Lovetone Meatball

Well, like the rest of the Lovetone stuff, this is no walk in the park, but if you read the manual and start off with one of the sample settings, you can wander from there and find yourself in some very strange places.

I use an '88 PRS Custom 24 and a '74 Telecaster Deluxe (2 humbuckers) through a Mesa Boogie Dual Rectifier Combo. This thing is just plain old bad ass. It sounds so lush, and I can get some very percussive sound with the trigger set on the down setting, it just thumps when I strike the lower strings on my guitar. When the decay is set at really long and you have some delay going, it just gets mad. I love it. This thing is not noisy at all. The effect level can be set with the blend knob, and full on it just sounds so funky. You can do the Radiohead thing perfectly with this, now I know how they do even more of their crazy noise-making.

So far this thing has had no problems, but I have the Lovetone ? Flange pedal and I'm having difficulty with it cutting my guitar signal periodically when I step on either of the three switches. That makes me worried about this thing. I'd bring a backup if I could afford it.

On the subject of the broken flange pedal, Vlad has never responded to me about getting it fixed. I have probably e-mailed him 6 times since November, and I've never heard back from him. I have no idea where I'm going to get this thing worked on, even the most skilled pedal repairmen I know are hesitant to work on this thing.

I will probably never play guitar without this thing in my signal chain, simple as that. Nothing out there sounds close to this. The Lovetone stuff is just over the edge, and it is ridiculous that they are not making these things anymore, totally ridiculous.

It's not easy to use. Simple as that. Best bet, Start with the settings in the manual and work from there. I didn't and spent an entire day trying to figure out why NO sound was coming from my unit. Tons of switches and knobs. The manual is an informative as well as an entertaining read...FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, READ THE MANUAL

HOLY COW. There is really an unbelievable amount of filter sounds that come out of this puppy. Auto-wahs, little high-pitched squeals, sub bass. All the sounds sound so FULL. Granted you can set it up to make it sound thin, but even on those settings, the intricasies of what you are playing come through. There is really no other rating you can give this besides a ten.

Um. Lots of knobs and switches to break. It's built pretty solid for the engineering marvel that it is, so i can't fault lovetone on the build quality. Boss pedals are 10's, so this pedal is an 8.

Um. Problems. When I emailed Vlad about buying a unit, i got a bunch of emails with reviews and all my questions answered, very politely. After recieving the unit, I emailed Vlad about the control inputs and got nothing back. And a one-year warrenty is a crock of shit. ZVEX, FULLTONE, all the boutique makers have these lifetime warrenties, and we only get a stinkin year from Lovetone?!? Bull-doody

bla bla bla. I play alt-rock. That's a stupid thing to say, but its true. I own lots of other gear. bla bla bla. I love the sound of this pedal. It's SO expensive though. Actually, now, that lovetone halted production, they are REALLY expensive. Been seeing some for like 400+ on ebay. I really doubt they stopped making these for good though, so don't get taken by some schmuck on ebay. I think lovetone did this before. Anyway, I love the pedal. If its within your price range, and you like envelope filter sounds, and the like, you'll appreciate this pedal. Don't sacrifice amp or guitar money for boutique pedals though. Too often you see people with like a Rogue strat plugged into a Crate 1x8, but they have every 300 dollar pedal known to man. Usually, I'm all for the cheaper versions of boutique pedals. A TS-7 sounds damn close to the boutique tube screamers. I love the mini-danelecto pedals. But the Lovetone stuff has no cheapo counterpart. Vlad doesn't make boutique reissues of pedals like Fulltone. Vlad and ZVex make their own stuff. And its revolutionary.

It isn't difficult to use for what it is but to get the best out of it you do need to understand what the controls do, which is fair enough. Although I started off playing guitars, I've got my head truly into synthesis so I would have preferred it if the controls were named with their common term - i.e. colour and intensity should be resonance and frequency. It REALLY is worth working out though.

Lovetone really do love tone. I could simply gush for hours about their work. It's one of the most 'musical' mad boxes I've come across. Just brilliant. No noise. Filters are very characterful so people have personal tastes on these things but I think it's great. I'm not a big 'tone' man, I'm well up for mad sounds and this really helps. Sure, I can think of things they could add, lfo(s) for instance, but the fx loop allows an awful lot of creativity.
I suppose the only thing is I find the sensitivity not really sensitive enough. Then again may be my guitar has a weak output (think it's a Gordon-Smith or something.) Still, there's no other score to give it but a 10.

Seems really rugged however I'm not a particularly wary individual. I'll gig anything. If it blows up, well, it died in the line of duty, what better way to go. But, anyway, my feeling is this pedal's absolutely solid. Much, much more solid than anything else I own.

