70s hifi reverbs? (Pioneer SR-202)

[popvulture]

I was cleaning out a junk closet earlier and came across an old Pioneer SR-202 that I bought at a pawn shop for twenty bucks years ago. I picked it up right before a move and it ended up being packed into a box and accidentally forgotten... so yep, wanna plug this thing in. I've gotta go get some RCA to 1/4 cables tomorrow, but in the meantime... has anyone used one of these things, or a comparable model? Fun? Tips? I imagine it could sound pretty fucked up and fun. Or of course... could be boring. Let's hope not.

[crochambeau]

I have a couple of the earlier SR-101s. I like them, not a huge reverb cavern though - more of a short springy "boink" that is not without it's charm. One odd aspect of the 101, from factory channel 1 wet is routed to channel 2 output and vice versa, so the wet dry balance is goofy if you're just running a single channel. It's a simple matter to swap the wires over and fix that (it is easy to think it's broken if you're just using one side).

I also used to own a Sansui RA-700. That unit was much darker sounding, and if I recall correctly, summed the reverb to mono and sent that to both outputs.

[repoman]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2tAh4ZKp1X8[/youtube]

These are really nifty, sometimes they are like 50 bucks on Reverb.com

I had a Realistic Radio Shack reverb for a while, that was a really strange mettallic clanky delay-ish reverb, you could use it as an overdrive too by cranking the output

[popvulture]

That Sansui looks rad! I find it so bizarre that people used to want to add reverb to an entire record. "You know, Master of Reality sounds rad, but I think I need to suspend the entire mix in cheap spring reverb murk." Or maybe that sounds kinda cool

And yeah Crochambeau—I was reading somewhere else that you can plug into the L input and R output and you'll get 100% wet (or maybe it was vice versa—I'm gonna try it). Seems like that'd be the most useful if you were putting it on an aux.

[DRodriguez]

I think it was mainly intended to add a sense of liveness to records. A close miced classical piano is cool, but throw it in a reverb and you can imagine what it would be like to hear the performance in a concert hall.

[rfurtkamp]

I had one of these for a while.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Pioneer-Analog- ... 3641.l6368

As mentioned, short dwell, didn't really do much.

I tried it on mixes out of my 4 track and reel machines at the time as an effect, and liked the first-gen home recording digiverbs better, which says a ton.

[popvulture]

I think it was mainly intended to add a sense of liveness to records. A close miced classical piano is cool, but throw it in a reverb and you can imagine what it would be like to hear the performance in a concert hall.

I definitely get that, just seems way iffy with such a low quality reverb, and applied to everything. I bet it'd be a lot more effective on sparse instrumentation, but maybe also rad if you put it on some Phil Spector recording and maximize the smear.

[rfurtkamp]

They sound acceptable if used sparingly on period amps - the stuff they were using with them was pretty damn sterile, and in low doses it took away from some of that at the price of fidelity.

[crochambeau]

I used to watch TV with the Sansui reverb on full feeding the stereo, but I also used to watch TV with an green monochromatic Apple II monitor, so.. fuck realism, I guess.

Those later Pioneer visual aids got downright wicked looking, I'd love a pair of those displays doing VU duty on a mixer.

[rfurtkamp]

I bought that model simply because I could watch the display on LSD honestly.

[popvulture]

I bought that model simply because I could watch the display on LSD honestly.

I have a hunch that was the target market.

[Psyre]

I use a SR-202 (w) from time to time. I'm using it right now with a 4 piece I'm mixing for. It gets muddy real quick, but the first 10-15% of the dial is killer on vocals and the drum bus. It's a great little spring for getting individual tracks to "reach out" of the speakers a little bit more and really creates some good separation.
Other than that, I really only use it for parallel reverb. Think I paid $15 and it was mint, well worth it.

[popvulture]

Nice! Gonna get some adapters today, psyched to check it out...

[popvulture]

This is pretty fun:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0gRvSNx2g4[/youtube]

The SR-101 sounds fucking sweet... looks like they go for a little more, but all tube

[duffmcshark]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYuBU-QCd4k[/youtube]

This guy's channel is pretty awesome if you feel like going down a rabbit hole of old audio and video formats.