Diamond revives its fan favorite Vibrato after nearly 20 years – and it’s been given some key upgrades
Canadian pedal firm Diamond is continuing its resurgence by welcoming its Vibrato pedal back to its effects collection.
After financial struggles, Diamond was saved by SolidGoldFX in late ‘22, before relaunching with a collection of overdrive, analog delay, tremolo, and EQ pedals last summer.
The re-release of Diamond's all-analog, true-pitch Vibrato finds the pedal reprised with modern features and a more pedalboard-friendly casing, with its circuitry built around the much-loved MN3007 bucket brigade chip.
But Diamond asserts this is no mere re-hash, with this “latest and greatest” version incorporating “decades-worth of end-user feedback, better tech, and modern features”.
Its enhanced components mean greater isolation for the audio path from the power and switching circuits, with the jacks now located on the top of the pedal and soft-touch true bypassing added.
Despite the changes, the MN3007 chip remains crucial in creating the “rich, organic, and warbling vibrato and chorus tones” synonymous with ‘70s and ‘80s guitar playing.
The result, Diamond says, is “a natural, liquid-like pitch modulation with a rounded vintage texture and mojo” that it claims digitized emulations cannot come close to.
Its updated Compandor Circuit – borrowed from the Memory Land Jr. delay pedal – better controls the dynamics of the pedal, giving the vibrato a fresh feel, response, and clarity, while reducing its noise and distortion.
In practice, powering the pedal with 18VDC delivers a more luscious, head-headroom vibrato, while charging it with 9VDC will add more color and warble to its tones.
Controls comprise knobs for Level, Speed, Chorus, and Depth, with an additional Jazz switch for extra tone-shaping goodness.
The pedal also offers a momentary or latching speed doubler to ramp up the speed of its vibrato, as the name suggests, double-time.
The first 800 pedals sold will use original NOS Panasonic BBDs, with the pedal priced at $279 with preorders now open.
Head to Diamond Pedals to learn more.
