I don’t think the folks who already love the mood are being blown away by the teaser video audio per say as it’s a marketing teaser with a clear focus on video aesthetics with a silly tune pumped through the thing. It’s just the new features are all things that we’ve all probably sat there and said to ourselves “man, this thing is so fun and sounds great, but it’d be awesome if it also did ____”. They’ve filled in that blank with pretty much everything existing users would’ve wanted.
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I see, I never owned this one, in spite of being a big cB fan, maybe this version will change that after some further listening
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The original can definitely feel samey at first until digging in more (it’s a happy accident monster)but I just leave it at the front end of an effects send and run all sorts of stuff through it. Mood->demedash t 120 stereo out->Gen loss MK2 stereo out-> Strymon Deco Mk2 stereo out back to mixer. My only issue with a stereo version would be the t120 (which I also love) would have to go in front of it as it only has mono in.
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To get a good idea of what the Mood does, you can check out some the OG Mood videos. At its core MKII doesn’t seem like it strays that much from the OG. They added some new features, implemented some user suggestions, cleaned some things up, as well as made it stereo. MKII basically looks like it is refined and expanded. But there is also a classic mode so that it works and behaves like the OG.
I would really like to hear a wet / dry comparison.
Pedals from CB or Microcosm Hologram confuse me because I can’t exactly reproduce what they are doing in detail and at the same time.
I prefer more destinct FX like chorus, flanger, distortion, vibrato, compressor, etc.
Well, they’re worlds apart, but if I’d single it out to two things -
First, sound. The Mood’s got all kinds of things going for it both in converters, the filters and the algoritms processing the sound, that the OT can’t reach. Results can’t be compared. This includes both the sampler / looper and the fx part, and together they blend into something quite unique.
Second, workflow. Stating the obvious in a way, Mood’s a pedal and the OT’s a B E A S T, but the essence of Mood is that you capture something, you don’t quite know where it’ll being and end or how it’ll sound, so you just hit record, then stop, and see what the Mood caught for you. And everything goes from there.
It’s a bit like fishing, really. Throw something out there, see what bites, reel it in and make something with it. Or not, throw it back, cast a new line, see what bites.
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I should add, I was on the OT for years. While I consider returning to it from time to time, I’d never consider it a replacement for any of my Chase Bliss gear. Other kits might feel threatened, but the Blissers are safe.
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I think I read an interview with Vladislav Delay where he was using the Mood with the OT
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Thanks for that. There’s definitely something about the Chase Bliss stuff that seems more than the sum of it’s parts. May have to take the plunge I think.
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It seems to me like the MKII also has huge architectural change inside the pedal.
OG Mood has a pretty clever archictecture with two FV-1 chips (one for each ‘side’), controlled by a third processor that handles the knobs, clock, MIDI etc. Each FV-1 accesses a separate EEPROM holding its firmware, and one could even swap these chips out for a different firmware (see this video for an example).
I bet that in Mood MKII, they have changed to running both effects in a single processor. Most likely this involved a complete recreation of the software for whatever chip they are using now.
They mention that audio in the loop does not degrade anymore, clock noise is gone, etc. The manual now states very explicitly that CLOCK sets the sample rate. This reads to me like the clock control is applied in the software realm instead of actually changing the clock speed of the effect processors.
Likewise, the cross-side integration – syncing one channel to another, MIDI sync, level balancing – is much easier to do when both sides’ programs are run by the same processor.
Noticing how a lot of the new features they mention (overdubbing, preserved loops, reversible stretch, refresh mode, fading loops) are related to the loop channel. It’d be interesting to know how deeply CBA’s software people got involved with the implementation of the effects. I guess we will hear more about this when they release another documentary or blog post about Mood MKII. For OG Mood, it seems their collaborators Drolo & OBNE did the work on the effects chips and CBA did the analog stuff, integrating the chips into their usual pedal format. If everything is in one big chip now, I’m pretty sure CBA was way more involved in the actual software.
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Ive yet to take the plunge also (though I have the Meris / Chase collab 1978) the Mood has appealed to me the most previously so this one is now really calling however I have a few other bits to purchase first
To be fair, that’s probably a pretty great combination!
What a pity. I love this part of the original Mood.
This track was recorded using the Mood as both looper and fx. Loop degradation is a sufficient part of it.
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Joel from Chase Bliss explains a bit in this thread
(your assumptions are basically right)
It has an OG mode as well
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Thanks for this link! That also confirms my last point, looks like Chase Bliss was very involved in the software work. Makes me wonder, will there be firmware updates for this device at some point?
Late April.
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Yes I believe I read that too, then there should be no downsides to this pedal right? (except price)
Cheers, somehow missed that before.
It does make me think I’ll hold onto my OG Mood until I’ve A-B’ed it against the MK II, because there’s a chance that the emulation of reducing the clock rate of the chip doesn’t really stand up to the real deal. The grottiness at the low clock rates is probably my favourite thing about it.
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