NEW GEAR 41/24: Charvel SD1 SB, Valeton GP-200X and Roland AIRA Compact P-6

Limited Edition Charvel Super-Stock SD1 Silver Bengal

For guitarists who prefer instruments with a more extravagant facelift, Charvel has prepared another design version of the Super-Stock SD1, which, in addition to the Silver Bengal lacquer, features simply conceived electronics, the classic Gotoh Custom 510 tremolo and the typical hockey stick headstock. The alder body is complemented by a maple neck and fingerboard with a variable radius and 22 jumbo frets, tuning is handled by Gotoh locking tuners, and the sound is carried by a Seymour Duncan Distortion TB-6 bridge trembucker with Volume control. Price including gig bag Multi-Fit: approx. 1 200 euros.

Signature guitars Vernon Reid by Reverend Guitars

Vernon Reid, the guitarist from funk-metal Living Colour, decided to change brands and, after Hamer and PRS, switched to Reverend Guitars, which designed his Totem series models in three graphic finishes. The neck with Soft-V profile and the body adopted from the Jetstream series are both made of korina, the ebony fingerboard carries 22 jumbo frets, there's a Floyd Rose tremolo and the reverse headstock is fitted with Reverend Pin-Lock locking tuners. The electronics consist of three Railhammer Vernon Reid pickups, a five-position switch, volume, tone and a bass contour potentiometer to boost the low bands.

Reverb multieffect and looper Mooer Ocean Machine II

Mooer, together with guitarist and composer Devin Townsend, has innovated the Ocean Machine reverb pedal, whose second generation with improved DSP algorithms again offers a pair of independent delays, a reverb and a looper. Each reverb has 9 different modes, there's a "freeze" mode for creating ambient textures, and the maximum delay time is 2000. The memory capacity of the modified looper has been increased from the original 44 to 120 seconds, it offers a programmable parallel and serial effects chain, there is a global EQ, the multi-effect supports DSP and true bypass, the dual inputs and outputs allow the use of true stereo mode and it has an input for an exp. pedal, USB-C and DIN MIDI In/Thru connectors.

Wah/exp/volume pedal Hotone Wong Press

For the great funk guitarist Cory Wong, Hotone has designed the variable Wong Press, which can act as a wah, expression and volume pedal with a special waveform or wah/volume combination. The different working modes and the position of the foot pedal are indicated by a strip of two-coloured LEDs. The wah pedal also features voicing settings (Warm/Classic) and a newly calibrated Q parameter. There are Tuner+Exp outputs, power is handled by a 9V adapter or battery and the footswitch is wired in true bypass mode.

Rail Series: traditional Seymour Duncan pickups in high-gain versions

Seymour Duncan has modified some of its best-selling humbuckers and launched high-gain versions in the form of JB Rails, Jazz Rails, Hot-Rodded Rails Set, Nazgûl Rails, Sentient Rails and Nazgûl Sentient Rails Set models and sets. All pickups feature rail extensions and Alnico 8 magnets and deliver enhanced string-to-string balance, solid bass, clear highs, longer sustain and clear projection. There are six- and seven-string options to choose from, and prices for individual pickups start at about 120 dollars.

Preamp/multi-effect Valeton GP-200X 10th Anniversary

The Asian company Valeton commemorates a decade of its existence with the GP-200X 10th Anniversary guitar processor, which, compared to the standard GP-200 version, features a new facelift, added presets created by guitarists from different styles, optimised switch, pedal and tuner response and improved firmware, providing even smoother operation with redesigned algorithms. With a price tag of about 350 dollars, the anniversary Valeton GP-200X comes in a premium package that includes various accessories.

Fuzz Death By Audio Bass War

This harmonically rich octave fuzz distortion for bass guitar features volume and gain parameters with extended range (Volume + 27 dB, Fuzz +16 to +64 dB), Tone functioning as a notch filter from 98 Hz – 3.3 kHz and a Mix potentiometer for adjusting the ratio between the effects and the clean signal. As a result, Bass War offers a near-endless variety of timbres and registers with different distortion characteristics, including extreme fuzz with long sustain. Thanks to the Mix control, the resulting sound can retain a clear expression and the required dynamics at all times. Price: about 195 dollars.

New Perspectives Music Upright Bass: pickup for double bass

The American company New Perspectives Music has prepared a pickup for double bassists that easily attaches to the bottom part of the fingerboard, and the height of the four ceramic magnets can be easily adjusted. The compact model has a coil wound with 42AWG copper wire, a resistance of about 5.2 kOhm, and the positions of the pole pieces can be changed with the included Allen key, so the player can adjust the resulting sound fairly quickly. Designer Tim Sway hand-builds these pickups, including the covers, from several types of reclaimed wood.

Luxury Snare DrumCraft Bell Brass

DrumCraft returns to the 14" x 6.5" Bell Brass snare drum with a new edition with revised specifications. A key difference from the original snare is the thickness of the cast bell brass shell, which is now three millimetres thick instead of six, providing more sound flexibility and sensitive reaction to strokes while maintaining punch, clarity and musical expression. Despite the modification, the snare weighs an impressive 12 kg. The ten lugs and hoops have a satin chrome finish, the drum is fitted with Nickelworks snare strainer and Remo Ambassador CS Coated / Ambassador Snare heads. The price is around 900 euros.

Roland AIRA Compact P-6 Creative Sampler

A new member of the Roland AIRA Compact series, the P-6 Creative Sampler, has arrived on the European market, partly inspired by the SP-404. With 16 voices, the P-6 works in polyphonic and chromatic modes and each of the six directly accessible samples has its own pad and parameter controls. There's a granular mode, 64-step sequencer, effects unit, built-in microphone, USB-C audio/MIDI, Sync and Mix connectors, P-6 SampleTool software, etc. Price: approx. 200 euros.