Roland AD-50 Double Beat

Any musician can work through the settings within a half hour, that is; settings on the double beat, instrument and amplifier. By actually spending the time many good sounds are achievable. As mentioned in previous reviews the volume of your guitar, bass, synth etc does influence the amplified sound (via the double beat of course). I have used this pedal for 11 years with guitar, bass and synth both in the studio and live.

Guitar: Fender Mustang 77 altered with lipstick pick ups, Roland Jazz/chorus amp.
Bass: Music man sting ray, Trace elliot AH1200 or Peavey markVIII and cabs 4x10 + 1x15.
Synth: MicroMoog, Roland Juno, EP30 and HP70 and MicroKorg with Roland Microphone amp.
The double beat has always been the fuzz and wah sound I have used, and in conjunction with my Ibanez sm9 which is just a distortion with a good EQ, I have been able to achieve all the fuzz/distorted sounds I was after. The Double beat can seem rough and edgy at first or even limited in some of the three fuzz wave types available but I have found a use for every setting over the last decade, just be patient and consider all factors; what instrument and amp, the position of the double beat (within your chair of effects) leads, batteries etc. Lately I have been using my Bigmuff for my bass instead of the double beat as its much lighter -The Double beat is very heavy compared to your average pedal.

No problems. Never used a backup.

No repairs required.

Have been playing for 25 years, teaching for 15. I don't see the point in listing my other gear, but I would definitely seek a replacement for the Double beat. The best feature is the quality of fuzz and ability to alter it, but I also love the wah which is very high end and both together can be extremely over the top, a sound I use often. I have tried to produce the sound of the Double beat with other pedals (after leaving it in Melbourne when in Sydney for recording) to no avail.

I've had my AD-50 Double Beat since 1977. One thing that many people may have overlooked is that the FUZZ works best when the guitar volume is around 2-3 on the dial. Too much guitar volume will make it over-clip/distort, noisy and not easy to control. (just my 2-cents :-))

Back in the day, I used to use it with clean amps like Traynor YGL-3 or silverface Fenders because it can really help them achieve the 'brown' tone. You can get that Bassman/Plexi sound with a clean-punchy amp using this baby. I always had it on the MID tone selector.

Also...little known fact: the 9v battery can last what seems like 'forever'.

As I said, 'brown' tone reins supreme from this baby on clean amps, especially tube/valve clean amps. Yes...it can be noisy if you turn your guitar volume over 4 or 5....so trim it down, you dumb knob! (LOL).

If you want volume...IMHO, this pedal can actually give you more DBs than your amp was originally designed for. It's truly a distorion gift from God.

IMHO, the wah was never great on these....very mid-to-high filter-ish, very harsh. And the attenuation in when engaging the wah used to drive me nuts....so I never used it. That's why I give it a 9/10.

I've had it since '77 and it works perfectly...any questions?

Never used 'em.

I've played guitar for over 35 years, owned many amps guitars, effects, etc....and I've still been able to rely on this pedal since day one. I don't use it as much because I
a) don't play as much anymore (family, kids....you know.)
b) have plug-n-play amp settings that work almost as good, now.

I think that I only paid $70 for it back in '77 (or less?)...it would take MUCH more than that now to pry it out of my hands.

Very easy to use.Has a nice three position bass, mid range and treble
mode. I use it with a fender and a gibson with an old marshall head.
The switching from wah to fuzz has a smooth click. The only down side
is the position of the fuzz on off switch is too near to the wah {not something too difficult to operate.

The wah really shines, great vintage wah very articulate sweeps.
the fuzz engaged with the fuzz is somewhat muddy but the fuzz alone is the most awsome fuzz i heard.....very thick and and defined very
hendrix {think of his sound at woodstock}

survived that long...so

i use it for santana and hendrix tunes...has that distinctive seventies smooth fuzz distortion to it and the wah is phenominal.

Easy to use. The AD-50 has controls for Sustain, Out Level and 3-way Tone Selector with a footswitch for the fuzz. The wah section has a conventional bypass footswitch under the treadle. The wah and fuzz can be combined or used separately. It runs on a 9V battery accessed through a door on the bottom of the pedal. Built in the mid 70's.

The fuzz is very Muff-ish. I find that when I run my guitar's volume on full, the fuzz over-compresses and farts out - which I like - just not all the time, so I usually roll the guitar volume back about half way and this cleans it up a little. All three tone selector settings are useful for certain things, but I generally stick to the first two ("bassy" and "normal" for lack of better terms).

