pedals that are as sensetive as a good fuzz face

[Chickenwings]

So all you fuzz aficionados know how much variation of tone you can get out of a well tuned fuzz face just by using your guitar controls.
They can go from warm and clean to all out sonic obliteration just by flicking your volume knob.

List any pedals you know that are comparably sensitive....
even better if you know any amps that can do it too!

 

[the guy who invented fire]

Re: pedals that are as sensetive as a good fuzz face

Blackstone MOSFET OD is close as is the ZVex Box of Rock

 

[Chickenwings]

Re: pedals that are as sensetive as a good fuzz face

i had a box or rock. it was pretty good but it never made that big leap in gain you can get when you flick your guitar volume from 8 to 9 or 10 the way a fuzzface can.

What i would really love is an amp that can get me a similarly wide variation of tones like i can get with a fuzzface.
Brian May seems to love just using his vox ac30s, and that dude Phil X seems to really dig his evil robot things. Both of these guys just crank their amps wide open and get all they need from their guitars (brain uses a treble booster but you get the idea).
Im thinking about building a bluesbreaker clone (amp) and using low efficiency speakers like greenbacks. Do you reckon this will give me a pretty wide range of tonal/dirt variations as a base? I'm happy to step on a pedal for leads, but for 90% of what i do its creating different textures and dynamics for rhythm work and nuance and sensitivity are number one priority for me.

 

[the guy who invented fire]

Re: pedals that are as sensetive as a good fuzz face

One thing to note...both Brian and Phil DO use boosters of some kind.

If you have a nice amp that will do clean and crunch and a nice dynamic boost pedal of some kind you can cover a LOT of ground.

A JTM-45 is a nice dynamic amp with a big pallet of both clean and crunch tones but it's a loud amp.

 

[Chickenwings]

Re: pedals that are as sensetive as a good fuzz face

yeh its a loud amp, but so is my NMV twin reverb .
What ive found over the years is that volume is mostly a combination of speaker efficiency and what frequencies you are pushing.
I have the treble rolled down to 4 and my speakers are texas heats - darker/smoother and not very efficient.
Its actually quite manageable at gig levels and ive been happy when ive been asked twice recently to "turn it up" by sound engineers (means im doing something right!) but i do need to use pedals for a crunchy sound (i either use an overdrive or a fuzz) cos the old beast doesn't start to get crunchy at gig levels.
im thinking perhaps the 30 watts of a bluesbreaker using mallory caps combined with forgiving speakers (maybe even texas heats) and perhaps a master volume circuit, id be getting pretty close to what i need. Voxes i know are responsive, but i like the extra bottom end you can get from bigger bottles than el84s.
Speaking of boosts, i know you are the guy to ask....how about one of those beano boosts? I like the idea of low and mid boosts.

 

[the guy who invented fire]

Re: pedals that are as sensetive as a good fuzz face

yeh its a loud amp, but so is my NMV twin reverb .
What ive found over the years is that volume is mostly a combination of speaker efficiency and what frequencies you are pushing.
I have the treble rolled down to 4 and my speakers are texas heats - darker/smoother and not very efficient.
Its actually quite manageable at gig levels and ive been happy when ive been asked twice recently to "turn it up" by sound engineers (means im doing something right!) but i do need to use pedals for a crunchy sound (i either use an overdrive or a fuzz) cos the old beast doesn't start to get crunchy at gig levels.
im thinking perhaps the 30 watts of a bluesbreaker using mallory caps combined with forgiving speakers (maybe even texas heats) and perhaps a master volume circuit, id be getting pretty close to what i need.

Maybe...

You will be surprised by how loud a JTM-45/Bluesbreaker really is.

Best way to get any amp to not be as loud is with speaker choice but Texas Heats are pretty loud are they not?? 100db or so??

I used to gig with a Twin Reverb, for almost 10 years in fact and there were only 3 amps that ever gave me a run for my money volume wise. A JTM-45, an AC-30 and a Matchless Clubman...

