Fuzz face and buffered pedals

[Theobalt]

Hi!

I just got a second hand fuzz face mini (the blue one) at a nice price and I am exploring the possibilities.

Everything was working fine, until I plugged my EHX Hot Wax before the fuzz face. Then everything is super loud, even with the Hot Wax off. The hot wax is about my only buffered pedal, all the others are true bypass, so I guess the buffer is the problem there. If the hot wax is after the fuzz face, everything is fine. Anyone had that kind of issue with the fuzz face? Is it normal?

Also, the fuzz face does not go well with the Tc Electronic Spark boost (the mini version). The sound becomes badly distorted and kind of cuts randomly. Totally useless combination, unless heavily annoying people is the objective. Again, anyone got that kind of issue? I should add that with the EHX LPB-1 boost, everything works fine. I can turn down a bit the fuzz pot in order to get a nice overdrive, and kick the boost on for full blown fuzz mayhem.

Otherwise, I think the fuzz face performs better with single coils on my blackstar on the clean channel with the american (fenderish) voicing. Which is surprising since my Big Muffs are all fizz with that voicing and sounds really nice with the more Marshallish voicing. So based on my experience so far, single coils and fenderish amp =ญญ> fuzz face, humbuckers and marshallish amp => big muff. Your opinion?

[PFDarkside]

The Fuzz Face has been notorious for this for 55 years. The basic rule of thumb for easy use is to put it first. If not first, then only true bypass in front of it. A major caveat is that if you LIKE the way it sound makes with a buffer before it, then by all means do it. Eric Johnson has had his setup with a TS before it. I use a UniVibe type pedal before my fuzz and a wah before my fuzz, but both are true bypass and the wah has a fuzz friendly buffer in it to avoid both the loss of wah and the squealing that can happen when combining them.

Regarding pushing it with another pedal, there is so much bass in the the Fuzz Face circuit that pushing extra full frequency level or extra bass into it causes that sputtering/clipping of the signal. If you limit the bass you push into it, you might have better luck.

As far as what amp to use, that’s up to artistic taste right? You can get great tone into all kinds of different amps. I usually find having the amp “breathing” and not crystal clear works better for me, but fuzz into a clean amp is definitely a tone.

Good luck on you fuzz journey.

[jeremy]

like darkside said, its normal. the ff has a very low input impedance which is a cause of a bunch of issues. i always have mine first inline. ive also found that they dont play nice with some overdrives after the ff, or at least some work much better than others. i use a catalinbread dls and its a fantastic pairing. the rest is preference, some love it with buckers, some with singles, some into a clean amp, some dirty, some fendery, some marshally... do whatever works for you but it may take a little experimenting. i found it was worth it for me, i love what a good ff brings to the sonic table.

[Francois]

Yes Normal. FF first. Also a maxed FF will go into a rather clean amp not into a hi-gain channel.

You are right it sounds better with single coils. The way to go is controling the level of fuzz with your guitar volume knob and your pick attack.

[Theobalt]

Regarding pushing it with another pedal, there is so much bass in the the Fuzz Face circuit that pushing extra full frequency level or extra bass into it causes that sputtering/clipping of the signal. If you limit the bass you push into it, you might have better luck.

Then it makes sense that the Spark and the fuzz face do not get along very well, since the Spark boosts a very large frequency spectrum. On the other hand, the LPB-1 is more mid-focused compared to the Spark, hence it does not introduce too much bass or else into the fuzz face.

But as Francois said, I should rather use the volume knob instead of a boost pedal to control the level of fuzz. Up to these days, that knob could have been replaced by a on/off switch that it wouldn't have changed anything... I am kind of discovering it... after 25 years... (!!!)