Danelectro Billionaire Series: Tone-rich pedals that won’t break the bank?

Danelectro Billionaire Series of effects  ·  Source: Danelectro

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The new Danelectro Billionaire Series of guitar effects is a range of pedals with an air of class about them. And although they emulate some “classic” circuits, they are also very keenly priced, making them an attractive proposition for players on a budget.  

Billionaire Series

Comprising four vintage-style effects pedals and a power supply solution, the new Billionaire Series is anything but pricey. Danelectro already has a pretty solid reputation for making decent quality effects pedals at reasonable prices and so this new range should hopefully follow suit.

Pride of Texas

First up is a Texas-style (think hot modern Blues) overdrive pedal that should be simple to use. It features four controls labelled Volume, Drive, Treble and Bass and is voiced to fatten up your guitar’s original tones. According to its maker, the Pride Of Texas is suited to both single coils and humbuckers.

Seems well priced, and I would imagine that it will sound similar to an Ibanez Tubescreamer, the archetypical ‘Texas-style’ overdrive effect.

Pride Of Texas RRP – USD 79

Billion Dollar Boost

Next up is a clean boost pedal based around a reissue of an unnamed ’80s boost pedal, supposedly used by A-list UK and Irish guitarists. I have no idea which pedal they are referring to with this claim, but the price again seems pretty fair for a decent pedal.

Three controls of Volume, Treble and Bass are complemented with a switch for Flat/Low Cut.

Billion Dollar Boost RRP – USD 69

Big Spender Spinning Speaker

The Big Spender Spinning Speaker is a Leslie-style rotary speaker emulator and has controls for Volume, Treble and Speed, plus an extra footswitch for the Ramp function. The Ramp switch lets you both initiate the next ramp move and select direction of the ramp move to either up or down as well.

It seems really quite cheap for a rotary speaker emulator. If it sounds any good it could be a big seller, as this type of effect is normally quite expensive.

Big Spender Spinning Speaker RRP – USD 79

Filthy Rich

The Filthy Rich is a tremolo effect based on a 1940s design. It emulates the type of circuit that would have typically been built into a valve amplifier. Of course, this one isn’t valve powered and so it fits into a regular pedal format, but Danelectro seems to think it will sound pretty “vintage”.

With controls for Speed and Depth, plus a switch for Hard/Soft, it looks easy enough to use. I often find this type of effect suffers from a volume drop when engaged, so I look forward to hearing one of these to see if it also has the same issue.

Filthy Rich RRP – USD 49

Battery Billionaire

Last up is the Battery Billionaire, a four-way power supply for your effects pedals. This unit has four 9-volt outputs that run on regular 9-volt batteries. A built-in “Kill switch” also cuts power to all 4 DC outputs, saving you having to unplug each one.

So you can run your effects off regular batteries, saving you having to unplug pedals on your board, as normally this would drain the batteries if they were left in.

Considering it includes the four batteries and four cables as well, this seems really well priced and one to check out, especially for those of you with smaller pedal boards.

Battery Billionaire RRP – USD 49

Danelectro Battery Billionaire

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