Review after a week and a couple of gigs with the Dream 65 (2024)

With every unit so far, it's been a struggle. Some days I'm happy, most I'm not and I'll just tweak to no end instead of just playing.

Since the Dream arrived it's been just great. I was shocked how great it sounded from the start and it didn't change since. Playing around with the settings, it's just shades of awesome. It sounds good and feels just as good to play. I have this familiriaty I was missing with other units.

The reverb is a feat in itself. Just gorgeous.

Won't say my opinion won't change, but yeah... So far it's been a much different experience compared to every other unit and it's been great.

The thing is more versitile than I imagined. It's a shame to have just two presets available. Hopefully they'll add a way to change presets through usb.

I'm not really interested in the other ones, but if they release a plexi one I'm all over it. Hopefully they'll add a great chamber reverb.

Pat6969 said:

Ya, kind of odd they don’t have a Plexi model. Maybe they couldn’t pull it off convincingly.

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A friend of mine kept saying the same…told him try the Tweed into 4x12 Woodrow…he got the Ruby. Now he got the Woodrow not missing the Plexi especially since he also hits it with pedals.
@jaeger28

For me I started with dream, then Ruby and my go to is Woodrow
I even just got the Starlight and Reverbator too cause I dug the amp pedals that much.

It sounds and reacts very very similar to my Deluxe Reverb.

It's also as easy to tweak as a real amp. Really happy with mine after some months now.

Played a gig with mine yesterday, and it was great! Much better that the provided amp (was a band festival).

Just had to put it tgrough a DI box, because the desk didn't had a instrument insert, only XLR.

I think that if you are struggling with cutting through the mix, you can increase the mids with the boost knob, in lead or in D-tex mode.

The one thing I didn't learn so far is to turn the tremolo off after engaged in the live mode. I didn't find anything about it in the manual. That's why I only engage it in the preset.

And as mentioned, would be nice to have a multiple preset selected by the two footswitches.

Noah said:

I just ordered a Dream 65 and the Pinstripe Miso to hopefully use as an amp-free solution for gigs.
( i don't play electric at home so don't care about home use)

Some people have said it's lacking in mids and disappears a bit when playing live. ... has anyone had to add an eq to boost mids?

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Can't say I had any issues. It's no more scooped than, well, a typical BF Fender I guess. So far it sounded great at the gigs I played using it.

Ed DeGenaro said:

A friend of mine kept saying the same…told him try the Tweed into 4x12 Woodrow…he got the Ruby. Now he got the Woodrow not missing the Plexi especially since he also hits it with pedals.
@jaeger28

For me I started with dream, then Ruby and my go to is Woodrow
I even just got the Starlight and Reverbator too cause I dug the amp pedals that much.

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Hey Ed, is this for a signal direct to DAW and monitors? Or something else?

Try it with a tube screamer in front of it.

There's your mids.

Jerrod said:

Hey Ed, is this for a signal direct to DAW and monitors? Or something else?

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Yes and yes
I got it initially as replacement for my previous convince boxes (Fractal/Atomic) but liked it so much I’ve been using one of the three non stop for weeks to record.

Just wanted to post I have the Dream 65 and also currently have a Helix LT. I am looking at building a board around the Dream 65 with just stand-alone pedals.

If you are looking for a Plexi sound, I got good results with a Friedman Smallbox pedal. I can get it sounding very close compared to the Helix Placator Dirty (Gain low around 1.2), compared to the Smallbox into the Dream 65.

I would imagine the Revv G2 would also work well, but the Smallbox sounds quite good running straight into the Dream 65 on the Deluxe stock setting.

jmtaylor22 said:

Just wanted to post I have the Dream 65 and also currently have a Helix LT. I am looking at building a board around the Dream 65 with just stand-alone pedals.

If you are looking for a Plexi sound, I got good results with a Friedman Smallbox pedal. I can get it sounding very close compared to the Helix Placator Dirty (Gain low around 1.2), compared to the Smallbox into the Dream 65.

I would imagine the Revv G2 would also work well, but the Smallbox sounds quite good running straight into the Dream 65 on the Deluxe stock setting.

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Don't get me wrong, it takes pedals just great, it's what I've been using since i got it. But if UA does the same to a Plexi what they did to the Deluxe Reverb I'm most definitely interested.

This is the 3 UAFX amp pedals....

I just got a Dream 65 on Friday and played it at 3 gigs over the weekend. First gig, I used it in tandem with my Deluxe Reverb, but in an effort to keep stage volume down, I opted to use the Dream 65 in the house and the DR on stage. The benefits were immediately noticeable.

1. Super easy to dial in - Literally plugged it in at sound check and turned it up through the monitors and thought "That sounds pretty damn good."
2. I was able to get the tone of how my real amp sounded at a much lower stage volume. I also bridged my real amp out of a stereo reverb pedal on my board and run in tandem with my real amp - Fake amp in monitor/Real amp behind me. The two together made a great sound, but the Dream really sounded like the DR in a sweet spot volume.

One bad part was that after an amazing soundcheck on Friday, something had changed in the monitor system and there was a high pitched squeal coming from my line almost like a dog whistle (it was drowned out while we were playing). I monitored my volume around the squeal. About half way through the set, the sound guy figured out what was wrong and got it to go away, but during the first few songs, I was a little annoyed that I had committed to the pedal for my sound. I never found out what the problem was, but didn't experience the same issue for the remainder of the weekend.

Overall, it was a very pleasurable experience and I was really impressed with the pedal. I have played Kempers and they have always been fine, but I still preferred my real amp. I am sure there are compromises made with the UA pedals, but on stage, the compromise was with my amp being on 2. Also, looking forward to not hauling a Deluxe Reverb inside a road case (although the pedal/real amp combo was a great first go at it).

couple of observations from gigging with Dream 65
1.I like to use it with the lead boost ON at at 10’ for clean sound - from 9’ above it removes the “bright cap”,so it removes the sharp highs , Bass at 10’ and treble 11-12’
2. That means I can not use the boost switch for solos, because it is on all the time
3. So I use the WYSIWYG for my dry rhytm sound and switch to saved preset, which is about the same, but little louder - for solos and for slow parts
4. Use Archer to give it more mids if needed
5. Use Timmy or Jan Ray for rhytm crunch tone
6. I was planing to have crunch Jan Ray and for solos feed it with the Archer, but it does not respond quite like a real DRRI - the volume did not increase enough and my solo was drowned
Last gig we played a venue, where the owner (he is a orchestra conductor pointed out ”the room is really live”, “keep your volume down“, so we had just 2 DRX Yamaha speakers, no monitors, I was planning to use in ear, but since I stand next to the PA speaker, it was enough, not great and not like my Princeton, but good enough. This coming weekend 2 outside gigs and I plan again no monitors, no amp

Here is my mini pedal board

How do other use it live ?