OVERDRIVE- CKK ELECTRONICS Lunar Drive ....a Dumble ?

$100.00 USD

 CKK ELECTRONICS 

LUNAR DRIVE 

It is a medium gain OD with Dumble intention's

All CKK dirt boxes seem to have the same EQ and lightning attack and this is no exception.

It has 3 voices to choose from symmetrical, asymmetrical and Silicon. Each one is usable and they go from raspy to smooth.

The over all tone is rich and full. I do not know if any of the die hard Dumble guys would like it. All the OD's that I have tried are usually ridiculously tame. This to me has a bit of punch.

CONCLUSION___

Like all CKK you get a lot of bang for your buck.

OVERDRIVE-how many OD's does it take to find the perfect one???

OVERDRIVE
The perfect OD will change over time with your tastes and ambitions.
There is always a endless stream of the 'new' ...and once a year or so something.
special comes along ...2 years ago it was the Friedman OD-BE.

I have been posting on this Blog for 2 years. No matter what pedals I put on it if it is an OD that gets the silly numbers of hits. Sooooo.... I try to find as many as I can ...but I do not want to waste your time with OD's that are crap ...or stupidly over priced when there is one that has the same or better sound for less.
I have great hopes for 2018 and beyond. We will see some stuff that better copy's the 'tube experience'.
Both with real tubes, with better digital and with analog circuits that give you more then just a good over all sound.

The best new OD is subjective.
For me it is the....

CUSTOM TONES ETHOS TWS-1 ...Best OD of 2017!!!

...read the POST
This pedal is a serious ground breaker. It does not try to be so by adding crap we do not want or need. It does this by making an OD that not only has a great tube amp tone. It actually has a circuit that follows what happens to a signal going thru the same path that it would in a tube amp. Things that happen by your own physical touch and expression with your pick or hand. Not only things you hear but things you can feel by the response coming back from the speaker.

I am so impressed I sold my Friedman BE-OD!!! to get some money. I ordered it today (Dec.31/17)

Finding the perfect OD is a process of trial and error. I often see a guys board with an OD that is a bit old and or a rather lame knock of a Tube Screamer or Boss DS-1 Distortion. It works for that guy
but will not work for you?

NOISE GATE: FORTIN Zuul ...made especially for Metal & the results are dramatic!!!

$225.00 USD

FORTIN ZUUL NOISE GATE

This a unique product. Not designed to be a normal gate that fades and trails off the guitar signal to sound normal. It is a 'hard' gate that chops off the sound dead. Just a simple one knob operation.

It can be used as a 'smart gate.'
With a normal smart gate the pedal has normal in and out plus another in and out to put the noisy pedal or pedals in a loop. This pedal has an in jack but not an out? The vid will show you how this works but for the price of this pedal it should have that second jack.



















WHOA!!!
Check out the Boss Noise Suppressor $100.00 USD. I even saw one used for $36.00 USD
I recommend the TC Electronic for everyone! BUT for Metal the Boss is probably a better choice!

COMPRESSOR- CKK Gears Comp....Ross style Comp..unbelievable!!!!

  CKK GEARS COMPRESSOR  

$100.00 USD

Everyone makes a compressor. The hot one's are from Wampler,
Keeley and Xotic.
All are based on the MXR Dyna Comp. The first other maker to 'borrow' the blueprint ...Ross ...got out the bugs. So to this day most
guitar compresses are a modernized Ross.
Modern standard improvements are a mix control to blend a bit of dry signal in with the compressed signal to add the attack of the notes back in to the sound. The Comp ratio is usually 4:1 some comps may give you more choice. Even so nearly all players will choose 4:1.
Compressors are notorious for creating  an annoying near percussive pop to the attack. Better comps minimize it. Loss of some is highs is normal.
So how does this one stack up.
If anything it does this better then the popular brands. It is even better then some of the premiere  brands. You would have to spend 3 to 5 times more to find one that you may prefer...even then the difference would be subjective.
All of the Comps impart a 'tone' to the sound. The Gears has a very nice rich sound. It is as full as the Wampler but as clean and crisp as the Keeley's.
The white finish and tasteful graphics gives it a look as upmarket as it's sound.

