Xploration • Curation • Recommendation
Beetronics' new Abelha Tropical 4-knob Fuzz combines 3 Flavours of Fuzz with an alternative High Pass Filter Mode
Key Points
Beetronics’ Abelha Tropical Fuzz celebrates Brazil’s 1970’s Tropicalia Movement, offering Polen (sagged low gain buzz), Nectar (round high gain fuzz), and Honey (sweet high gain drive) flavours across Buzz and Tropical Modes.
Controls include Loud, Flavour, Buzz, Hi EQ and Lo EQ. Its dual-mode footswitch provides momentary action or double-tap engagement of the Tropical High-Pass-Filter Mode. LEDs indicate modes and alternate colours when engaged.
The standard edition is $289; Custom Shop Editions are $349. Available from Beetronics’ Webstore and Reverb.com Store, with International Dealers imminent. The pedal has a 3D-printed surface and oversized enclosure.
Beetronics’ new fuzz celebrates the tones of Brazil’s 1970’s Tropicalia Movement. With 3 different flavours of Buzz, Fuzz and Drive across default Buzz or Tropical Mode.
The Flavour switch helps you define your core tone and texture - which you can then fine-tune with Hi and Lo knobs - and engage the Tropical Mode to shave off some of the low-end.
Controls - Loud (Volume), Flavour : Polen (sagged low gain buzz) / Nectar (round high gain fuzz) / Honey (sweet high gain drive), Buzz (Fuzz), Hi EQ, Lo EQ, Dual Mode Footswitch - Momentary action or Double Tap to fully engage alternative Tropic High-Pass-Filter Mode.
This is another Beetronics pedal where I like the standard edition the best - it looks really beautiful up close - with subtle monochromatic variations in the 3D-printed surface. You also have 3 pairs of LEDs which are default lit Blue for Normal Buzz Mode, and Green for Tropical Mode - once the peal is engaged those Paris alternate colours - Blue/Pink/LightPink for Buzz Mode, and Blue/Yellow/Green for Tropical Mode.
It’s another really smart pedal from Beetronics - looks great, sounds great and benefits from smart functions - it’s a little over-sized for my preferences - so I didn’t leap on it immediately. But will probably hit the trigger fairly soon. Definitely down on the wishlist - even though I would have preferred it in a more pedalboard-friendly enclosure - not sure why it needed to be quite this big!
Interesting the current crop of Custom Shop Editions - which are of course a little dearer, those do nothing for me!
The Abelha Tropical Fuzz is available right now from the Beetronics Webstore and their Reverb.com Store and will surely be available imminently at International Dealers too. Standard edition is $289, and Custom Shop Editions got for $349.
When I do get the Abelha - it will be my 10th Beetronics pedal - which is a pretty decent milestone for that brand!
Demos
