Keeley Bassist Compressor and Limiting Amplifier Pedal

Using for bass (Fender Jazz). My biggest takeaway is the clarity and articulation that the Keeley Comp Plus brings, compared to my other compressor (which is the compressor effect on a Boss ME20-B). The articulation of the Comp Plus is amazing! Every note is distinct. Yes, it noticeably evens out the signal; and with no added noise. The downside (and the big question) is low end loss / loss of presence/punch. My sound is definitely tighter, but I found that I had to crank the Level, dial the Blend to 3:00, and start playing with the tone and EQ on other devices to bring back the “thump.” But is it low end loss, is it just less “boomy” and clearer? I dunno. If you’re looking for Jaco Pastorius, or a mids-forward kind of sound you’ll probably love it. And you can definitely cut through the mix with this thing. I’m not 100% sold; going to compare it to Keeley’s Bassist and see where I land. Wherever that is, I don’t think I can do without that clarity, though! EDIT: I went with the Keeley Bassist. Also very transparent, very quiet (although you can introduce noise if you max out the gain). Biggest factor for me, though, was the fact that the Bassist doesn’t steal my low end. I pretty much stay in drop-D tuning, and that low D stays as heavy as ever. Bassist is easy to set up, and doesn’t affect my tone. It’s not cheap, but you can spend way more. And I feel like you get a lot for your money with the Bassist. Recommend!

Pedal seems to be exact what I need. Not knowledgeable enough to elaborate too much, though BUT, (First to admit, I don't know beans about electrical specs, so I may oblivious to something critical) I bought a D'Addario power adapter to power this unit, and I noticed after a few days a persistent whine at about 2.4Khz. I hadn't noticed it at first b/c when recording, I chop off the quiet part the beginning and end, but it became apparent quickly enough. I swapped it for another adapter I had, and that one gave me a VERY loud hum. Figuring that I was probably returning this compressoer, I tried a third adapter, a cheapy purchased from Amazon, brand name WUKUR, and it works perfectly. Not dead silent, but 95% of the way there. I put the D'Addario on a tuner, where it works as it should. Did not realize that different adapters can introduce signal issues with pedals. Lesson learned. If you have problems with your pedal being noisy, start with the power adapter.

This is a great compressor. It is highly transparent and easy to use. If you are looking for a pedal to add warmth or color, this isn't the one. You can dial in a ton of compression and it still stays pretty tranparent. While this pedal is missing attack and release controls, the built in system adjusts them based off the input level. I'm a picky and skeptical person, but am satisfied by it. I use aggressive finger style with high output active 5 strings, and the Keeley handles the hot signal cleanly. I'm super picky about my compression, and didn't think I would be happy with a 3 knob, but this pedal makes up for it in ease of use and sound quality. It can dial in gentle compression to hard limiting. Pros: Highly transparent Great sound quality Handles hot B strings Ease of use Small footprint Standard 9V Cons: No adjustable attack and release Single led metering Too transparent to use as an effect

I can’t seem to be able to create a tone that sounds ‘real’. Always assumed it was 100% my hands and was late to discover effect pedals. This compression pedal was a huge step, it made such a big difference, never realized how prevalent compression is in recorded music. It was always toward the bottom of my list of effects but splurged when I received an unexpected bonus. If I’d known how much my tone would improve I would’ve obviously gotten this long ago. Should definitely be at the top of anyone’s list Anyway this pedal is about middle of the road in terms of price and it sounds awesome. I don’t know enough to do a thorough review but I was really shocked/happy how much more my Tele sounds like a Tele, and everything just sounds so much richer. Maybe some day I’ll figure out more time secrets but I was very happy with this one.

