ValetonMulti Effects Guitar Pedal Dapper Indie of Distortion Reverb Delay Chorus Fuzz And Phaser Tremolo for Indie Ambient Psychedelic Grunge Post Rock Stoner Metal Retro Alternative Tone

I am writing this review after one year of use, three round-trip cross-country flights from LA to NY, and about eight sets of live performance spread across six shows as well as three rehearsals and more recordings than I could count plus a few jam sessions. It's an outstanding unit. I have had no switch or pot failures and no pot noise. There is occasional subtle switch pop, but only on the chorus/flange/tremolo, and only when you either switch from one effect to another, or haven't used the effect in a song or two. It can be remedied by simply tapping the switch that controls all three of these songs once between songs-- if you remember to do that, no popping.What is great about the unit is that it offers chorus and phaser (either one or the other, not both) that are separate from reverb, (three different kinds), as well as delay and a light boost/distortion, or 'indie drive.' I don't use the tremolo-- it seems a little weird, but the main reason is the kind of music I play doesn't call for it.The indie drive section seemed like a weaker section of the unit, but over time, I've found it's actually pretty usable. I do use it with a BOSS SYN1 and a Tube Screamer clone, but if the backline of the club has a tube amp, the 'indie drive' is actually more usable than the TS clone.The delay unit has tap tempo which works pretty well (though I avoid it under the stress of performance) and chorus has tap tempo, which is irritating to me just because I tend to leave my foot on the pedal and accidentally go into tap. Not the unit's fault, I'm slowly learning to avoid this.I find the fuzz section unusable-- it's too loud-- and it's a bit annoying that when you engage the tuner by hitting the switch for the fuzz and holding the switch down, you get a little extra hum for a second or two before the tuner kicks in. Honestly, though, live no one will notice. The tuner itself is only fair, but it's good enough if you know its weaknesses: After re-tuning, mute the strings with your hand until the display is totally dead, then check the string. If you let the string ring as you retune, it just returns the most recent previous value (slightly sharp or flat), so it tells you nothing useful. Took me months to figure this out, but once I did, it was fine. Also note that if it registers sharp or flat less than a second after plucking the string, you can trust the reading. If the reading strays sharp or flat after a second or two, ignore it-- you are now as close to in tune as you are going to get.I have used this in venues from small rock clubs like Otto's Shrunken Head in NYC to larger outdoor venues with over 150 people in the audience and through both tube and solid state heads. The sound is probably a bit thinner than some better effects, but hey, it's a fly rig. And through a good tube amp, I wonder who can really tell the difference. Generally, I've been using it with a pretty loud rock outfit, but I've also used it at smaller clubs with a more acoustic quartet. It's also my practice rig and rig for sketching songs in Reaper, though I recommend some kind of cabinet emulation for that, even if it's really basic, with some IR loading. I did use it direct for a public access TV taping with no cab emulation, and it was a bit brittle sounding, but-- unfortunately-- brutally clear and accurate. (We did that gig with no rehearsal, and you could hear every mistake, it hides nothing-- that problem is solved with bigger, warmer amps.)Very happy with this, hoping to get more years out of it. I am running this, the SYN1 and the TS clone of a single nine volt power supply with an octopus power cord, no special power conditioning or fancy transformers, and it seems really robust. It's ridiculously portable, far easier to carry than my old full size pedal board or a series of micro effects, which often suck and have QC problems... some of those little things have to be returned four or five times, and then I finally gave up. No problem with this one.Highly recommended.

This is still one of my favorite pedals, in fact right now on my pedal board it is this one, plus a reverb and a vibrato since the distortion can go from very subtle to quite powerful, the fuzz is one of the best I have heard giving that degree of dirtiness to the sound that makes it excellent, the 3rd effect is modulation, it has tremolo, phaser and chorus, of this I only use the chorus in a very subtle way and it does its job, in the delay section it has 3 options, of these I mostly use the tape and it is incredible, the controls are very easy to use and get the desired sound, and in the field of reverbs I always use the Room or spring and I always have them on as a fixed reverb, giving a very clean and subtle sound, an excellent pedal that gives you a lot

I’m enjoying the combination of effects this pedal offers. The sound is good, the construction is solid, and the signal flow within the pedal itself makes sense. I also appreciate that I’m not toggling through hundreds of patches to find the kind of effect I’m looking for. This thing really simplifies my setup visually, which is what I was going for.Placing this in line with other pedals can be tricky as it combines effects that you might want in different parts of your signal chain if you’re using multiple pedals in your setup. In my case, I am playing around with compression and noise gate placement. Do you place a noise gate before or after this pedal? How does that impact the time based and modulation effects? Do you place it after the pedal? How does that allow your initial gain stages to impact your sound? Etc.There are many opinions out there on signal flow, but I’d recommend this product and then playing with your setup to see what sounds best to your ears.

I was looking for a simple tool for home recording of guitar tracks where I didn’t have to go menu diving. I have other more expensive multi effects units but never seem to get the tone I’m on a quest for. Now with this device, I get pretty much everything I need. I did find one thing personally I didn’t like and that was the emulated cab out. It sounds ok but to my ears, it’s a bit too dark and a little low-fi due to the lack of top end frequencies. I could see where some users might be going for that sound and I may even choose to use it at some point, but I needed to fix that one and only disappointment with the product. Easily solved if you have another effects unit with a decent clean preamp and speaker cab simulations. I plugged the output of the Dapper into a Boss GT-1 using just the natural clean preamp and the 4 x 10 cab sim and it sounds absolutely incredible. Also allows to me to do a little more with the eq on the GT1. The 4 x 10 really cleans up the mud and lets the unit shine especially if you’re using humbuckers. I did quite a lot of experimenting so I have a few more tips to optimize results with this unit. 1. A 4 x 12 cab sim is nice for a big acoustic sound with more bottom end. 2. Don’t overdo it on the gain unless you want that powerhouse sound. For me, setting the drive to about 1 gives just the right amount of breakup for those clean borderline dirt tones. Use your guitar volume and tone knobs old school style and the tonal range is unbelievable. 3. The effects, the drive, and the fuzz on this thing all sound so good together. Many possible settings and combinations. You really do not need any more effects or knobs to twiddle with to find your sound IMO. Simple, easy, awesome tone. 4. The unit sounds great with all kinds of pickups. 5. I plugged in my Taylor TZ electric-acoustic. Sounds better than my acoustic amp somehow with just reverb, chorus, or delay and the clean cab sim. The effects on this are very organic and inspiring. I highly recommend this product. I’m actually blown away at how good is. With the right amp or cab sim, you are good to go. Solid build, compact, and tremendously versatile.