My Leprechaun FX Paddy Whacker Distortion has landed, featuring a fetching red and black swirl on top of a silver sparkle enclosure
I’m quite the fan of those Landgraff style swirly paint jobs - which skill Leprechaun’s Patrick has very evidently mastered. The original ones of these were mostly green - as per the example below. While Patrick has done some in blue (per the demo), and red also - like mine!
The Paddy Whacker, designed in collboration with Dr Scientist’s Ryan Clarke, is described as a high gain distortion - where for me it’s not so much heavy metal high gain, but close enough I guess in certain circumstances. The pedal benefits from a really smart 4-knob Control Topology - Gain, Volume, Contour, and Dry>Wet Mix.
I typically like my gain pedals full-flavoured - so the Mix knob is kinda sorta surplus to my requirements here. I would have probably preferred a second tone control instead - for more accurate and granular shaping of the output.
I own a few Mini Distortion pedals, where the Leqtique 10/10 is quite similar, with a little more range though, and more output volume. I find that a lot of my mini pedals tend to have rather moderate output profiles - I have 2 BJFE / OneControl Minis currently on the board too, which could both also do with a little more volume, while both are slightly louder than the Paddy Whacker. That's my only niggle really with that pedal - meaning that I tend to post boost this pedal when I play it - where the texture of its output sounds really decent regardless.
For my preference, the Paddy Whacker delivers its optimal output with Gain @ Noon, Volume @ Max, Contour @ 3 o'c, and Mix @ Max!
The demo video can be a little misleading as the demoer's amp has a certain degree of gain on it already - so that the pedal sounds quite a bit more aggressive and higher gain in those circumstances. I of course play into a clean pedal platform stereo rig, and the pedal does not sound quite so textured or high gain through that (vs the below demo) - certainly not without further assistance.
Seems the demoer is using his Paddy Whacker more as a boost to some degree - where the nature of the amp you're playing into has a huge influence on the final sound. It's described as verging on fuzz at times - which again I would say was a somewhat subtle distinction. Higher output and single coil pickups for sure give the Paddy Whacker a little more of a fuzz-edged flavour.
The Paddy Whacker is sporadically available on the Leprechaun FX Webstore for $199 CAD (c$150 USD) - it is made in very small batches - so you need to react quickly whenever you see that more have materialised. It's often just a matter of a handful of pedals in each batch - so your certainly need to have you luck in and your wits about you to snag one!
I'm really glad I've added this pedal to my mini collection. I make sporadic forays into Mini Pedaldom on occasion - and I am at such a juncture right now - having covered a number of mini pedals recently, and being about to complete the BJFE Honey Bee Mini Trifecta - I'm just waiting for the Silver Bee edition to land, and then I will put up my feature with all 3!
Demos
