At one stage there was a 50/50 chance as to whether I would make the show - as there were significant disruptions on the Liverpool Street to Norwich line - which meant a bus replacement service between Colchester and Ipswich. Some of the journey times quoted were up to 4 and a 1/2 hours each way! In the end the door-to-door was closer to 3 hours in total! The journey up including the coach was actually more fun that the journey back via Cambridge. Cambridge has obviously sinned grievously as ...
May has been a little bit of strange month - lots of delays really, and waiting for pedals to land.
As inevitably happens most months - much was delayed this month, and I was unable to complete some of the larger articles - they will need to wait until next month, there’s certainly lots of projects in progress. Where new and imminent arrivals kind of scuppered several intended projects - hopefully they can be completed in June.
The first event I’m attending this month is tomorrow - as a micropub ...
Obviously the Glenn S. Wyllie Moonrock Fuzz circuit is back in vogue again largely because of JHS Pedals’ recent Coyote take - a somewhat slavish 2-knob recreation of that original. While G.S. Wyllie actually made a huge variety of Moonrock fuzzes over his years of operation - mostly in the ’Moon rock’ style oval enclosures - but also in square and more evenly circular boxes too. My good friend Henry Kaiser sent the below visual of a selection of G.S. Wyllie’s finest! Note that several of those...
As introduced at the recent Leeds Pedal Show - Northern Stompboxes alone has the really attractive Limited White Colourway Edition of the Fuzz Fields Modulated Fuzz and the IT.. LFO Modulator.
I own and love my original Fuzz Fields Black Set, but would be heavily conflicted if I didn’t already own one of these - I would likely have a preference for the White Set if starting from scratch, but I don’t feel it enough to want to change my unit - I’ve already bonded with it! - and everything ...
My first ever Mattoverse pedal was the acrylic-face edition of the Just A Phase, and I needed to wait several years until there was an equivalent AirTrash acrylic edition. I later picked up an acrylic-face Tremstortion, and finally a white edition of the Inflection Point. So I have 4 Mattoverse pedals to date!
I’ve always liked the AirTrash - a very unusual experimental noise-maker fuzz - which I always refer to as a signal scrambler and corruptor. Matt has always preferred for the 3 ...
This goes back to a demo that my good friend Pedal Experiments’ Phil did back in October of 2024 (2nd one below) - of the smallsound/BigSound Blarg o-tron o-tron.
He was in contact with Lucas from Rockwright around about the same time - they got to discussing the circuit, and decided to collaborate on an evolved compact edition of that circuit - which is what became the Phuzzmaphobia.
They weren’t the first to evolve the Blarg o-tron o-tron as the now alas defunct Dominican Republic’s ...
A slightly uneventful month in many ways - just the one event - the excellent sophomore Leeds Pedal Show - where I ended up picking up 3 pedals.
Some killer releases during the month, with a strong final flurry to make up the 10 notable article highlights. I’ve been very busy all month - and plenty of work has gone into this as usual, while there was somehow fewer large-scale rundowns and marquee features - more of that next month for sure.
HIGHLIGHTS for APRIL :
[Click on Images for ...
For me - these Dealer special White Light editions - are some of the prettiest varieties Spaceman has released to-date - with the white-out / snow-blind livery and striking cyan / teal LED’s - just gorgeous. I was missing the Atlas IV and Apollo VIIb - and Cream City Music and Axe and You Shall Receive were enormously helpful in getting those shipped to me in short order. I then spotted that my friend Scott at Axe and You Shall Receive also had a White Light Rumblefuzz II remaining - and I just...
I’ve been on friendly terms with Oleg from Russia’s Shift Line electronics for a number of years now - mostly on account of his killer original Termofuzz - first released in 2011. I’ve championed that super versatile fuzz for years, and long advocated for a reissue - which finally happened around the middle of last year. Obviously there is understandably no way to get products out of Russia to the UK these days - I’ve no idea how the Australian I bought this off managed to get one - possibly ...
After the quiet comfort of February, March unleashed an avalanched of work - both in terms of new releases and acquisitions, but especial in the field of Guitar and Pedal expos - where I attended 3 within a month - first The Birmingham Guitar Show at Cranmore Park, then the London Synth and Pedal Expo at Studio 9294, Hackney Wick - and then back to Birmingham for the Noise Maker Market at Centrala, Digbeth - all grand events.
I burned myself out a little this month, and came back willingly empty...