At $100.00 USD it is a no brainer? Why buy anything else?

OVERDRIVE- SORCE AUDIO L. A. Lady OD ...a new spin on the obvious.

$150.00 USD

 SOURCE AUDIO L.A. LADY OVERDRIVE 

Source Audio have been around for a long time making
digital pedals in funny looking boxes. :-) This pedal is in the
recent trend to give you very high definition sound in a digital
OD with a reasonable price and with a mainstream sound.
There latest product for them is much more mainstream. This first effort gives you a Classic Brit sound with Classic, Crunch and smooth settings.
It only gets scary when you link it to a  computer and find you can create drastic changes in the EQ and download more voices. The unit holds 2 sounds that can be switch to or run together or one each out the the twin outputs.
It is similar to Hotones XTOMP pedal. The main difference is that it comes out of the box just set up to use as your typical Brit sound. If the digital programming thing leaves you cold you can just ignore it.
A few more players are getting into using 2 amps for stereo so they have designed the pedal to hold 2 different OD's so you can have perhaps a Brit sound thru one and a Fender type sound thru the other.
It is great pedal to try out sounds that you may not normally be interested in . Perhaps you are a blues guy but having a day here and there to mess with a Metal pedal can be fun. It is but a download away and you  can always put back the factory sounds. It certainly gives room to grow with it. Even if you are locked in one genre there are many player in that genre that go for something different then you use so being able try new sounds without buying a new pedal is a big bonus.

The down side for me is I have heard other pedals like this that seem to clone another pedal dead on ...but if compared the difference is in the dynamics.You hit a note or chord with the real deal and it just jumps out of the speaker. The digital box just lies there. In short the analog has punch. This would not be present on a recording ...but it is inspiring to feel that energy!!!

The price is silly cheap for what you get. It was selling for 
$200.00 USD give or take and was cheap at that price. A lot of player I expect will give it a shot at this price of $150.00 USD.

OVERDRIVE- MOSKY NEW HAND MADE...a heads up

 MOSKY AUDIO 
                                                                                                                                                  

Mosky have been around for a few years. They are a Chinese company that make clones.
They were often sold along side Mogoo pedals.
Keep that in mine.
Some are quite good while others are lame. A few were so good (on the outside case as well as in) I think they had a few "cease and desist' problems LOL.
It would explain how some disappeared for months at a time and in one situation returned about a year later.

So ...at any rate they are now offering 3 hand made OD's. The initial prices seem to be in the $125.00 USD  ...but I saw their Brown Sound model on for $50.00 USD on AliExpress.

The TW is a Wampler Triple Wreck 

The Ultimate drive is an OCD
No one will buy if they ask $125.00 hand made or not ...because the original sells for that. LOL

The Brown Distortion is a Wampler Pinnacle


This stuff is so new the paint is wet. So far they have only just seeped into the Chinese market.
There are no video's as yet ...anywhere???

For a long time I have noticed some sort of tie in with Mogoo Pedals....they made handmade copies of these same pedals some they did as replica forgeries. I have a fake Maxon graphic EQ. All the pedals on this page were once offered with different graphics and were Mogoo knock offs.
Thanks to viewer correcting which pedals were cloned by which originals my memory was sparked and I remember that Mogoo could be tied into this new little scam.

Oddly if I am right. Mogoo is in an odd way going straight. 

Pedal circuits can not be patented.
This has been true for decades. The problem is that one can put 3 or 4 electric parts in a row ...the same row of parts opens a garage door. Is the door maker infringing on the guy making a pedal???

You can steal the shape of a Strat... but you can not copy the headstock because the headstock is a Fender trademark. yes folks the laws are tricky.

Sometimes it appears brands are breaking the rules but getting away with it .....there are makes of guitars with the Fender headstock. SURPRISE...Fender owns the company but keeps it's mouth shut    ....Why?
Bob loves the look of a Tele...he hates Fender because of Blah ...Blah ...Blah so he buys an XYZ that looks very Tele like. He's happy ....but Fender did not loose a sale.

How do these guys get away with the blatant stuff!!!
 EASY...the real reason is that the evidence shows up is the small online stores selling this stuff. Some are Moms and Pops stores miles away in the middle 'no where' China. Mogoo wishes they would just go away. It does not need then.

