Xotic AC Booster (guitar)

First review on the guitar side for MotherTone is the Xotic AC Booster.  If you're not familiar with any of the offerings from Xotic, you need to find your closest dealer and try them out as soon as possible.  They make EXCELLENT stuff.

The Xotic AC or "Almost Clean" booster is a true bypass boost pedal with on-board active EQ.  There's four knobs - Gain, Volume, Treble and Bass.  You can add or cut bass, as well as treble, which allows the pedal to mate with many different guitar and amp combinations.  When the treble or bass knob is at 12 o'clock they're at neutral.  Turning them counter clockwise cuts treble or bass frequencies while turning them past 12 o'clock adds the frequencies.   

The Beauty of the Xotic AC Booster is its ability to fatten up your signal while retaining the character of your guitar and amp.  It very slightly bumps the low mids which is extremely pleasing to the ear.  Its quite similar to a tube screamer or boss SD-1, but where the Xotic outshines those pedals is in the EQ department.  Some pedals like the tube screamer will suck your low end out just by nature of their circuit.  Its not something you can dial out or compensate for with the amp.  The Xotic AC not only remains transparent but allows you tweak the EQ if you want to enhance the lower or upper frequencies of your guitar.  The result is some serious tone.  It makes your tube amp richer, bigger, and more dynamic.  Personally I use it with my Strat through a Fender Twin Reverb or Marshall Super Lead Plexi to make the Strat sound like a semi hollowbody guitar with humbuckers.  It makes the Strat sound twice as big, and allows it to do a good impersonation of a gibson es-335.  I should note I have actually tried this pedal with an es-335 and I didn't care for it.  It was almost too much signal and made the notes clip a little too much for my preference.  It truly shines with lower output pickups like in a Strat when you need to thicken them up. It will seriously doctor up your clean tone, or when used in conjunction with a distortion pedal it will push the signal over the top for endless sustain.

Fit and finish on the pedal is top notch.  The knob feel is smooth, the switch is heavy duty, and the input jacks have a solid click when you put the cables in.  The LED lights up red and is easily seen.  If you're looking for a pedal that will fatten your signal to make your guitar sound larger, especially for strat players, this pedal does the job excellently.  It should be noted that prior to owning the AC, I had Xotic's RC or "Really Clean" booster.  This version was the same layout but super transparent; it made whatever sound you were getting just louder.  I wanted something that would enhance and almost color the tone very slightly, yet retain the true character of my amps and guitar.  I stepped up to the AC and it did the job.  Currently its one of those "always on" pedals for me.  I feel slightly naked without it - yes its THAT good.  For those of you that want a heavier crunch look into Xotic's BB pedal.    Try them all kids! Excellent products.

-Rob