# Pedal that imitates a Leslie speaker



## greco (Jul 15, 2007)

I have a friend that is looking for a pedal that will imitate the sound/effect of a Leslie speaker.

Do they exist? 

Any suggestions? (What would be your top 3 choices?)

Thanks

Dave


----------



## Guest (May 15, 2009)

Top of my list is the Eventide ModFactor. In stereo is amazing. Mono is still the best I've heard. I thought the DLS RotoSim was excellent as well, but for a few bucks more the ModFactor gives you amazing Leslie plus a ton of other great effects.

The Destination Rotation Single was nice, but sounded just like my modded Phase 90 to me.

The ModFactor really, really kills in stereo. I have it running mono, slow speed, on all the lead guitar on this track: http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/870088/sounds/rpm2009/chilled.mp3


----------



## Wild Bill (May 3, 2006)

greco said:


> I have a friend that is looking for a pedal that will imitate the sound/effect of a Leslie speaker.
> 
> Do they exist?
> 
> ...


I believe the common name is "chorus pedal".

:food-smiley-004:


----------



## CocoTone (Jan 22, 2006)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KP4e7E8_WkE

There is one on my board. Awesome.

CT.


----------



## greco (Jul 15, 2007)

Thanks for the comments.

Just for interest, my friend went into the local L&M store and asked the question that I'm asking in this thread...they had no answer for him.

Cheers

Dave


----------



## traynor_garnet (Feb 22, 2006)

greco said:


> Thanks for the comments.
> 
> Just for interest, my friend went into the local L&M store and asked the question that I'm asking in this thread...they had no answer for him.


Really? Don't they carry the Line6 Rotomachine?

Actually, I've heard that the Rotomachine is pretty good and cheaper than the other options.

If you want to do it very cheap but still have good sound, check out the Danelectro Rocky Road.


TG


----------



## hollowbody (Jan 15, 2008)

traynor_garnet said:


> Really? Don't they carry the Line6 Rotomachine?
> 
> Actually, I've heard that the Rotomachine is pretty good and cheaper than the other options.
> 
> ...


I'm sure they do, but have you ever talked to the kids that work at L&M? They barely know how to change a set of strings sometimes, nevermind know anything about gear.

I'd be willing to wager most of the people on this forum know a heck of a lot more about products out there and what they do/how they work than the average floor salesperson at L&M


----------



## Rugburn (Jan 14, 2009)

The Option 5 Destination Rotation is a hell of a pedal. It's not cheap and a little harder to get your hands on than the others mentioned here. To my ears it doesn't sound like any other chorus/vibe pedals I've tried.......and I've tried *a lot* of them. My experience with digital pedals hasn't been great. I tried a pricey Roland/Boss roto something or other, and I was pretty surprised at how cold it sounded. To each his own.

Shawn:smile:


----------



## dwagar (Mar 6, 2006)

I've always thought the H&K Rotosphere was top of the heap for Leslie pedals. There may be better ones now though.

The Digitech RPM1 is okay but it's a rack unit. 

Motion Sound Pro3 series in a real spinning horn.


----------



## Guest (May 15, 2009)

It's important to decide if you're after a single speaker sim or a dual speaker sim. The DLS and Eventide both do dual speaker (bass and horn) sims -- you can adjust the rotational speeds of the horn and speaker independently. The dual speaker sims can be made to sound substantially different than the single speaker sims.

If you're feeling plucky with the soldering iron mhammer has a great mod for the Small Stone (or was it the Small Clone -- I can never keep the two straight) that turns it into a phase/vibe/volume swell effect that's crazy cool in mono, loud. I used it here: http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/870088/sounds/mhammer/pf-splus.mp3

It definitely gets a wicked "air sucking" action happening.

You might able to convince him to share the mods. :smile:


----------



## Rugburn (Jan 14, 2009)

Here's the Boss RT-20 I mentioned. Pretty faithfull to my experience. Boss doesn't do itself any favours by hiring these guys that seem like they could be side characters off "The Simpsons".

Shawn 

http://www.bossus.com/gear/productdetails.php?ProductId=696&ParentId=96


----------



## Stratin2traynor (Sep 27, 2006)

I have a Fulltone Mini Deja Vibe. Sounds awesome. 

Still waiting to find a used Small Stone Phaser. LOVE that phaser. Had one and reluctantly sold it to help fund the purchase of an amp. Been kicking myself ever since.


----------



## mhammer (Nov 30, 2007)

I have a Vibra-tone cabinet, and a Line 6 Roto machine, in addition to all manner of chorus, flanger, uni-vibe, and phaser pedals.

"Emulating a Leslie" has several sub-forms:

1) getting the slower faster gurgly sounds

2) getting the spatial swirl

3) getting the ramp-up/ramp-down effect

4) getting the "post-production" tone of a doppler effect as the very last thing in your signal chain

Very few flangers, phasers, uni-vibes, or chorus pedals will have a ramp-up or ramp-down feature, even though many can do a respectable job mimicking the tone achieved at faster or slower speeds. The original Uni-Vibe came with a foot-pedal to permit manual ramp-up/ramp-down, and some units come with over-sized speed knobs to let you work the speed with your foot. None of them really nail the precise feel or a belt-drive system slower accelerating or winding down.

