Seymour Duncan has been slowly dipping its toes into the world of pedals, stepping outside their usual wheelhouse of awesome pickups.
Yesterday they announced the release of a new compressor pedal, the Vise Grip. From the official press statement:
The Seymour Duncan Vise Grip Compressor is a studio-grade soft-knee compressor designed for guitarists who want to take control of the dynamics of their sound, from a subtle smoothing-out of peaks and valleys to the most squished and pinched extremes and everywhere in between. The Blend knob lets you add as much or as little of the original signal as you like to the compressed sound, while the Mid/Full/High lets you choose the character of the blended signal by deciding what frequency range of the dry signal is blended in with the wet. The Sustain knob determines how long your notes will ring out and the Attack control regulates how quickly the compressor reacts to your initial pick attack. Higher settings give you a late attack that lets your picking dynamics come through before the compression kicks in. And the Volume control does more than just let you match the output with your bypassed sound: you can also use it as a boost while taking advantage of the Blend and Mid/Full/High controls.
I generally use a compressor on clean guitars, and not really on high-gain sounds for the obvious reason that distortion is compression. But for squeezing some more sustain and clarity out of leads and solos, the Vise Grip might be worth checking out. I have their 805 OD pedal and it’s pretty great, so I’m sure this is just as well made and solid.
I think it looks good based solely on the sheer flexibility of options, which many compressors skimp on.
Here’s an informational video for further perusal:
The Vise Grip Compressor is assembled at the Seymour Duncan Factory in Santa Barbara, California, and like all Seymour Duncan Effects Pedals is 100% true-bypass.
For more information, visit: http://www.SeymourDuncan.com