This company, wow. I'll post my little experience of them on my RongStinger review but all I can say is that they really do seem to care about their products and the people who buy them. I guess it's a trade-off isn't it? Big faceless corporations make mass produced homogeneity, but they do it cheaply. Small companies like Lovetone make some amazing little boxes and give you unbelievable support but have to charge a lot more. In this case, I think it's worth paying for.

Pukka. If all their stuff were a bit cheaper I'd get them all without a second thought. Seriously, if they did a special offer on buying multiple pedals, I'd just keep buying. I love mad sounds, and so do these guys.If it were stolen, I'd really miss it, I mean REALLY miss it. At 250 quid I'd whince and look at other dynamic filters, but I reckon I would end up back with this one. It's a really creative box. I'm giving them a 10 because I trust they're not largin' it on a beach in Indian Ocean while slaves make their stuff. I guess they need to charge this much to keep things tickin and fair play, you do get your money's worth. Just wish I could afford the lot. If you can, you really won't regret it.

This thing was kind of hard to figure out at first. If you don't under stand ECF's (envelope controlled filters) forget about it. I bought the unit used and it didnt come with a manual. After reading an article here, http://www.geofex.com/Article_Folders/ECFtech/ecftech.htm, I was really able to get some great sounds out of this thing. This thing is super tweekable. ive kinda figured it out. Basically there are 2 sections. A Trigger and a filter. The trigger can go up or down. (most of the good guitar sounds or with the trigger in the up position) It can also be turned completely off, to full or to half. It has 3 knobs sensitivity, attack and decay. It also has a green led indicating when the trigger is active and the brighter the led the more it is being triggered. the filter is pretty easy to under stand.
It got four different ranges high, mid to high, mid to low, and low.
It also has a swith which effects it somehow but I dont understand?
that switch has three positions. it also has three knobs. colour, intesity and blend. All of which seem to do the same thing and sound best turn all the way up. Im sure there is something I dont understand about why they all seem to do the same thing???? Who knows? The effects loop is incredible. It applies which ever effect you insert to the filter.

i use a les paul studio->line 6 delay modeler->boss-ds-1(which i want to replace asap)->lovetone meatball with a big muff in the effects loop of the meatball->mesa trem-o-verb 2x12. im not much of a tone nut. i like things that sound good really loud and noisy. but this thing is incredible. i used it in my studio on keyboards and it seems to magically make things just sound better. i also used it in my guitar rig with my band and et super louyd levels it cleans my tone up so nicely. i can get the exact sound that ed obiren gets at the end of talk show host. the whucka whucka sound. download a live mp3 of the song and youll here it.

i guess ive only had it a week. id better be able to for what i paid. i can't afford a backup.

vlad is so nice. he replied to my emails very quickly. he wouldnt answer any questions without the serial # and my contact info. once i gave him that though he answered all my questions and offered to send me a manual for 5 pounds including shipping to the us.

i like to sound like johhny greenwood playing guitar for yanni and barabara stresand. i like to play noisesy crazy experiatel shreiking guitar. this thing is great i can get squektches and skweekqz and quacks out of it. ive been playing 6 years. i love this thing. lovetone is the perfect name for this perfect product. at first i was skeptical and just bought it cuz it was so cheap i was going to resell it and make a couple bucks. i can now not live with out it. i need to get a ringstinger.

Oh my..will this EVER get a low score... This is the most complicated effects unit i have ever used. PERIOID. I suggest spending a lot of time witht his unit before you judge it. Naturally, the first thing we did when we took it our of the box was "crank that baby up". We turned every knob right..and nothing happened. It was only through extensive work and lots of manual reading that we finally produces some sounds. One must also consider the nature of the knobs and their labels. Lets see..we have.. Sens. Attack. Decay. Colour. Intens. Blend (makes sense so far right?) Trigger up or down. off full or 1/2. Filter High..dot dot..Low.. and Mysterious squiggles at the bottom. I can honestly say I now have a firm grasp of thei pedal- but at first it was an enigma. I do wish there were numbers or something on the knobs so i could be like..oh yes..i set this at 8.. but. you have to "guesstimate" a number. I should also mention that the ONLY hting good about the manual was its power supply specifications and suggested setting...there were 2 suggested settings by the way. I had to read the thing a few times before i got it. THe explanation of the filter section just sucked. I still would like to know waht it means by high-pass, band-pass, and low-pass. From experimenting it seems to affect the Eq somehow. I think it has to do with the output. Oh yea. I forgot to mention. If you have a low output guitar- like my strat youll have some problems with this unit. We had to take the meatball out of my amps effects loop to get it to trigger consistently. My friends Sg had no problems however. If anyone has any suggestions on how to fix this pragmatically let me know.

