The Warden £205

Signal enhancement is strong on the agenda here with multi-knob control for a natural, nuanced sound

ORIGIN: USA TYPE: Compressor pedal FEATURES: True bypass CONTROLS: Tone, Attack, Release, Level, Sustain, Ratio, bypass footswitch CONNECTIONS: Standard input, standard output POWER: 9V DC adaptor (not supplied) DIMENSIONS: 66 (w) x 120 (d) x 59mm (h)

Audio Distribution Group www.audiodistributiongroup.com www.earthquakerdevices.com

Another optical compressor, The Warden offers a full complement of compressor controls to shape your sound. Balancing Sustain (input signal fed to compressor) and Ratio (strength of compression) knobs determines how much compression you’re going to get, and it’s very natural sounding. The pedal doesn’t offer any obvious squashiness even with Sustain and Ratio maxed, but it does keep things solid and consistent, and there’s also plenty of headroom, so you can set the Level to drive your amp’s front-end.

Tonally, there’s a nice open sound with no obvious addition or subtraction of frequencies, but you do get a Tone knob to subdue top-end or – more likely – give it a boost to make up for losses due to compression. You could always just use that extra top-end to enhance your signal, making this a good choice for an always-on tonal component. [TC]

VERDICT Expensive, but those six knobs will deliver nuanced compression for a range of tasks 8