Anasounds reveal further chapters of the Full Story Modular Muff Saga - now also available in Standard and FX Teacher Editions
You may recall that I shared the details of the €499 Full Story Collector’s Edition back in June. My copy actually arrived only recently - this last Tuesday - and what a gorgeous production that whole package is - the Pedal and the Tone Cards in separate display boxes. There were all manner of extra details I discovered then - including that the Boost circuit is also modular and on a swappable card! While this article’s focus is not really about the original and now long since sold out version - but rather its two more pedalboard-friendly derivations just announced!
It turns out that this project is even more massive than I first perceived - as the fairly common architecture is now shared across 3 different pedal formats / variants - with 4 new collaborative Tone Cards created, and where the Teacher FX edition is available in both Kit and Fully Assembled formats as usual. What is entirely unique this time around is that you can take an FX Teacher Full Story Course - where they teach you to make your very own Custom Tone Card - meaning that truly the Sky’s the limit with this project!
There are significant differences to each of these pedals too - which I will now focus on.
The Collector’s Edition is unique in having a Boost / Modular Boost component - where currently you have 4 different varieties of boost options - ranging from Treble Boost, through Mids-focused, and onto more of a Full-Frequency Boost. There will be further Boost Cards coming in the future - which will allow you to do further new and interesting things with the circuit - as well as swapping in and out all those new and evolving Tone Cards.
For the Standard Edition the additional selection is 2 Mids switches - one per Channel - which essentially give you 2 Options - the classic Scooped or Mid-Enhanced profiles. I don’t believe that component is modular - but you never know!
Finally for the FX Teacher Edition which only carries a single Tone Card you have 2 further modular selections - via Clipping and Mid Switches where those key components are anchored to Terminal Blocks placed within the circuit - such that you can change Clipping Diodes, and experiment with different Capacitor Values for the 3-way Mids Switch.
So in short - each of the pedals has its own advantages and strengths - and so impressed am I with the whole series and in fact the whole project - that I’m getting in all Formats and all Tone Cards. I already have the core 7 Tone Cards that came with the Collector’s edition - but there are 4 more Collaborative Tone Cards available - which can be had for €149 - ALH Effects' versions of its own Muff takes - Battersea (Ram’s Head), Pulse (Civil War), Piggy (Ram’s Head V2?) and a Tampco sort of hybrid Muff-Bender!
I will detail the main points and differences of each - starting with the smallest and working my way up the scale! :
FX Teacher Full Story including 1 Special Edition Tone Card - €129 Kit or €179 Fully Assembled
Controls - Output, Tone, Fuzz, Clip : 1N914 Diode / No Clipping / 2 Red LEDs or Custom Module, Mid : Enhanced / Scooped / Flat or Custom Module.
So while the FX Teacher Edition carries only a single Tone Card - it has further modular possibilities via the 3rd Clipping Option and 3rd Mids Option. You can assign different components for those via Terminal Blocks - which allow you to experiment with the format and fine tune to your own preferences.
What's more you can take a 2-day FX Teacher Course - which will teach you how to make your own Custom Tone Card and further tweak that edition of the pedal. Of course as this is an FX Teacher Edition - it is available in both Kit Format and Fully Assembled Editions! And as you can build your own version you can of course customise to your heart's desire!
Ensure you use 9V DC [-] Power Supply - Current Draw is 8mA. Full Story pedals have been engineered so that they can be placed anywhere within your signal chain.
One thing to note is that the FX Teacher Full Story Edition comes with its own 'Modern Hybrid Muff' voicing Tone Card which is exclusive to this format!
Standard Edition Full Story including 2 Tone Cards - €279
Controls - 2 x Output, Tone, Gain, Mid : Stock (Scooped) / Enhanced, Left Channel 2 Footswitch (Tone Card 2), Right Channel 1 Footswitch (Tone Card 1).
Obviously streamlined down from the Collector's edition - this mid-size format has the 2 Full Channels - and where the difference here is a 2-way Mids Switch Per Channel - Up for Stock (Scooped) Mids, and Down for Enhanced (Boosted) Mids.
