Mad Professor strips out the Sweet Honey Overdrive portion from its original mid-size Super Black Fender Blackface style Preamp - for a more streamlined and pedalboard-friendly experience.

The Super Black Mini retains the main controls :

Super Black Mini Controls - Bass Cut Switch, Compression Switch, Presence, Volume, Gain, Bass, Middle, Treble.

Where when you compare it to the original :

Super Black Original Controls - MAIN } Bass, Middle, Treble, Gain, Volume, Presence, Bass ...

You may recall that the last time I did a Mad Professor roundup I still had 3 long-term targets remaining - that I was hoping to land somewhat opportunistically.

And just recently my good friend Joe Light had a pristine second-hand Sky Blue available on his Joe’s Pedals store - which I snapped up at a great price. And while looking around for my other 2 active Mad Professor targets - I was given an offer on a near pristine Double Moon too - at a price that I could not refuse. So in quick ...

I’ve been a huge fan of the Dumble sound for several years now, and have around 20 pedals representing that genre. All my Dumbles hit slightly differently and each has a distinct usage scenario - with some excelling at the cleaner lower-gain tones - like the Clean-Fusion II, and others delivering an incredibly mid-rangey sear - like the Zenkudo.

My very first ’Dumble’ was the Mad Professor Simble - back near the start of 2017 - that was recently reissued as a MKII with some further Lassi ...

36 outstanding Boost and Overdrive pedals  featured here in various sizes - 35 of which are already in the reference collection - with the Superlunar SR-01 the last remaining straggler!

The rules of the game are that I can only finally recommend pedals that I own and have lived with, while I can also feature a few other intended targets in the overview which I fully intend to acquire (like the Superlunar SR-01) - but those can’t feature in the final rankings. So there is only one remaining ...

It’s great news that Mad Professor’s high quality Handwired Series is back in circulation with 3 of its best loved pedals. I’m not sure any of these are specifically for me - as I already have the Anniversary version of the Royal Blue, and I prefer the more expansive shaping of the Deluxe format of Sweet Honey Overdrive. So I’m very happy to see these back - while the one Handwired pedal that’s high on my priority list - the Sky Blue Overdrive - has yet to be re-issued!

The re-issued ...

July was a tough month for me! Plenty going on for sure - and I had a particularly traumatic Sunday a couple of weeks back - when I was unable to get any sound out of my pedal-chain for the best part of that day. At the end of that I retired incredibly frustrated and kind of distraught - which zapped whatever remaining energy I had - and left me entirely shattered.

After a night’s sleep - I turned up  a little sharper on the following day - and was able to fairly quickly and systematically ...

It seems a long while since I first met the new owners of Mad Professor the Iconic Finnish Pedal Brands - Jussa and Mikko - at the London Synth and Pedal Expo back in March - where they announced their new MK2 Simble. They were sort of queuing up the pre-sales for that pedal - which started a week or two later, but it took quite the while for it to be officially launched and in stock.

I’ve been a big fan of Mad Professor pretty much from the start - especially as it’s somewhat connected to ...

The original Simble was my very first Dumble Drive pedal, and I still have very warm feelings about that beautifully balanced, organic and natural sounding Overdrive. For several years this was my favourite of that type - and I always felt that the wood-finish enclosure was very representative of its organic sound.

I guess Mad Professor are now reserving the brown colourway for their Brown Sound #1 Pedal. It’s cool to see the more emphatic Mad Professor branding on said pedal - where the ...

So - we’ve had 3 incredible guitar gear events this month - covering Birmingham, then Woking, and now London - in probably my favourite venue on the circuit. Studio 9294 is such a unique place - having the outside canal-side terrace, and superb next-door restaurant and bar - in the guise of Number # 90 - which always serve up a very decent lunch! With the sun out - like we experienced at the weekend - this venues is wholly glorious - there’s a cool nearby Sainsbury’s, and indeedned ’Bad Coffee’...