If last summer launched my pedalboard design and effects selection project, this summer has initiated “phase 2”; refinement and tuning. As part of this process, I ordered two new pedals this past week; The EarthQuaker Devices Levitation (to change out my EQD Ghost Echo) & The Way Huge Blue Hippo MKII (to upgrade from my MXR Micro Chorus.)

To see my review/comparison of the Levitation, please click here: https://www.thegearpage.net/board/i…-earthquaker-devices-reverb-w-review.1588869/. I suspect that this review will be much shorter in length, not that the Blue Hippo MKII is any less of a pedal.
​Two days, two new pedals; The Way Huge Blue Hippo MKII arrived today. It has been six months since I acquired the MXR Micro Chorus; my goal was to learn more about how the effect could be incorporated in my current projects, and as to what extend that would be. With a better understanding, it seemed an appropriate time to upgrade, primarily seeking more control. The Micro Chorus was a solid sounding analog chorus but simple to a fault. The one control/knob allowed one to easily dial-in several great settings within the spectrum of speed but any fine-tuning or custom blending of speed and depth was not feasible. There was also the slightest of volume bumps when the pedal was engaged.

Enter the WAY HUGE BLUE HIPPO MKII, an analog chorus pedal made with NOS (new old stock) bucket brigade chips; the same used in the original design of the pedal. It has top mounted jacks; a feature I was specifically looking for due to limited space on my board. There are three control options: speed, depth, & vibe switch. The settings allow for finite control over the resulting chorus effect and intensity thereof. Users can dial in a great variety of chorus sounds. I found that the pedal was voiced with a slight emphasis in the mid-level frequencies which probably correlates to a “warmer” sound. While there is a “sparkle” that starts to appear as one dials up the effect, I found the pedal filtered/mellowed some of the highest frequencies of the dry tone. There is a healthy amount of bass throughout but not overpowering by any means.

After a few hours or playing and running though a myriad of settings — I really enjoy the tone and flexibility of the Blue Hippo. It successfully meets many of the needs I had identified with respects to control. A very subtle chorus can be achieved in a few different ways: turn the speed way down and adjust the depth to one’s liking or, turn the speed up to about 11pm on the dial and then turn the depth way down to about 7~8 pm. It gives it a very fat solo sound. Where I had found the MXR Micro Chorus to be overly intense much of the time (read: “click”, the CHORUS pedal is now on), the subtleties I could dial-in on the Blue Hippo makes the effect much more compatible for my use. Many have suggested (including the manual) to have the speed all the way down and the depth all the way up for a different type of mellow chorus.

As for the VIBE Switch, I would suggest it is a nice bonus feature – colored sprinkles on ice cream. It sounds good and can do some fun things. As it provides 100% of the wet signal, you can really hear how the highs are mellowed out and the mids take more focus.

Another good setting for a lively chorus is with the speed around 11pm and the Depth around 1pm. In general, it does take just a tad bit more work, obvious I know, to find the tones offered by the Micro Chorus but they are all certainly there, including the Leslie sounds, as well as many new additional effect tones.

About the foot switch: Sturdy and yet has a soft-click to it as compared to some of my other pedals that have a very hard feel to the action of the switch.

I wish there was more I could say but as I had suggested at the start of this post, this review is a bit more straight forward. To quickly add, the pedal feels physically bigger compared to other pedals as it sits up off the board a bit but it is not too much wider or taller than a regular mxr-sized pedal. I share this as many of the other pedals in the Way Huge product line are bigger in size.

[UPDATE: Day 2 Observations]

As the case with most all of my pedal first-day introductions, I like to give my ears and mind some rest before we reacquaint ourselves the next day to either validate or expand upon those first impressions.

I am happy to share that I am still “vibing” (pun intended) the Blue Hippo Chorus, both the sounds and scope of effect thereof. I prefer the mellowness that I did not have before with the Micro Chorus but, make no mistake, the pedal can get into crazy-land if so desired. I have often placed some importance in having a ‘Mix’ control on my effects (for those who have seen my other postings on the TGP), but I find that, inherent to the ability to mellow out the effect via adjustment of the speed & depth, one also gains the ability to control the mix (per-se). The Chorus effects are generally set to be at a 50/50 split of wet vs the dry signal so, in being able to minimize the parameters it is essence “turns down” the effect.

Some additional thoughts about the Vibe: In basically it’s default setting (as shared in the manual), it has this really cool, drenched, sort of sound to it. It reminded me of playing some old vinyl, a bit compressed and mid-focused, and … if I didn’t know better, I could have sworn (read:imagined) that I was hearing the sort of crack and pop randomly heard when playing records. Don’t panic though – LOL — there was no audio artifacts present, the tone just played up that feeling in my mind.

If there has been one pause so far about this pedal — and this is a personal taste — while I like the bright blue light, I could have done without the flashing indication as to speed. Maybe I am just getting older.

[Update: … after two months we parted ways]

I tried to like it, honestly I did. The control mechanics, the use of “new old stock”, the physical aesthetics, the vibe feature … all good things. The implementation and voicing were just too heavily focused in the mids and thus the overall tone was easily ‘muddied’. This was even more exacerbated in the vibe mode. The second the effect was activated, the clipping of the highest frequencies was instant with no noticeable pass-through of the dry signal highs to compensate. Perhaps when using the single coils of the Strat, the pedal was more friendly/adaptable but with the Les Paul, it just didn’t seem to be at all friendly. Had the pedal had a tone control system to allow one to dial in the highs or flatten the lows, then it probably would have easily been a keeper for me … and/or … the presence of a mix/blend control would have allowed the highs to be retained in the same sort of fashion.

I have since tried the Keeley Seafoam which easily addressed the tone problems and adaptability between guitars but otherwise, was just “Ok” considering the price point. There was also some sort of processing delay between the dry and digital effect that was just enough to “itch” my ear a bit (read: throw me off). I just received the MXR M234 Analog Chorus which I can already tell is hitting all the targets of ‘Wants and Needs’ and easily dials in great range of classic chorus sounds. Read my NPD post here: MXR M234 Analog Chorus | The unheralded workhorse of chorus pedals