SUMMARY An excellent, easy to use full frequency range compressor. It passes the low frequencies that most guitar compressor pedals filter out and it's quite transparent. That makes it suitable for bass, keyboards, or any instrument. The only other Keeley compressor that does that is the PRO at $250-$300. The LED design is troublesome and irritating to me. I repeatedly have thought it was on when it was off during gigs and practices. The value isn't great even at the new discounted $169 price when compared to guitar compressors (including keeley). And now they appear to be trying to sell it at $199. At equal price points, I'd recommend the MXR over the Keeley. But both are excellent, just slightly different. The LED thing is annoying as hell on the Keeley, at least to me. -1 star for the LED design. PROS - full frequency range enables use on bass without loss of low end - simple effective knob controls, and mostly intuitive - Red/Green LED indicates when compression is occurring. - 9V power input is located where it should be...on the rear facing panel - Form factor is the "best" size CONS - Red/Green is ALWAYS ON when plugged into power, including when pedal is disengaged. - Blue LED is quite bright, and it indicates whent the pedal is engaged. It's view is obstructed by the center knob in some positions because of the upside down V shape of the knob placement. - Indication pedal is engaged/disengaged is confusing - Value isn't great. It's overpriced for what it is. And now it appears they are raising it higher. DETAILS Red/Green LED ALWAYS ON - This is distracting, confusing and annoying to me. It's just not intuitive. I look down and think the pedal is engaged when it isn't, it just has power to it. Yet there's that damn green light suggesting it's engaged. It makes the pedal less intuitive. The Blue LED is very bright - almost bright enough to make me want to tape over it as some players I've seen have done. Perhaps it can be modded to add a resistor and reduce the current flow to this LED to dim it. A better design would have been to lose the blue LED altogether, and have the red/green turn on when the pedal is engaged, and change color when the compression is occurring. This would be intuitive. And, not burn power on a board that's plugged in and not being used. Or use the Blue LED to indicated there is power applyied, green for "on" and red for "compressing". Because of the "always on" LED I have to unplug my pedalboard when not in use, or unplug this pedal's power. It's ok, but a little annoying. The value at $200 MSRP is poor, at $169 is still overpriced, and should cost the same as a Keeley Plus guitar compressor which is $129, in my opinion. They priced it to compete with the "defacto standard" MXR Bass Compressor at $200 which is also VERY overpriced for what it is. I bought it at $169, mostly because it was $30 cheapers and I expected it would work well. In my opinion, this is just gouging bass players, who do need the full range of frequencies to pass through (which means they need LESS frequency filtering circuit components, hence should cost manufacturer less to build it.) Overall I reduced 1 star for the value and the LED design. But I like the product, I bought it and I'll probably keep it. Someone needs to bring out a cost effective full frequency range compressor for bass (and other non-guitar instruments). COMPETITIVE COMPARISON First, if you think you're just going to use your guitar compressor pedal with your bass, think again. It's going to chop the low frequencies off and you don't want that when playing bass. The only guitar compressor I thought came close was a Truetone Route 66 pedal that has a bass boost switch, that brought some of that low end back (and the overdrive sounded great too). But even that paled when put side by side with the bass compressors which just had more low end girth. The MXR bass compressor is the top competitor. I bought one on sale for $174, mostly because the LED's of the Keeley were really annoying me. The MXR does a much better job of indicating it is engaged, as well as showing how much compression is occurring. The LEDs are more visible and the knobs don’t get in the way of that because their layout leaves room around the LED's for good line of sight in any position. I really prefer the MXR on those points. But I found its control settings less intuitive in part because it has two controls (attack/release) and a 4-choice compression ratio plus input and output levels. I had to go read the manual to really understand how to set it initially. By comparison, the Keeley has a sweepable compression ratio knob (vs 4 fixed options), then a threshold and a level. I dialed up an acceptable sound rapidly and intuitively on the Keeley but struggled to find it on the MXR until I read the manual. After a few sessions of comparison, I decided I liked the sound of the Keeley slightly better, as the MXR has a little bit softer, duller sort of compression sound. Even with the attack turned to full, I felt like the attack lost it's "cut". I also liked a compression ratio that falls in between the preset options offered on the MXR. (about 6:1, vs 4:1 or 8:1) I was truly torn on which compressor to keep. I hate the LEDs on the Keeley and I keep thinking it is on and engaged when it’s not despite being fully aware of that issue. It even happened to me in practice on the same day I initially wrote this review...when it's functionality was most fresh in my mind. But it sounds good and it is intuitive to set. The MXR is also very good, but I wish the compression ratio was continuously adjustable vs 4 set points, and the soft edge on the compression was just a little less preferable for my use. In the end, I returned the MXR even though I really wanted to keep it as nearly everything else on my bass board is MXR. I had to acknowlege my cost was sunk on the Keeley (meaning I'd have had to sell it used at some level of loss) but I could still return the MXR for a refund. Plus the MXR even on sale was $5 more, but most importantly, I preferred the overall sound of the Keeley and the ease of dialing it in. At the same price point, I'd still recommend the MXR. In my instance, I kept the Keeley, but I might regret that down the road. If I didn't already own the Keeley, I probably would have kept the MXR and adjusted for a bit more brightness at my preamp. They are both really nice bass compressors. But man I wish the Keeley didn't have the weird LED design. It drives me nuts.

