Death By Audio & Levitation Announce Psychedelic Lightmare

Death By Audio and Levitation Summon the Psychedelic Lightmare: A Light-Reactive Stereo Reverb/Tremolo from Another Dimension

QUEENS, NEW YORK, JULY 2025 — Death By Audio Effects, in collaboration with the legendary Levitation festival, proudly unveils their latest boundary-melting creation: the Psychedelic Lightmare. A limited edition of just 333 units, this hallucinatory stereo effect pedal is available now exclusively from Levitation.

The Psychedelic Lightmare is no ordinary pedal—it’s a swirling portal of reverb, tremolo, and pitch manipulation that responds to light itself. Designed to deliver the spirit of Levitation in pedal form, the Lightmare transforms your tone into something completely unstable, expressive, and alive.

At its core, the pedal features a lush stereo reverb and razor-sharp tremolo, but the true magic lies in its light-reactive WARP SENSOR. This sensor alters the internal clock speed in real time—stretching decay, shifting modulation speed, and bending pitch as ambient light changes. Play in darkness and time slows down. Step into the light and the entire soundscape speeds up, warps, and evolves on the fly.

“The Psychedelic Lightmare is freaking insane. It warps your playing in real time with light. You can do things with this pedal that aren’t possible with anything else,”
— Oliver Ackermann, Founder of Death By Audio

“The Psychedelic Lightmare’s been a few years in the making—an idea born during a photoshoot for the A Place To Bury Strangers – Live at Levitation album release, and fleshed out over hangs at Death By Audio HQ. We’re beyond stoked to work with the fine folks at DBA once again. This pedal is somehow more insane and fun than anything we’ve done together yet.”
— Harry Portnof, of Levitation and RVRB

“The Psychedelic Lightmare marks our third collaboration with Levitation, and it’s definitely my favorite. We love working with Levitation because, frankly, they’re one of the coolest festivals out there. The artists that play at Levitation truly embody the sounds of Death By Audio, so it really brings everything full circle.”
— Heather Bickford, COO of Death By Audio

With stereo ins and outs, the Lightmare creates massive, immersive spatial effects whether used in mono, stereo, or mono-to-stereo configurations. The TREM and REVERB sections offer a huge range—from subtle ambience to alien pulses—and the WARP RANGE control lets you decide just how much chaos the light introduces.

Housed in a trippy, red-on-black enclosure inspired by vintage sci-fi and analog weirdness, the Psychedelic Lightmare is equal parts audio tool and time machine. Whether you’re chasing haunted tape trails, bending pitch with shifting shadows, or building walls of dimensional reverb, this pedal is ready to guide you to the outer reaches of your signal chain.

Open your 5th eye. Step into the 6th dimension. Play diminished 7th chords on your 8-string bass 9 times a day. The universe demands it.

Available now, only from Levitation.
For more information, visit Death By Audio.

Death By Audio and Levitation Summon the Psychedelic Lightmare Demo Video

Video by Death By Audio

Controls

• GAIN – Adjusts the overall output volume, from quiet and clean to overdriven and powerful.
• REVERB BLEND – Mix between your dry signal and reverb.
• REVERB TIME – Controls the decay length of the reverb. When WARP is active, this expands even further into a surreal ambient space.
• TREM – Engages and adjusts the tremolo speed. OFF disables the trem. Increasing this knob speeds up the chop from smooth pulses to stuttering ring modulation.
• WARP RANGE – Sets how much influence the light sensor has over the pedal’s internal clock.
• WARP SENSOR – A built-in light sensor that alters the clock rate of all effects. More light = faster speed. Less light = slowed, stretched effects.

Inputs / Outputs

• MONO – Use either Input (R or L) and the matching Output.
• MONO TO STEREO – Use Input (R) and both outputs to create a stereo spread from a mono input.
• STEREO – Plug in and out of both sides for full stereo separation.

Tech Specs

• DIMENSIONS – 4.95″ x 3.95″ x 2.6″ (including hardware)
• WEIGHT – 13 oz
• POWER – Standard 9V DC (2.1mm center-negative). Optimized for use with Death By Audio’s RAW POWER supply.
• CURRENT DRAW – 95 mA
• LIFETIME WARRANTY
• USA RETAIL PRICE – $299

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