Tech 21 SansAmp YYZ

The Tech 21 SansAmp YYZ is Geddy Lee's signature bass preamp pedal: an all-analog SansAmp that puts the Rush bassist's core tone into a standard-sized stompbox. It grew out of Lee's earlier signature gear with Tech 21, and MusicRadar's review team describes it as the rackmount tech "shrunk into a standard-sized, all-analogue pedal"¹. Tech 21 positions it as offering Geddy's core sound along with the versatility for many different playing styles².

The pedal is aimed at players who want a preamp they can use on a bass pedalboard or straight into a recording desk. Tech 21 says the all-analog SansAmp technology enables you to record directly and enhance previously recorded tracks², and launch coverage described it as designed for recording and playing live direct to the desk³.

What the YYZ does

The YYZ is a bass preamp pedal built around Tech 21's SansAmp circuitry, which the company describes as blending high-end studio clean tones with dirty bass tube amp tones. Rather than modeling amps digitally, the all-analog circuit shapes the signal directly, and Tech 21 says it can be used to record direct or to enhance tracks that were already recorded².

Geddy Lee's involvement is the point of the pedal. He partnered with Tech 21 to design his signature rackmount SansAmp, the GED-2112, and the YYZ carries that design into pedal form². As MusicRadar's review team put it:

Gearnews reported at the pedal's announcement that it offers the core Geddy Lee sound as well as tones for many other playing styles⁵, so it is not limited to recreating one player's rig.

The controls

The YYZ's control set is shared with the GED-2112 rackmount, adapted for a pedal enclosure. MusicRadar's Jonathan Horsley noted that on the later Shape-shifter version, "As for controls, it is as you were with Lee's signature SansAmp, the GED-2112"⁶⁷. The controls, as Tech 21 and press coverage describe them:

The Mix control is the heart of the pedal. Guitar.com's Daniel Ong described it as setting "the blend ratio between deep (studio-clean) and drive (gritty bass tube amp tones)"⁸, so a player can move from a clean studio bass sound toward an overdriven tube-amp character with one knob. The Drive control then governs how hard that pushed-tube character comes through².

From the GED-2112 rack to a compact pedal

The YYZ's story starts in 2017, when Geddy Lee partnered with Tech 21 to design a signature rackmount SansAmp. Tech 21 says Lee wanted to streamline and simplify his gear for new projects, and the GED-2112 distills a boatload of his equipment into a single rackspace⁹¹. MusicRadar's review notes that Lee's bass tone was generated from 2017 via that rack unit¹.

Tech 21 then describes the YYZ as a challenge to itself: to bring a super-compact, portable alternative, the company "further distilled the rackmount into a pedal format"². Premier Guitar's launch coverage described the result as a super-compact, portable pedal format distilled from the rackmount¹⁰. The pedal adapts the GED-2112's parallel pre-amp architecture to simplify blending the two signal paths in a compact enclosure⁶.

The YYZ was announced in early 2019, with guitar.com reporting availability from mid/late spring of that year⁸.

Powering it

The YYZ runs on a 9V alkaline battery, which is not included, or on an optional DC power supply, Tech 21 model #DC9. The pedal is also operable with Tech 21's former supply models #DC2 and #DC4². Gearnews confirmed at launch that the pedal is powered by either a 9-volt battery or an external power supply⁵.

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