It took me a few years to pick up this full set of 4 - where each of these is a revelation - they all deliver more than you might initially think, and they do it in such a clever way. Each one of these is far greater than the sum of its parts - and all those parts are high quality THT components.

My only tiniest niggle here is that I feel the Grimalkin could do with a little more output volume, while all of these sound amazing, and are all super versatile.

We essentially have 2 fuzzes ...

At one stage - for a circa 2 year period Sof at Expresso FX was one of my very best friends - and I used to speak to him regularly - every couple of weeks or so. In that period I acquired 6 of his best, and some of those still remain as enduring classics to this day - while one of them has been further improved with an additional Low-Cut filter Knob over the two variants I have of that type.

Sof became distant during Covid - and despite several attempts, I’ve been unable to reestablish that...

I’ve pictured all 5 Mini Editions released to date - while only 3 of these are currently available at Joe’s Pedals - the ’69 and ’71 Colordrivers, and the Two Face Fuzz Face - which I own in original full-size edition - per the centrally pictured pedal in the visual!

The mini Pedals mostly have the same controls - as you can see by the 2 Colordriver models - which still have those 4 knobs (including one on the side), while the Mini Two Face drops the Input Gain knob which comes with the ...

New Pedals in the Class of 2025 Pedal-Chain Snapshot = 41

[OCTOBER]  = 9

[NOVEMBER] = 6

[MARCH] = 5

[SEPTEMBER] = 5

[AUGUST] = 4

[JANUARY] = 3

[FEBRUARY]  = 3

[APRIL] = 2

[JUNE] = 2

[MAY] = 1

[JULY] = 1

[A-Z by Brand]

1. Becos FX CompIQ Pro Yuna Soft Knee Blackmer VCA Studio Style Compressor [SEPTEMBER]
2. Blue Colander Grimrobe Dual Cascaded Super Rat [OCTOBER]
3. Blue FX Devices Fuzz Fields Ultimate Modulated Fuzz [SEPTEMBER]
4. Boss RT-2 Rotary Ensemble Leslie / Rotary Speaker

Probably the strongest selection of the year - each one of these is amazing and sounds killer. But then agin similar was true of the Overdrives. I’m very much a fuzz fanatic - so his selection has to take the edge - what a selection!

This selection includes 3 from EarthQuaker Devices, 2 from Drunk Beaver, 2 from Fjord Fuzz, and 2 from ThorpyFX.

It also includes the likely pedal of the year - within a selection of 10 award winners here - these are so good - I could have labelled even ...

Another super busy month for me - particularly towards the end - with numerous large scale articles out this week. That also coincided with my busiest week of the year for my other day job. Meaning that I was up until 4-5 in the morning every day - just to keep up with my commitments.

I was already somewhat shattered and burned out before I even got to this super busy period - and it’s a relief that all that work has now been completed on schedule.

I’m especially proud of my work on the Bucket ...

My close association with Thorpy started back in late September of 2018 - at the now defunct Olympia UK Guitar Show. He was the first pedal maker I reached out to, and the first I connected with.

Since then ThorpyFX Pedals have become my 3rd most populous selection after Boss and Drunk Beaver. Those 3 brands alone contribute over 200 pedals to my reference collection!

The fact that I’m now at 31 ThorpyFX Pedals is a major milestone - and features every mainline MKII pedal Thorpy has made. ...

For those that already own the Germanium Have Blue and Tacit Blue Pedals (like me) - the Redacted initially would seem to obsolete those - by providing versions of those 2 circuits in a single compact enclosure.

While those are not the same really - and contain quite different transistors onboard - the Have Blue and Tacit Blue have somewhat softer and smoother 2N-type Germanium Transistors. While the Redacted contains somewhat more aggressive - fierce even - mil-spec Transistors.

...

October was a super busy month - one of the busiest ever - with such a scope and scale and body of work covered - I’m quite shattered as a result!

We had of the penultimate Events of the year :

• The 2nd Woking Boutique Guitar Show
• Kempton Park London International Guitar Show

And around one dozen key posts  as below also :

• Letter from Dr.No
• Teaching Machines FuzzBillion Component Combinations Wheels Gain-Shaper
• Hangman fx DAGG’R Dynamic Auto-Gain/Gate Mighty Morphing Gain-Ramper