Chris Benson makes incredibly musical devices - and that is very much the case once more with his Jessica Dobson signature Deep Sea Diver Fuzz-Echo pedal. I don’t always gel with the horizontal medium enclosure format with is inoptimal dimensions - I don’t understand why this cannot be a vertical format - as it’s the pedal’s width which is mostly the limiting factor for pedalboard compatibility. All that needs to happen is that the enclosure layout is rotated 90 degress clockwise - so the ...

There’s an incredibly rich mix here of no less than 38 killer Modulations, Utilities and Pitch-Shifters - no one does rundowns quite like me! I always dive in at the deep end of things - and give you maximum expansive scope!

There are several here that I don’t have yet, in fact some hat I’m somewhat unlikely to ever have - for reasons of rig compatibility, size and overall sensibilities, practicalities, and preferences!

These 19 are still to be acquired or eventually overlooked :

Non-Human Audio introduced the 2-knobs Slow Loris Short Delay Line Dynamic Modulator about one year ago now - where it was incredibly enthusiastically received. Slightly reminiscent of a number of Delay Line Modulators - like say the Fjord Fuzz Loke, and Spaceman Effects Meridian - but hugely simplified - and with a slightly dissonant nature to the output.

And while inspired by the Slow Loris - this is a slightly differently calibrated effect with 2 different A + B Short Delay Lines - each ...

And so to the final category - where competition is extremely fierce this year. No doubt some of your favourites will have missed the cut here - but hopefully this selection is fully representative of the best of the year. Obvious I lean more towards immersive stereo effects - mono doesn’t really do it for me so much - while there is a smattering of mono pedals in here too. Price, format, versatility and practicality - everything counts!

Of the 23 featured in the selection - I own around ...

I’m not typically a fan of simple mono delays, while Chris Benson has indisputably created something really great with his fairly minimalist Benson Delay Pedal.

This originally Karaoke Machine PT2399 chip has been repurposed for myriad delay pedals over the years, but no one’s quite managed to eke as much flavour out of it as Chris does here - combining the core delay sound with an analog LFO - which introduces tape-like Wow & Flutter, and Warble into the proceedings.

Controls - LFO...

It felt right to cover these 2 fuzzes together as there are some superficial similarities here. The same size enclosure, and both with 4-Knob control topologies including a dedicated Filter control - and of course both originated in the 60’s - one in 1965 and one in 1969.

Of course there are significant differences too - in orientation, number of footswitches, and circuit makeup - these are both super versatile and great sounding fuzzes while each delivers something quite distinctly ...

The Boost, Overdrive and Distortion category is the most heavily contested, and indeed the most heavily congested category this year. I started with a Longlist of more than 70 and whittled down to the 39 featured here. Note that for balance I have included Rat pedals in the Fuzz Category already listed. This list features some of the more subtle fuzz-edged / fuzzy-drive varieties - although there will of course be some slight degree of overlap.

Featured above and listed here are 39 ...

Chris Benson’s Germanium Boost is actually his first attempt at creating the Auto-Biasing Germanium Fuzz. The first attempt consisted of using a voltage-controlled error correction circuit to bias a single Germanium Transistor. It ultimate didn’t work well enough for the Fuzz - which is overly sensitive to transistor gain. While it worked brilliantly as a Single Germanium Transistor Clean Boost - which is what we have here. It takes approximately 10 seconds for the self-biasing ...

I actually only got to know ’Axe and You Shall Receive’ Owner / Founder Scott Hager relatively recently - while I first bought a pedal from his store (courtesy of Reverb.com) back in 2017 - my much loved ’Gold Bar’ edition of Dr Scientist’s The Elements Preamp / Drive which readers will have seen heavily featured on this site.

Earlier this year - back in March in fact - Scott and I bonded over Big Tone Music Brewery’s (BTMB) EQ’d Vintage Series...