So you get the same 2 Modular Tone Card elements as on the Collector's Edition - but without the Modular Boost / Treble Boost / Third Footswitch - while you get dual Mids switches instead per Channel. Also you don't get the Terminal Blocks for customising Clipping and Mids options - per the FX Teacher Edition.
It's so interesting here that each of these Editions / Varieties has its own advantages - while I will likely mostly use the Standard Edition - as I can apply other different types of EQ and Boosts from within my existing signal chain to change things up also. So that's definitely the most practical format for me - also in terms of placement flexibility.
As far as I understand you get to choose which 2 of the Tone Cards populate your Standard Edition - I'm not sure whether that includes the new Collaborative ones - but certainly the Core 7 of Triangle, Ram's Head, Opamp, Civil War, Green Russian, Black Russian, and Black & Red 2000 NYC Card. UPDATE! Actually it now seems that the 2 Tone Cards that come with the Standard Edition are custom for that Edition too - so supposedly variants of the Core 7 Tone Cards - but not exactly the same - will be interesting to check that out.
My favourite Muff variety is usually Triangle, followed by Ram's Head and then Black Russian - but I will have different cards deployed on each of these devices for sure.
The Standard Mid-size option is probably the most practical one of these - but depending on how handy your are with a soldering iron - then the FX Teacher Edition could be the most fun in the long run. I will certainly be glad to own all.
Collector's Edition Full Story All 7 Core Tone Cards (250 units) [sold out] - €499
Controls - 2 x Output, Tone, Fuzz per Channel (Silver & Mini Knobs), Boost Rotary Switch : Treble Booster / Upper Mid Focus Boost / Lower Mid Focus Boost / Full Range Frequency Boost, Boost Level Mini. Channel 2 / Card 2 Footswitch, Channel 1 / Card 1 Footswitch, Boost Footswitch.
This really is a glorious box set - beautifully packaged and where all elements are gorgeous really with lots of attention to detail. The Tone Cards are a little fiddly in manipulation - both to get them in and out of their display case, and to install them on the pedals. It's not a major thing - but I had to make some accommodations along the way - interestingly each of the modular cards is affixed by a retaining screw - which is something I'm not familiar with on my other modular pedals - but I can certainly understand that would make these pedals much more robust for transport and to protect against wear and tear.
Also when I originally acquired the Collector's Edition I was not aware that the Boost circuit was a Modular Card too - as it wasn't particularly well marked out in the original documentation or photography - but on the production model you can see it clearly says 'Treble Booster' - so it will be cool to see what other Boost Cards Anasounds come up with next!
I feel the size of this unit does impact a touch on its pedalboard practicalities - but there's no question of how much use you could get out of it with all the different possible combinations of 3 Modular Cards - perhaps the EQ section here needed to be a touch stronger for certain applications - I'm thinking here of my BYOC Crown Jewel - where only its Boost element is modular - but it does have very extensive Clipping and EQ sections within that circuit.
The Boost element here is essential for me to get the most out of this unit as I never find just the classic 3 Muff controls quite granular enough for where I want to get to. The pedal is beautifully made, and well thought out and this is genuinely the 'Full History' of Muff as you get 7 key circuits with it on individual Tone Cards - which yes you can stack together!
My unit came with Civil Will and Opamp Cards installed - which I quickly swapped around for my two favourites - Triangle and Ram's Head. Which means I have Black Russian, Green Russian, and Black & Red 2000 NYC Cards still to try - so far so good!
I can't get over what a brilliant concept this is. The Collector's edition own merits one of the releases of the year status - while All 3 Pedals plus all the Cards - Core and Collaborative and the other Modular elements - with the opportunity to attend a course to make your very own Tone Card - it's all next level genius.
I think each derivation of the pedal is genius too as each offers something that the other doesn't have - so they're all special - and obviously come with an array of different prices. At the moment it's really tough to decide which my overall favourite is here as I really love aspects of each. I wonder sometimes whether this is the best approach to pedal making - i.e. making each pedal attractive on its own merits - versus simply scaling down the features as you moved down then enclosure sizes. Here all of these are special - and it may even be the FX Teacher Edition that ends up as my favourite - but we will have to wait and see on that.
The invoice has been paid - I just need for these others to land now!
Both the new varieties are available from the Anasounds Webstore - while the Collector's Edition is alas long since sold out!