The spatial swirl is a pivotal part of a Leslie sound, as the speaker points away from you and towards you, bouncing the sound off reflecting surfaces. About two years ago, Tim Larwill came over to the house and I let him try out my Vibra-tone with a little Princeton amp. Tim is best known for making the Retro-sonic line of effects pedals, and his clone of the Boss CE-1 in particular, and has a good ear for tone. I asked him if he had ever tried a rotating speaker before, and was surprised to find he hadn't. But I wasn't nearly as surprised as he was when he plugged in. Even the best chorus does not fill the room up as splendidly as the punyest rotating speaker does. It's that spatial element thatis missing from all those modulation pedals noted above.

It's worth noting that a Leslie is placed at the very end of your signal chain, such that the doppler effect is mapped onto whatever tonal qualities have accumulated from pickups right through to amp transformer. That adds a certain richness of effect that plugging into a pedal and THEN amplifying that will not mimic very well. That's why I call it a "post-production" effect - not unlike mixing down a few mic' signals and feeding what you've mic'd through a reverb.

I'll lay my cards on the table and note that I got my Roto-machine from Line 6 ( http://line6.com/tonecore/rotomachine.html ) as part of a collection of pedals in gratitude for being a beta tester for the product line. So, I guess you could call me biased. And, since I already owned a Leslie simulator when some of the other pedals started coming out, I felt no need to try out the Destination Rotation, Boss, or other pedals.

That being said, The Roto-Machine is a decent pedal. It permits you to set fast and slow speeds separately, and has three ramp-up/down rates, in addition to models for three cabinets. The L16 model nails the Vibra-tone cabinet I have, based on A/B testing. I can't speak to the other 2 models, but they provide lovely sounds too. If I have a gripe with it, it is that volume is contingent on drive settings, The drive settings are very nice, mind you, but sometimes you want more grind without a concomittant volume change.

Now the biggie. In mono, these pedals, whether Line 6 or others, are "pleasant", but lack that certain something that will lead even knowledgeable folks like Wild Bill to suggest chorus pedals as reasonable replacements. They *absolutely* need to be heard in stereo. Seriously. If you plan on buying one, insist that the music store guy give you 3 cords and let you use two amps. Use one amp, and you will spend 90 seconds diddling around going "That's nice". use two amps , and if it's a Wednesday or other no-so-busy day, you and the music store clerk will spend the next 3 hours running through every song the two of you can remember that uses a Leslie. It's THAT important to have a physical distribution of the effect and sound.

Now, if all you want is to get a gurgly sound, many chorus, flanger, or phaser pedals CAN do it okay. I recently picked up a Small Clone and bumped the delay range over a bit with an added switch, and it does a VERY nice slow Leslie sound that rides the zone between flanging and chorus. But it doesn't do any of the other tricks.


----------



## WEEZY (May 23, 2008)

I have the BBE Soul Vibe - it has the rotation effect with a hint of chorus in there - it is a very useable, awesome pedal. and look how funky it is!


----------



## greco (Jul 15, 2007)

Many thanks to everyone...I never thought this thread would be so active...much appreciated.

Cheers

Dave


----------



## Guest (May 15, 2009)

After hearing mhammers speaker I started to develop a pretty good itch for the real deal. And then Guitar Player last month reviewed the Motion Sound SRV-212 -- oh man. That' looks perfect. It's driven by your guitar amp. When you stop it from rotating it always goes back to a "home" position that lets it function very near to a standard guitar cabinet. Fast/slow speeds. And built-in stereo mics.

Wow! So with one cab you _could_ have it all. Tempting...


----------



## Rugburn (Jan 14, 2009)

iaresee said:


> After hearing mhammers speaker I started to develop a pretty good itch for the real deal. And then Guitar Player last month reviewed the Motion Sound SRV-212 -- oh man. That' looks perfect. It's driven by your guitar amp. When you stop it from rotating it always goes back to a "home" position that lets it function very near to a standard guitar cabinet. Fast/slow speeds. And built-in stereo mics.
> 
> Wow! So with one cab you _could_ have it all. Tempting...


Read the same review. As often as I want a Leslie, a $1000 is little pricey. I like that it doubles as a 2x12 cab though. I would like to see a review of the single 50 watt version.


----------



## Guest (May 15, 2009)

Rugburn said:


> Read the same review. As often as I want a Leslie, a $1000 is little pricey. I like that it doubles as a 2x12 cab though. I would like to see a review of the single 50 watt version.


I had the same thought. But I've paid $800 for a 2x12 cab before (that's what my new 2x12 Rectifier cab cost me), and then another $400 for the ModFactor...so, you know, it's kind of not such a bad deal really. If you really love rotating speakers its pretty freaking sweet.

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't tempted to ditch the Koch, but a Dr. Z head and this cab...it's sort of floating in my head now.


----------



## CDWaterloo (Jul 18, 2008)

I am using Nova Modulator for leslie sim. It is very good at it...see the below demo (at 12.02):

http://kidman.itide.dk/tccinema/nova_nsm_manual/nova_modulator_run_through.mov

it is very good at simulation of Mutron Bi-phase as well (see at 10:30)...

sdsre


----------



## lbrown1 (Mar 22, 2007)

the line6 POD XTL has a leslie emulation with or without horn......it's pretty good.


----------



## JimiGuy7 (Jan 10, 2008)

In all honesty, I bought a BBE Soul Vibe and I love it. I mean I can get that Zakk Wylde Pride and Glory sloshy tone, Trower and Jimi. Some may say that you need this chorus or this vibe pedal to acheive what you want but I like this pedal and it does exactly what I want. You can get them on ebay for a pretty good price. Check it out on youtube as well.


----------

