Acorn Amps new Adaptive Droning Hyperfuzz Device is a Glitchy, Bit-crushing, Octave Square Wave Guitar Synth Oscillator masquerading as a Fuzz Pedal

The ADHD is for sure a quirky proposition of a fuzz with a suitably kitschy artwork to match. In fact considering how much is going on with this device - the 5 controls hardly seem sufficient to fully exert control over everything onboard.

Acorn describes it as an adjustable square wave oscillator paired with a rambunctious fuzz circuit which combined creates a wildly interactive noise box. 

8-bit vintage video game tones become searing octave leads with the turn of the five control knobs. The synth noise oscillator can be controlled using an external expression pedal or tuned by hand with the Frequency knob. The circuit utilises a voltage-controlled timer that blends with the gain control of an LM386 amplifier IC chip to produce interactive and layered bit crushed octave-up-and-down fuzz tones - that can be sculpted even further along the Frequency bandwidth with the Tone / Filter / Bandwidth control. You can quickly and easily transform your guitar into an expansive multi-textured fuzzy synthesizer.

Controls - Threshold (Drone), Frequency (Drone Pitch), Level, Balance (Oscillator to Fuzz Mix), Tone (Bandwidth).

This for me is in essence a sort of simplified PLL Synth-Fuzz as far as I’m concerned - a format at its best in the fairly recent Beetronics Swarm version. That one can be quite tricky to tame though - and Acorn have essentially extracted most of the textural goodness from that circuit without any of those inherent complexities.

I so liked this upon first exposure that I ordered one immediately - I will file it alongside my 2 x Mantic Flex / Pro devices, my Beetronics Swarm, and the Pedal PCB Mini Heterodyne Receiver. I feel this gives you the perfect inroads into those classic PLL tones - but with the minimum of fuss - and of course the Maximum of Fuzz!

I’m concerned that the quirky artwork may put off a few prospects - while I feel it’s entirely suitable and actually pretty right for the circumstances.

The ADHD is available right now on the Acorn Amps Webstore for $149 - I should warn you that they have a habit of announcing these as limited releases kind of after the fact - so if you snooze on these you often loose out. I was very lucky that they consented to doing a second batch of the Kakarot - which just landed for me very recently.

The only thing I would note here is the diversity of artwork styles on these different Acorn pedals - all are totally different and don’t seem to have any sort of brand-mark consistency - in terms of a recognisable brand visual style - which can make brand / product recall more tricky than it need be. While I really love most of those artworks however much at odds they are with each other!

What say all of you dear readers - are you fans of these too?

Did any of you get one of the Kakarots - and if so which colour - and are you considering this ADHD also?