Tru-Fi Full Range Overview and Joe's Pedals Restock
I probably should have tackled Tru-Fi a little sooner - where it hasn’t featured too heavily on this site yet - I always need to do a certain amount of due diligence before I do one of my brand features - and frequently there needs to be some sort of trigger event or catalyst required to set things off - which on this occasion was the purple Ghost Vibe Uni-Vibe - where I have one of those en-route to me as I write this - I will likely receive that on the same day this goes live. So that will be my very first Tru-Fi pedal experience.
While there are several more pedals in the range that I really like the look of - and which are next on my Hitlist, and some that I would consider acquiring once they have had one or two improvements!
For the longest period I was not 100% clear on the merits of this vintage-inspired very slightly over-sized form factor, with largely just 3 core controls, and where if a 4th was required - that was typically tagged onto the side - which is kind of a pet peeve of mine - but still much preferable to an internal trimmer.
So the Ghost Vibe was the first to really appeal to me - while I will for sure be picking up a few more - including the Two Face Fuzz (likely next target) and then the pseudo harmonic tremolo Ultra Tremolo after that. So top tier for me are Ghost Vibe, Two Face and Ultra Tremolo.
And then the sort of second tier includes the 18V Colordriver, R*t Pack, and Super-Fuzz - while for octave fuzzes I really think the binary Octave On/Off switch should be a second Footswitch - which this format doesn’t / cannot readily support.
I feel that Teddy Rasch generally makes fantastic fuzzes - using rare NOS components and producing some of the best sounding and best value pedals in the industry - especially when you see the high quality of the components used. While for any Germanium Fuzz Pedal - I’m really going to want a 3rd / External Bias knob - which sort of puts a dampener on the Spider, Supa, and Zosa Fuzzes.
Also - as most Muff varieties are scooped by nature - I like to have an additional Mids Control on most of my Big Muff variants - so that I can get them to cut better through the mix as such.
Teddy is particularly great at selecting just the right colours of finishes for each of his circuits - and his vibrant standard editions, and shimmery sparkle edition enclosures are some of the best in the industry. Note that the Swirly Paint Job guy is no longer associated with the business - while I though it was necessary to reference that for the Zosa enclosure as a bookmark in time - as several of those are already out there in the wild!
Each of these pedals comes in a recommended standard finish / colour - and you can pay extra for alternative colours and specialist sparkle paint job types etc..
I had initially thought I was getting a purple sparkle edition of the Ghost Vibe - but some sort of order snafu meant that only one of those was made for that batch - which another interested party had claimed ahead of me. The purple sparkle is closer to Magenta - while I actually probably prefer the deeper hue of that really rich standard deep purple.
In the above visual I tried to select the most obvious colours per pedal type - while still giving a full colour spectrum overview of the range - and I think I largely succeeded in the end. Note that these exercises are always tricky - as they require me finding suitable visuals that I can grab and retouch those images from - cutting out the pedals - re-aligning and squaring them up - and then adjusting a variety of those image characteristics - including exposure, contrast, hue and sharpness. I’m not sure many of you properly have an idea as to how much work goes into such visuals - the research along is hours, For sure part of it is therapy - but a large part is also hard-graft - so I do hope you appreciate the effort put into all of this!
By me reckoning there are 15 different effects currently active in the range - all as featured above, and in idvidual detail below.
Joe's Pedals Tru-Fi Restock
The second catalyst for this article is that my good friend Joe Light's Joe's Pedals Boutique seems to be the only properly active Tru-Fi dealer at the moment - as all other named dealers are very short of stock - if not actually delisted already. I guess much of what Teddy does is direct to market - with a batch or two going out to dealers relatively rarely - so the recent Joe's Pedals Tru-Fi restock is a fairly rare event - and already quite a few of those pedals are spoken for - but with a fair few still remaining.
These Tru-Fi types are still in stock at Joe's Pedals as of this article going live :
- Two Face Fuzz - Red Sparkle (with external / side Input Gain knob) - £229
- Colordriver 9V Overdrive / Fuzz - Orange - £199
- RangeMaster - Gold - £199
- R*t Pack Distortion Standard Black Version (OP07?) - £199
- Sammy Fuzz - Red - £199
- Spider Fuzz - Gold - £199
And apologies that I snagged the last Purple Ghost-Vibe from that restock! And in fact grabbed the Sparkle Blue Two Face as a very last minute decision - right before this article went live!
Here follow the individual pedal details as usual :
Colordriver 9 Volt Overdrive / Fuzz - $199.95
Controls - Treble, Drive, Bass, Volume (side).
One of the very best takes of the Colorsound Power Boost Dave Gilmour classics - where this comes in both 9V and 18V variants - depending on how much headroom you want / need! The only slight awkwardness here is the side-mounted Volume knob - which sort of thing can be a pet peeve of mine - but I'm prepared to put up with it mostly for this brand!
