New Zealand-headquartered stompbox maker Red Witch has relaunched an “even better than before” variant of its cult-favorite Empress Chorus—the Empress Deus Chorus Vibrato.
Limited to only 70 units, the latest offering from Red Witch is a faithful recreation of the original but adds some brand new features.
Touted as “the most versatile analog chorus ever made,” the Empress Deus Chorus Vibrato is an all-analog stereo stompbox based chiefly upon the design of Andy Summers-favored Empress Chorus. Other big names who have used it include Oasis’s Paul Stacey and Faith No More’s Jon Hudson.
New to the Empress Deus Chorus Vibrato is a Dark mode feature accessible via the right-hand toggle switch. Activating this gives you high roll-off Boss CE-1-esque tones.
Control-wise, you have a quartet of parameters—Mix, Depth, Voice, and Velocity—lifted directly from the original Empress Chorus. While Mix dial takes charge of combining the wet/dry signals, Depth and Velocity knobs set modulation speed and intensity, respectively.
Finally, Empress Deus’s greatest weapon, the Voice control, lets you “change the delay time of the chorus—allowing you access to an infinite number of chorus pedal sounds in one box—from super-spanky sparkling clean to over-the-top sea-sick inducing, pitch bending wobble.”
Each Empress Deus Chorus Vibrato pedal comes hand-made, signed, numbered, and with a price tag of $249.
