RamoRenDez
New member
First, some quick and dirty picks of the current set-up. Guitar into Rivera KR, FX send to Para EQ into Superdelay into FX return - levels matched in series. Plz excuse the rats' nest 
Now onto reviewing the Empress Superdelay.
For the TL;DR types: Awesome pedal, lots of fun to use, sounds fantastic. No MIDI, no FX loop, and delays don't trail off when it's off or you switch presets is kind of a bummer. That aside, well worth the price and I highly recommend it.
Right off the bat, this is an impressive digital delay unit that comes with a host of features. There are a grand total of 5 knobs, 4 mini switches, three buttons, one mini button and an expression pedal jack to give you full control of what you're trying to achieve. There are 8 'modes', each with three 'sub-modes'. The basic knob controls are 'Mix', 'Delay Time/Ratio', 'Feedback' and 'Volume'; the mini switches control 'Expression Pedal' assignment, 'Filter', 'Modulation' and sub-modes. 'Mix' controls the wet-dry signal, 'Delay Time/Ratio' is pretty self-explanatory (it's either-or, depending on the mode), 'Feedback' is self-explanatory, and volume controls overall volume, not delay volume. An expression pedal can control either the mix or feedback (for gradually blending in delays or to bring the unit into self-oscillation). The 'Filter' applies either a high-pass or low-pass to the delays (or none at all). 'Modulation' adds a bit of a chorus-y effect, and you have the option of choosing two pre-determined rates: fast or slow. The three buttons from left to right are tap tempo control, preset selection and bypass. The mini-switch is used in conjunction with the preset button to assign a new preset. You can program a total of 8 presets.
Normal mode
This is your typical digital delay - delays are straight-forward and sound very good. Obviously you can affect the delays by changing filter and modulation, but overall, it's your typical delay. The three modes are short, medium and long. I don't remember off the top of my head the exact lengths of each, but I believe the total delay time on the long setting is close to three seconds.
Tap mode
This is like the normal mode, except with tap tempo capability. Rather than selecting the length of your delays, you tap them in via the tap button. Minimum of two taps are needed to set a tempo, though it averages the last four taps. The first submode is your straight quarter-note tap, second submode applies triplets and the third submode applies dotted quarters. The D-Time/Ratio knob is separated into 1:4, 1:2, and 1:1 sections, so you can further divide the tapped tempo.
Auto mode
This mode is pretty cool. Again, it's your typical digital delay repeats, except it reacts to the input signal to give back dynamic repeats - it adjusts delay time according to your playing. The three submodes correspond to input threshold - low if you have a low output guitar, medium for medium output, high for high output.
Reverse mode
Another fun mode. The first submode is self-explanitory - it's a regular reverse delay. The second submode is a tap reverse. Third submode is awesome - it a double-timed reverse delay. Essentially, it takes your input, reverses it and plays it back twice as fast (which effectively plays back an octave higher). Very cool for doing shimmering and cascading types of reverse delays.
Rhythm mode
Haven't spent too much time with this one. The jist of it is you tap a rhythm (as opposed to a tempo) and anything you play is repeated with that rhythm. First submode is straight forward, second scales the rhythm depending on the ratio knob, and the third is dynamic - the repeats progressively get louder.
Tape mode
My favorite mode. Quite possibly the most 'musical' mode out of the bunch. The first submode is your basic tape emulation (and it does sound noticeably different than the other modes). The second submode goes for a vintage tape delay sound by adding some prest modulation. The third adds more modulation (and a bit of low-pass), a bit of tuning fluctuation, and some grit. Although I don't think they essentially capture the sound of tape delay, they do sound very good and do not take away from the delay itself.
Misc mode
Haven't spent too much time with this one either. The feedback either increases or decreases along with the strength of the input signal depending on mode, or you can tap in when you want your signal affected.
