Pink Floyd produced some of the most haunting rock and psychedelia the mainstream has seen, and behind a large part of their sound was the Binson Echorec. With four playback heads on a disk, this old tube-powered unit produced echoes with a distinct sound, almost ancient, as if they were coming from the ether rather than a machine. With a powerful pre-amp and a complicated spinning magnetic drum, the Binson was more than the sum of its parts. As working specimens became more and more rare, people feared that this magic box would be lost to time... until the Catalinbread Echorec appeared.

All Of The Tone, None Of The Fragility

Even in their day, Binson Echorecs were difficult to maintain due to all the moving parts they contained. Like a computer hard drive, the spinning magnetic drum was susceptible to damage and imparted a certain warble and lo-fi quality to the echoes. The Catalinbread Echorec succeeds in capturing that character and echo decay, but does this all digitally in a standard stompbox enclosure. The designers did an excellent job of really studying each playback head and combination in original Binson units, organizing the settings on the Catalinbread Echorec to correspond with these.

Anything You Can Do, I Can Do Better

While the Catalinbread Echorec stays faithful to the Binson unit, copying its every function, digital technology allows it to do some things the original could not. For one, you could not adjust the actual delay time on the original as the rpm of the magnetic drum was fixed. The Catalinbread box conveniently includes a delay time knob for timing that original could never produce. The Binson unit was also incapable of using every possible combination of playback heads, which the Catalinbread Echorec can explore, providing 12 separate modes. The Swell knob also adds an easily controllable parameter that can serve more as a reverb when the delay time is toned down.

Touchy and Tasty

Perhaps one of the most under-rated features of the Catalinbread Echorec is the way it acts as a boost or pre-amp for other pedals in your chain. Catalinbread has always focused on touch dynamics with their pedal designs, and the way the Echorec responds to pick attack will boost your signal in kind, making it a juicy pair with an overdrive like their Dirty Little Secret.

The Catalinbread Echorec may not be the only delay you need - it's still pretty niche - but it's a piece that will leave and impression on your audience and open way more sounds than just sticking with a standard analog delay. If you need to, sell one of your pedals that's collecting dust, get an Echorec and thank us later.