TC Electronic Shaker Mini

The TC Electronic Shaker Mini is a compact digital vibrato pedal, a shrunken version of the full-size TC Electronic Shaker released in 2014 as part of TC Electronic's Mini Pedals line alongside the Flashback Mini Delay, Corona Mini Chorus and Vortex Mini Flanger¹. Vibrato is a pitch-wobble effect, and Delicious Audio described the Shaker Mini's sound as a clean vibrato based on the algorithm of TC's original Stereo Chorus pedal².

It is built in the same enclosure as the company's PolyTune Mini and Ditto Looper, so it suits players who need modulation on a crowded board without giving up much real estate¹.

What it does to your sound

Vibrato modulates the pitch of your signal up and down at a set rate and depth. On the Shaker Mini, MusicRadar's reviewer Michael Astley-Brown found that slower rates yield a gentle, seasick vibe, while cranking the speed knob moves into Black Hole Sun Leslie territory³. The pedal's three controls are speed, depth and ramp, the ramp setting controlling how quickly the effect swells in when engaged⁴.

The full-size Shaker adds a Tone control and a Rise Time control over the same core effect⁵.

TonePrint: artist presets and momentary switching

The Shaker Mini carries TC's TonePrint technology, which lets you upload tones created by high-profile artists or create and save your own¹. Loading one is unusual but simple: you hold your iOS or Android device up to your guitar pickups, select a preset in the TonePrint app, and the sound is beamed to the pedal through the pickups³.

The TonePrint Editor also unlocks a performance feature. As Astley-Brown put it:

That gives the Mini a trick borrowed from its bigger sibling. The full-size Shaker has a Latch mode on its three-way switch that applies vibrato only as long as you hold the footswitch down, and Premier Guitar's reviewer called it "a cool Latch feature that enables you to hold the footswitch for momentary applications of your vibrato"⁵. On the Mini, the same kind of momentary behavior is set up in software rather than with a hardware switch.

Power and bypass

Two practical points separate the Mini from the full-size Shaker. First, the Shaker Mini takes external power only, with no battery option³, whereas the full-size Shaker runs from a 9V battery or a DC adaptor, with battery access through the baseplate⁶. Second, Vintage Guitar reported that the mini pedals use a true-bypass and analog-dry-through circuit, so your dry signal stays analog even when the effect is on¹.

Where it came from

TC Electronic announced the Mini Pedals line in May 2014, miniaturizing four of its existing pedals: the Flashback delay, Shaker vibrato, Corona chorus and Vortex flanger¹². The Shaker Mini Vibrato, as the press release named it, put the full-size Shaker's vibrato algorithm into the smaller enclosure TC was already using for the PolyTune Mini and Ditto Looper¹. Guitar World reviewed the line in February 2015, listing the Corona, Shaker and Vortex at $136.49 each⁴.

What reviewers said

MusicRadar's review of the Mini range covered the Shaker directly, and the verdict was positive about the effect itself while acknowledging its narrow appeal³:

The Shaker Mini's vibrato range was a point reviewers returned to: slower rates yield a gentle seasick vibe, while cranking the speed knob gets you into Black Hole Sun Leslie territory³. The overall verdict was that "It may be a niche effect, but the Shaker absolutely nails the vibe"³, which speaks well for the circuit family the Mini is drawn from.

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