Keeley Caverns Delay and Reverb

The Keeley Caverns is a dual-effect pedal that puts a delay and a multi-mode reverb in one compact enclosure, built by Keeley Electronics of Edmond, Oklahoma. The two effects are independently foot-switchable, so you can use the delay alone, the reverb alone, or both together for a layered, spacious sound at the end of a pedalboard¹². Keeley announced the original Caverns Delay Reverb on June 26, 2015, and followed it with the Caverns Delay Reverb V2 in August 2017, which rebuilt the delay side around the company's Magnetic Echo circuit¹³.

What it does: delay and reverb, alone or together

The Caverns is built as a "wonderfully rich, compact, and dynamic platform for time-delay enhancement," in the words of the original announcement, combining what Keeley described as a full-featured one-second delay with a studio-quality multi-mode reverb⁷. Because the reverb and delay modes are independently foot-switchable, the pedal works as two units in one enclosure, and running both at once is where much of its appeal lies. As Pedal of the Day put it:

The control set splits between the two sides. On the reverb side you get blend, decay and warmth controls; on the delay side, blend, time, rate and repeats². The original Caverns ran on a newly designed dual DSP platform engineered completely in house at Keeley¹.

The reverb modes and Morph control

The reverb channel has offered two different mode sets across the pedal's life⁷¹⁵:

The original pedal's Morph control customizes the reverb in each mode, giving control over modulation pulse, pre-delay reflection, and octave-up voice intensity depending on which mode is selected¹. In Modulated Mode, Pedal of the Day found the Morph knob controls the depth of the chorus and pre-delay modulation⁸. Delicious Audio's later buying guide describes the V2's Spring mode as a blackface amp-style spring reverb with Fender-esque tremolo, with Modulation adding choral modulation and Shimmer emphasizing octave-up voices in the trails⁹.

Delay: up to 650ms

The two versions take different approaches to the delay side:

• Original Caverns (2015): a digital delay on the dual DSP platform, with the Time knob offering a range that swells up to 950ms when maxed out, according to Pedal of the Day's review⁸⁷.
• Caverns V2 (2017): Keeley's Magnetic Echo circuit, designed to emulate analog tape delay lines, with up to 650ms of warm delay³.

On the V2, three-way switchable modulation gives options for adding wow and flutter to the repeats, the kind of pitch wobble associated with tape echo units³. Gearnews billed the V2 as an "analogue style" delay with reverb and modulation thrown in¹⁰, and MusicRadar described its delay circuit as Keeley's "analogue tape-aping Magnetic Echo"¹¹. Delicious Audio calls the V2 an analog stompbox packed with features⁶⁴.

On the V2's delay time, the sources are consistent at 650ms³⁵⁶⁴. The original's maximum is only documented by the Pedal of the Day review at 950ms⁸, while Keeley's own launch material described a full-featured one-second delay¹⁷.

V1 versus V2

The V2, which Keeley fine-tuned over two years, builds on the old Caverns pedal in several ways⁵:

• The delay side swaps the original digital delay for the Magnetic Echo engine, which Robert Keeley described on That Pedal Show as "a much more analogue sounding delay"¹².
• The whole pedal moved onto one circuit board¹².
• The control layout is more open and logical, with more space between the footswitches³⁵.
• A true bypass or trails option replaces plain true bypass switching, so effects tails can ring out after bypass³⁵.

=== 22 === Players comparing Keeley's delay-plus-reverb designs can also look at the Keeley DDR Drive Delay Reverb and the Keeley Parallax Spacial Generator, alongside dedicated delays like the Keeley Halo Andy Timmons Dual Echo and the Keeley RK2000 Funk Siren Delay.

That Pedal Show's demo of the V2 covers how the Magnetic Echo delay and the reverb modes work together in practice¹²¹¹³:

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Where it sits in Keeley's line

Videos

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Questions