Magoo could survive by just selling to one or two citys.
Seriously. For example have you ever heard of a cities like Chong Quing???
"No' you say."
Population 36,000.000 ...that's the same as the population of Canada.
...with 3 billion people... pedal makers only need a small region to sell to and survive..
and there are lots of NO NAME citys.

PEDAL AMPLIFIER- BARONI LABS Mini Amp 50

 BARONI LABS MINI AMP 50 

Straight off this pedal makes sense. A pedal amp is all about
portability. You do not need an amp that has less power then 40 usable watts to be portable because it is not guaranteed to be more then a practice amp. Why pay a premium for a pedal practice amp when there are so many small conventional amps much cheaper.

Yes this is certainly a pro amp. It is made by a pedal company who has paid more then a little attention to how well it takes pedals. Baroni make tube amps and pedals which gives me some confidence in them getting the voicing of the amp to an acceptable quality.
It has so many uses. Your main amp, a back up amp or a
second amp to do the stereo wet dry thing with your pedals.
The price is easily competitive with a 40 watt head.

OVERDRIVE- BONDI 'Sick As' ...is it yet another 'me to' Dumble pedal?

 BONDI EFFECTS 'SICK AS' OVERDRIVE 

Bondi have been hand making their OD's
for a long time. I have heard a few. They are all a variation of the Timmy type of effect.very popular with the Fusion type player all looking for the elusive Dumble like mellow smooth sound.
 I even bought a few. I hated all of them.
They usual had a lot of artifacts and nasty fizz or halo of course harmonics that seem to drop in and out randomly. These would only go away if you pushed up the gain. with the gain up the word bland and colourless comes to mind.
The sick seems to deliver all that the other pedals promised. the distortion is complete smooth and even. It can be very light and airy. If you keep the gain down  nothing but  very rich smooth harmonics float through the highs.

The pedal has lots of gain though. You can push it into a near Marshall like tone. But even then the harmonics never get too nasty. The attack though has a lot more smack to it then the tones that most of it's followers would every dial up. On one video they compare it with the Ltd. ED. Gold.
The Gold is definitely more of a medium gain pedal and seems rough enough to be a different pedal ...with for that matter a different name.

COCLUSION

I am not impressed. It still seems half way there. I would rather use something like the

Gristle King on a light setting. It is more of a gentle giant then ballerina in blue jeans.

OVERDRIVE- CKK Destruction Drive....best METAL pedal of 2016 .... $100.USD

$100.00 USD

 CKK DESTRUCTION DRIVE 

This won several prizes for best high gain pedal in 2016.
It is CKK's Metal offering...and not a bad one at that.
CKK are a small Chinese company that was set up with the goal of making serious gourmet pedals. Not easy because
they knew price may not win out over the image of made in
China pedals.

It holds up well to 2017's choices from KHDK, Keeley and Wampler and is less then half the price.
The others mentioned are more versatile...which really means giving their pedals a wide range of options to do everything from traditional Metal to Modern Metal.
Who in the hell needs that?
We are talking modern Metal

A modern Metal amp has typically a lot more headroom in the amp ... this sacrifices compression but gives you a sledge hammer attack for keeping those quarter note rhythms which are part of the style powerful and crisp. The sustain is taken care of in such an amp with an extra tube to double the gain in the preamp. By focusing on this CKK give you a truly authentic modern Metal sound.
  

SO WHAT IS MODERN METAL ???

 Djent, Progressive Metal/ Mathcore and a few others we might agree on or not
I could list 26 genres of Metal  (seriously) 
I am sure someone out there could add another. lol

It is any Metal that favours        -cutting the bass below 200Hz 
                                               - boosting a little around 800Hz to tighten and clean it up
                                               -and a nice spike at 1.6 Khz to give it some attack from your pick
                                               -and any strings not being played are palm muted 

The Construction Drive has the standard volume and gain. The 3 way EQ is active with lots of nuance to tweak the near perfect tone.. There is also a mid switch to put a boost into either the upper mid or lower mids. This is all unusual for such a modest priced pedal. It quickly becomes apparent why it won so many awards. This would be a contender at any price.
This pedal has some serious balz. 

