Wednesday, January 31, 2024

FUZZ- VADERIN PEDALS Colossus___NEW___ Tone Bender with attitude

$190.00 USD
 (!)VANDERIN 
COLOSSUS 
      A Tone Bender MK II topography but with both germanium and silicon transistors.
The layout is Bass, Treble, Gain and Volume. 
  
CONCLUSION ___ 
It looks great, very vintage yet with an understated upmarket vibe. The pedal has a Muff meets a high gain overdrive thing. Designed more for riffs and leads and for keeping chord things tight. It has plenty of aggressive balzy punch.


GUITAR- HARLEY BENTON JA-25th __NOT Click-bait __$259.00 USD rivals a $7000 guitar

HARLEY BENTON JA-25th 

Just go to 16:40 on the video and watch the 'My Two Cents'  
 


Tuesday, January 30, 2024

REVEREB- M-VAVE Mini Universe ___ NEW___ 9 voices & some respectable sonics

$27.00 USD incudes
Fee shipping on AliExpress
M-VAVE 
MINI UNIVERSE
The company is not new as they make wireless communications for the Military and Emergency services for several years. These clients demand equipment reliability and function and brands that fail can literally get blacklisted. Of course music is more than a robust & usable mechanical device. Still, it is good to know a product is unlikely to prematurely malfunction and the company have a rep in general for making quality product.
The layout has Decay, Mix, a 9 voice select switch and 3 Parameters that are assigned to specific functions that are relayed to the Verb you choose. 
For example you may wish to fade in an ambient sound but on a Spring reverb you would want control over the springs natural chatter 
on its fade out.  
 
NEED TO KNOW 
In the digital world a new release of a chip can change things over night. A guys killer Strymon Big Sky verb can still sound killer but the chip can drop several times over 10 years it has been available making it possible by 2024 to be a budget chip. That said it takes a good algorithm/program to give you a great sound. Add to that if you use the whole chip for one or 2 sounds instead of 9 you can put more detail in the sound.  
 ....<>^
CONCLUSION 
__ Is it any good???  To be honest I do not know. I would expect it to be totally usable. 
Yes some sounds more than others. I expect the ambience Star Wars will sound good 
even with a few warts. Real world Rooms and even a Spring need a lot of detail to be convincing. In short a few sounds if applied right and not used as attention 
getters but as nice frame pushed back behind your guitar sound will pass 
the pro test. It was not long ago that you would have to pay $270 not $27 
for this quality of product.


OVERDRIVE - BMF EFFECTS The Godfather ... old school look & approach

$190.00 USD
BMF Effects   
The Godfather
The company looks and approaches pedals in the old school way. Their dirt pedals are all aimed with a purpose to achieve an expressive unit to go between you and your amp to make, player, guitar, pedal and amp works as one. In short they are not trying 
to clone another pedal or a classic amp. The pedal is a low to medium gain with some transparency. The layout is a classic simple Volume, Gain and Tone. 
 
CONCLUSION ____ It has a very rich full mid sound with a bit of amp like sag. It leans towards a dark tone. 
It hits you as the missing piece of your puzzle or not.

OVERDRIVE- TONE CHARM AUDIO Szczur .... a Polish Rat

$165.00 USD
 TONE CHARM AUDIO   
|SZCZUR|
Yes folks yet  another take on the infamous Rat. Oddly this one really sounds different. The sound is very big and resonant and open.
The layout has the usual Volume, Tone and Gain but it also has a second Gain. It reminds me of the Expandora with 2 Rat pedals in a box but wired up as one monster near Fuzz like OD. A toggle give you 2 different voices. 
A low and a high gain. 
 
CONCLUSION___ It is really its own thing. A Rat is not near as huge nor 
is resonant and open all through the mids. The Low gain voice has Russian Fuzz like openness and very grit in the lows. I repeat. 
It is its own thing and a damn good thing too. 
 

Monday, January 29, 2024

KDH ___ NAMM 2024 Day 4 (LAST DAY) ____ all sorts ...even a serious pedal ???

KDH TAKES US TO COOL STUFF
What do dead cool small builders have? Apparently  
much more than the Big Guys who had squat 
or let alone interesting.


CHAPMAN GUITARS|| Sunday ...last day NAMM of 2024

CHAPMAN GUITARS     
The company slowly morphed from the inventors of a playable budget guitar  
that had modern features in 2009 to doing a cross section of niche market 
working mans guitars in the middle market. These days the big market is 
cheap or luxury. Perhaps to over simplify cheap these days is a mid price 
guitar but without that hour per guitar of hand work to send it out playable 
right out of the box. In short one can buy an entry level and over time 
turn it into a mid priced guitar just by forgoing a pedal on occasion 
for up grades. 
 

