60 Cycle Hum Collaborates with BIG EAR pedals on novel 9-Footswitch Whac-A 9-Stage Cascaded Boosts Pedal

As Ryan Burke freely admits in the below video - this is all based on a somewhat zany idea he had one day to create a pedal which was covered in multiple footswitches and with no further controls or frills. This idea was then taken up by Grant Wilson of BIG EAR pedals - who roped in Jordan Clayton from Pine Box Customs to design the circuit and PCB layout.

The basis of this pedal is 9 equal but slight individual boost circuits - one per Footswitch - where you ramp up the level of boost - by hitting further Footswitches - which in turn adds more of those Boosts into the mix. You don’t really get a particularly noticeable boost until 4 are cascaded together - the first 3 are very subtle really - but definitely add sparkle.

The Boost type is closest to clean - while it seems to add a lot of brightness and sparkle to the top end. With all 9 Footswitches engaged you get a moderate Overdrive - largely sitting in Low Gain territory.

In terms of practicalities - this is a novelty pedal really. Its very nature, size and side-mounted jacks makes it all rather impractical. There are far more elegant ways to deliver a multi-stage boost. While the Whac-A certainly has its own kind of charm.