 

[Agileguy_101]

Re: pedals that are as sensetive as a good fuzz face

I recently picked up a Trombetta Bone Machine and I can say with certainty that it cleans up even better than my Sunface. You can have the gain full up on Ge mode or close to it on the Si side (maybe full up on the Si side even, I can't remember off the top of my head) and pull it all the way down to actual clean/edge of breakup tones, very much unlike the fuzz face which always has a decent amount of fuzz on the signal. And besides the incredible versatility of the pedal (four knobs and four switches in a just-barely-bigger-than-a-phase-90 enclosure) it can do overdrive, boost, and treble boost tones. It's an incredible box. I even talked to Paul himself - he lives 30 minutes away from me - for a few hours and I got to see his whole shop. They're expensive, but trust me, it's absolutely worth it. There's not a bad tone in this box, and we haven't even gotten into the trumpet/trombone tones.

 

[jon the art guy]

Re: pedals that are as sensetive as a good fuzz face

Here's a pedal I recently built and somehow messed up, but kept the nice IC from it.

It's a "OD", but listen to it; it's pretty dang fuzzy for a dirt pedal.

it's got that unhinged quality a Fuzz Face has while not being into Burns Buzzaround/Maestro area, and also has some balls to it while not being a BMP or clone.

 

[Chickenwings]

Re: pedals that are as sensetive as a good fuzz face

I recently picked up a Trombetta Bone Machine and I can say with certainty that it cleans up even better than my Sunface.

ill check it out thanks!

Texas Heats are pretty loud are they not?? 100db or so??

no not really. perhaps eminence measure their db's a little more liberally than celestion.
Ive had texans in my twin for a few years now and they reined its volume and brightness in quite a lot which has been a great thing for me (and for most sound engineers).
Recently tho, i picked up another one cheap, so i stuck it in my princeton. The volume on that has since dropped quite appreciably, like i run my master volume at least two knotches up from where i used to. I really like the thick tone, but im feeling that the 22watt amp pushing a 150w speaker is not what its really built for. Much prefer the cannabis rex cos it gives you a lot more of your moneys worth from a 22 watt amp.


I might try 50s wiring on my axe too...if i can bothered gutting the 335 again!

 

[Funkfingers]

Re: pedals that are as sensetive as a good fuzz face

The Catalinbread RAH responds very well to guitar volume control adjustments. Of course, this was always the design brief for the pedal.

 

[chewpac]

Re: pedals that are as sensetive as a good fuzz face

a good treble booster will do that, too. i use an arc effects gamut, and it's a sweet sweet pedal.

 

[Chickenwings]

Re: pedals that are as sensetive as a good fuzz face

yes. ive been wanting to try a treble booster since i watched the brian may star licks video when i was 15......
that was in 1985! lol.
Maybe its time

 

[Securb]

Re: pedals that are as sensetive as a good fuzz face

The MOOG DRIVE is very dynamic and has a huge range of tone. I like the fact that it has two different gain settings.

 

[Securb]

Re: pedals that are as sensetive as a good fuzz face

yes. ive been wanting to try a treble booster since i watched the brian may star licks video when i was 15......
that was in 1985! lol.
Maybe its time

Once I put my treble booster on my board it never came off. I get a pretty good Brian May tone with my BBE FREQ. They are discontinued but you can find them on Ebay for under $50. Very quiet (a must for me) and they start to add some cool overdrive at around 11 o'clock. I recommend this pedal so strongly that if you buy one under $50 and don't like it PM me and I will take it off your hands to have a back up.

 

[SirJackdeFuzz]

Re: pedals that are as sensetive as a good fuzz face

One thing to note...both Brian and Phil DO use boosters of some kind.

If you have a nice amp that will do clean and crunch and a nice dynamic boost pedal of some kind you can cover a LOT of ground.

A JTM-45 is a nice dynamic amp with a big pallet of both clean and crunch tones but it's a loud amp.

Probably stating the obvious here, but i'm gonna say it anyways.

Phil X loves his $40.00 Bad Monkey.





I would love to one day test/try a US made Evil Robot.
I really think that amp would be 'perfect' for my playing style.

 

[Gearjoneser]

Re: pedals that are as sensetive as a good fuzz face

I've gotten some 'amp ready to explode' tones out of the T Rex Mudhoney.

The interesting pedal I'm digging into right now isn't actually a dirt pedal. It's the Xotic Custom Shop Robotalk RI. Instant classic that a lot of people will never know about.

 

[Chickenwings]

Re: pedals that are as sensetive as a good fuzz face

that thing is way off the mark of what i was after, but wow! what a rad pedal!
itd be fun to chain it up with this bad boy: