2021 January Pedal-Chain Update - Episode I - A New Dawn

There are 6 new entries for January - actually plus the Team Medic on slot #6, the Abominable Electronics Hail Satan Deluxe on #19, and the Sinvertek N5+ back in on slot #22. I had hoped to secure both a Friedman Smallbox (Done!) and Klirrton Oh My Goat - both of which are in somewhat short supply, but which I believe I will secure within the next week or two. Update - actually Smallbox now secured - should be with me on Saturday.

The brand new entrants therefore are the Reeves Electro Black Hat Sound Fuzz on #5, Decibelics Golden Royale on #9, Zander Circuitry Surplus on #10, Friedman Smallbox on #17, Zander Cranium on #20 and the superb JAM Pedals Harmonious Monk no #31 - which is just the gooey / syrupy confection that I hoped it would be when maxed out!

Here follow the individual slot updates :

For January there have actually been three new fuzzes largely on rotation on this slot. The Reeves Electro Black Hat Sound is the overall favourite of that bunch - ahead of the Fulltone Queen Bee and ToneTuga FX Salvage Fuzz. The Black Hat Sound is just one of those legendary fuzzes which sounds truly amazing - thick, and richly textured with very significant volume and gain on tap - and useful Bias and Bass controls. It's slightly MKI adjacent but not exactly with that same dry edge - but definitely a close cousin! It's one of those fuzzes that just deliver sheer joy on playback - wonderful sonically, inside and out.

The incumbent here was obviously the JA Prism - which I still really love, and which has a slightly different tone-signature to the ThorpyFX Team Medic currently in place. The Prism renders slightly warmer, softer and more sustaining - you can more easily feel the blooming of notes. While the Team Medic is slightly brighter and more articulate. I have tuned that in very close to the Prism - and I will see how it goes. If I determine long-term that the Prism is the preferred choice here, I will have no qualms about switching that in again despite its association! Note that the Team Medic now comes with indicator LEDs next to each footswitch, and an internal trim-pot to adjust the Boost level for that left-hand footswitch - which in my setup delivers a vary tasty mid-gain overdrive.

I though I would mention that despite my best intents - I have discovered that the Bloom is pretty much irreplaceable for me. There is no other pedal that comes quite close enough to its smart combination of feature set and functionality - particularly the granularity of control afforded by its smart footswtiches. The Hamstead Soundworks Zenith and DryBell Unit67 are the closest matches - while they're really just not close enough for my needs. I seem to genuinely love the format and granularity of what the Bloom delivers - and so it stays despite the association! Note that I changed its emblem to a Rebel Alliance Jedi insignia!

I'm a little sad to see the ThorpyFX Peacekeeper leave the rotation as it has served me so well for so long. However with all its obvious prowess - it can't hope to match up to the dual-channel delights of the new Decibelics Golden Royale - which totally doubles up on what I so love about the Golden Horse. Those extra toggle-switch mods just add another whole range of tones and versatility. People really should be queueing up around the block to get hold of one of these - of course in the same imperial green as mine! Sounds fantastic every which way.

Out goes the Golden Boy, and in comes the every bit as good mid-gain fuzzy-drive which is the Zander Circuitry Surplus. I've taken to this like a duck to water - as I find it really intuitive and responsive to use. That combination of clipping options with Tone and Response controls is just really easy to get stuck into - and I was up and running with great tones in no time at all. Obviously with 8 clipping modes to explore it's still very early days for me - while I seem to be very much favouring the Transistor/Mosfet option right now. Alex Millar has really hit it out of the park with his new compact units - and I will be picking up each of those - bar the Bass-specfic varieties. Note also that I have a Pettyjohn Custom Mods ODI incoming - which will also take up rotation on this slot - which will undoubtedly mean some sort of time-share!

I've determined to give the Friedman Smallbox a decent run on this slot, but I was a little slow to move initially - and by the time I got organised in this area they were all sold out in the first batch - at least those at the appropriate price level. I am largely waiting on these to come back into stock - and I will pounce when a suitable candidate materialises - hopefully in the next week or two. Will be interesting to see whether this one sticks, or I return back to the excellent Menatone King of the Britains. Update! One acquired at the time of writing this - should be with me on Saturday - so just gets in within the January deadline!

Currently on the slot is the excellent grinding Abominable Electronics Hail Satan Deluxe - which sounds nothing like any of my other Muffs. It really has a special texture to it which I seem to have a lot of fun and success with. The Hail Satan will though inevitable give up is slot in time for the incoming Way Huge Atreides - which I expect will live on this slot for a while. The Atreides could also have gone in on the #3 slot - but I determined it to be more of a Synth-Fuzz, than Fuzz-Synth! In fact much like the Beetronics Swarm which also lives on this slot - in time-share fashion.

While the Dr Scientist Frazz Dazzler V2 largely owns this slot - it still occasionally yields its place to the also excellent ThorpyFX Field Marshal - and currently to this excellent new Zander Circuitry Cranium Rat variant. I foolishly initially misconstrued the Tone control for a master EQ - where it's obviously rather a High-Cut - which needs to be the other side of mid-way for me - in fact currently at full CW. If you dial that too far back you get more and more Treble - which in the end results in some degree of whistling. It seems to work best for me parked at max Hi-Cut, while I'm still endeavouring to get a grasp on the subtleties of the 'Frequency' control - which is essentially a variable Ruetz Mod. Took me a little longer than The Surplus to get properly on track - but I feel I've mostly got the measure of this now. Like the Surplus it comes with 8 Clipping Options which delivery a vast variety of tones. So I've still got a lot of exploring to do - but so far so good!

The final JA ejection - i.e. El Guapo sees the significantly more nuanced Sinvertek N5+ back in full effect. This is really where that pedals lives best - while weirdly I was for a while using it for lower and mid-gain settings. Where it really is a saturated distortion monster - with so many clever ways to hone its signal. It properly sounds stellar in this EVH Brown Sound role.

This year has been a little like wading through treacle - with everything just taking a lot more time and effort than in the past. I had hoped to secure one of these superb Klirrton Oh My Goat distortion pedals sooner from my new pal Carsten Plinker - but it's taking a little longer to arrange. This is a thunderingly good and expertly calibrated fat distortion - in fact taken from the 'BottomShaker' half of Klirrton's amazing Grindstein HM2 style monster. This will no doubt happen soon enough - and I will of course be sharing a more in-depth review when my copy lands. This one sounds really fantastic!

As predicted - the JAM Pedals Harmonious Monk is everything I thought it would be - and yes it does that syrupy pseudo Uni-Vibe thing really well with most of the controls maxed - which is exactly how I am enjoying it these days. I would really have preferred a tap-tempo versus double speed on the second footswitch, but I really cannot fault how the pedal works and sounds. Would have been nice to have the dynamic envelope functionality from the Anasounds Ages - which I still love, and which will surely be in on the rotation. The Ages is generally though quite a bit more subtle than the Harmonious Monk - and doesn't get anywhere near quite that syrupy - still sounds fantastic though.