MXR M300 Reverb Electric Guitar Effect Pedal

Product Information

Most guitarists who love reverb fall into either the vintage or ambient camp, and both are well catered for here. The plate, spring and room modes have a convincing depth and sense of physical space, and record very well. Darker tone settings yield impressively authentic, retro-flavoured results.

Reverb is one of the more expensive effects out there. That’s because they are created through the use of algorithms and powerful computer chips. Carrying out the myriad amount of calculations required to accurately simulate your guitar tone occupying a space, in real-time with no latency requires tremendous processing power and that’s before you start adding in modulation and octave effects to the tails. There are some reverb pedal bargains out there, but for this type of pedal, you really do get what you pay for. First and foremost, we are guitarists, and we want other players to find the right product for them. So we take into careful consideration everything from budget to feature set, ease of use and durability to come up with a list of what we can safely say are the best reverb pedals on the market right now. Read more about how we test products and services and how we make our recommendations. Related buyer's guides

MXR dips its toe into the reverb pool

Presets are accessible in separate banks of three presets (A, B, and C), which are accessible via the pedal’s three footswitches and/or the rotary value control knob. The large LED displays preset info, including its number and a programmable name. The LEDs surrounding the rotary reverb-type control change color from green to amber to let users know when a preset has been modified. A reverb pedal simulates a space for the sound of your guitar to occupy. When you clap your hands in a large room, you’ll hear the sound of your clap bouncing off the walls and surfaces of the area around you. A reverb pedal does the exact same thing for your instrument, artificially recreating the sound as it if it were happening in that space. DESCRIPTION Six-voice digital reverb pedal with mono or stereo operation, true or buffered bypass, analogue dry path

The sound quality of all of the effects is stellar, boasting smooth tails and pro-studio-quality noise-free performance. The spring reverb setting is based on a 1962 Fender 6G15 reverb unit and delivers some of the best spring reverb effects you’ll ever hear. Echo combines delay and reverb, while tremolo applies a tremolo effect to both wet and dry hall reverb. No one wants a pedal that takes ages to set up. Simplicity is key especially with things like reverb, that is why the MXR just has three simple controls. Mix which sets the dry/wet mix of the effect, Tone sets the feel of the effect rolling in more high end, the Decay control sets how long you want the reverb to last. Nice and simple to set up and get any tone you want. Here's what MXR say about the M300 Reverb Pedal The lower left rotary switch knob on the Oceans 11’s front panel gives the strongest indication of the complexity lurking within this diminutive device. Here, users will find 11 different settings that consist of hall, spring, plate, reverse, echo, tremolo, modulated, dynamic, auto-infinite, shimmer, and polyphonic effects. We particularly love the shimmer mode with its angelic chorus of octave-up voices adding a synth-like quality to your guitar tone. The modulated mode is fantastic as well, adding a dark, warm wash with a lovely movement to it to your sound. You get a dynamic mode that responds to your playing touch, and even a nice delay plus reverb to throw in the mix. Inside this compact pedal you have access to mericulously crafted Room, Epic, Plate, Spring, Mod and Pad reverbs that are all switchable with a push of the Tone control. Each of these models are controlled by a high quality digital chipset while the dry signal is 100% analogue not going anywhere near the digital tone path. This keeps your signal clean and clear.

Of the two modulated reverbs—mod and epic—I used the former most. The extra kinetic energy adds a dreamy, drifting layer to spacious chord progressions and lazy, moody lead passages—especially when used a little lower in the mix. The colliding modulated reverbs of the epic setting are less elegant, generating high harmonic tone shards in longer decays that betray a touch of their digital origin. I did notice, however, that this texture is more effective in a band context, where ride cymbals and bass undercurrents help soften the harmonic edges. Reverb is, for the most part, a digital effect. This is because for it to be analog, you’d need something physical to play your sound through. Early reverb effects like the plate reverb required huge metal sheets through which the sound was played. Echo chambers had sounds played into them which were then captured by a microphone and added to the dry signal to create a sense of space on the recording. So as you can imagine, it’s pretty inconvenient to use an analog reverb outside of the studio or sound design spaces. The Boss RV-6 is a massive improvement over its predecessor, offering all-new algorithms and a totally updated DSP. We’ve had one of these on our ‘board for years now, and considering the number of reverb types you get for the money, it’s without a doubt one of the best reverb pedals out there. The straight-forward layout of Regen, Mix, and Delay controls on the Carbon Copy provide an extremely open-ended array of delay tones to work with. Regen controls the number of repeats in the delay signal, while Delay controls the time between each repeat. The Mix knob adjusts the level of dry and delayed signal going to the output.

