Night Owl Industries Q the EQ

Night Owl Industries makes Q the EQ, an equalization pedal with a twist: it is housed in what is traditionally viewed as a wah pedal enclosure, and the name itself should clue you in to the fact that this is not a wah, but an EQ pedal¹. Instead of a set of slider bands, the player shapes tone with the foot: rocking the treadle sweeps the midrange, cutting mids at the heel and boosting them at the toe¹.

What it does

The foot sweep controlled by your foot is responsible for the midrange: heel position cuts mids, toe position boosts them¹. That makes it a hands-free tone shaper you can work mid-song, in the same physical way as a wah pedal, but moving the midrange rather than sweeping a filter.

Headroom and placement

Inside, the pedal carries an internal voltage tripler, the same circuit found in Night Owl's Edison Preamp. According to Pedal of the Day, this increases the headroom and allows placing the pedal after other pedals in the signal chain, so it can shape the overall tone rather than just the dry signal¹. In practice, that means it can sit late in a chain after overdrive pedals or distortion pedals and act on everything upstream of it.

Build and reception

Each unit is drilled, machined, finished, wired and assembled in Greenwood Lake, NY¹. Pedal of the Day's reviewer called it "an awesome tone-shaper laid right at your feet" and described it as a unique, exquisite effect overall¹.

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