Looper mode
Basic looper. You have a normal length looper (~7 seconds), a longer looper (2x normal, except with reduced quality - but it still sounds very good), and a reverse looper. Good stuff.
In case you forget what each submode does, they've included a nifty chart on one of the sides.
My thoughts
The SD is fantastic - it sounds great, it's fairly easy to use and you have a lot of control over your sound. You can literally spend hours sitting there, messing with the different modes and submodes, tweaking not so much to find something that you like but because you have lots of things to mess with and they all sound very good. At first, the SD can seem overwhelming, but the functions are for the most part self-explanatory and there's always that little chart to help you along the way.
I do have a few minor complaints, but none of them are deal breakers. For the price, and considering it's a digital delay, I'm surprised there's no MIDI capability. The presets are nice and personally, I think 8's enough, but in order to pick a certain preset, you have to scroll through the others (if you're on the first preset and wanna go to the 5, you have to tap 4 times, etc). An FX loop in the unit itself would have been nice. It's kind of annoying that the delays don't trail off once you deactivate the unit - it's a hard bypass so once it's off, so are the delays. I guess it keeps the integrity of your tone intact, but that would've been sweet. This isn't really a complaint because I can't see how this would be possible without making the unit bigger than it already is, but it would've been cool if the filter and modulation were footswitchable. The differences between the submodes in the tape delay mode aren't as drastic as I was expecting, but they're still very cool - I just wish there was 'more' grit, modulation, filter, etc. Setting the Modulation switch on fast and the Filter switch on low-pass solves this, but still... (the Vintage Modified Superdelay at PGS solves this, but they're limited in quantity... and the people who are selling used ones are trying to fetch more than the new price...). It also introduces a little bit of noise (which is disappointing considering that the KR is dead quiet), but I'm not sure if that's a defect or normal - I've sent the Empress guys an email about this.
All that being said, I'm really digging the SD. It's a blast to use and has kept me entertained for hours at a time - the last delay I had was a Boss DD-6 years ago, so I had forgotten how much fun a delay can be. Well worth the price new, imo (and you can snag a used one for anywhere between 350 and 400). Highly recommended
Now onto reviewing the Empress Superdelay.
For the TL;DR types: Awesome pedal, lots of fun to use, sounds fantastic. No MIDI, no FX loop, and delays don't trail off when it's off or you switch presets is kind of a bummer. That aside, well worth the price and I highly recommend it.
Right off the bat, this is an impressive digital delay unit that comes with a host of features. There are a grand total of 5 knobs, 4 mini switches, three buttons, one mini button and an expression pedal jack to give you full control of what you're trying to achieve. There are 8 'modes', each with three 'sub-modes'. The basic knob controls are 'Mix', 'Delay Time/Ratio', 'Feedback' and 'Volume'; the mini switches control 'Expression Pedal' assignment, 'Filter', 'Modulation' and sub-modes. 'Mix' controls the wet-dry signal, 'Delay Time/Ratio' is pretty self-explanatory (it's either-or, depending on the mode), 'Feedback' is self-explanatory, and volume controls overall volume, not delay volume. An expression pedal can control either the mix or feedback (for gradually blending in delays or to bring the unit into self-oscillation). The 'Filter' applies either a high-pass or low-pass to the delays (or none at all). 'Modulation' adds a bit of a chorus-y effect, and you have the option of choosing two pre-determined rates: fast or slow. The three buttons from left to right are tap tempo control, preset selection and bypass. The mini-switch is used in conjunction with the preset button to assign a new preset. You can program a total of 8 presets.
Normal mode
This is your typical digital delay - delays are straight-forward and sound very good. Obviously you can affect the delays by changing filter and modulation, but overall, it's your typical delay. The three modes are short, medium and long. I don't remember off the top of my head the exact lengths of each, but I believe the total delay time on the long setting is close to three seconds.
