Tech 21 Roto Choir

I'll admit I bought this having no idea what it did. I've been known from time to time to purchase something on a whim just because it looked unique. And after all, isn't that why they invented the 30 day return? I'm generally a traditionalist and I rarely use wacked out effects to tell the truth. But sometimes I'll be in the studio and I need something that sounds NOT like a guitar...but is still...a guitar? Yeah, I know. Anyway, I bought this a couple months ago and spoiler alert...I still have it.

Turns out this is a rotating speaker emulator? Who would've thought. Controls are pretty simple for the most part. Level/bass/treble/drive. Then you have the position and the speed knobs which even I can mostly understand what these are, and I rarely use pedals like this.

UTILIZATION

The editing is pretty simple. It's nice to have a fast and slow switch in addition to the on off switch. This makes the pedal that much more versatile. The manual is good but personally I think this pedal is more like a tremolo/flanger than a rotary.

SOUND QUALITY

You can get a ton of sounds out of this box. Really. It can get choppy tremolo stuff or really phasy flanger airplane style sounds. It's a nice combo of modulation and tremolo functions. In fact, if you want a rotary pedal combined with a chorus...this is probably just what you need. Probably the best feature though is the drive control which lets you emulate that old busted out horn sound. Of course there's also the wacky crazy sounds you get when you go extreme on the settings. They usually end up sounding pretty alien. It's hard to get it to sound really bizarre though. Don't expect any chaos. It's still just a chorus rotary.

OVERALL OPINION

All the tech 21 pedals can go direct which is nice for recording emergencies. I rarely use this in a live situation only because I rarely need it and it takes up too much space on the board to warrant it being there. However I use it in the studio all the time, although in a more non-traditional way. Overall though this is a very cool pedal and worth the price. Definitely check it out if you want a rotary/chorus/tremolo type pedal.