For Fender, NAMM 2019 was the year of modulation pedals: they unveiled three of them, all sharing a few features with each other.
The Pinwheel is a stereo in/out, rotary speaker emulator that works seamlessly with guitars and keyboards thanks to a voicing switch on the back panel (see image below).
It features three different rotary modes (including one modeled after Fender’s own vintage Vibratone speaker), foot-switchable Slow and Fast speeds, and an onboard Overdrive for added texture.
The Sensitivity control allows modulation rate changes based on your playing dynamics.
A look at the back pedal reveals a few surprises: besides the mentioned voicing switch, extra switches let you turn the leds and the dynamic effect on and off and use the expression output either with a footswitch or with an expression pedal.
Here’s the video of it featuring Fender’s Product Development guy Stan Cotey.
P.S. We added the Pinwheel to our guide to the best Rotary Pedals. We gathered all the new modulation pedals released at NAMM here.