Just plug in ...dial up your sound and PLAY!!!
AND all for a hundred bucks!!!

        

                                                                                                                                                                  

HANDS ON

Jan. 22/18
Well mine arrived in the mail today.
I was surprised just what a rich tone it has when you back it off a bit.
The sustain is the best of any pedal I've ever played thru. That alone is amazing!
The thing I really love is it has nailed the 'Modern' Metal sound ...in fact so well it is justification to still keep my KHDK for classic Metal sounds.

As much as I love the classic sounds ... I refused to live my life in yesterday ...this pedal is fresh and exciting.  I love it!!! There is enough left over from my Prog days to slip those ideas into a Progressive Metal .
Within minutes of first playing it I rewrote the chorus of a song that I was using a fuzz on but was not completely happy with . It was pure magic what it does for my tune,
This is a keeper!
At the moment I know of no other pedal that has gone for a true straight on Modern Metal sound.
So if that is what you are looking for ...you have found it.
The killer is ....only a hundred bucks!!! How cool is that!!!

WHAT'S NEXT ...NEW GEAR IN 2018

 WHAT's NEXT.... with NEW GEAR ??? 


DIGITAL

In a month the NAMM show (much like the Detroit car show) will reveal their new products.
The thing I noticed in the last few years is a big improvement and lower costs in digital pedals.
This is because new and even better chips are available on the market. These are not cheap but for the high end you can expect a new level of quality.
 Maybe more important the last generation of chips that makers like Strymon
and others have made in to a much coveted product will drop in price and allow
mainstream priced products to move from the very passable to WOW!
So expect a very high quality in Digital Delays and reverb. The same for modulation pedals like Flangers, Chorus, Vibrato etc
I feel that digital OD's will still not even get anywhere near the very best analog ones.
YET!  :-)

BETTER OVERDRIVES

One thing that will start to happen will be more overdrives to start to address details in sound that tubes amps impart to the music that have never been seriously dealt with.
Supro, Custom Tones and Clemo Labs have made pedals that addresses how 'sag' which is caused by transformers in a tube amp not only respond to the sound but to the 'feel' and the positive response to the guy playing their guitar. Unfortunately this has not been dealt with at all by most makers.

OD pedals need to address the dynamic range issue. The lighter your touch with a tube the less distortion you get. The harder you hit the string the more a tube distorts. Some OD's do this anywhere from not at all ...to not bad. Compared to a good tube amp most pedals fail miserably.
The main reason I buy a great sounding and expensive OD pedal only to sell it after even a few weeks is because of this.

TUBES REPLACED BY TUBES & TUBE SUBSTITUTES
Vox has address the tube issue by making a faux tube the Nutube that at least visually appears to be part mechanical. Ibanez will soon have a new Tube Screamer with a NuTube.
NuTube was designed and built by Korg engineers. Korg owns Vox. Korg wisely decided to licence the use of the NuTube before others took it apart and found away to clone it (legally) and sell it to anyone.
I expect both solid state amp makers and many new dirt pedals manufacturers will be checking it out.

Bluguitar makes a 2 lb. amp with a Russian military tube that is the size of the cap on a ball point pen. It can substitute for the power amp tubes in a tube amp without the the need for the need of the massive and very heavy transformers that power them.


FAUX STACKS
Most of today's players are using small open back amplifiers.
The issue of having a circuit to address the sound made by a 'stack' has been given little or no thought.The size of an actual speaker and the tone created by a closed speaker boxes natural resonance is all but ignored. Again I point to Custom Tones. They allow you to turn on either a 2x12 or a 4x12 sealed back speaker box sound to give you that massive low end typical of a Marshall stack.
HOTONE XTOMP & XTOMP MINI  digital modeling pedals let you download speaker several cabs. This may be the best solution for pedals you already own.

I think we may see more pedals addressing these issues in 2018.


GUITARS

I expect the Chinese quality will notch up.
The very best of the Chinese stuff will enter the entry level Pro market.
There will be more makers who will follow the Chapman guitar's formula. They will give you a high end guitar for a mid range price.