Colordriver 18 Volt Overdrive / Fuzz - $199.95
Controls - Treble, Drive, Bass, Volume (side).
I typically prefer the response of the 18V variants of this particular circuit - so the 18V variety is the one I would go for for myself. There's plenty of pretty decent Power Boost takes out there nowadays - in more compact and practical enclosures - while this is easy one of the best sounding ones!
Floyd Muff Fuzz - Various types - $199.95
Controls - Volume, Sustain, Tone.
The 'Floyd' Fuzz moniker covers all the key Big Muff varieties under one umbrella - even though the Red Army variety is also separately branded as the Red October type. As far as I and Josh Scott are concerned the Red Army and Civil War Muffs were produced at near enough exactly the same time with exactly the same parts - so those are pretty synonymous. I like all varieties of big muff - while the original Triangle and Ram's head editions are probably still my overall favourites of that type! As stated in the intro I would really need these to have an additional Mids control for me to find proper use for these!
Tru-Fi offer up the following varieties / edition of Floyd Muff :
- Tri-Angle Muff
- RAMs Head Muff
- Creamy Dreamer
- Red Army
- Civil War
The Ghost Vibe Uni-Vibe - $299.95
Controls - Volume, Mode : Vibrato / Chorus, Depth, Speed.
The fact that this was demoed by my good friend Alberto Barreras obviously helped to win me over here - that and the gorgeous deep purple of the stock enclosure. I thought I had baggsied a purple sparkle one - but only one of those turned up in the recent Joe's Pedals batch - and one was already promised to another ahead of me - so I snapped up the stock purple one instead - which actual colour / hue I probably prefer - as the sparkle version is rather more magenta than the deep purple hue of the one pictured above and in my previous visual. I reported at the time that over 100 had been sold already - where these were very exactingly engineered Ito match the original 1968 Vintage Photocell Uni-Vibe - with many / most of those same original parts values. To many Uni-Vibes are enormous in size - and I have a preference for the more compact editions!
Octavia Fuzz - $199.95
Controls - Volume, Boost, Mode : Fuzz / Octave.
A cool take on the Octavia Upper Octave Fuzz - specifically based on the Tycobrahe Octavia version - hence that hue of blue on the stock enclosure. As I mentioned in the intro - this should really have the Octave On / Off switch as a second footswitch - while this style of enclosure here does not really accommodate that! Sounds great in any case!
R*t Pack Distortion - $199.95
Controls - Distortion, Volume, Tone, Mode : Frank (Turbo LEDs) / Dino (Ge Diodes) / Sammy (Si Diodes).
A really cool 3-Mode variation of the Rat Distortion - mostly made with stock modern OP07 OpAmp I presume - while there is also an option for original LM308 for a few dollars more! You get 3 different modes of Rat here - Standard - Silicon Diodes, Turbo (2 Red LED's) and sort of Dirty Rat - with Germanium Diodes. A really highly regarded variety of the Rat format - while I think I have around 40 or more Rat varieties already - so this is a nice to have - but I wouldn't say no if offered!
Red October Red Army Muff Fuzz - $199.95
Controls - Volume, Sustain, Tone.
A very specific and exacting replica of the original variety of Sovtek / Russian Muff - where the very first was the Civil War style variety, which ever so briefly right at the start was also labelled 'Red Army Overdrive' on some of the very earliest pedals from that batch. If you follow Josh Scott and Kit Rae - you will know that the original Red Amy Overdrives and Civil War editions were wholly interchangeable - where only really the enclosure design was different. In any case these feature those now pretty rate original Soviet KT3102E Transistors.
Alas there are no demos currently for this pedal!
Sammy Fuzz Sam Ash Fuzzz Box - $189.95
Controls - Volume, Tone, Attack.
A formidable 60's Fuzz rolled out by the Sam Ash Music Store Group in fairly unique angular wedge shaped enclosures - in a kind of a burnt orange or fiesta red style of red pain job. This same circuit is also the Analog.Man Astro Fuzz - which I have and love - obviously fairly simple but great sounding - and really versatile 3-knob fuzz.
The Spider Fuzz TB MKI Fuzz - $199.95
Controls - Attack, Level.
A cool Tone Bender MKI take - named after David Bowie's 'Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars' album - whose lead guitarist Mick 'Ronno' Ronson was the first and most significant guitar legend to favour this pedal. I have a number of MK1 style fuzzes already in my collection - and all of those are minimum 3-knob varieties with an external Bias control as the 3rd knob. So Teddy really needs to update this format with a 3rd Bias knob - as that would be essential for my acquisition of this effect. I don't really buy Germanium fuzzes any more unless they have an external bias control! These Spider Fuzzes feature the original spec authentic Mullard OC75 + 2 x TI 2G381 Transistors. A great sounding fuzz for sure - beautifully made - but currently short of an external bias!
