One of the positive outcomes from the end of the Cold War is that many of our former Communist Bloc comrades have shifted their efforts from trying to destroy us to making musical instruments that blow our minds.
One example is a mysterious company from Poland called Chaosound, which has developed a truly unusual pedal called the Anti-Effect.
Housed in a large, black metal case and featuring two footswitches watched over by the silhouettes of inventor Slawomir Badowski and his son Lukasz (right and left, respectively), the Anti-Effect is a unique weapon of mass distortion that mangles a guitar’s sound like a pipe bomb in a picnic basket.
Basically, the Anti-Effect causes a guitar’s signal to stutter and sputter like a bad cable being jiggled by a highly caffeinated crack addict. A rate control adjusts the speed of the effect, while the depth control dials in its intensity. A four-position sequence control alters the rhythmic pattern, although each setting has its own unpredictable tendencies.
The two footswitches are both momentary, turning the effect on or producing the effect at full depth as long as the switch is held down and generating sounds that resemble an amp about to explode, but without melting tubes or blown up transformers. Świetnie!
Chris is the co-author of Eruption - Conversations with Eddie Van Halen. He is a 40-year music industry veteran who started at Boardwalk Entertainment (Joan Jett, Night Ranger) and Roland US before becoming a guitar journalist in 1991. He has interviewed more than 600 artists, written more than 1,400 product reviews and contributed to Jeff Beck’s Beck 01: Hot Rods and Rock & Roll and Eric Clapton’s Six String Stories.
