Let’s say you’re listening to a guitar solo
that’s been soaring for three minutes. Some
theoretical guitar demigod . . . an unholy
union of Alvin Lee and Eddie Hazel is ceaselessly
raging right in front of. You’re convinced
this solo can’t go any higher—and
then the dude kicks a flanger on. You’ve
officially gone interstellar, and you’re not
coming back. Cut to a tender, hushed club
performance. A slow, sad ballad with an
arpeggiated guitar line is slowly swirling . . .
getting a little sleepy . . . taking you somewhere
just a little outside the song.
A great flanger—which essentially varies the
speed of a duplicate of your signal—can
take you both places. A product of the
psychedelic era (Abbey Road studio staffers
claim John Lennon helped coin the term
“flanging” when he described the tape-manipulation
sounds they were exploring
on the Revolver sessions), flanging can be
subtle or absolutely mind-frying and over-the-
top. Either way, if it’s texture you want,
flanging will give it to you by the barrelful.
The original A/DA Flanger may be the most
legendary pedal flanger ever built. Designed
by engineer David Tarnowski in the late
’70s, the pedal colored countless spun-out
heavy-rock, funk, and reggae tracks over the
later part of that decade and into the ’80s.
In 2009, Tarnowski resurrected A/DA and the
A/DA Flanger. And thanks to his commitment
to making the A/DA Flanger a dead-on
replica of those original units, it’s just as
amazing and psycho-swirling as ever—ready
to pepper the guitar work of studied texturalists
and radical experimentalists alike.
Armor-Clad and Authentic
The A/DA Flanger was an elegant piece
of analog engineering in 1977. But even
in our modern era when interface and design
are king (as buzzwords anyway), the A/DA
Flanger remains a smart, beautifully
designed piece of gear. It would actually
make a great companion to one of those
gorgeous, airtight BMWs of the ’70s—it’s
solid as a rock and looks set to spring into
action even when it’s just sitting on a desk.
The cast aluminum case, which is dressed up
in period-correct graphics that evoke a first-generation
video game, has a heft and solidity
you rarely encounter even in boutique pedals,
and it feels capable of taking a hit onstage.
Controls are ingeniously set into a recessed
panel that prevents you (or your stumbling
bandmate) from kicking them out of whack—an important consideration for a pedal that
can change personalities rather radically.
Apart from the footswitch and a Harmonics
slider with Even/Odd settings (more about
that later), there are five controls: Threshold
is a noise-eliminating gate, Manual sets the
time of parallel signal delay, Range determines
the extent to which the delay is determined
by the Manual function or the Speed
knob, and Enhance controls some potentially
crazed amplitude-peaking effects. There’s
even an input that enables you to plug in
an expression pedal and put control of the
Manual function at your feet.
Inside the box, Tarnowski was exacting in
making the new A/DA Flanger as close to the
original as possible: He still uses Panasonic
“bucket-brigade” transistors, which he considers
essential to recreating the original
unit’s sounds (especially the more extreme
effects). However, there are a few useful differences
between the original A/DA Flanger
and the reissue. Most notably, this latest version
features hardwired true-bypass switching.
Slightly Swirled or Super
Psychedelicized
Whether you apply the A/DA Flanger to
your guitar sound with a measured and
sedate approach or with the intent of heavily
altering a listener’s perception, the pedal
has a distinct richness that works well with
almost any guitar tone. For the purposes of
this evaluation, I used a Rickenbacker 330, a
Danelectro Standard Reissue, and a Les Paul
Studio through a Fender Bassman 4x10, a
Fender Blues Jr., and a ’64 Fender Tremolux.
In every case, the Flanger remained tuneful
and responsive to the characteristics of each
instrument—retaining the bite and brawn
of the Les Paul and the even, full-spectrum
qualities of the Danelectro and Rickenbacker.
Though you can go positively transgalactic
with the A/DA, the basic lushness of the
flange effect adds welcome dimension in
more mellow settings. Some of the most
effective sounds are the Leslie- and UniVibelike
voices. These sound particularly deep
with the Harmonics switch set to Odd. But
they can be made less overt by dialing back
the Speed and Manual knobs—a setup
that can add heaps of character to arpeggiated
or heavily accented rhythm parts in
a band mix. Kick the Speed and Manual
switches back up again, though, and you’ll
enter a realm of mega-heavy rotary-speaker
swirl. Through a clean amp, this range of
settings enables access to delicious Mick
Jones or Eddie Hazel rhythm flavors (think
of his “California Dreamin’” cover.) But turn
up the amp—or, better yet, put a Big Muff
in front of the A/DA—and you’ll out-swirl
Jimi’s heaviest UniVibe-driven excursions.
Heaviness, needless to say, is one area
where this pedal shines.
A sweet auto-wah-like effect can be achieved
by using a variation of the rotary-style settings,
switching in some even harmonics,
and cranking up the Enhance control. It’s
a very heavy effect in lead settings, and it
works great with fuzz and distortion, though
it’s important to use the Enhance knob carefully—
some signal peaks can be downright
piercing in high-gain settings.
True flanging effects—the kind many of us
associate with the Faces’ “Itchycoo Park”
and its psychedelic ilk—are predictably cool
and easy to get with the A/DA. They’re effective
in a surprising number of contexts, too.
Slow, dreamy space-rock chord drones were
a perfect match—they took on an elastic,
melting, time-warping quality that can also
guide or inspire a whole song, band, or vocal
approach. And in a fuzzed-out lead environment,
the Flanger maintains clarity and preserves
the harmonic details of pitch bends
and finger vibrato—a quality few flangers can
maintain in extreme-gain settings.
It’s worth noting that, in more flanged-out
settings, the Harmonics switch shifted the
texture quite perceptibly. It’s especially
obvious—and to my ears, useful—on the
Odd setting, which emphasizes peaks in
a way that creates an aural picture of the
signals crossing over in a sort of double-helix
pattern. It’s yet another feature that
makes the A/DA one of the most versatile
Flangers ever.
The Verdict
Though the A/DA Flanger beckons you to
go a little wild with your playing, it’s a very
musical, expressive, and nuanced pedal
when you take the time to work through
it’s myriad settings. And while the uninitiated
may be inclined to write off flanging in
general as a psychedelic or shag-rug funk
relic, the A/DA is wide-ranging enough to
speak softly and breathe life into otherwise
stale chord progressions or rhythm patterns.
In its original incarnation, the A/DA
was the most wide-sweeping and versatile
flanger available. And in terms of function,
musicality, and quality, this reissue remains
a gold standard.
Buy if...
you need everything from subtle
modulation textures to warped
flanging ecstasy.
Skip if...
you’re never bound to dive into
the galaxy of extreme flanging.
Rating...
