I
t seems Fender’s audacious ‘taking
effects pedals seriously’ gambit is
paying off. The original line of six
stompers has now swelled to 15,
and the latest batch includes this tastefully
tinted trio: a combined tremolo and reverb,
a twin-speed analogue phaser and a
valve-powered distortion with added boost.
They’re all housed in Fender’s now
familiar brushed-aluminium enclosures,
with the same dinky LEDs in the control
knobs (which can be switched off if you’re
anti-dinky). One thing they don’t have,
however, is the clever battery compartmentdesign of the previous models...
because they’re mains-powered only.
This is understandable: the Tre-Verb
is digital, the MTG Tube Distortion
needs to pump 150 volts to feed its 6205
subminiature valve and even the Lost
Highway Phaser demands 80mA of current,
which would drain the average PP3 like a
toddler downing a Fruit Shoot.
It’s the Tre-Verb that catches our eye first,
if only because of its obvious similarities
with the Strymon Flint. But then, you could
say Fender got there first: it’s been pairing
tremolo and reverb inside amplifiers since- Things are a little different here to
how they were on the original Vibroverb,
though: you get three flavours of each effect
to choose from and the reverb has separate
dials for blend, dwell and tone. Got a stereo
rig? There are even dual inputs and outputs.
The Lost Highway Phaser offers the
lip-smacking prospect of two separate
phaser speeds with Leslie-style ramping
from one to the other. You also get
switchable 4-stage and 8-stage phasing,
two different wave shapes and a sensitivity
control that lets the modulation speed
respond to the level of the incoming signal.
A one-knob wonder this is not.
And that brings us to the MTG, a
distortion pedal designed in cahoots with
Bruce Egnater of Egnater Amplification
fame. Next to the three-band EQ here
you get an extra control marked ‘tight’,
for reining in the bottom end at higher
gain levels. There’s also a footswitchable
boost, but this isn’t available on its own,
only as the cherry compote on top of your
distortion cheesecake.
FENDER
TRE-VERB, LOST HIGHWAY PHASER
& MTG TUBE DISTORTION
WORDS RICHARD PURVISThe new Fender stompboxes just keep on coming – but do these
three multi-talented new units have the sonic chops to match
their twiddle-friendly versatility?REVIEWS116