Because the wah is electronically positioned after the fuzz, it sounds a bit weak and the volume drops a bit. You can compensate by turning up the fuzz volume, but if you then accidentally switch off the wah you're left with about 150db of raging fuzztone destroying your speaker. The fuzz has no shortage of output!

I like the wah on its own very much, or in conjunction with an overdrive/fuzz placed after it. It doesn't sound anything like a pukey Vox Clyde tone. If you slowly sweep through the frequencies it almost sounds like mild phasing. It's very unique and that's why I like it so much.

Very solid casing and typical Roland build quality, I think it should last another 30 years easily.

I play a mixture of blues, jazz, funk and mild noise/experimental. I'm into the old gear. My current rig is either a Jazzmaster/SG > original EHX Bass Balls > Roland Double Beat > Boss OD-1 > original EHX Small Stone > Z Vex SHO > early 70's Fender Champ with Weber alnico. Sometimes I use a Foxx Tone Machine, but my bypassed tone is suffering enough as it is.

I love this pedal. I don't recommend it per se, as it is a little quirky, but it suits me fine.

simple, like what youd'd expect.

It is very noisy and buzzy, and you can obtain a nice variety of fuzz-sound by its few controls.
I especially like the eq-type selector, so the fuzz can go from a smooth, very dull and muddy overdrive, like the amp stands in the cupbord over a crispy and dynamic crackle to a sharp and harsh electrifying distortion.
I play a jap Tele thru the fuzz into a mesa quad. I got best achievemets in using an absolut clean preamp-mode, if u turn on a overdrive or lead channel, most sound will really suck with the fuzz enabled. I also used a transistor amp in a total clean mode, and also overdriven. This was the best-suited setup for getting the best out of the fuzz, 'cause its clipping does not fit to a tube-dist. but well into a additional solid-state overdrive.
The wah is nice, but i wouldn't overrate it. It seems a kind too weak, but works nice and sublime thru my tube amp's overdrive.
The combination of wah/fuzz is a very experimental. Like someone mentioned u can get these nice harmonics-sweeps if u move your foot very slow. For my taste the pedal goes too easily and the range the cv reacts to is too short, so slow sweeps get difficult. You can go from nasal, ringing "one-tone" sustain-chords to really annoying and screaming burst. It's versatality makes it good for nearly every instrument like a drum-machine or synth.

seems very reliable.

Good for nearly every style of music. Brutal industrial powerchords, and very psychedelic. An interesting addition to your gear and perfect for unusual sounds.

I find it hard to dial in a good consistent sound, but this may have more to do with my other equipment (late '70s Hondo Les Paul-ish guitar and 1960 Ampeg Rocket amp.) than with the pedal itself. Once it's dialed in, though, I can get most of the sounds I want from this pedal. I love the fuzz/wah sound that allows me to reproduce some of Grasshopper's (from Mercury Rev) great cathartic noise bursts.
I think someone has replaced the wah switch, as there was some amateurish electronics work up there. I bought it at a pawnshop; no manual or other history on this unit.

I find I get muddy sounds in fuzz mode with the humbuckers turned up, especially on slightly dissonant chords. Seems OK when I stick to power chords, etc. But great Sparklehorse "Piano fire" sound with treble all the way up and "square" sine wave setting. Considering running 18 volts through it to see if the sound clears up at all. Any thoughts about that?

No worries about reliability; seems a very well-built unit and very easy on batteries.

N/A

I like this pedal alot - to the point that I'll take it with me when I finally go to buy a new amp. (No ,I'm not going to sell the Ampeg) I'd like to base my system aroud this pedal as it's so convenient when gigging, etc. Plus it's so COOL!

Three knobs: Sustain, Fuzz out volume, and a selector for three different fuzz waveforms: A bassy, kind of muddy one I am not too found of (yet), a mid rangey fuzz I would compare a little to a Big Muff (I like this one alot), and a thinner, trebely one (I like this one for power chords). Just choose your tone and go! Suggestion: slick it up with some slapback echo from an analog echo! Wow!). I don't dig programming, anyway. I am a dinosaur. The wah is a wah: step on it! Ya dig?