Nice pedal. Lots of controls to refine your sound. I got this one even though it's not specifically for bass because what I read about the one that's actually for bass said that it sometimes gets rid of some of the low end.

I bought this compressor to add some color to my tone. When I received it... I plugged my Fender Strat (HSS) into the Keeley Compressor plus and plugged it straight into a Marshall Origins 50 tube amp. Holy sheet!!! This is the tone I was looking for!!!! Not so much compressed as overdriven! I have every major overdrive pedal you can imagine, BOSS Waza Blues Driver... BOSS non-waza BD, several green Ibanez pedals, ... always looking for that blues sound (think 80's Clapton beer commercial or SRV Texas Strat blues sound.) This thing is incredible. To make it a great upfront clean OD compression pedal, just bring the sustain and level up over the 1 o'clock position and crank up your tube amp. Fabulous pedal. Won't play without it. I leave it on the humbucker setting even through single coil pickups and just tweak sustain and level... as a bonus... the tone knob can be used to bring down the ice-picky treble boost that happens with all my other driver pedals. Well done Keeley!!! (As always.) If you throw out all your other compressor pedals and blues drive pedals and get this one... you will be happy!!!!

Everything works great!

Having worked in a home studio for a number of years, you realize that one of the hardest things to get right is recording the bass guitar. Using a compressor as it is meant to be used, limiting peaks and bringing up the quiet parts, you can finally achieve a good consistent mix on your recordings. This is especially true if your playing isn't that accurate, and a compressor will help the bass come through more evenly and solidly. The downside is that you lose dynamics and a bit of punch. This compressor, however, is probably as close as you will get to an actual high end studio compressor in a pedal format. I have tried others that just didn't impress as much as this one does. It does what it is meant to do, with no extra noise, and leaves your original tone intact. It is very easy to dial in and make quick changes on the fly if you need to. One of the complaints that I have heard about it is the brightness of the lights and I can concur with this. My remedy was to use a paper hole punch to punch out a couple of 'holes' from a roll of copper shielding tape. Then stick these over the led lights, tamping the tape down tightly around the 'bulb' with a chop stick. Then all you do is take a nail file and carefully file away a tiny bit of the tape in the center of the led. You are left with a tiny pin prick of a light which greatly diminishes the light output. I haven't tried it yet but I would think that this compressor could even work well on an acoustic or electric guitar. It's that good. Whatever optical magic Keeley uses in this pedal, it's worth the premium price. If you've been looking for a reasonably priced, effective and quiet, limiting type of compressor, this is it. Try it, you might like it.

E' uno dei migliori compressori a pedale che si possono trovare in giro, E' silenziosissimo a prescindere dal livello impostato e se non viene spinto eccessivamente è di una trasparenza esemplare. (rispetta molto il suono dello strumento), sembra veramente un compressore a rack ficcato dentro ad un pedale. Le regolazioni però permettono di passare da una compressione blanda, fino alla limitazione vera e propria e fino allo squish (se si alza molto il livello di compressione e si abbassa quello della sogli di livello a cui il pedale interviene. Pedali praticamente boutique come il compressore di Nemphasis sono forse ancora più trasparenti, (la tecnologia ottica sembra sempre leggermente più trasparente del VCA), ma a scapito delle estreme possibilità di intervento che questo pedale permette. Consigliatissimo.

Excellent quality. The ability to switch between single coil and humbuckers is especially useful.

Tolles Effektgerät. Klingt genauso wie ich es wollte. Ich habe jetzt nicht alle handelsverfügbaren Compressor-Pedale miteinander verglichen, aber ich bin zufrieden. Macht sich gut auf dem Pedal-Board.

Buen compresor, bien disenado especificamente para lo que debe de hacer, o sea, para guitarra.