My take on the JRockett 45. It's a Malcolm Young tribute. Now I just have to learn to play like him.

My birthday came and went, with two new pedals for my board. The expression pedal is the EP-25k, for use with the Pitch Fork and the tremolo. But alas I only have the one TRS cable for now, so I've only tried it with the Pitchfork. Really fun, and pleasantly different than using a vibrato arm on the guitar.

The EQ I haven't hooked up yet. I need to flip the board and look at my power situation as I don't have any slots left on the C-spot. The main intent for that pedal in the near-term is for when I switch from humbuckers to single coils. Presently plugging in my Strat is just really underwhelming as everything is set more for my PRS 24-08 and Epi 335. A longer-term interest with the EQ pedal is for splitting my chain for wet/dry between the Prince of Tone and the Micro Flanger.

This was a limited release a few years ago. Glad it’s getting a wider release with new features.

Does anyone here own one? I have questions! Kind of lusting for one, but, I need to know a little more about the functionality of selecting and combining patches (and people on youtube seem to only go through the sounds). Thanks!

Ok, I've cracked. I have a nice pedal board and I can get some nice sounds from it. But I'm selling almost all of it and moving to Helix. Keeping a rams head muff and blues driver. But the expandability, versatility, simplicity of setup and no need to worry about patch cables, power supplies etc..

Am I going to regret it?

Big Cheese by Lovetone clone. I added a blend knob so it'll be a little more bass friendly. Waterside decal. And a uv led.

Looks like ALM is getting in on the guitar pedal game. They're a Eurorack module manufacturer that makes some of the best modules on the market. This is a pedal version of their effects module.

Not surprised about the Strymon presence, he has a lot of nice layers and texture from the middle of his career. I've never heard a bad review of the Duelist, but seeing it on Ian's board certainly bumps it up a notch in my book. He was playing through a Holy Watt amp head/cab, which I'd never heard of. I assumed the Holy Watt pedal was like a channel switcher. But looking at their site, not only is it a standalone drive pedal, Ian has a signature line with them!

https://holywatt.com/products/ian-moore-signature-prestige-cl15/ https://holywatt.com/products/ian-moore-signature-prestige-cl30/ https://holywatt.com/products/ian-moore-signature-2x12-cab/

He mostly played through his Tele-Strat (Tele neck on a Strat body). He had two that he swapped between every song (guessing they had to be re-tuned after every song). But he also played a Les Paul Junior for one song (Today, very emotional tribute to his late brother-in-law), and a Supro, maybe a Rhythm Master, for a slide track (Nothing).

Finally got to try etching. The pattern is the pcb layout of a classic Pi. Bonus point to anyone that can name the typeface, or at least where it came from. Man, I love these big Boss style knobs. I got a 10 pack and I'm almost out already. Next diy project is a Lovepedal Cheese clone with a dry blend add on.

I know in my last post I said I was going to do an etching on a Big Muff next, but I didn't have the right photo paper. So I tried doing a print on water slide for my GGG Brassmaster. I can say this is my second favorite fuzz but the build is not for the faint of heart.

New version of this pedal that includes the presets knob from Aurelius/Ledges and EXP control.

I have the V2 version of this pedal and EXP control is a huge plus as it let's you use it like a regular wah. Or you can assign it to one of the other knobs. Looks like they changed how the filter knob functions (or at least labeled it).

I mostly use my V2 on Bass and it's pretty good for the funk but it can scream if you use it on distorted guitar.

Just bought one a couple of weeks back and have been using it since then. The tone seems to do nothing as far as I can tell. A few people have said this is a Klon clone, and it does have that sound at higher gain settings. To my ears its like a wider TS pedal if you put it after a hard clipper (think HM-2/Metal Zone) as it still gets that cocked-wah sound.

I put some sound examples up here if you want to hear them. Its not much, as the pedal doesn't do that much to be honest, so there are 3 sounds I put through a Helix (iirc a v30 speaker/Fender Princeton model). I found it worked ok into a Karma Suture fuzz, too, sort of made it glassier and oddly gruntier... the volume knob just barely reached past unity on my unit, so possibly thats why it reacted that way.

I might open it up at some point and mod it. Another oddity is how it has 3 different potentiometers - all different heights. So the knobs all sit at different levels. Changing those out and sorting the tone control would be relatively simple.

Keeley has dropped 3 new pedals following on the Noble Screamer design, allowing you to mix and match the gain and tone stacks from two other pedals, all at $199.

• Blues Disorder: Bluesbreaker and OCD
• Super Rodent: Rat and SD-1
• Angry Driver: DS-1 and Muff

Andy's Reverb Tone Report video here.

Hopefully this is cool to share.

Bought this week for a silly price (apparently nobody gets/understands this pedal according to the retailer). Its a clone of the Big Cheese by Lovetone - an amazing company from the 1990s. The Cheese Ball is just as versatile. A damn sight smaller.

All sounds are a Fender Strat into a Helix (used as simply a pedal platform, but two sounds had an octave effect, minimal amp drive to add "compression"). The guitars are then lightly compressed in Ableton, a bit of subtle EQ on panned guitars to make them sit.

