Alexander Pedal has a knack for releasing creative and playful pedals, and their new creation pushes the limits in both realms.
With colorful, cartoonish illustrations likely to make any toddler want to steal it from you, the company’s brand new Marshmallow is a rather ‘out-there” take on dual modulated pitch shifting, featuring six modes (listed under the videos) and all the other goods common to all the manufacturer’s Neo series (presets, second foootswitch for momentary effects, USB/Midi/Expression connectivity and the Neo Morph function that allows to “seamlessly morph between different knob settings on the fly”).
The Marshmallow can also deliver lo-fi tones by letting you reduce the effect’s sample rate all the way down to 1.2 Hz using the Clock knob.
As far as functionality is concerned, this is a rather “deep” device, but the design avoids control overcrowding by gifting its four knobs with alternate functions accessible by holding the selector button in the center of the pedal.
An interesting Pitch Lock function lets you easily browse through presets that tune your pitch shifted note to specific chords.
Check out the videos below!
“Marshmallow?” That’s a silly name for a pedal, we know.
But it totally fits. Sweet, fun, and probably best consumed in small doses, our Marshmallow makes weird gooey sounds with your favorite instruments.
At its heart, Marshmallow is a pair of pitch shifters that we combine and modulate in interesting ways with a variety of magic tricks. Want smooth chorus? No problem. How about juicy organ tones? Yup. Maybe you want your stuff to sound like a cat on helium? Yes, we do that too.
Basically, Marshmallow is a quick way to start at normal and end up at “what was that?!” We hope you like it as much as we do.
Marshmallow features six effect modes, all of which are adjustable to play from 44.1kHz down to 1.6kHz bandwidth using the CLOCK knob.
High clock rates yield impressive fidelity and great sound quality. Low clock rates introduce artifacts, noise, and weirdness. You have been warned.
EFFECT MODES:
MOD Dual pitch shift with adjustable pitch modulation. VOICE and TWO control the pitch shift intervals, MOD and ALT control the depth and rate of the modulation.ARPY Tweakable arpeggiator effect. VOICE, TWO, and MOD control the intervals of the arpeggio, and ALT controls the speed and direction of the arpeggiator. Set ALT near the middle for slower speeds, or towards either end for faster ones.
RAND Dual pitch shift with random modulation. VOICE and TWO control the pitch shift intervals, MOD controls the amount of modulation from the randomizer, and ALT controls the amount of modulation signal fed to each pitch shift voice.
RING Dual pitch shift with automatic panning between the two signals. VOICE and TWO control the pitch shift intervals, MOD controls the speed of modulation from a very slow tremolo to a very horrible ring modulation, and ALT controls the balance between the two pitch shifted signals.
DYNA Dynamic pitch shifter. VOICE and TWO select the “quiet” and “loud” pitch shift intervals, MOD sets the sensitivity of the envelope detector. Play quietly to hear the VOICE pitch and play louder to hear the TWO pitch. Set ALT counter-clockwise to shift seamlessly between the two pitches, or clockwise to bend from one to the other.
CLOUD Dual pitch shift with adjustable feedback, for reverb-like washes and echoes. VOICE and TWO control the pitch shift intervals, MOD controls the feedback / texture, and ALT controls the balance between the two pitch shifted signals.
PITCH LOCK:
A lot of pitch shifting pedals on the market allow you to set the intervals over a wide range, but trying to find the right pitch can be tricky. That’s why we’ve added our exclusive Pitch Lock function to Marshmallow. Hold the center button and the Ramp footswitch to cycle between the available Tune Lock settings:PITCH LOCK OFF (alt LED is violet) – Pitch sweeps smoothly from -1 octave to +1 octave. Non-chromatic pitches are possible including slight detuning effects.
PITCH LOCK CHROMATIC (alt LED is yellow) – Pitch locks to chromatic intervals from -1 octave to +1 octave. Every half-step is available from -12 to +12.
PITCH LOCK MAJOR (alt LED is cyan) – Pitch locks to a major scale from -1 octave to +1 octave.
PITCH LOCK MINOR (alt LED is green) – Pitch locks to a minor scale from -1 octave to +1 octave.
