NAMM 2023: Darkglass seeks to shake up the noise gate market with mysterious and “cutting-edge” new NSG pedal

NAMM 2023: Darkglass Electronics has announced the NSG Noise Gate pedal, a noise suppressor designed for bass, guitar and any signal chain you can think of.

On the surface, it’s a simple design. There’s a giant Threshold knob to adjust the point where the noise gate kicks in, which promises to tackle unwanted hums, hisses and other audio interference.

Pressing the knob switches between ‘Soft’ and ‘Hard’ levels of noise reduction. The threshold ranges vary from -65 dBV to -30 dBV in Soft mode and -45 dBV to +5dBV in Hard mode.

Unlike noise gates from the likes of Electro-Harmonix, Boss or TC Electronic, there’s no send/return effects loop, but then the ISP Decimator and MXR Smart Gate didn’t need FX loops to effectively hush the hum.

Darkglass has described the NSG as an “innovative” and “cutting-edge” pedal that can “deliver crisp and clear output with minimal background noise”, but we don’t know much else about how it operates.

Knowing the Finnish audio co, the NSG will have a few tricks up its sleeve, but the spooky trailer video above doesn’t give a whole lot away. We look forward to hearing how it performs, because right now it’s hard to know exactly how it stacks up to the competition.

The NSG Noise Gate is available to preorder now for $199 – head over to Darkglass Electronics for more info.