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J. Rockett Aqueous Review
Дата публикации: 03-03-2026 20:40:15


It might be an overstatement to call the J. Rockett Aqueous chorus “surgical.” But for any player that has lamented a lack of subtlety in vintage-style chorus effects, the Aqueous offers an impressive level of control, making it a promising studio and performance tool and an intriguing alternative to the classics—even as it often excels at those sounds.Waves on the Turquoise SeaJ. Rockett seems to relish a challenge. Even drive pedals, like their Archer series of Klon clones, sit either at the head of their class or are designed to the specification of a very particular, discerning player. In some cases, they have collaborated with designers responsible for stompbox institutions, with the aim of redefining them. They rarely build anything ordinary, and in that way the Aqueous fits the company’s lineage well.The Aqueous’ digital circuitry is built around the Accu-Bell ABE-1, an effect module constructed by the same company that makes the popular Belton Brick module at the heart of many popular and excellent digital reverbs. Though it’s a digital circuit, Aqueous’ sounds make it a spiritual descendant of many pedals that vintage heads obsess over, like the Boss CE-1 and CE-2 and Electro-Harmonix Poly Chorus and Clone Theory. With the exception of the Poly Chorus, most of these pedals were straightforward affairs offering little control beyond rate and depth. Where additional controls existed, as with the Poly Chorus, they often served to make things extra weird. What’s cool about the Aqueous is that it uses its extra flexibility to achieve greater precision and subtlety instead.The most interesting of these additional controls are the preamp and tilt EQ knobs. The former will appeal to some as a way to compensate for perceived volume loss. But it’s also capable of subtle drive that blurs modulations and makes them sound like a more cohesive part of your signal, not unlike a dark analog delay. The tilt EQ adds either real darkness by subtracting high end, or brightness that brings a more analog-like liveliness to the output. The tilt EQ works beautifully in concert with the wet-dry mix control, another much less common chorus control parameter, to enable very specific shaping of the modulation intensity and presence.The practical importance of chorus—or any modulation—that can be foregrounded or tucked back into the hidden corners of a mix in this fashion is hard to underestimate. In live situations, different rooms can respond to the EQ peaks and valleys created by chorus in the same way overdrive or distortion can, and the ability to adapt to those shifts can be the difference between a guitar that goes missing in a mix and one that vibrates with life. The studio benefits of a chorus this nuanced are even more obvious. In both situations the Aqueous can be a great scalpel.I Threw a Brick
As we’ve noted in earlier J. Rockett reviews, the company has a way of building things to a bulletproof standard. This applies to the Aqueous for sure. Though the I/O and 9V DC jacks are mounted to the printed circuit as well as the enclosure, the enclosure itself is robust enough to be used in self-defense. And it’s hard to imagine many shocks, bumps, or bruises that the Aqueous couldn’t handle. The knobs, meanwhile, are the kind that make on-the-fly adjustments easy. They are smooth, sensitive, and resistant to accidental adjustments. But the real beauty of the control set is the use of Neve-style wing knobs for the preamp and tilt eq, which stand up a little taller and facilitate easy adjustment with your toe.The VerdictIf you're open-minded about what chorus can be, the Aqueous merits more than a casual tryout. Vintage-aligned players with very specific opinions about how chorus should sound might find certain elements of classic voices missing. Aqueous’ tendency to be many things could also come at the expense of super-deep, over-the-top sounds like those a vintage Poly Chorus or Way Huge’s Blue Hippo can generate.But if you’re less attached to those templates, Aqueous might leave you wondering why anyone bothers with less tailorable chorus units. A colleague suggested that Aqueous might be a chorus for people who don't like chorus. I’d venture that Aqueous is simply a great chorus for players who want a more flexible one.
J. Rockett Audio Designs
Aqueous Chorus Pedal
Street price
$249.99

Buy now

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Основное содержимое страницы с новостью.

It was these darker tones and phasey “parked wah” colors, typically matched with high gain, that came to define the new wah way. Taking input from numerous name players of the time, Dunlop created the original Cry Baby BB535 with features that this new generation of ax-grinders asked for: An easy way to switch frequency ranges from darker to brighter that didn’t require a screwdriver and lots of swearing; higher-grade inductors for lower noise and less RF interference; a high-impedance buffer for stronger signal integrity across long cable chains; and a built-in boost for solos and volume compensation on the fly. (The original Cry Baby GCB95 could experience signal loss when engaged.) With the original BB535 they got all that, including four tiered and selectable frequency ranges, which Dunlop would expand to six ranges with the updated BB535 in 1999.