IS THIS THE YEAR FOR...
A PRO NO EXCUSE GUITAR FOR $500.00 USD
The thing I have been looking for is a new maker who gives you a $1200.00 pro guitar for $500.00
The main reason no one does this is because most players buy on looks & features. So a thin veneer of great wood on the top with some binding, split coils on the PU's etc.
A serious guitar MUST have it's own body style. Nothing looked like Tele, Strat, LP etc. when they first came out. No matter how well a LP is by anyone but Gibson we all think 'fake' 'second rate' and if money was no object we get the real deal without giving these 'me too's' a second thought.
PU's are not tied to this feeling. Gibson puts the PAF in many gutars. Even Fender has a HB what's more it has the same shape and dimentions as a Gibson.
So a new guitar without it's own shape has a ZERO cool factor. But the PU has the biggest effect on our sound so we do not care who invented it.

 It will take someone new...
 who wants to establish a new Brand name without copying Fender, Gibson & Ibanez  body styles. 

It can be done ...if you let me digress and I can tell you how.

 Zero frills!!!
-NO binding or inlays.
-Bolt on maple neck of Hard Rock Maple.
-a plank body like a Tele (but with an original shape not a copy) in a Grade A quality tone wood.
 Alder for Fender tones. African Mahogany and Canadian Maple for Gibson sounds.
-Fender style hardtail bridge with quality metal (like a Wilkinson).
-Quality electrics ...but minimal. One volume & tone and a toggle switch.
-Quality pick ups ( Wilkinson PAF made in Korea or any Artec (also Korean) premium models.
 Artec make PU for Epiphone, Seymour Duncan & Fender. They use exactly the same materials and spec as Duncan even for their own PU's
- basic quality tuners (like Wilkinson)
-Polyester paint in a plain colour ...no metallic, pearl or other 2 or 3 stage processes. Polyester is 'cheap' looks great and wears better the more expensive paints. It has an overkill shine that tends to glare to much when looking at a great woodgrain.But on a plain colour it looks as good maybe even better.

A guitar like this could have a killer sound!!! It could easily blow away even some high end LP's or Fenders. Yes guitars that cost 5 times more! The worst case scenario to make one from playing great to dead perfect may require your local repair guy to do $100.00 in tweaks. No big deal since out of the box it should play as good as a U.S. Fender Pro.with the same problem.

Perhaps it could look something like this???
Ignore everything but the shape of the body of both the original Kay on the right and the modified 50's KAY guitar below.
To say this shape is like any present 'Hot' guitars is not justified. It would be like saying a GretschDuo Jet single cut looks like an LP.

The top horn is relatively modest but it balances the guitar so the guitar is not neck heavy. The lower cutaway allows you to get at the top notes of a 24 fret guitar with ease yet does not look radical in spite of that. The shape is distinct without doing the Explorer, V's or other out there thing.
What I love about it is it looks like it has been around forever
when in fact to most people it will be the first time they saw it.
It has a built in traditional look. This always up's the comfort level when choosing a guitar
The Tele came out in 1950  & the Strat in 1954 this body style looks like what Fender might have done if thy had brought out a guitar in 1952. Half Tele half Strat.

Just imagine a plain colour and maple neck like the Strat pic.
                                           

PICK UP CHOICES
FENDER STRAT & TELE
and GIBSON PAF & P90

Lollar Tele on HB mount

Lollar P90 on HB mount

By simply shortening and then widening the bobbin in a Fender Tele or Strat pickup or Gibson P90 they will fit onto a Gibson standard size pickup mount.
In this way giving the buyer a choice of classic bullet proof sounds without the maker modifying the guitar.

Duncan 2 Tele HB mount
making a single PU is a given

So for the same price you can have a LP  sound with a mahogany body with a maple top and real PAF pickups.
Or an alder body with Strat pickups.
Or an alder body with Tele bridge and a PAF neck
(unless you are a die hard classic Tele guy...you will not miss a Tele neck PU even Fender sells a Tele with a a Humbucker)




The final result is guitar that is not a waste of money to upgrade.  Over time one could change tuners, bridges, electronics or  pickups etc. The guts of the guitar...the woods and build are timeless. The guitar will age well...maybe even improve.
                                         
         

REVERB- DONNER Verb Square Reverb ..a cheap Pro pedal

$35.00 USD a reasonable price 

should/could be about $150.00 USD

 a true SBS ...STEAL!!!