AMP- FRIEDMAN AMPLIFICATION Vintage Plex ___ NEW ___ a REAL Plexi !!!

 FRIEDMAN V I N T A G E   PLEX 

Something I always thought was obvious. Dave Friedman makes many amps and they all start with an early Marshall topography and then modified to suit a dozen niche market applications. Why not have one that is more or less a pure copy of the famous Plexi.  

He chose his own personal specimen. A 50 watt Plexi. As fate will have it my favorite Marshall.  $2800.00 USD  

.....I want one !!!

the fine print
 ...this is a quick demo by Dave himself from the weekend NAMM 2024 show. 
There are not any pics available yet. MORE TO COME  ASAP. 

Sunday, January 28, 2024

NAMM 2024 ___ FIRST LOOK ___ IBANEZ

IBANEZ     
What's NEW for '24? 
 

NAMM 2024 FIRST LOOK ___ FULLTONE !!!! Yes they are back!!!

FULLTONE & JACKSON
Jackson will make selective models.

NAMM 2024 ____ NEW STRANDBERG Bodin ESSENTIAL ...$1000.00 USD

STRANDBERG   
The only super high tech guitar that has been able 
to create a serious following and of highly skilled 
players that by that alone are usually totally
anal about what they will play. 
The Essential is not cheap but assessable. 
 


 

NAMM 2024___ LANEY AMPS

  Laney  ||Amps 
A few new amps. Laney make ALL their gear in the U.K.
They gave up on cheap amps in China in 2018.
The last classic Brit brand that is 100% Brit. 
 



NAMM 2024 ___ FIRST LOOK ___ Mooer Guitars ???

MOOER Guitars
Toy of the week? Here today and 
gone yesterday, or sooner ?? 
Resale value ... zero!!! 

NAMM 2024 Day 3 ___ some cool unusual sh@t

COOL STUFF    
I was impressed by the  Fehse light 
weight aluminum guitars from Germany.

NAMM 2024 ___ DANISH PETE & the Captain ___ MYTHOS Pedals

MYTHOS PEDALS 
Brand new old stuff, lol.
 

Saturday, January 27, 2024

NAMM 2024 ____ FIRST LOOK ____ BAD CAT AMPS ...killer pedals!!!

Bad Cat Amps 
The original owners years back had a 
couple of killer pedals and it looks 
like more are coming back.




NAMM 2024 ___ FIRST LOOK ___ Magnatone Slash Amp!!!

 M A G N A T O N E 
Sounds like a JCM800 to me. Perhaps 
a tad fatter and just a bit darker.
Pricy but the level of disappointment 
is zero !!!   
       ....<>^

NAMM 2024 ___ FIRST LOOK ___ ESP Guitars

   ESP Guitars
What you see is what we get :-)

NAMM 2024 ___ FIRST LOOK ___ EVH makes a semi !!!

EVH SA-126    

We get the unthinkable from EVH the inventor 
of high gain guitars.

NAMM 2024 ____ FIRST LOOK ____POSITIVE GRID do a stage ready amp!

| POSITIVE GRID AMPS |
Famous for their cheap small or even smaller modeler 
voiced practice amps they now have a larger amp for the
gigging player.  
 

FUZZ- BARBER ELECTRONICS Exacta Fuzz ___ Re-Issue ___ Muff/Silicon Tonebender

$190.00 USD
BARBER ELECTRONICS 
EXACTA Fuzz    
The Big Muff Triangle Fuzz and the Colorsound Jumbo Tone Bender are more the same than different so ol' Dave Barber took both to use for his topography. We have a both an American and Brit Fuzz in this box.
The layout is a standard volume, Gain and Tone. A toggle lets you tighten up the lows for HB PU's or leave a bit splugy to work as one loves with single coils. A second toggle lets you switch between a Brit or American Fuzz. 
 
CONCLUSION ___ Dave as usual over decades of building pedals and modifying Marshalls is anal about checking every box. We get a huge sound rich in harmonics with bags of sustain from a guy always under the radar for years.  Keeley became famous for his 4 knob Fuzz that put the guy on the map. Dave already offered nearly the same pedal. 
Who had their nose in who's pedal, lol. The price is reasonable  
for a handmade pedals with the best parts.