STOMP BOX STEALS: April 2025

Thursday, April 3, 2025

FUZZ- PIGTRONIX Gas Giant Fuzz _NEW_ a Muff with disc brakes

P I G T R O N I X

GAS GIANT

$150.00 USD
Founded in Brooklyn N.Y. in 2004 they were one of the early handmade gourmet brands. Over the years they have formed partnerships with first Supro and then D'Angelico. They love the vintage but also loved to try anything nuts. They always kept it in mind that the players needed good very usable gear ...cheap. I have had their Philosophers Tone Compressor mini on my board for 10 years. There has been a version of it since the beginning.
This new pedal is a basic Muff with a wild wall of sound made bigger with a mid boost or kept traditional with a scoop. A Gate adds a very usable bit of tightening and noise suppression.

CONCLUSION __
It meets my every expectation. Totally usable and just rough enough around the edges to have some real character. In short it always does the job but has not had the soul ripped out of it.

As Mavin their mascot space pig would likely say

"Quirky but never crappy.'' Love it!!!

Wednesday, April 2, 2025

FUZZ- ANARCHY AUDIO Baa Bzz Fuzz... a 1972 Roland Bee Baa Fuzz __clone

ANARCHY٢AUDIO

BaaBzz

$165.00 USD
Before Roland headed into total Synths they made all sorts of gear.

Drum Machines, Amps etc. In 1972 they released an original design

Fuzz a couple of years before making a separate dept. for pedals

that they called BOSS. This is a clone of that Fuzz.
The layout is Volume, Tone, and Gain. Shift lets you blend 2 different voices. The toggle switches in a low pass filter that cuts the highs.

CONCLUSION __
It has its own sound that goes from old school crazy BIAS

sounds to a more modern Fuzz Distortion. I love the Fuzz,

Distortion Overdrive like sound that does not sound like

a Rat but can easily serve the same purpose.

COMPRESSOR- MXR Studio Compressor... under the radar

MXR
studio compressor

$200.00 USD
A compressor meant to be used only for guitar was invented by MXR.

The Dyna Comp of which a version is still in production. Robert Keeley built his empire of pedals by modding it. We now have dozens of Comps

to choose from. Many really are a Studio-Comp-in a-Box. Eight years ago MXR decided to strike back with their own. Perhaps too little too late?

The layout is Input, Output, and Attack which allows the guitar sound to get thru before the comp comes in. Ratio is the amount of compression.

CONCLUSION __
It has always been under the radar. The myth is that the perfectly transparent Comp is the best and the best are transparent.

The best one like all effects is the one that sounds great.

I think this pedal suffers from doing too good a job to be neutral, lol. It is vanilla ice cream in a store that has dozens of gourmet

flavors. That said I do like it. It is easier to get the job

done and ignore that rabbit hole of "could I get a better sound,'' lol.

....the demos are both sparce and lame.

This is simply the best in spite of the language factor ...click on the sub-titles

REVERB- JOYO R-31 Para-verb _NEW_ Strymon clone

JOYO R-31 PARA-VERB

$85.00 USD
It is over 10 years since the guitar world went breathless when they heard the Strymon Blue Sky ambient reverbs.
It would not have been possible without the digital chips that arrived at that time. The Strymon is still made and even more popular. The chips are now quite dated and therefore relatively cheap. That said they count on a programmer to make great sounds for them. The good news is 2 or 3 great sounds is enough and many new budget in a blindfold test would fool even the 'cork sniffers'.