Way More Than Wakka-Wakka

It’s the six-range version that Dunlop has now reissued in 2026 as the Cry Baby BB535R, and honestly, the 27 years has been worth the wait, especially for the many players who’ve been combing online resellers for examples of the original, which adherents swear sounds better than any wah since. (Note: The popular Dunlop 535Q, which added a variable Q-control to the BB535’s six-range EQ section, was released soon after, effectively replacing the standard 535, and is arguably its equal in timbre and flexibility. The BB535 does not include a Q control, which allows players to select a range and then fine tune the width of that range.)

For all its expanded tone palette, to my ear, Dunlop didn’t sacrifice anything that the original CryBaby GCB95 did well.

While the 535Q uses Italian-made Red Fasel inductors, the BB535R uses the very same high-grade inductors that were first implanted into the BB535 in 1994. What’s the difference? Well, have you ever left your wah in its middle position, only to start hearing a random radio station coming through your half-stack? These higher-grade inductors, it’s argued, are far less prone to that kind of RF interference as well as ground noise, and therefore run quieter. And while inductors’ role in tone shaping can be hard to pin down, there’s no question that there’s something velvety in the BB535’s tone, especially in the middle to low frequency ranges, that might support Dunlop’s claim that better inductors impart warmer, more vocal tone. And the BB535R is definitely warm. Wah-wah pedals can hit you with serious treble spikes, and that only seems to happen with the BB535R in toe-down position, at the very highest peak range.

Gotta Have That Funk

Now, while the 535 clearly arose from the rock scene of the late ’80s and early ’90s, its multi-function capabilities and smoother tone are no less applicable to soul, funk, and r&b playing. It performs extremely well with clean tones—allowing the player to pick tone terrain that’s funky and character-rich but restrained in the sense that there are fewer treble spikes. That balance and control can be hard to achieve even with a very disciplined pedal foot, but it’s much easier to maintain here.

Another thing worth noting: For all its expanded tone palette, to my ear, Dunlop didn’t sacrifice anything that the original CryBaby GCB95 did well—they just made the original CryBaby platform a lot more versatile, and made it play way nicer with modern high-gain tones. So, devotees of icons like Hendrix, Carlos Santana, Prince, John McLaughlin, Jimmy Nolen, Eric Clapton, Michael Schenker, Ernie Isley, and Frank Zappa will still find that same great midrange focus, percussive bark, and grainy goodness on tap with the BB535R, which rejoins a wah family that now includes the 535Q, the CBM535Q Mini, and my favorite, the CBM535QAR Mini. (“AR” refers to “auto-return,” meaning that you never have to stomp and click to turn the wah effect on or off. It’s a very nice feature, especially in live performance, that keeps your lyrical flow seamless. It could be a great inclusion on a future version of the BB535R.)

Lastly, you’ve got to love that Dunlop moved the boost potentiometer to the side rather situating on the bottom. The pot is not sizable enough that you can adjust with your toe in the middle of a solo, but you can make relatively fast adjustments when you need to without disassembling your pedal board.

The Verdict

Whether you’re after the hefty tones of grunge’s chief progenitors, or the silky sounds of 1960s psychedelia and 1970s funk, the BB535R is both an eerily accurate component-by-component recreation of its original namesake and a terrific all-purpose wah-wah for the studio or stage environment. Given the prices that original 535s fetch on the used market, and the expanded tone range, increased boost levels, low-noise operation, rugged build, and smart new features that Dunlop have added to the BB535R reissue, its substantial street price of $229 still strikes me as reasonable. One can certainly buy a wah pedal for far less. But after all these years, few pedal effects offer players as much real-time control of their guitar’s frequency response as a wah does—especially with a built-in boost, and the BB535R elevates this flexibility to a higher level.

Cry Baby BB535 Multi-Wah Reissue Cry Baby BB535 Multi-Wah Reissue

Dunlop

Cry Baby BB535 Multi-Wah Reissue

Wah Guitar Pedal with Boost, Range Selector, and High-Impedance Buffer

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