Catalinbread Soft Focus Deluxe

FIRST : DON'T USE BOSS EXPRESSION PEDALS ! They don't work with the Deluxe pedals from Catalinbread. I almost sent it back to Thomann because of that, but Catalinbread answered me immediately when I asked about it. It is not written down in the manual or on the website (would Boss sue them ?)

A lot of pedals say they have rack unit sounds (Red Panda Context, Alexander Pedals, Ventris, Digitech, ... ). But this pedal goes further and really gives a fragment of a rack unit with (almost) all the composing parameter knobs. It has delay, symphony (tri - chorus like),.. and even that digital rack distortion like the original unit wich really brings you into Slowdive territory. I will do a comparison with the original unit later and add it to the review. It already sounds close enough and is way more simple to use. The real one has more subdivided controls but this pedal did made the right choices to transfer them into a pedal. I love this real rack approach for pedals. I would love to see more of those pedals.
It is rather expensive and is more aimed at the amateurs of shoegaze sound. But for them it is worth the money ! I like this pedal a lot more then their first simple soft focus pedal because that one had no delay.
- I love the old rack distortion mixed in the reverb tail to get a breathing sound.
-The shimmer sounds are really nice.
- I will play a lot with mode nr2 with the endless verb. It gives such a nice curtain of rack verb that blends so well in and is easy to control from not endless to endless. I 've been looking for that for a long time.
- The Expression pedal is really usefull for the swells on the last mode. Very nice ! The other expression modes seem more subtle but I do miss an only feedback expression, wich I use a lot when I play delay.

I use a compressor behind it to match volumes because I use it fully wet (I do the same with the Walrus Audio Descent).

That other Deluxe pedal, the Belle Epoche Deluxe, is imo not really a big step forward to the simple Belle Epoche because there were no essential additions apart from the more accurate preamp. But the Soft Focus Deluxe is another pedal compared to the simple Soft Focus. The simple Soft Focus still had competition form the Keeley Loomer (soft focusmode), but this Catalinbread is definitely a level higher and beats Keeley :).