Onward

Think of this as the 'length of the loop chunk' and the master clock for everything that moves. Small settings give short, fast, choppy samples and quick fades; large settings give longer phrases, slower fades and longer holds.

tip: Because Shape and Error timing follow SIZE, you get usable, musical results at any position — turn it down for stuttery blips, up for longer evolving loops.

The wet/dry blend. Left is more of your straight guitar, right is more of the sampled effect. Just note that the moment you turn on any ramping dip switch, this knob stops being a blend and becomes the speed control for the automation.

tip: While ramping, you can still nudge the blend: hold the left footswitch down while turning MIX to adjust it without changing ramp speed.

Adds a harmony voice. Turn left for a lower, slower octave that fills out the bottom; turn right for a higher, faster octave that adds sparkle. Straight up (noon) turns the harmony off entirely.

tip: Max it to the left for a doomy sub-bass 'synth' that follows you, or right for dense rhythmic interplay when paired with Glitch.

The 'chaos amount' knob. Low settings keep things tidy; turn it up and Onward starts randomly glitching — dropping out, stuttering, changing speed and direction, depending on which TYPE you've selected. Great for bringing a static pad to life.

tip: Turning ERROR up is also the key to unlocking stereo movement when the SPREAD dip switch is on — glitches randomly favor left or right for a wide, animated image.

How long a sound lingers. Low settings give short blips and stutters; high gives long pads; all the way up freezes forever. On the Glitch side it doubles as a repeat counter — pick exactly how many echoes you want.

tip: If you want an exact number of Glitch repeats with no extras, set the FADE toggle to the right (fast), since slow FADE adds extra crossfaded repeats.

The 'dirt' knob. Turn left for crunchy, sizzly digital degradation that pushes the effect forward; turn right for warm, smooth overdrive. Noon is clean.

tip: Pairing high TEXTURE with high ERROR and a short SUSTAIN makes intense sounds that flame out quickly — great for aggressive, spitting glitch bursts.

Adjusts how loud you have to play before Onward decides to grab a new sample. Around noon works best for most.

tip: Turn it down if quiet notes are triggering resamples too often; up if you're struggling to trigger it.

Sets the volume balance between the Glitch and Freeze sides so one doesn't drown out the other.

tip: Nudge toward Freeze for background pads under a prominent glitch loop, or vice versa.

Once you've turned on DUCK or SIDECHAIN, this sets how much and how easily the effect dips in volume.

tip: Only matters when DUCK or SIDECHAIN is engaged — dial it for how dramatic the pumping/ducking feels.

Lets you program your own preferred fade-in/out speed and park it on the middle FADE position, so you can flick between slow, your-custom, and fast.

tip: Set it to a medium speed you use often so all three FADE positions become useful.

Instead of just one flavor of glitch, this lets all three types (Timing, Condition, Playback) happen at once for maximum unpredictability.

tip: Turn it up with ERROR for the 'anything can go wrong' UH OH setting where every kind of glitch is equally likely.

A tone knob hiding behind TEXTURE. Turn it up to thin out a muddy sound, or down to darken and mellow a harsh one.

tip: Use it to make the effect sit in a mix — thin it out so pads don't clash with your bass frequencies.

Picks the flavor of chaos. Left = rhythmic/pattern-like variation. Middle = natural pops, dropouts and gritty bites (best for lifelike glitches). Right = random speed changes, 2x/4x, and reverse.

tip: The middle (Condition) setting is the easiest way to make Glitch pop in and out naturally instead of repeating steadily. Set it to Playback on a Freeze pad for generative pitch-shifting drones.

Controls whether sounds appear instantly or swell in gently. Left = ambient, swelling, with brief moments of layering as old and new samples overlap. Right = snappy and responsive. Middle = whatever custom speed you programmed.

tip: At slower FADE settings you get fleeting overlaps where the old and new samples momentarily blend — lovely for pads. Set it fast to avoid those extra layers.

Adds movement and sway. Left gives pitch wobble/vibrato that speeds up or slows with SIZE — can sound vintage or dissonant. Right gives lush, hazy chorus for width and dimension. Middle is off.

tip: Chorus is fixed slow and dreamy; if you want the modulation speed to follow your timing, use vibrato and control its rate with SIZE.

A three-way preset switcher. Flick left or right to instantly recall a saved sound; keep it centered to play with the knobs live. Dip switch settings are saved into presets too.

tip: To factory-reset all Hidden Options, flick this toggle left and back to center three times, then press both footswitches together when the lights blink.