I am currently using this with A fender strat and a Carvin Legacy. I meantioned the problem witht he strat earlier. Likewise i use a boss noise gate and a boss dd5 digital delay. Both the amps distortion and the delay sound AWSOME with this pedal. Once i got this thing going- it worked great. I would like to run it through my amps effects loop though, so i can use its preamp. The thing is totally quiet by the way. From experimenting Ive found that the best quality of this pedal is its ability to combine it with other effects. BY itself alone i can get it to sound like old skool funk or a deranged sitar. Experiment a lottel more and you can get a cool synth like swooshing sound. Add some delay and you have a computer spazzing out- with that really cool popping whipping sound. Add some distortion and it sounds like A screaming banshee or that ever memorable guitar solo from paranoid android by Radiohead. We even used some external triggering for some totally cool effects. Run one instrument in the effects loop and another in the "in" and you can actually have two instruments playing at once..affecting each others sound. We spend an hour or so making some really cool ambient music with this option. Basically, the skys the limit. Bow down.

Well. the things made of metal. Its hollow too. It's also got a totally spiff fliptop. Hmmm, i seriously doubt it would break or mess up. This thing is honestly the pinnacle of sound engineering. The knobs are plastic..but they seem to be a very high density plastic. As long as you leave it closed and dont stick forks in the internal circutry it sould last you forever. Get a power supply though. Yhe thing is a battery monger.

Vlad is the man. He was friendly, prompt and helpful. I would imagine if i had any problems i could just email him and get it resolved quickly. I was a little worried ordering an effects pedal for across the pond at first..but now.. well hes a lot nicer than all the jerks at my local guitar center.

Overall.. this thing is freaking awsome. the most important thing.. in the long run.. is sound and reliablity. Ive been playing as a hobby now for almost 10 years and this is an awsome addition to my gear. I play progerssive and experimental rock..with electronics. Boy did i EVER hit the jackpot with this!!! Compared to all other brands of effects ive played, this blows them all away. Trust me, just because its popular doesn't mean its good. IM dtermined to eventually get the entire lovetone line now. Im a believer. The only complaints i have are little things, like markers on the knobs or a more in depth manuel. WEll, i say that..the manuel is pretty big already, but this pedal NEEDS a big manuel. I can't hpwever grade this down on my own ignorance in operating the pedal or a thrifty explanation of its knobs. THe sound makes up for it a hundred fold..and.. you would have had to spend a lot of time with it ANYWAY to figure it out. Basically, this is the uber-pedal as far as sound is concerned and if you ask me, that is whats important.

The Lovetone Meatball is the best envelope filter/follower that I have ever used or heard. It has a unique tone and sound shaping, that only can be described as FUNKY!

Although the pedal can be intimidating to the eye due to the large number of knobs and switches, the sound will soothe any doubts you may feel about your purchase. Once you recognize the function of each knob, it is really easy to get the perfect sound -- and some really whacked out sounds!

The manual is a "must have" for a first-time user, but after a 10-minute read, the Meatball will be rolling all over your sauce!

I typically run a 5-string Pedulla Thunderbass II directly into the Meatball, run a Roadkill distortion box in the effects loop on the Meatball (that's right, the Meatball pedal has it's own effects loop!), and run the Meatball into an Eden Metro DC-210XLT combo.

The Meatball is noise-free, and doesn't affect the signal amplitude (in fact, it doesn't have a "level" knob). I have noticed that sometimes the envelope sweep can get so low, that it will drop out of the audible range, but that is only when I have it dialed in to some experimental settings.

This unit is bomber! It is one tough box, and has an industrial strength stomp switch. The knobs are plastic, so I guess the pedal isn't completely indestructible (thus the 8)....

I can't imagine this thing ever breaking, but I would replace it in a heartbeat if it did.

I have talked with Vlad on a number of occasions as I was shopping around and comparing, and he is a great guy. He was very helpful, cheery and easy-going, and informative.

Since this pedal has yet to break, I haven't had to talk with Vlad about repairs.

I typcially play groove-oriented rock, and don't actually use the Meatball much for that sound. But when I'm getting funky, nothing else can compare!

Really, if you get the chance to hear and use one of these things, you will forget about all the other envelope filters out there. It is truely unbeatable in sound and versatility, and is well worth the price.

Kind of hard to use at first, becuase there are so many differant settings and types of sounds. The instructions help, but you have to just sit down and mess with it. No matter what te setting, anyone will be imporessed.

I play a Aria custom shop 5-string through an SWR 4x10 and a 15. The 15 is great for the sub-bass sounds. The effects always ring out clear abd sound great. Even on my little practice amp the meatball sounds great. Blending it with a fuzz pedal (it has it's own effects loop!) is amazing.

Very reliable although if you use a battery, it will eat it up pretty fast. Definately a gig pedal.