I've got a Shredmaster and ZZTop style pedal to try still, but have been enjoying this too much. 😊 Any questions, let me know and I'll try and answer.

I REALLY fancy building a Maestro Fuzz clone based on the original. Point to point wiring etc.. I've got a soldering iron sitting there doing nothing and some spare time during week days due to my job.

Does anyone know where people get housings, resistors, capacitors etc etc in the UK? Amazon seems to sell a load but I dont want 100x some value part that I wont ever use.

Also where do others find the right schematics?

Looks like they're letting OG Condor owners send in their pedals to get upgraded to this new version. Kind of neat.

This is an incredibly versatile pedal. I got a JHS Pack Rat and after a few hours, I went back to my HM-2 for my default distortion.

Fender has launched the Switchboard Effects Operator loop switcher.

> Unleash the full potential of your pedal board! The Switchboard Effects Operator is a streamlined and compact effects switching solution with a remarkably simple interface, bringing complete signal path control, multi-pedal preset recall, and convenient effects switching right to your feet.

This is an interesting open hardware and software project for creating a multi fx pedal. The cool thing is that it's fully customizable, new plugins can be created or added from other members of the community, or buttons can be remapped etc.

The guy that made this video has developed some plugins to run some neural network models that imitate real gear (similar to NAM), although due to the limitations of the processing power of the chip they are simplified so they are less cpu intensive. Nonetheless it's a cool project!

Some interesting pedals that didn't receive a lot of attention in the last year. I'm only about 35 minutes in, but the Josh Smith Flat V from Poly looks pretty fun to mess around with.

Alright y'all. As 2023 comes to a close, lets share how our boards have changed, and maybe plans for 2024

How it started:

!A collection of guitar pedals: TC Polytune 3, Vox wah, EHX PitchFork, EHX Soul Food, Boss SD-1, Boss DS-1, Danelectro Cool Cat, Danelectro Dan-echo, MXR Tremolo, Boss RC-5

TC Polytune 3, Vox wah, EHX PitchFork, EHX Soul Food, Boss SD-1, Boss DS-1, Danelectro Cool Cat, Danelectro Dan-echo, MXR Tremolo, Boss RC-5

How it's going:

!A colleciton of guitar pedals: TC Polytune 3, EHX Pitchfork, DOD Carcosa, EHX Soul Food, Analogman Prince of Tone, MXR Micro Flanger, MXR Phase 95, Danelectro Cool Cat, MXR Tremolo, Strymon El Capistan, Boss RC-5

TC Polytune 3, EHX Pitchfork, DOD Carcosa, EHX Soul Food, Analogman Prince of Tone, MXR Micro Flanger, MXR Phase 95, Danelectro Cool Cat, MXR Tremolo, Strymon El Capistan, Boss RC-5

In 2024 I may replace the Cool Cat with another chorus, and put together one or two other boards from my spare pedals: Danelectro Dan-echo and Fab Tone, Boss BD-2, SD-1, and DS-1, TC Ditto).

Fun and interesting exploration of what made the Klon unique, inspired by the JHS Notaklön, by deconstructing it.

Really bizarre pedal that I picked up while on my vacation in Colorado. Vibrato, tremolo, and phaser all in one (I think)! It can generate some cool sounds, especially when the controls are dimed.

So far, I like it best as a subtle trem with some added phase and vibrato for coloring cleans. Not sure if it’ll stay on the board but its fun for now.

I picked this up because I was a big fan of DOD/Digitech when I started playing in high school. My first pedal ever was the Digitech Death Metal pedal and then I got a DOD grunge shortly after (both played through my Fender frontman 😎). Now I play very different styles so I’m hoping I can incorporate this weirdness into my playing.

This is a multi-head delay circuit from PedalPCB.com similar to the Boonar, Echorec, and Volante. It sounds amazing. I used to have a Catalinbread Echorec that I sold and have regretted it ever since. This is filling that hole in my heart.

I've been trying to build this pedal for a while now but the parts were out of stock till a few months ago. It was kind of a difficult build as everything is tucked in there pretty tight and there's a lot of enclosure holes to line up.

The black faceplate is something you can buy from Pedal PCB and it makes it look really good. Extremely happy with how this turned out.

Purchased this on Black Friday as a distortion for my bass.

Idiotbox says this was designed to mimic the bass tones of Voivod's bassist and I don't think it's based on any existing circuit. Personally, I've never listened to them but this thing sounds pretty good. It has a TON of low end I have the Low set to 11 and it's already thumping pretty hard.

Yes, the eyes light up when it's on.

Figure this might be useful to some folks looking to score deals. I'm not associated with any brands. Link your favorite local/small shops to support small businesses!

I'll be updating this as I find more.

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Brands

EQD - 20% off till Dec 1st (excludes the new Zoar). Most retailers are honoring this.

BOSS - Seems like the HM-2w and DS-1w are on sale at a lot of vendors.

Jupiter FX - Sales on all their pedals.

