Hi all! I keep hearing good things about the JHS Colour Box from various sources. So I thought I’d ask you all what you think of it, for any of you who have it and/or have played around with it. Specifically, how useful do you find it on bass, and what do you use it for?
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I have one of these…it is very good but I don’t think bass players necessarily get as much out of it as some other instruments might from the colour box so may not be value for money unless the phrase ‘neve sound’ really means something to you or if you record multiple instruments
I use as an always on pedal to add a ‘console sound’ to my tone and like it…it also has a nice sculpting type eq section…I haven’t really experimented with its distortion but I know it offers a different sound than most distortions
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Yeah, @g13dip nailed it, the background here is there’s a number of iconic old mixing boards, DI boxes, and other studio gear that were not very transparent and imparted a little tone color. Over the years musicians rightly fell in love with these. So what Josh and others have done is offer pedals that replicate it - you can think of them in the same way as amp sims or tone coloring bass preamps like the SansAmps.
I used to have an audio interface that had this as well, the SSL2; The SSL 4000 was one such mixer that people used to love. Focusrite has an “Air” setting on some of theirs that is similar; these add a tiny amount of compression/harmonic distortion and warm the sound a little. Some vocalists love this.
- these are usually very subtle things, especially ones that mimic something like the REDDI. Just adds something like a little tube compression warmth.
Another good option for stuff like this is bass preamps with tubes in them; the Two Notes ones tend to be very subtle but add that same warmth.
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