Very friendly. Vlad got my pedal in the US in 1 day!

I play everything from blues and jazz to funk and alternative. This pedal works great for showing off or just adding a little flavor to a "blah" tone. It's a little hard to figure out, but once you set to where you like it, you'll love it forever. Very light, and made of metal.You can't use it full blast all of the time, because it will get old. You got save it to blow people away, and it will

I already posted a review so I wont rate this pedal again, but I want to let all bass players no of what I found. When I first got my meatball, the sounds were great but on the setting I liked the most, a very loud thump would come out of my amp. It could be controlled by muting the strings but for the money I paid, I wanted the sound to be perfect. I run a compressor with my bass rig now and it has a low pass filter on it. When I kick on the filter, the nasty thump is gone and I can use lower filter settings on the Meatball to get the sound I want. If you are a bass player and have the same problem I did, try the Behringer MDX4400, with the Ball, you wont be unhappy

Number one, i am not a pro guitarist, i only have 5 non lovetone pedals(a wah, a rat, a sd1 overdrive(modified),a voodoo labs trem and a delay unit) so i have not had a great deal of experience with sound prossesing.
The only way u can get the most out of this pedal is by reading the manual. the controls are all interactive so touching one will affect the others.
to start with i plugged in the pedal and turned all the knobs to the max and plucked and strummed away, not much happened. i re-read the manual and used the sample settings. from here on i have got better at using it and found loads of sounds i did not know existed. for me it took time to get to know it but it may be quiker for the more experienced musisions.

WOW. i dont know much, what what i do know that this pedal comes up with some of the coolest(bissare) sounds i have ever heard.
when i got it i was looking for that weird radiohead phasey sweepy sound plus some funky quacks, it certainly delivered the goods and a whole lot more. u can get so many sounds out of it u would be amased, the way the the controls interact makes it imposible to ever master it.
My amp and guitars are good but not pro quality, these pedals were designed for the high end of the market, if u have good gear they will make it sound better.
i use a fender nashville tele and a customised tele(bridge humbucker, strat bridge) through a lovetone wobulator,big cheese and brown source into a very clean ampeg SS-70. i dont use it with any other companies pedals because i feel they would spoil the sound.
the way it interacts with other fx is great, u can put other pedals in the fx loop and get some of the most mental wacked out sounds u could imagine. i use it with the big cheese set on swiss, YUK! is the only way to descibe the squelcy sounds i can get. use it with a octave if u dare!
it is not nosiy at all. it has got super true bypass, when put with the other(cheaper fx) in a chain it will make it queiter!
very clear sounding.
i know if my gear was a bit better i could get them sounding dangerous!

When i first picked up the unit i was worried, it was so light i thought there was nothing in it! but once u have fliped up the top up u can see how well made they are. i have no worries about this unit.
i do gig with this and their other units on the loveboard. the only thing i can see going wrong are the switches. if i stand in it to gently it gives out a loudpop, in a live situation this would not be a great problem as u stanp on the pedals as the notes are your no 1 concern.

Vlad is the man! every time i have called him to ask about anything he has been very helpful, even with my dumb arse questions. he treats everyone with the same level of respect, bedroom guitarists to superstars(read their client list). i have never had a major problem with any of my lovetone gear, but if something did go wrong i would not hesitate to send it back. top sevice.

if u play funk or any style for that matter u should get this. it suits everything.
i have been playing seriously for 3 years i dont a great amount of gear but what i do i value. i own 4 of the lovetone pedals and their board, they are the best u can buy. i am only 17 and i had to save for ages to get this and for people who have the cash why dont u get a meatball or any other lovetone pedal? u wont be disapointed.
if u buy this pedal it will make it easyer to create your own sound(dont be a boss boy) u feel like u r the only person that can make the weirdest sounds imaginable. the one draw back is quite a big one. the cost. they are expensive but they are worth it, the trade off works for me.
e-mail me for full details i will try my best to explain. u will be impressed.

It is a little tricky to work with at first. I turned each knob and each one did nothing. I thout is was broken but in an instant, a waterfall of sounds came out. Each knob works with another so you must figure out which ones they are. After that you are set. The direction switch is a little tricky but alas, I have got it. Think of the ball as a wah peddle. When the direction is down the tone starts at the top and comes down. When it is up, the tone goes down first and comes back up.or vice versa, i dont have it to look at right now.

amazing, silent as hell. There is no noise what so ever. All sounds are very clear(if you want them to be)

Very light but looks well made. Dont use a battery, its power is too little, and dies quickly.

Best support of any company, Vlad is great

Great! Can't say it enough. Great for all instuments especially the bass. I can turn my bass into water, mud, Guiness or 10w30, Or any other sound you can think of. I also found some slight reverb.