 REVERB- DONNER Verb Square 

The short story is Donner has never made pedals. Their main supplier
has been Mooer who Re-Brand their own pedals by putting on a different
colour of paint and a differed logo and graphics. Mooer are currently doing this for 14 other companies. The Mooer product is generally entry level pro.
Having said this I tried to find who made it starting with Mooer ...ALL the other mini pedals have a Mooer equivalent.
Other brands always have something different . This looks Mooer as it uses the Mooer knob. ...the LED is in the right position and the input for the adapter is centered. There is a hole in each side for the audio jacks ...others have a scoop starting at the base of the pedal. The corners of the box are very rounded other boxes are nearly squared off.
Still it may be Mooer as they recently have made some boxes that Mooer sell as preamps but sell to Donner as OD's where the pots are on a different board. The Mooer are designed to be viewed horizontally. The Donner are meant to read vertically in the normal fashion. These pedals have 6 knobs.
Still always keep in mind if you like a Mooer re-brand it is well worth seeing which of the companies have the best price. A rule of thumb is it should sell close to $30.00 USD.

OK I digress.
But straight up ...this pedal to my ears is still Mooer ....but Mooer at  it's very best.

This pedal is unusually aimed right at the working pro. It gives you 7 simple usable sounds that with tone and decay you can quickly tailor a good sound to fit a specific song when playing in a band.
Most cheaper reverbs are aimed at the hobbyist with Sound Scape sounds
that are very gimmicky and unusable to most players outside of the 'bedroom' crowd.

I have never been a fan of Spring Reverbs to me it is nothing but nostalgia. They sound trashy. But lots of players love them. The sound is complex to copy because they have a mechanical element coming from the springs that is hard to digitize without a complex algorithm and a powerful chip in the pedal to do the job.
The fact that the one in this pedal is quite good says a damn lot about how good the product is.
I am very impressed.

It is usually desirable to have an always on reverb. If you have ...or buy a really good reverb it is great to use it for some of the larger the life sounds. You may want it for a solo. BUT ...when the solo is over turning it off and going back to a dry sound to finish the tune it will probably sound drastic. So having a pedal like this is an amazingly cheap quick fix.
The quality of the over all sound is modest but definitely pro.

CONCLUSION
If money is tight this will certainly do the trick.

ADDITION JULY 2019
If you can scrape together a hundred bucks then the King of the mini reverb is definitely
the Mr Black Mini Reverb. (It came out in late July 2019). 
It has one sound ...a plate reverb. It is very easy to use live and sounds equal to anything at any price. What you do not get in choices is more then compensated by the quality of sound. 

Note: the biggest selling recording of all time is Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon. It ONLY uses  plate reverb for all those amazing guitars sounds.

OVERDRIVE- CUSTOM TONES ETHOS TWE-1 TRAIN WRECK EXPRESS ...all high tech engineered

 CUSTOM TONES ETHOS TWE-1 TRAIN WRECK EXPRESS OD/PREAMP 

$225.00 USD

Engineering, engineering, engineered! At one time the guitar pedal makers were not engineers. They were more likely guys that repaired home entertainment equipment like radios televisions etc.
They usually had different levels of education and many were self taught. Trial and error reigned supreme. Now we have a bit of all types.
Some of the best pedals ever made and are still made by amateurs. These people are not afraid to think out of the box because they have never been in the box. LOL
But today there are so many engineers that there are always some that...
...play the guitar
...that are infatuated with pedals and have the skills to turn the sounds they hear into a product that sounds and plays flawlessly.

The TWE-1 is the out come of these new pioneers.
All pedals have an over all tone that is often loved or not.
This is no exception.
But as for features and execution of how a real tube amp
reacts from input to speaker to the time it hits your ear
this has no competition.

Nothing is missed It mimics even the effect of sag from the amps transformers and rectifier.
Puting the pedal on modern pushes up the gain and forces the rectifier to scoop exactly like tubes.
It also drops the headroom which increases the compression. The dynamics change
even from your touch. If you hit harder you make small changes in the gain which instantly
is dynamically followed by the pedal by changing all the above just by the small gain added by the force from how hard your pick hits the string.
This pedal reacts EXACTLY like the very best of the gourmet tube amps.