Tap mode
This is like the normal mode, except with tap tempo capability. Rather than selecting the length of your delays, you tap them in via the tap button. Minimum of two taps are needed to set a tempo, though it averages the last four taps. The first submode is your straight quarter-note tap, second submode applies triplets and the third submode applies dotted quarters. The D-Time/Ratio knob is separated into 1:4, 1:2, and 1:1 sections, so you can further divide the tapped tempo.
Auto mode
This mode is pretty cool. Again, it's your typical digital delay repeats, except it reacts to the input signal to give back dynamic repeats - it adjusts delay time according to your playing. The three submodes correspond to input threshold - low if you have a low output guitar, medium for medium output, high for high output.
Reverse mode
Another fun mode. The first submode is self-explanitory - it's a regular reverse delay. The second submode is a tap reverse. Third submode is awesome - it a double-timed reverse delay. Essentially, it takes your input, reverses it and plays it back twice as fast (which effectively plays back an octave higher). Very cool for doing shimmering and cascading types of reverse delays.
Rhythm mode
Haven't spent too much time with this one. The jist of it is you tap a rhythm (as opposed to a tempo) and anything you play is repeated with that rhythm. First submode is straight forward, second scales the rhythm depending on the ratio knob, and the third is dynamic - the repeats progressively get louder.
Tape mode
My favorite mode. Quite possibly the most 'musical' mode out of the bunch. The first submode is your basic tape emulation (and it does sound noticeably different than the other modes). The second submode goes for a vintage tape delay sound by adding some prest modulation. The third adds more modulation (and a bit of low-pass), a bit of tuning fluctuation, and some grit. Although I don't think they essentially capture the sound of tape delay, they do sound very good and do not take away from the delay itself.
Misc mode
Haven't spent too much time with this one either. The feedback either increases or decreases along with the strength of the input signal depending on mode, or you can tap in when you want your signal affected.
Looper mode
Basic looper. You have a normal length looper (~7 seconds), a longer looper (2x normal, except with reduced quality - but it still sounds very good), and a reverse looper. Good stuff.
In case you forget what each submode does, they've included a nifty chart on one of the sides.
My thoughts
The SD is fantastic - it sounds great, it's fairly easy to use and you have a lot of control over your sound. You can literally spend hours sitting there, messing with the different modes and submodes, tweaking not so much to find something that you like but because you have lots of things to mess with and they all sound very good. At first, the SD can seem overwhelming, but the functions are for the most part self-explanatory and there's always that little chart to help you along the way.
I do have a few minor complaints, but none of them are deal breakers. For the price, and considering it's a digital delay, I'm surprised there's no MIDI capability. The presets are nice and personally, I think 8's enough, but in order to pick a certain preset, you have to scroll through the others (if you're on the first preset and wanna go to the 5, you have to tap 4 times, etc). An FX loop in the unit itself would have been nice. It's kind of annoying that the delays don't trail off once you deactivate the unit - it's a hard bypass so once it's off, so are the delays. I guess it keeps the integrity of your tone intact, but that would've been sweet. This isn't really a complaint because I can't see how this would be possible without making the unit bigger than it already is, but it would've been cool if the filter and modulation were footswitchable. The differences between the submodes in the tape delay mode aren't as drastic as I was expecting, but they're still very cool - I just wish there was 'more' grit, modulation, filter, etc. Setting the Modulation switch on fast and the Filter switch on low-pass solves this, but still... (the Vintage Modified Superdelay at PGS solves this, but they're limited in quantity... and the people who are selling used ones are trying to fetch more than the new price...). It also introduces a little bit of noise (which is disappointing considering that the KR is dead quiet), but I'm not sure if that's a defect or normal - I've sent the Empress guys an email about this.
All that being said, I'm really digging the SD. It's a blast to use and has kept me entertained for hours at a time - the last delay I had was a Boss DD-6 years ago, so I had forgotten how much fun a delay can be. Well worth the price new, imo (and you can snag a used one for anywhere between 350 and 400). Highly recommended
