With the Silos, EarthQuaker Devices delivers straightforward, versatile delay that covers a wide range of echo and repeat sounds, housed in a simple, compact pedal. With presets to boot! The Silos starts with three distinct voices—Digital, Analog, and Tape—covering the basic territory of the three generations of echo. Built by hand in Akron, Ohio, the Silos then adds tap tempo, six presets, and user-assignable expression control while keeping the actual delay controls to three knobs.
Each mode captures a different character entirely; they're different degrees of filtering. Digital mode keeps the repeats bright and present, with shorter settings producing a tight, stuttering effect and longer times moving into spacious ambience. Analog mode is darker and more mid-focused, with quicker decay and a murkier character that works particularly well with overdriven or distorted sounds. Tape mode goes darker still, with a saturated, worn-in quality that adds atmospheric depth without overwhelming the original signal. Each mode offers up to one second of delay time.
Despite the wide range of sounds, the Silos remains user-friendly in every setting. Time, Repeats, and Mix provide the familiar Delay controls, and the dedicated Preset switch allows six complete settings—including the selected delay mode and expression assignment—to be saved and recalled. Tap tempo makes it easy to sync the delay on the fly, and the external TRS expression pedal can be assigned to Time, Repeats, or Mix. The Silos is also designed to play nice with the repeals and respond well to gain and overdrive, making it equally useful for clean ambience, rhythmic repeats, or darker trails behind a heavily driven guitar.
The Silos is a practical, user-friendly option that covers a wide range of delay sounds in a compact, pedalboard-friendly design. The Digital setting covers clean, defined repeats, while the Analog and Tape modes provide progressively darker and more atmospheric voices, giving the Silos plenty of range while retaining the immediacy that makes a good stompbox useful.