NO OTHER PEDAL DOES ALL THIS!!! ONLY A REAL TUBE AMP!!! and the TWE-1!!!


In short it is a flawless
piece of engineering!!!!
If you like the sound.
BUY IT!!!
It is impossible to find
a better designed pedal!!!

z

CONCLUSION
My only complaint with this pedal is that all my best OD pedals and 
I own 17 high end beauties.
I love the voicing of a Marshall especially a gourmet BIG Plexi This pedal has a fairly accurate voicing of the late Ken Fischer's Train Wreck Express amp. Although it was based off a Marshall Plexi the1959 Super Lead it could use either 6L6 or EL84 tubes 
it is in many ways half Fender. 

 

The TWE-1 to my ears has a very American sound. It reminds me a the famous Fender Bassman used as a blueprint for the Marshall Bluesbreaker and  is virtually the same. It isn't but in effect the results of choosing to emulate a TWA amp are the same.  

 Brett Kingman says at the end of the demo "One of the best I've tried in 2 or 3 years."
He makes his living by doing pedal demos. I watch them because you never get bull You do have to take note of what he does not say ... this is a guarded statement that he has said. In short he has to hold back the praise or he won't get more product to demo from Custom Tones competitors.
I have only heard him give the equivalent praise once in 2 years.

The damn thing has such great dynamics. The word 'thrilling' comes to mind. I own a few pedals where I find the overall tone more pleasing.
BUT ... when it came time for a solo and this was sitting beside them which would I pick.
It is very innovative but there are a lot of OD's that are equally  if not more appealing.
Unfortunately many big names spend the research money on marketing which is both unfair to small innovative companies and the naive players.
Damned if I buy it ...Damned if I don't!!!

Damned if don't... I just put a few OD's on Reverb!!!

When I get mine I will invite my audience on a roller coaster ride 
before every time the urge to shred hits me.

MY FRIEDMAN BE-OD WAS JUST SOLD!!!
so you know how much faith I have in the TWE-1

JAN.29/2018
So today I got my pedal.
It lives up to everything shown and discussed in the video.
It truly is versatile...it can do everything from a fairly light gain to Metal and in between you can colour the sound a dozen different ways.
In short if you only were going to have one single OD.
...THIS IS IT!!!
                               Money well spent!    

OVERDRIVE- MASTERBUILT AMPLIFICATION Stone Groove TUBE OVERDIVE

 MASTERBUILT AMPLIFICATION STONE GROOVE TUBE OVERDRIVE 

$349.00 USD
(on sale $199.00 USD)

Another serious tube OD. This time we have both level and gain.
A very classic Marshall type voicing.
Not hard to take.
My only concern is that many tube pedals are not designed to actually use the tube for the voicing. It ends up being a transister drive with a light bulb.
Lightning Boy Audio Knob goes thru a lot of trouble explaining the how and why they use a very high voltage.
Well it does in fact use NOS MOSFET transistors.
Still this pedal has a shearing metallic quality you do not hear with transistors. The sound is very convincing.
I have been looking for just the sound this puts out when the gain is pulled back. Check out the chord work between 6:10 & 6:20 on the first video where the gain is set at 10 o'clock. You get a nice light medium gain. It has a very high definition and zero fizz.I was sold!!!I love the '20's ART DECO look too. Well... I pushed my luck...I bought one.The sale price is amazing!!! Even for a hybrid.

Jan.29/18

My pedal arrived. Impressive. 

I set it up to just hit some crunch then backed it off.

This will be my clean sound.

The pick attack has great dynamics ...the notes have a very nice compression that just slightly blooms.

chords just sparkle. I then went one after another with my OD's. Everyone sounded great.

The only fault I could find is it takes over the OD with its characteristics. In short the OD's sound great but they all sounded too much alike. With a lot of tweaking I got each one back.

If you have a solid state amp this pedal will blow your mind. Just be sitting down when you try it. LOL

VOX___FENDER___MARSHALL__???

 FENDER  VOX  MARSHALL                                

Tube technology was virtually perfected by the mid 20th century. These 3 brands eventually dominated

the market.

-Marshall used one technology. 

-Fender used another

-Vox shared both.  

