Beetronics FX finally does the right thing and swaps the Octahive toggle-switch for a Second Footswitch - but only for Custom Editions

As far as I’m concerned this has been somewhat a long time coming and I’ve mentioned it a number of times previously. While the Whoctahell Sub-Octave Fuzz has had dual footswitches from the start - the Octahive Upper Octave Fuzz has always relied on a side toggle-switch until now.

I am generally a fan of Beetronics pedals and have 3 of theirs to-date - the Royal Jelly, Swarm, and the lower-right Octahive ArrowMint Edition pictured above. It always niggled me that the Whoctahell had the more logical / ergonomic second footswitch while the Octahive hasn’t until now.

I have never been enamoured with Beetronics’ relick’d and tarnished standard range - there was no way I was ever going to get the scratched up standard blue version lower left-hand side above. But I’m a little miffed that my current ArrowMint edition has been somewhat obsoleted.

I feel it’s high time that Beetronics improved the looks of their standard range pedals - and brought it more into line with the others - which all really look quite slick - I would though have preferred some of the later Royal Jelly editions to my Green and Orange original - some of the latter editions are far prettier - and I’m not including any of the custom ones which have always looked stellar.

Beetronics should update the whole standard range to be better looking by default, and the Octahive V2 needs to be released immediately with dual fooswitches as it should have been from the start. The Octahive has been one of my favourite octave fuzzes for a long time and this functional flaw has always irked me somewhat. For now there are just 10 each of the 3 colour ways pictured above available - from USA retailers including Cost Sonic, Cream City Music, Guitar Pedal Shoppe and Pedal Genie and for the princely sum of $280.

I actually still prefer the looks of my ArrowMint edition and will be holding onto it as I seem to have some sort of emotional attachment to it - I will wait for the next run - which will hopefully and rightfully should be the new and improved standard V2 edition!

I have actually experienced this many times before - where first mover advantage turns out to be a disadvantage as later / latter editions have been polished up and improved in the interim - and those who wait often get a better pedal.

There is a touch an inflated artificial element to this which several brands make use of with priced-up limited runs which need not be more expensive - but usually are priced such nonetheless. I really quite like special and limited edition runs where relevant and worthwhile but I’m often put off by the price-gouging nature of much of this activity which just gives me a feeling of being exploited really. I’m also not referring here to actual limited editions based on the rarity of a particular component - those are always justified as there are only so many of those components to go around. Increasingly though certain pedal-builders are artificially creating demand by putting in unnecessary limits - where in reality there is no scarcity of the component parts used.

Those who engage in unnecessary price-gouging and customer exploitation will be found out eventually. I try to stick away from negative things on this blog - so it’s up to others to out unfair business practices. I can be critical at times - but it always comes from a constructive viewpoint of making things better.

Here are some demo videos of this great octave fuzz - I’m sure new owners will be happy with their acquisitions. While I’m waiting this one out.

PS - I really like the knobs on the yellow edition - the Boss-like knobs don’t do anything for me in this context - and the mix of the two looks odd to me!