Supa Fuzz TB style Fuzz - $224.95
Controls - Attack, Level.
This one again suffers kind of the same challenge for me as the above Spider Fuzz - another 3 x Germanium Transistor Fuzz without an external bias. Teddy solved that issue for his Two Face fuzz - he now needs to do similar for his Germanium Tone Benders! Another great sounding fuzz - where I own a variety of this from Basic Audio - which has a 3-knob topology - but no external Bias either! This comes with an option of 3 x OC75 (Smooth) or OC81 (Fat) Ge Transistors.
There appears to be no current demo for this pedal - at least not that I could find!
Super Fuzz V2 - $199.95
Controls - Fuzz, Tone, Volume, Mode : Octave / Fuzz.
A really cool take on the Univox Superfuzz circuit - for which I already have several variants in the collection - including some very special version - like the Loe Sounds one. I really like this one, and it's in my second tier of Tru-Fi pedals - currently at nice-to-have level, but I would be happy to add this to the collection!
Treble Booster RangeMaster - $189.95
Controls - Boost, On/Off Range : Full Range, Treble Focus, Bass Focus.
A classic take on the RangeMaster - with original Germanium OC44 Transistor onboard - and 3-way range action via the toggle-switch. I have quite a lot of Treble Boosters in the collection already - including a couple of OC44 varieties - so not sure I really need this one - down as a nice-to-have for me at the moment.
Two Face Fuzz Germanium and Silicon Dual Fuzz Face - $199.95
Controls - Volume, Bias, Fuzz, Input Gain (on side or internal), Mode : '69 (Ge) / '70 (Si)
A really cool take on the Fuzz Face Circuit - with both Germanium and Silicon Transistors onboard - as '69 and '70 Mode options. Stock Germanium Transistors are AC125, and Silicon are BC108C. So you're essentially getting Two Fuzz Faces in 1 - ergo 'TwoFace Fuzz'. Would love to own one of these - although I already have several similar ones - in fact which offer mixing up the Germanium and Silicon Transistors too.
Ultra Tremolo (60's Kent Tremolo) - $199.95
Controls - Depth, Speed, Switch : Fast / Slow (Speed).
Vintage style Tremolo based on the 60\s Kent Tremolo - which in turn was just a different badged version of the original Schaller Tremolo. The output of this sounds a lot like Harmonic Tremolo - while it's not that variety - really deeply textured and distinct Tremolo - that is lots of players' secret weapon. I definitely want one of these - they tend to sell out pretty quickly whenever a new batch is produced!
Zosa Fuzz Vox TB style Fuzz - $224.95
Controls - Attack, Level.
Much like with the very similar Supa Fuzz (Marshall Supa Fuzz Bender) you get a choice here of 3 x vintage Mullard OC75 (Smooth), or OC81 (Fat) Germanium Transistors for a very classic Vox Tone Bender. And like the Spider Fuzz and Supa Fuzz - this really needs a further external Bias control to be fully worthy for my preferences. Great in every other way! Note once more that the swirly paint job in the visual is no longer an option - but there were quite a few made of that type - so some may turn up second-hand somewhat sporadically!
Final Thoughts
A fantastic range all-round with some really eye-catching enclosures and great sounding high quality circuits. I actually mostly really like the enclosure format - it's a cool bridge between vintage and modern styles - while it does have some limitations - no second footswitch option, and 4th knob needs to be side-mounted for instance.
A lot of these are near perfect vintage replicas with those self same original NOS components - including period-correct essential Germanium Transistors. While I would really want those 3 Germanium Transistor Tone Bender types to have a 3rd - Bias knob.
As mentioned - the top tier here for my preferences consists of the Ghost Vibe, Two Face Fuzz, and Ultra Tremolo - those are my must-haves. And in the second tier I may look to add an 18V Colordriver, R*t Pack and Super Fuzz.
If Teddy ever decides to add an external Bias control to his Germanium Tone Benders - then I would look to snap up at least the Spider Fuzz too! Those lucky 7 would be enough to represent the range for me.
We'll see how I go - while there is certainly plenty here to get stuck into.
Tru-Fi Pedals are obviously much easier to come by if you're in the Americas - but they're still small batch manufactured / crafted - and each one of those sells out very quickly. As mentioned in the intro most of the listed dealers don't really have any stock at the moment - and some don't even feature Tru-Fi at all any more. So your sources are limited. I will have to lean on my good friend Joe and his Joe's Pedals Boutique - for my Tru-Fi needs - which inevitably means a lot of waiting around for new batches to come in - which are really rather infrequent events alas!