This is Onward's secret weapon: you can send the errors to only the Glitch side while keeping Freeze smooth, or put all the effects on Freeze while errors animate Glitch. Point each toggle toward the channel you want to affect.

tip: When routed to only one channel, the other channel behaves as: stable (no errors), or infinite sustain + fast fade, or completely clean — letting you run Onward like two separate effects.

Turns the repeating-chunk channel on or off. Once you've played something you love, press and hold it to freeze that phrase in place so you can solo over a steady loop while it no longer swaps out your samples.

tip: With the LATCH dip switch on (the default), the hold-to-lock becomes latching — it stays locked until you hold again. Hold this switch while powering up to enable Dry Kill for wet/dry rigs.

Turns the sustaining-pad channel on or off. Hold it to lock the current frozen note into an infinite pad — the classic freeze — so new notes you play don't replace it.

tip: Hold this switch while powering up to enable Trails, so the effect fades out gracefully when you bypass instead of cutting off abruptly.

Your visual feedback. Red = active. Green = you've locked a sample or you're editing hidden settings. Blinking-red-everywhere = you're in tap tempo mode.

tip: The middle LED blinking is your confirmation that a preset save or a reset succeeded.

Turn this on if you're feeding Onward a single mono cable but want stereo out of two outputs.

tip: Combine with SPREAD for genuinely different processing on each side rather than just a duplicated signal.

Makes Onward wide and immersive in stereo. Errors will bounce between left and right for an animated stereo image.

tip: Turn ERROR up to actually hear the stereo motion — with SPREAD on but no errors, there's little movement to spread.

Lets you lock a sample without keeping your foot down — press and hold once to lock, press and hold again to release.

tip: This is on from the factory; turn it off if you prefer the lock to only last while your foot is pressing.

Makes the pad 'breathe' or pump in rhythm with the glitch loop, giving a linked, alternating groove between the two channels.

tip: Use it even without Glitch engaged to add rhythmic pulsing to an otherwise static freeze pad — SIZE sets the pulse speed.

Automatically lowers the effect so your fresh notes stay clear and audible, then lets the effect swell back up in the gaps. Keeps things from getting muddy.

tip: Adjust the DUCK DEPTH hidden option (behind the OCTAVE knob) to set how sensitive and strong the ducking is.

Plays your captured Glitch chunks backwards for a swelling, backwards-tape feel.

tip: Great combined with slow FADE for reverse-swell textures.

Turn this on if your Glitch samples feel too short — you get roughly twice the length at the cost of a slightly grainy, lo-fi sound.

tip: The lo-fi character it adds is a feature, not just a compromise — it pairs nicely with TEXTURE crunch for tape-like textures.

Turns Onward into a traditional foot-controlled freeze/looper. It stops listening to your dynamics and only grabs a sample when you tell it to with your foot.

tip: Use this when you want precise, deliberate control over exactly when each channel captures — it lets you sample each channel independently.

Flip one of these on to make that knob move by itself — either sweeping once at power-up (ramp) or continuously back and forth (bounce). The physical knob position sets the top or bottom of the range.

tip: Turn on more than one at a time to automate several parameters together for complex evolving textures.

Sets the automation to keep oscillating forever rather than moving once and stopping. This is the easier one to start experimenting with.

tip: Start with BOUNCE, pick a knob (like TEXTURE), and set the speed with MIX to hear constant morphing between two settings.

Decides which end of the sweep your physical knob position defines — the ceiling or the floor of the movement.

tip: Flip it to reverse the direction of your ramp/bounce without changing anything else.

Flips whether the automation or pedal moves up or down as it sweeps or as you press an expression pedal.

tip: If your expression pedal or CV is working backwards from what you expect, flip this.

Plug in an expression pedal or CV source to control parameters with your foot or an external device. Choose which knob(s) it controls with the dip switches, just like ramping.

tip: Never feed it more than 5V or any negative voltage — that can damage the pedal. Stay within 0–5V CV range.

This jack does double duty: it's your gateway to deep MIDI control, or you can plug an external footswitch in to engage Glitch remotely — handy for tabletop/desk setups.

tip: An external footswitch takes control automatically the moment it's plugged in — no menu diving required.

Where you plug in power. It must be a standard pedal 9V center-negative supply that can deliver at least 200mA.

tip: Onward does not run on a battery — use a quality isolated supply to avoid noise.