Anyone have one of these? (Belle Epoch)

[hydro]

http://www.catalinbread.com/product/belle-epoch/

Thinking about throwing an echoplex/space echo clone on one of my boards. Needs to be small form factor. I've read good reviews of this pedal but wondered what ye forumites have to say

 

[jeremy]

Re: Anyone have one of these? (Belle Epoch)

i know a few people with them and they all love the pedal for what it is

 

[PFDarkside]

Re: Anyone have one of these? (Belle Epoch)

It's my delay on my main board. From my perspective, the sound is really good and usable, I prefer its tonality to straight digital for sure, both for adding a little ambience to your general tone, and for longer delays for solos.

A caveat, it's a little finicky to integrate into your rig, and needs to be dialed in. It has the Echoplex style preamp circuit with the gain set by an internal trimmer. It offers the ability to switch the preamp on with the effect, or keep it engaged all the time. I was having trouble, I'd kick it in and get a big volume bump from my amp. I ended up leaving the preamp engaged and set the gain along with my amp's volume/tone controls for a "base" tone. This allowed the delay to kick in more naturally. Second, the Record Volume is a huge part of dialing in the repeat tone. Too much and the first repeat jumps out at you, too little and delay tones are kind of weak.

Spend a good amount of time dialing it in and it's a pretty nice tape sim.

I also like the Strymon El Capistan, it's much easier to setup, but it's not as oedalboard friendly. I'd
Checkout the El Cap, the Empress and the Wampler in addition to the Belle.

Good luck on your tone quest!

 

[Lazarus1140]

Re: Anyone have one of these? (Belle Epoch)

I also have the Belle Epoch and never took the time to adjust the internal trimmers. The dry tone is good and the repeat tones are good as well. The only thing I don't like is that there are at least two pots that are interdependent. So if you want to change a delay time between songs it's too hard (for me) to find the sweet spot.

I am learning that I need to start reading advertising copy more closely because there is nearly always something in the text that warning me about something I won't like. For example, I bought a Skreddy P-19 fuzz pedal that is a great pedal and is manufactured to capture a certain sound. Well, that sound that it is designed to emulate may have included an OD before or after the fuzz and that won't work for me because I already have an always-on OD on my pedalboard. Long story short, I've discovered that I want something that sounds good without trying too hard to sound like something else.

The "Record" pot function is not something I like. Like PFD said, turned one way the first repeat hits really hard and turned the other way the first repeat is very soft (speaking of how percussive the attack is). That function is modeled after some attribute of the EP-3 Tape Echo. I can see how this might be useful for some U2ish stuff or where you might want to do a riff where the repeat hits hard like your pic attack and you can pretend to be playing twice as fast as you actually are or whatever. I would rather have a regular tone control because rolling the treble back has a similar effect of softening the attack in a way that is easier for me to adjust.

Something else I don't like, and this is very common among delay pedals, is the way the mix control works. As you adjust the mix control you are trading dry tone for wet tone so that fully engaged you would not hear the dry signal at all ... only the repeats. I prefer my dry signal volume to remain unchanged and that the repeat volume control only controls the volume of the repeats.

All that said, the Belle Epoch is a great sounding pedal and undoubtedly solidly built and well engineered. I love the sound but the functionality just doesn't quite work for me. From their product line I probably would have been happier with the Echorec.

 

[Funkfingers]

Re: Anyone have one of these? (Belle Epoch)

I have the Catalinbread Echorec. It had that early Seventies Gilmour vibe about it that I was seeking.

 

[hydro]

Re: Anyone have one of these? (Belle Epoch)

Thanks y'all for the feedback and suggestions.

A friend has a Wampler and I may try it out also. He really likes it a lot, and I think I could make it fit on my board.

 

[Lazarus1140]

Re: Anyone have one of these? (Belle Epoch)

That's great. Please let us know how you like.

 

[JeffB]

Re: Anyone have one of these? (Belle Epoch)

Belle Epoch sounds amazing. Very organic.

Its a ***** to dial in, IME.

Its pre-amp section is the most authentic I have used so-far. Fantastic.

Be very careful adjusting internal trim pot. I slipped with the scredriver and damaged mine permanently.

I find my little tc mini to be more practical and easy to dial in (using the PGS Andy ep3 toneprint), and easy to dial back in if I change something...but it doent have the raw organic purer tone of the BE. Still, I have pretty much set it and forgot it since about 10minutes after I took it out of the box. I always fiddling with the BE trying to get it right.

I dont think I would buy the BE again, Id probably look at an empress or strymon

 

[PFDarkside]

Re: Anyone have one of these? (Belle Epoch)

Jeff articulated my point very well. When the Belle is dialed in its awesome. The Strymon is WAY easier to get dialed in though (and has tap tempo).

 

[Aceman]

Re: Anyone have one of these? (Belle Epoch)

Nope - but if I had the spare cash I'd get one in a heartbeat sight unseen and not worry a bit.

 

[Lazarus1140]

Re: Anyone have one of these? (Belle Epoch)

Nope - but if I had the spare cash I'd get one in a heartbeat sight unseen and not worry a bit.

They have pictures on the internet. Just for the record, they look like this:

 

[El Supremo]

Re: Anyone have one of these? (Belle Epoch)

The Belle's preamp beefs up singles coils nicely and for me the functionality is great. No problems dialing in the sounds I'm after. It can also run on 18V for more headroom. With the addition of the Rec Level function, it's the best delay to run in front of a dirty amp imo as it's easier to control the repeats.

I also have the Empress Tape Delay, which will give you a bit more options (including tap tempo) and more delay time, but doesn't have the EP style preamp (it does have the abilty to provide some serious clean boost though). It also has the ability to store presets (although this will disable the tap function) and is abreeze to dial in.
Don't have one myself, but the Wampler Faux Tape Echo sounded awesome to me also.

Dunlop's EP103 Echoplex Delay is scheduled for this summer btw. It doesn't allow you to fine tune saturation and modulation, but it does have tap tempo ability via an external tap switch (this will also give you the option of up to 4 seconds of delay). If you want the whole Dunlop EP experience though (including Dunlop's EP101 preamp and tap switch), this option will set you back close to 500 bucks and take up more space than the Belle of course.
If Dunlop made a pedal that includes all these features at a reasonable price (500 bucks will get you a Time Factor or Time Line), it might be a contender to the Belle.