I play a Reissue '65 Fen Jag with humbuckers (for punch). I usually use the "beat" with a Space Echo or a Boss Delay Machine (sounds great with chorus, too. By the way, check out my review of the Boss Dm-300 or the 201 Space Echo!). I like slapback echo on my solos. Like I described the tones before, they really are versatile. I also have Boss Hyper Fuzz (which is a really modern sounding fuzz), and this thing does really deliver those old soul and rock vibes (Always go VINTAGE FOR VIBE! Hey! sounds like a slogan for a used guitar shop!)I thin it was made about 1973 or 4. Anyway, mess with it for a while, see what you can pull out of it!
Now for the wah, without the fuzz, I like it. A real midrangey wah. Easy to use, but I keep clicking it off. It should have been built a little higher off the pedal. I usally put another wah before it, anyway. So, not a huge thing to me (someone else may not be so gentle, though). The fuzz is placed before the wah, so when used together, the wah acts like a filter sweep. Not too bad, but I use them seperately anyway. I dig this thing, and the fuzz and the wah are cool, but only seperately, but maybe someone will dig this. So I give it a 8.

Come on, this thing is built like a tank, and damn,is it heavy! My car would break down before it would!

Considering I have about 30 Roland/Boss products (most vintage), they should call me!

Fantastic toy! Scares the hell out of the neighbor's cats! Looks very cool, and WOW, what a sound! Love it! Fits a lot of music styles. I like a lot of 60's bands and 60's-ish bands: The Stooges to Starflyer 59. I can lay down a lot of those tones easily (to the cat's torment!). If you see it, and you like that vintage, very loud "fuzz on your tongue" kind of fuzz, buy it. I did!! Here, kitty kitty!
God bless America (9/20)

Wah- Click it down at the front, and do your stuff
Fuzz- 3 way selector switch (treble,Midrange, Bass), Sustain, and level, pretty easy

Overall i gave this pedal a 7.....But....thats only because the fuzz is crap. I would give the fuzz a 4 and the wah about 9. The fuzz is far to noisy i mean this is more noisy than kurt cobain doing feedback in your ear. THE FUZZ IS A HUNK OF FUCK. but on the other hand the wah, well. It is lengendary. I know most people put the wah before the distortion but i find it chopps the end of the notes off, But i barly use distortion with wah at the same time and never wtith the actuall fuzz on the pedal. (((((((IF YOU HAVE DISTORTION ON BEFORE WAH WITH BOTH TURNED ON, BY FUCK ITS NOISY, ITS LIKE A FUCKING BOMB
My Setup

Abilene Strat====> Boss Ds1==> Roland Ad-50 ======>Monarch cx-40 combo
or Fender Custom Distortion wah/fuzz Fender Valvestate

I can Depend on it
But lasst night i played at a party and the wah wouldn't work when i whamed it foward.I think it might have been my leads that fucked the tone up.
When i bought it it was really squeeky, but i poured some lubricating oil in it and its not squueky. Thats probably why i got it for $85

i play death metal, Hard Rock, rock, classic rock, blues, Jazz etc it is good for every thing
Ive been playing guitar for 1 1/2 years but i know what good is. and this is

Heavy duty on/off stomp switch for the wah-wah section; nice sweep action on the wah-wah itself.
Three position rotary filter (sine, square and triangular waveforms) switch for the fuzz/preamp section with rotary pots for the output and sustain levels. Again a heavy duty on/off stomp switch (with easy access) is used to cut the fuzz/preamp effect in and out.
Takes one 9 volt battery, which as long as the operator remembers to disconnect the guitar input cord after each use of the pedal, will last a really long, long time. Easy access to the battery compartment is made by undoing two screws holding down a small metal plate located on the underside of the effect pedal.

For the "do-it-yourselfer" the unit can be opened up by removing 7 screws which hold the underside cover plate on. Lots of room inside to add extra output jacks for dual amping etc. Wah-wah return spring can be adjusted.

One thing that has bugged me (and which I finally rewired today) is the instrument jack is located on the left side of the pedal and the output jack on the right side which is compleatly opposite to the layout of my other effects (echo, compresser and chorus). Swapping the jacks required a bit of soldering but was fairly straight forward and is something I should have undertaken *years* ago but was always put on the back burner! <grin>

I've used my '72 Strat, '67 Gibson SG and Hagstrum Swede (Les Paul copy) with a first edition Peavey Deuce II 120 Watt amp and various combinations of speaker cabinets, dual amp setups etc. The wah-wah section sounds great with all the guitars I have tried with it.......the fuzz/preamp section is too muddy, IMHO, for general use with single pole pickuped guitars such as the previously mentioned Strat or Gibson SG. The Hagstrum Swede though is another matter altogether....early DiMarzio in the bridge position which when combined with the Double Beat fuzz/preamp gives a really nice clean crunch on power chords and high sustain/feedback for the lead runs. Set the output volume on the pedal for personal taste and then adjust the sustain pot just till it starts to feedback...then back off the sustain control just a hair.

