Ugly Truth About Polara Reverb by DigiTech

I may or may not have told you before, but I'm not a great fan/user of reverb. I usually use a little bit of reverb, but just. I like to hear my guitar loud and clear, and too much reverb can make things mushy. So, when spending time at my local music store, my helpful pedal pusher set me up with two pedals. One was the Obscrua Altered Delay, and the Polara Reverb. I was looking for weird but useful sounds. He was sure that this combo would fit the bill. The Obscrua is reviewed here, now we are going to look at the Polara Reverb.

It's a Reverb

Generally considered a good thing, reverb is a very useful effect that many guitarist use in a "always on" type manor. I use a little bit of verb all the time. I own serval amps that all have analog reverb, so for me a pedal unit should create something special. I spend a considerable amount of time with this pedal. What I found was a really good reverb. That was about it. This pedal look psychedelic in the best way. It feels super solid and everything is really smooth. Besides a little bit of pedalboard candy, this pedal offers little more than the average reverb pedal.

There Are Better Options

In September Boss will release a updated version of their Digital Reverb. This update adds a lot of functionality and a few new features, which is more than I can say the the Polara. Digitech want to break into the boutique market, but there is one problem: they're Digitech. They have produced pedals on a mass scale for years. Just because you release a fancy looking pedal and charge a premium price for it doesn't mean it's boutique, and it doesn't mean that people will be willing to buy it.

Conclusion

If you have $150 to spend on a reverb and you have to maintain a certain atheistic on your pedalboard that doesn't include Boss pedals, buy you also want more functions than basic boutique stuff, then you might be the prime candidate for a Polara Reverb. I've seen tons of Demos and have had a lot of hands on time with this pedal and still looking forward to the Boss RV-6. If this pedal has an Expression input and 100% wet setting, then the looks would put it over the top, but considering that this will be topped next month, I'm waiting.