Black Mass Electronics - 10% off till Nov 28th

Spaceman Effects - 15% off sitewide.

Alexander Pedals - 15% off. Free shipping over $299.

Jackson Audio - 20% off.

JAM Pedals - 20% off.

Friedman - 15% off all pedals

Gamechanger Audio - 20% off Bigsby and plus pedal.

Diamond Pedals - 20% off and free shipping over $150

Wampler - 15% off till Dec 6th.

Past FX - Various discounts and free international shipping.

Old Blood Noise - 15% off till Nov 29tb

Walrus Audio - 20% most pedals. 40% off limited and B stock

Chase Bliss - 15% off everything except the brand new Lossy

Vaderin - Sales on various pedals. Free shipping when purchasing 2+ pedals.

Mr Black - 25% off all pedals. 10% off entire order if you buy the new Double Tracker.

Drybell - 15% off + free shipping

Beetronics - 20% various pedals

Catalinbread - 20% off till Nov 28th. BOGO on the CB series.

IDIOTBOX EFFECTS - 30% off everything Nov 16-23rd. 15% off Nov 24-Dec 1.

Two Notes - Sales on Hardware till Dec 6th.

Solid Gold FX - 20% off till Nov 29th

Red Panda - 15% off till Dec 4th

JHS - 25% off till Dec 6th. Excludes the NOTAKLON.

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Shops

Perfect Circuit - Various sales

Chuck Levins - Various sales.

EDIT: Looks like EHX made the video private.

Context: This song seems to be about an event where he got beat up by Union picketers (that may have had Mob connections) in '81 but everything about this video is fucking gross. The way it’s edited to make the Union look like antagonists, the use of the word “thugs” (dog whistle much?) in the description, the fucking title…

There’s so many better ways to criticize corrupt unions or write music about an event that affected you personally. Putting this out on EHX’s channel ensures I’m never buying their pedals again.

Boss being Boss with the new RV-200 pedal.

Love him or hate him, JHS knows how to market.

This may have been out for a while but I just noticed it yesterday.

It's a pre-amp/boost pedal modeled after the preamps from the original Space Echo and CE-1. I know when it released some people were upset the CE-2w didn't have the CE-1 preamp built in so this is kind of nice.

Sounds decent but I'm not sure $170 USD is worth it. I think I'd rather see a CE-1 reissue ala the DM-101 or RE-202 with the preamp built in.

Put the finishing touches on two pedal clones I built over the last few weeks.

Left is a clone of the EAE Model FET. Which itself is based on a Sunn Model T. This one didn’t turn out as well as I hoped. Probably used some bad components or it’s not biased right. I can make it sound good but only on specific settings. Otherwise there’s sputter/static on the low strings.

The HM-2 clone on the other hand turned out great. It’s a little bass heavy with everything at 10 so I’ve been turning the bass down a little. I figured since you kind of do one thing with an HM-2 it would be silly for me to buy the HM-2w.

I have one more pedal I’m finishing that I’m really excited about that I’ll hopefully share later this week.

It’s an all transistor based distortion with a 3 band EQ and the ability to run at 18v. The EQ bands affect each other and the Weight knob determines how much low end passes through.

> The original TC 2290 Dynamic Digital Delay set new standards when introduced in the 80s, and while often mounted in studio racks, it was also to be found in countless guitar rigs.

> A key component of many guitar sounds is a string of tasteful delay, which is just one of the things 2290 P provides. It is a time-based effect generator that - apart from delay - also offers chorus, flanger, tremolo, vibrato, phaser, panning, ducking and compression.

> And that is the essence of 2290 P: it is a faithful recreation of the original 2290, equally suited for adding delay to lead guitar tones and rhythmic patterns that can be used to build up powerful and inspirational walls of guitarscapes with or without additional modulation. In other words, 2290 P allows you to really dive in and carefully program it to meet all of your sonic ideas.

> It simply evokes a distinct classic vibe from the past in a contemporary setting.

TC Electronic posted a deep dive video on their YouTube channel.

First hear about it on Guitar Geek The Week in Gear 22. At $70 with both Amplitube and ToneX desktop and mobile included, it's really tempting. I don't have any iOS devices though, so the Mustang Micro still wins for portability in my case.

Saw this over on Mastodon (original post), had to share. What are some other good pedal puns?

It's not the most exciting pedal in that it's just a clever switch, but I do like the possibilities it gives.

It has two switchable loops. In one loop I have my Diezel VH4-2 working as a preamp and in the other I have my Peavey Classic's pre amp. This allows me to switch between which preamp I want to use whilst also keeping my delay and modulation effects in the FX loop - post preamp.

Guitar goes in to the input. Red loop sends to the VH4 and returns from the VH4 preamp output. Green loop sends to the front of the amp and returns from the FX loop send. That's the two preamp loops. The left switch toggles between each loop and the right switch bypasses both loops, which in my case means I have no preamp as the signal goes straight to the FX return via the delays - so I'll keep the right switch always on.

Then the output of the pedal goes to the modulation and delay pedals and then to the amp's FX return.