the Rotosphere sound...

[monkmiles]

I have recently become a proud owner of a H&K Rotosphere. I've had a thing for it's tone from hearing it played by Charlie Hunter for years. I never wanted to spend the $ for one though and tried a bunch of substitutes. But in the end it was a specific Rotosphere tone (fast speed) that I was looking for and what I now have after finding a decent local sale/deal.

I see a lot of complaints about noise from the Rotosphere...and seeing them turned me off from getting one for a while because I intended on playing it in front of the amp (no fx loop). But now that I got one I feel the noise is very little provided you set the knobs up right. Put the drive up (I often max it), put the output at about 10:00 and the rotor balance at 12:00. It becomes noisy when you put the output knob up over 10-11:00 and/or when you turn the rotor balance much over 12-1:00. With these settings I'm going straight into it to my amp input and noise is not an issue.

It's one of the few pedals that when I click it on...oh man, ummmm, it's good stuff. A short little rotosphere clip: http://www.danjulie.com/images/guita...Rotosphere.mp3

[radcliff]

man that thing IS charlie in a box

great tone

[Phil M]

I agree with you about the noise, for live at least. I never had trouble with it and I have not yet found the unit that sounds as good (and I've been through a few). Should've kept that one.

[Cody McLain]

Sounds great.. always wanted one of those, but I shied away because of the size ans reported noise. I love that tone for playing funk or blues type stuff.

[dewman]

thanks for the tip- expecting one soon!

[jazzguitarplay]

its a great concept, but i find it chessy sounding, maybe thru a leslie speaker would make it more interesting, but its also too big for my pedalboard, great idea for comping to fatten it up but i just cant accept the quality of sound for that much bread

[MightyGuru]

I've owned my Roto MKI for 11 years..MKII for a couple. I really love them. My fave swirly effect. A little noisy into the front but that sweet, fat swirl is addicting.

[dewman]

Holy Moley this is a fun pedal- Arrived today and exactly what I was looking for!! It adds a lot of fatness to the tone as well...anyone ave any advice on what it stacks well with or doesn=t stack well with?? I have a deja vibe and have owned previously a PE vibe unit ad tey just sounded like garbage if the were after the overdrives, very swooshy. I only tried it with a maxed amp ad also at a seting were the amp is at breakup, but no serious stacking yet. I imagine this pedal will be wither last if going mono or second to last if running a dual amp setup, going stereo in to a line 6 DL4. Man I like this pedal and the MkI version I hav s warm and has a momentary actuary switch on the brake so you depress to turn it on and let go for off, makes for some B3 keyboard-like effects which is cool. Makes me want to play some Texas Blues..

[monkmiles]

Yea, it is a fun and great sounding pedal, huh dewman? I also have the Mk1 version.

At home I've been pairing it with a tremolo (EHX Wiggler) and the combination makes some super cool tones! Both pedals are big, so probably don't make the most portable setup but it sounds fantastic with the dtwo swirls.