TENS was physically modeled after a series of high-end studio spring reverbs introduced by the famous Austrian company in the early 1970s and early 1980s.
Unlike classic spring reverbs used in guitar amps, these devices were based on their own patented design principle that allowed various connected spring elements of varying lengths and wire diameters to vibrate within a small isolated space.
The spring elements were manipulated in a variety of ways, such as etching the surface of the wire and deforming individual turns of the coil, resulting in a very diffuse and very dense reverb that lacked the “bump/chirp” artifacts associated with spring reverbs and was much closer to the sound of plate reverbs.
This range of reverbs is praised for its incredibly deep, organic, complex, rich, smooth and floating character. From a sonical point of view (but certainly not from a technical point of view) it can be considered as the missing link between classic spring and plate reverbs. A very unique beast indeed!
To expand the sonic capabilities of the originals, TENS offers:
- a wide range of decay times (from 0.2 seconds to 40 seconds).
- unlike the originals, each tank of the TENS models produces a stereo signal instead of mono.
- various possibilities for deep modification of real models using TENSION, WHOOSH and METALLIC controls.
- an additional saturation (pre)amplifier, which can be freely placed in the signal chain.
- three modulation slots for adding movement or creating unusual sounds.
- Each continuous TENS parameter can be a modulation target.
- The target can be modulated by either an LFO or an envelope.
- The envelope follower can be triggered by either the reverb input or output, or even an external sidechain signal.
- It is also possible to use the envelope for muting effects.
- The envelope follower can be used to change the dynamics of the input signal, add additional amp saturation and reverb signal.
- Using the modulation section, you can achieve various modulation effects such as tremolo, chorus, vibrato, phase-like sounds and more unusual sounds, as well as combinations of the above effects.
