My Ultimate 3-in-1 Pedal: Zvex Machine, ProCo Rat, and Big Muff

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Lightfoot Labs Goatkeeper Demo

Lightfoot Labs has released V2 of their amazing tremelo pedal called the Goatkeeper. It is different than other tremelo pedals in that it offers tap tempo speed control as well as a four stage sequencer. It also has all of the standard wave forms (sine, square, ramp up, ramp down) as well as user set waveforms (through a unique waveshaping feature).

You can easily use it as a classic tremelo pedal by simply turning off three of the four stages and using a sine wave form.

Additionally, the Goatkeeper is capable of extremely deep and choppy helicopter-like trems, using the square wave form. With most other tremelo pedals, if you set it to a deep square wave form, and you increase the speed, it usually gets to a point where the circuit cannot respond fast enough to create a choppy sound and the trems start to blend together. The Goatkeeper, on the other hand, manages to keep chopping away even at fast settings, until it gets into ring-mod territory!

Here's a basic demo that I did of the Goatkeeper's basic function.



At the time I did not have an expression pedal so I used a knob in a box. But it's a LOT more fun being able to control with your feet!

Here's another demo I did where I also got to show off another one of my favorite pedals, the 4MS Atoner. A quick word on the Atoner: this is a circuit that shifts the input pitch down octaves and fifths at jump-points. What does that mean? I have no idea, and just wanted to sound smart! But basically it produces the thickest, swarming, bumblebee, breathing wall of fuzz you've ever heard. It is downright huge sounding.



Finally, here's a video of me showing what kind of sync'ing possibilities you can do by combining a delay pedal with the Goatkeeper.



Just set your delay first to whatever speed you want (works nice with slower delay times like 1 sec). And then play a chord and listen to the repeats. Tap the Goatkeeper to the sound of the repeats. And that's it. The two pedals are sync'd up.

A delay is generally very easy to sync up with a tremelo pedal or a drum-track. The reason is that with delay, slight errors in sync'ing are non-cumulative. This means that slight imperfections in sync'ing will trail off in a matter of seconds, and new delayed notes are continuously resync'd to the beat of the tremelo through human playing. Give it a try with a Goatkeeper sometime!

There are actually many more features I haven't shown. Such as the waveshaper that I mentioned briefly. Also, there is LFO Out and Sync In jacks that allow you to control other pedals with its advanced sequencing and waveshaping abilities. It also allows you to input a click track or drum machine to set the tempo, giving you sync'ing capabilities.

Lightfoot Labs Goatkeeper V1 sound clips

I did these soundclips for the Lightfoot Labs Goatkeeper V1 several years ago. Austin from Lightfoot Labs sent me early versions to make soundclips during the development phase of the original Goatkeeper. Although the Goatkeeper V2 is new and improved with additional features and improved sound quality, these clips still give you a basic idea of what the Goatkeeper is all about, which is tap tempo, sequenced tremelo.

The sound quality of these clips are not very good as I recorded directly into a crappy soundcard. So please excuse the quality.

Here's a clip of me playing Radiohead's "Planet Telex", giving an idea of how the Goatkeeper sounds as a classic tremelo, set to sine wave.

Planet Telex Riff

Here's the ProCo RAT going into the Goatkeeper (square wave): Recorded on the production model, the Goatkeeper alternated between divisions of 8 and 16, on a very fast setting. Even with the RAT on a mild distortion setting, the super fast stutter bends the notes making it difficult to make out the chords. Towards the end, I tapped a slower setting to allow the listener to hear the goatkeeper settings more clearly.

2 Stage Stutter

Here's the MJM Foxey Fuzz going into the Goatkeeper (square wave) with the stages set at 1-3-mute-8.

Pinched Harmonics

Here's clean guitar going into a generic Line6 chorus into the Goatkeeper (ramp up). This has the goatkeeper set at increasing divisions (can't remember exactly, but probably something like 3-4-6-8), with no attention paid to rhythm.

Ramped up Ramblings

Here's the Keeley BD-2 Freak Fuzz going into the Boss PS-5 into the Digitech Digiverb and into the Goatkeeper (ramp-up). This was recorded on a beta model. The Digiverb was set on a very slow reverse reverb setting and turned on only on a few select spots during the clip, when a real rushing swell was needed. The PS-5 is set on T-arm (whammy) with the Goatkeeper set with a ramp-up at maximum depth and divisions at 1-6-3-8.

Screeching Swells

Here is the MJM Foxey Fuzz going into the Boss PS-5 into the Goatkeeper (square wave). Recorded on a beta model, the stages were set at 1-6-2-1, with a square wave at maximum depth. After the tempo increase, the PS-5 was used for some whammy effects.

Fuzz Pitch Shifted

This is a clean guitar going straight into the Goatkeeper with a user-set waveform. I set a very quick ramp-down waveform, with the stages set at 1-1-1-2.

Ultra Short Staccato

Here's the Zvex Machine going into a Moosapotamus Dirty Bird into a Goatkeeper (square wave). This was recorded on a very early breadboard version. The Machine and Dirty Bird were used to create a mostly static, white noise, allowing the Goatkeeper to be the main driving force of the passage.

Tremmed Noise

Here is a clean guitar going into the Boss PS-5 going into a generic Line6 fuzz and into the Goatkeeper. This was also recorded on a very early breadboard version. The PS-5 was set on harmony and the Goatkeeper stages were set at 16-16-8-4.

Harmonized Trem

4MS/Commonsound Atoner Build

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