer friend who has done a lot of these things. I prefer analogue .. as you can tell ;-)
Hi Tony - it was delightful to read your comments above - just discovered this thread now. I would certainly be interested in an updated ADT. A friend of mine, Geordie (guitarist in a UK band called Killing Joke), would doubtless also be interested - he uses 2 of the PAiCE units. I'm fascinated to hear that the original is more complex circuitry than the larger unit.
Any further thoughts or developments on this?
https://www.andertons.co.uk/brands/tc-electronic/tc-electronic-mimiq-doubler
There's things I've had, there's things I wanna have"