Akai flanger

The Akai flanger is a flanger pedal made by Akai as part of what MusicRadar's reviewer Trevor Curwen called "Akai's new Analog Custom Shop Range"¹. Like any flanger, it produces a sweeping, whooshing modulation effect: as EarthQuaker Devices' buying guide puts it, "Flangers work on time delay, taking two signals and mixing them, and playing one signal back at a slower speed with an LFO to modulate the timing of the delay"². If you are new to the effect type, the Flanger Pedals page covers how the circuit works and how it differs from chorus and phaser.

Controls and sounds

The pedal has four knobs that control the sound, and MusicRadar found that "there are plenty of variations on the flanging effect going on here"¹. The range of sounds the reviewer described goes well beyond conventional flanging:

• Familiar, conventional flanging
• Extreme sounds, "including some that will take your head off"
• Faux rotary speaker sounds
• Metallic timbres

The reviewer also noted that manipulating the knobs without even playing guitar produces "endless" variations, which points to how much of the pedal's character comes from the interaction of its four controls rather than any single setting¹.

What reviewers said

MusicRadar's verdict was that the pedal makes itself heard. As Trevor Curwen put it¹:

That framing suits the pedal's character as described in the review: a flanger with a wide enough range of sounds to move from conventional sweeping into deliberately extreme territory¹.

Questions