ALL SUCESSFUL NEW BRANDS START BY CHOOSING ONE TO EMULATE

THEN AS A RULE ...

ADD AT LEAST ONE EXTRA 12ax7 TUBE FOR OVERDRIVE.

All 3 brands use these tubes in their preamps.

Like anything in life there is usually an exception.
Exceptions come ...Exceptions go.
BUT IN THE END THESE 3 MANUFACTURERS OWN THE MARKET!!!

Even the difference between these 3 brands are minimal. Put a very high gain Metal pedal into all 3 and hearing any significant differences virtually disappear!

So keep this in mind when you choose any new pedal.

HOW NEW IS IT ????  
HOW OLD IS IT  ????       
WHAT DO YOU THINK & WHY ???? 

The manufacturers know this...
I FELT YOU WOULD ALL REALLY ENJOY WHAT THEY THINK.

OVERDRIVE- PETTYJOHN ELECTRONICS IRON PEDAL ...an aressive King of Tone?

PETTYJOHN  ELECTRONICS IRON PEDAL

If set up right it does a good copy of a King of Tone ...but it can not hide it's extra edge and aggression. A lot of 'modern' players would prefer it. It is easy to get tight and to push out a lot of extreme aggressive tones. This thing has Balz!!!

$230.00 USD

PREAMP- SYNERGY ...an all tube Gourmet cloned preamp of your favourite gourmet amp for $400.00 USD

 SYNERGY PREAMPS  
_________________ 

Preamp inserted in a casing. Above ...a Basic preamp

Synergy make 11 TUBE preamps.
or are there 15 ?
Each one is a virtual clone of the real amp.
Including Plexi, Soldano, Diezel, Friedman and Morgan AC. There will be many others made to add to the list.

All are $400.00 each and all snap into the same casings and /or amps.

You can buy a case that will hold one or a larger one that can hold 2 preamps.
Alternatively you can get a Synergy tube amp that takes 2 modules.
There are 2 heads and 2 cabs.
(2x12 and a 4x12) plus a combo.

Most players will use a standard casing that  can be  connected with your own amp by inserting it into the FX loop.
If for example you have a single channel Fender Deluxe and buy a Soldano the module is set up for you to access 3 channels. You still keep your great Fender sound!!!
If the real Soldano rates as 10 for it's sound ...the sound of the Synergy going thru the Fender rates a 9. That is how close it gets. So at $400.00 USD the thing is a Steal!!! It is only the price of 2 good OD's.

FUZZ- EL MUSICO LOCO WEE BEAVER FUZZ ...total mind blower!

 EL MUSICO WEE BEAVER FUZZ 


I tried to order this Fuzz 2 years ago from the
guy in Spain that made it. I did not get an answer
Then shortly after I found he had a heart attack and died.
Since then the price has kept going up. When I ordered it was $145.00 USD it is now over $400.00 used
.
But tonite I stumbled onto some British discount site DSSLROUTLET.TOP  (click Categories then click musical instruments)

It sells everything from dresses to kitchen utensils. The fuzz is ....

$38.00 USD ...NEW!!!
(My impression is this site gets there inventory from overstock and bankruptcies from a jobber, They have no idea of what they have.)

UPDATE - WARNING!!! ...I NEVER GOT MY FUZZ! I WROTE TO THEM DOZENS OF TIMES... THIS IS A RIP OFF SITE!!!




It originally came in 2 sizes a standard 'B' box with a battery compartment or in a Mini. The price was the same for either.
This Fuzz is unique  it has 2 or 3 distinct sweet spots and a voice that once you hear it you could pick it out of a dozen fuzzes.

Need I say it. Mine is on order.

There will be no more.
and I would be surprised if there are
more then 4 or 5 at
DSSLROUTLET.TO

 THIS IS ONE KILLER PEDAL !!!!!

One last very cool thing. The artwork on the pedal is all engraved by hand. Then the metal is polished by hand to a mirror finish. This must take hours and hours. At $145.00 the guy was definitely not into making money. $145.00 USD is a good price for  silk screening or a transfer & a coat of lacquer. But hand engraving??? No.

IT CAME IN 2 SIZES IT IS THE MINI THAT IS ON SALE