DAN AGOSTO: Hi. Welcome to Gearwire. We’re taking a look at the MXR Dyna Comp. So, this is the box.

All right. Here is the DC Brick. It’s an advertisement. You can power a good amount of pedals with that instead of batteries. Here we have an MXR catalog, and inside we can see a whole bunch of pedals. They make a lot of pedals. Here is the business reply, postage paid. Send this in for the warranty, registry of product. Cry Baby: this is a catalog for the Cry Baby wah pedals you get with this. We didn’t get a manual so I printed something out from a web site which has all the instructions on it. That’s about all you get with the Dyna Comp anyway, just a quick description of the pedal directions and the controls.

All right. So, let’s take a look at the pedal. All right. With all these MXR pedals, you get these washers that you can put over the knobs. They’re good to protect the knobs that you could also sort of use them so that you’re able to move the knobs onstage with your foot if you need to. I’m going to leave those off to the side. So, we got two knobs. It’s an output pedal -- or an output knob and also the sensitivity knob that will just control the amount of sustain and compression. We have the input, 1/4”, for guitar. You also have an input for a power adapter. We will run this on batteries. Output, 14”. The batteries would go in the back. These four screws need to come off, and then there’s a little compartment for the battery. So, that’s the MXR Dyna Comp out of the box.

All right. We’re back and we got the Dyna Comp wired in. It’s ready to go. I’m playing with a Fender American Standard Telecaster that’s plugged into a Marshall JCM2000 half stack which is mic’ed up with a Shure SM57. Let’s see what kind of of sound we’re getting when the pedal’s inactive.

[DAN AGOSTO PLAYING THE FENDER AMERICAN STANDARD TELECASTER THROUGH A MARSHALL JCM2000 AND SHURE SM57 WITH THE DUNLOP MXR M-102 DYNA COMP BYPASSED]

All right. I’m going to bring the pedal in. I’m going to move the knob up to about middle.

[DAN AGOSTO PLAYING THE FENDER AMERICAN STANDARD TELECASTER THROUGH A MARSHALL JCM2000 AND SHURE SM57 WITH THE DUNLOP MXR M-102 DYNA COMP ENGAGED]

So, we can see there’s a difference in the amount of noise that we hear. This pedal is going to be raising the lower levels so it will add a little bit of noise. If we turn this down, it will get a little bit less.

[DAN AGOSTO PLAYING THE FENDER AMERICAN STANDARD TELECASTER THROUGH A MARSHALL JCM2000 AND SHURE SM57 WITH THE DUNLOP MXR M-102 DYNA COMP ENGAGED]

What it’s doing to the sound is kind of tough to tell. I’m going to turn it up to see if we can hear more of it.

[DAN AGOSTO PLAYING THE FENDER AMERICAN STANDARD TELECASTER THROUGH A MARSHALL JCM2000 AND SHURE SM57 WITH THE DUNLOP MXR M-102 DYNA COMP ENGAGED]

Compare that to lower.

[DAN AGOSTO PLAYING THE FENDER AMERICAN STANDARD TELECASTER THROUGH A MARSHALL JCM2000 AND SHURE SM57 WITH THE DUNLOP MXR M-102 DYNA COMP ENGAGED]

So, since it’s a compressor pedal, what it’s actually doing is once the level of the guitar gets above a certain threshold that’s set within the pedal, it’s going to start bringing down the level, so you can kind of hear that. When we turn it up, it’s sort of accentuating the first attack and you can hear it sort of come in and become active.

[DAN AGOSTO PLAYING THE FENDER AMERICAN STANDARD TELECASTER THROUGH A MARSHALL JCM2000 AND SHURE SM57 WITH THE DUNLOP MXR M-102 DYNA COMP ENGAGED]

You can kind of hear the noise drop and then come back up.

[DAN AGOSTO PLAYING THE FENDER AMERICAN STANDARD TELECASTER THROUGH A MARSHALL JCM2000 AND SHURE SM57 WITH THE DUNLOP MXR M-102 DYNA COMP ENGAGED]

So, also one thing that this helps is improve sustain. So, if we brought the pedal out and played a sustained note.

[DAN AGOSTO PLAYING THE FENDER AMERICAN STANDARD TELECASTER THROUGH A MARSHALL JCM2000 AND SHURE SM57 WITH THE DUNLOP MXR M-102 DYNA COMP BYPASSED]

You can see how that decay’s become a bit less high into the sound. If we turn the pedal on, it’s going to sustain a bit more and keep it more consistent tone.

[DAN AGOSTO PLAYING THE FENDER AMERICAN STANDARD TELECASTER THROUGH A MARSHALL JCM2000 AND SHURE SM57 WITH THE DUNLOP MXR M-102 DYNA COMP ENGAGED]

And bring it out.

[DAN AGOSTO PLAYING THE FENDER AMERICAN STANDARD TELECASTER THROUGH A MARSHALL JCM2000 AND SHURE SM57 WITH THE DUNLOP MXR M-102 DYNA COMP BYPASSED]

Bring it in.

[DAN AGOSTO PLAYING THE FENDER AMERICAN STANDARD TELECASTER THROUGH A MARSHALL JCM2000 AND SHURE SM57 WITH THE DUNLOP MXR M-102 DYNA COMP ENGAGED]

So, it’s by using the sustain, as the note decays, the volume of the output is increasing. So, thanks for checking out this Dyna Comp with us here at Gearwire.Com.