Guitar Interactive – Issue 66 2019

http://www.guitarinteractivemagazine.com^159

As an ‘annexure’ to Nick Jennison’s review of the Helix Stomp in issue 63, Dan Veall takes a second look at the Line 6 flagship model’s ‘baby,’ the

HX Stomp and offers his thoughts from the bass department!

Line 6 HX Stomp

STAR RATING

PROS

» Top-quality effects and

amplifier modelling

» USB Audio Interface

» MIDI connectivity

» Multiple audio path options

» Headphone out

CONS

» See comments about editing

patches

Line 6 Helix HX Stomp

MSRP (UK) £503 (US) $839 //

300+ effects and models from

Helix, M-Series, and legacy Line

6 products // MIDI compatible

// USB Connectivity // For more

information, please visit:

For more information, please visit:

line6.com

v

Check THE SPEC

THE BASSMENT LINE 6 HELIX HX STOMP

Of course, Nick did expertly cover a huge amount of the

pedal’s prowess and yes all of which can be utilised by

us bassists too, including “4 cable method” and the full

MIDI implementation.

One area I specifically wanted to play with that we are

seeing more and more (See my column, ‘Setting The

Tone’ about drive pedals for more details) is the want

for bassists to split our signal path in to high and low

frequencies elements so that we can create tight, gritty

bass drive or effected sounds without losing our low

end depth and punch. Yes, I couldn’t resit trying out

some craziness in full stereo in my video too! The HX

Stomp allows this arrangement effortlessly and each

“configuration” can be saved as a patch. Jumping between

several in just one song is as easy as tapping a foot-switch.

Going in to further detail such as saving settings as

‘Snapshots’ is outside of this second-look feature, however

suffice to say that there is more than one way to save and

recall effect parameters allowing some really intelligent

methods of access in performance.

I also, in my video, briefly touched on adding a MIDI

controller as well as extending fast effect access using a

two button foot switch (momentary type) so that HX

Stomp has 5 foot-switches available verses the three seen.

(You can set the pedal so that button three, by default is

not a tuner/tap tempo button, which is handy). »