The wah-wah potimeter has always been somewhat noisy (scratchy) ever since I bought the unit but this hasn't been a big deterance in using the effect even for live gigs.

Sure can depend on it.......it's my only purchase in the fuzz/preamp effect and have used it for many a practice section and gig.

Have had no dealings or support experiences with Roland.

I must say I have been quite happy with the Double Beat over the years and would probably buy one again if I had a need to. Nice unit for hard rock and reggee.......but try it with your fave axe before committing yourself to buying one. I originally bought the unit along side the Gibson SG and was disappointed in the muddy sound produce by the combination of the single coil pickups and the fuzz/preamp section (using a SG equiped with humbuckers would probably work quite nicely though)but it wasn't until I purchase the Hagstrum Swede that the Double Beat became a regularly used effect in my lineup.

This thing is the BEST wah i have played. Its got a very unusual bite to the treble. there are 3 knobs...sustain...which doesnt do all that much but does its job....output...which is for the fuzz on this....and tone selector...i never change this....its always in the middle otherwise it sounds incredibly bass/treble biased.

My rig is Hardtail strat....Doulbe beat wah....boss: psm-5,cs-1,mt-2,bf-2,sd-2,ds-1,hm-3,dd-5,nf-1,ge-7,ce-3....to my peavey classic 30. This i will admit is a bit of a noisy wah....but using it is MORE than worth it. The fuzz is Great! not very clear and it seems to bog down on power cords.....but its that VINTAGE sound everybody is chasing. I can get that Hendrix tone to sound so similar my mom thought it was the radio! This isnt the best with your amp distortion...it seems to squash the notes when wah is half depressed into oblivious wonders. On clean you have quite a bit of range....better than a vox....its quite smooth too....almost as smooth as a crybaby....but this has a ton of more bite!

This is about 30 years old! i have cleaned the pots once! I rebuild pedals and know whats good and whats not....this is definatly a TANK!i have seen tons of crybabys crap out....this one has never even thought about it. I would definatly use this without a back up....

Never had to deal with them

I play stuff from dream theater to hendrix....this is great for all of them! Im lucky this one was givin to me(thanks dad!) because these go for over 300 bucks on the net! My one complaint is that this thing is HEAVY! like 5lbs! I stubbed and broke my pinky toe on this....its a rock. I have played many a wah....but never ever have i seen one that can do what this does.

this is a fuzz/wah combination from the early 70's. the wah's on/off, so it's simple enough. what's different about the double beat is that instead of a tone knob, the fuzz controls consist of level, sustain (distortion/compression), and a 3-band click knob which adjusts distortion EQ; sine wave, like a fuzzface, square wave, like a big muff, and pulse/ramp wave, like an old vox tone bender. the pulse tone is thin and nasal, almost reminiscent of early neil young leads, and it's only good for single notes, but the sine and square tones are quite useful, and the wah acts as a strange sort of tone sweep- with susatin up to 7, the wah tone actually seemed to click cleanly from one harmonic to the next as i slowly moved the pedal. whooooooa.

noisy? you betcha, and like i said, the pulse wave EQ is pretty limited (not everybody likes "mr. soul"), and as a stand-alone fuzz, it's so-so. where it all shines is the fuzz/wah combination, which makes for more of a "red"- era king crimson tone than the usual fake hendrix that the crybaby fuzz provides. i've had both, and this is hands down the better box. not the usual sweep by any means. however, i just got an old Foxxtone/octave/wah, and once i get it restored, it should make for an interesting evening of a/b comparisons. in the meantime, only the Electro-Harmonix fuzz/wahs top this puppy, and not by much.

it's in the same type of housing as the CE-1 chorus ensemble and the AF10/BeeGee Fuzz. in short, it's a tank. as long as you like the fuzz, no need for a backup.

roland = good service that seems to take forever.

at $45, you bet i'd buy it again. i've seen it on the web for over $300 (good lord), and of course it's not worth it. neither are tube screamers or foxxtones, but that doesn't seem to affect the market. my BeeGee is a much better fuzz, but the wah and the fuzz/wah combo are quite lovely and musical. i've used both pedals together (double beat first, then the beegee) and WOW, what a tone. sometimes i get uncontrollable feedback, but all of it is usable in a belew/reeves gabriels sort of way. i got this a few summers ago in phoenix. the store wanted $60 plus tax, but all i had was $46. the salesman left me a buck so i could get a soda (it was well over 110 degrees, but it was a dry he......oh, nevermind). nice man. even then i knew i was getting a killer deal, and that was back when it was just used, not vintage, as if there's a difference (apparently there is a difference-say, about $255).