Here at Guitar World, we are experts in our field, with many years of playing and product testing between us. We live and breathe everything guitar related, and we draw on this knowledge and experience of using products in live, recording and rehearsal scenarios when selecting the products for our guides. That said, spring reverbs had a physical spring that the sound was played through to create it’s metallic twang, and you can still get these analog-type reverbs today, usually found built into amplifiers. Gamechanger Audio and Danelectro both do physical spring reverb pedals too, bringing analog sound straight to your pedalboard. How we choose the best reverb pedals We always like to say there are no hard and fast rules on where you should place your pedals, but if you’re new to reverb, we’d start by placing it at the end of your chain. Reverb creates a sense of space in your sound, so if you place it before certain effects it can end up sounding mushy and distant rather than tight and focused. Of course, this may be the effect you’re going for but for the majority of styles, reverb works better at the end of the signal chain. Several of these effects - tremolo, modulated, and dynamic - have three different sets of parameters that can be selected with the mode switch. The mode switch also selects tap tempo divisions for the echo setting and engages either interval or mix edit parameters for the Poly setting. Other controls include an FX level, time (decay), and tone knobs, with the latter two also providing a second set of parameters that are accessible by holding down the mode button for about one second. Enjoyment of the pad reverb depends on how you relate to the phenomenon called shimmer or octave reverb. But the cool thing about the MXR’s version is that high or low octaves can be used in equal measure or dialed to one EQ extreme or the other, enabling you to sculpt a very focused but expansive sound. I liked the effect in dark low-mix settings. But if you dig the ethereal, floating, angels-on-high sonic sensations of high-octave reverb, the MXR delivers the goods in plentitude.

First and foremost, we are musicians, and we want other players to find the right product for them. So we take into careful consideration everything from budget to feature set, ease of use and durability to come up with a list of what we can safely say are the best reverb pedals on the market right now.

You could use this to just add a slight sense of warmth and depth to a basic clean tone, or you could make it sound like it’s being blasted into your ears via the depths of the cosmos. It’s an incredibly versatile effect, and you’ll find it on the pedalboards of pretty much every guitar player. Where should my reverb pedal go in the chain?Unless you’ve been marooned on a island, entirely apart from guitar-nerd media, you may have noticed that we are mired in a reverb arms race. Around the globe, pedal weirdoes are tweaking algorithms and stuffing knob upon knob of fine-tuning power to create the most distantly spacy, authentically springy, and perfectly plate-y reverbs. There’s a ludicrous amount of reverb pedals available, doing everything from warm room tones and period-accurate spring reverbs, right through to ambient modulated synth sounds that reverberate infinitely. Choosing the best reverb pedal for you can be tough, so it’s important to do your research before pulling the trigger, especially as the majority of the pedals are relatively expensive. One of Strymon’s “large-format” pedals, the BigSky provides 12 different reverb effects that encompass standard reverbs and special effects like swell, bloom, cloud, chorale, shimmer, magneto, nonlinear, and reflections. Seven control knobs on the front panel allow users to instantly adjust parameters like decay, pre-delay, mix, tone, parameter 1, parameter 2, and modulation, while new settings can be saved in any of 300 preset memory locations. The Light Pedal is GCA’s attempt at redefining what a reverb pedal can be. Combining a real spring tank with an innovative infrared optical sensor system, the Light Pedal can be used to create brand-new sounds we guarantee you’ve never heard before.