The #rip is a distortion pedal from Dropping Acid Pedal Etching, a small builder that, before this pedal, was mostly busy modding and recreating effect circuits. The #rip, an LM386 based op amp distortion, is the builder's first foray into a fully original circuit, and the first pedal it released1. It sits among distortion pedals but covers a wide range: as Delicious Audio's Paolo De Gregorio put it, "it can act as anything between the range of a dirty boost and noise apocalypse"1.
What it does
The #rip is built around the LM386 op amp and, in De Gregorio's words, "goes from mild to wild"1. It offers four modes:
- Dirty Boost
- Distortion #1 (Tight)
- Distortion #2 (Dirtier and Bassier)
- Distortion #3 (Full-on Gain And Low End)
A Starving knob adds extra breakup on top of the selected mode1.
The feedback footswitch
The pedal's most unusual control is a momentary footswitch on the left that feeds the signal back into itself. Depending on the other settings, De Gregorio reports it produces "robot farts to high pitch squealies"1. It is a performance tool rather than a set-and-forget control: hold it for self-oscillating chaos, release it to return to the set sound.
Who it suits
Players after a conventional tight distortion have simpler options, but the #rip is aimed at those who want an unpredictable, noisy edge. De Gregorio called it "a very intriguing take on noisy distortion that works well also with synths"1, which puts it in territory closer to fuzz pedals and experimental filter pedals than to a standard overdrive.
Videos
Dropping Acid Pedal Etching
collector//emitter
Ponderer Sounds
Sources (1)
- Dropping Acid Pedal Etching #rip Boost, Delicious Audio, 2019-11-22