Tag: guitar effects

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Guitar Equipment

Kinda Miss My Camaro

CamaroFuzzTopCC copyAbout 10 years ago I had a dark purple 1986 Camaro Berlinetta with a 305 and the digital ‘knight rider’ instrumentation panel.  I bought it for $775 (only 83k miles!) from an old lady who grumbled, “don’t kill yourself Don Johnson” as she handed me the keys.  Except for one odd incident in which the car would simply not turn off,  it was 100% reliable and I loved driving it.  I sadly had to sell it because I lost the parking space it slept in.  I was poking around the ole MacBook today trying to find some pics of it, and there ain’t even one!  I guess that 2005 was maybe riiiiiiiight before the era of ubiquitous photography of every single fkkn facet our goddamn lives, and maybe I’m better off for it.  Maybe Camaro is just better off living in my midnight-blue tinted memories.

Camro_Fuzz_insideWhile I couldn’t find any Camaro car pics on the laptop, I did stumble on the above-depicted germanium Fuzz Face ‘clone’ that I decorated with a mid-seventies Camaro badge.  I buy these old chrome auto badges in lots at the flea market; if yr patient, you can get em for a buck or two each.  Anyhow, this is one of the only guitar pedals that I ever built and it turned out great, despite the fact that I simply used whatever old NOS RCA germanium PNP transistors I had around, without so much as even looking at the data sheets.  I just tried a few different types until the thing sounded like a Fuzz Face, and voila.  One cool detail: in the image above, check out the massive mil-type chassis-mount oil cap (far left) that I used as the output coupling cap.

fuzzfacepnpschematic copy
Above is the very simple schematic that I apparently pulled from FuzzCentral.  Much like my Camaro (the car), my Camaro (the fuzz) was sold off many years back, and yeah I kinda miss it.  Can’t keep em all…

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Guitar Equipment

Maestro FX units of 1972

Maestro_Rover_1972Today at PS dot com: just a quick look at some of the state-of-the-art in guitar/keyboard FX of 1972, courtesy the Maestro division of Chicago Musical Instruments, also parent to the Gibson brand of instruments.  Maestro made a lot wackier stuff than even the above-depicted Rover (a mini-leslie-on-a-stick) – Rhythm and Sound, anyone? – and we’ll get to it all eventually.  There’s only so much past I can write about, people…

Maestro_sustainer_1972Above: This does not appear to be a legitimate doctor. At best, he will likely ‘goose’ you whilst you are subdued via anesthesia.  I don’t really understand why a sleazy physician makes a good metaphor for a compression pedal.

Maestro_Fuzztone_1972Above: SuperFuzz.  It’s like a smug cop.  Ok…

Maestro_RingMod_1972Above: the Maestro Ring Modulator.  This is a rare one, I believe.  Do you get the feeling that this advert tells NOTHING about what this thing actually sounds like, other than it makes ‘unheard of sounds?’  This is likely because ring mod is really very hard to describe in words, and its effects really can be incredibly varied.  It actually synthesizes new pitches by outputting the sum and difference (in hertz) of your monophonic performance input and some second signal – in this case, likely an internal ‘carrier’ oscillator whose pitch is determined by the panel fader there.  I love ring mod.  It’s great that a few companies (Moog, EH) are making ring mod pedals again. A truly wild sound with a ton of applications for modern music.

Echoplex_1972Above: The Echoplex line of 1972.  The EM-1, ES-2, and EP-3.  Better than hanging out in a trash can.  Kinda need one of these.

Maestro_Brassmaster_1972Above: The Bass Brassmaster.  Tuba/trombone/bass sax players end up homeless/hobos/vagrants as a result.  Great, thanks.

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Guitar Equipment

Ibanez Analog Guitar Effects of the early 80s

Ibanez_AD202_1981Above: the Ibanez AD202 c. 1981.  A multimode analog delay with modulation section.  I had one of these in maybe 1994 and it was a phenomenally great unit.  What on earth did I do with it? No idea where it ended up.   It had this great crunch to it when it overloaded.

Ibanez_Effects_Connection_1981Above, the Ibanez UE-400 and and UE-405, also c. 1981: 4x analog rack-mount multi-effects units.  I found a UE-405 (the one with Delay) with the pedal+ a rack case in a Minnesota Guitar Center in maybe 2003?  I paid about $150.  I used it on a few tracks and sold it when I moved apartments.  Bad move, even at a big profit…  another great unit that I wish I had kept.  BTW, above, I love that dude is using his UE-40X’s with a blond Fender Bassman piggyback.  Pretty good, pretty good…

Ibanez_FX_1984Above: the complete Ibanez FX lineup of 1984, right before the transitioned to the single-rackspace digital units.  I recently found the ‘bass’ pedal-board unit (compressor, flanger, and envelope filter) for $60 at the flea market.  Which seemed expensive, but I was given many assurances.  Dude totally ripped me off!  It had some weird distortion issue that I could not easily diagnose.  To the transfer station with that one.  Caveat emptor…Ibanez_FX_1988Above, an ad for root beer, bad denim, and hairspray c. 1988.  I think they lost my interest by this point.

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Some oddball Guitar Pedals of the 1980s

VestaFire_R1X_reverb_1988

I’ve been buying and selling guitar effects pedals for a long time; I currently have maybe 60, and have probably had 300-400 pass through my hands at one time or another.  There are just so many of the fkkn things out there that I’m bound to find at least a couple every month for $5 – $10 at the yard sales and flea markets of Southern CT.  I also have all the available books on the subject, but even still, there were just so many of these things made that I am bound to be surprised regularly.  Here are three interesting units that I have never come across.  Above: The VestaFire R-1X digital reverb c. 1988.

Sescom_PC100_compressor_1981Above: Sescom, 80’s maker of some pretty excellent DI boxes, also made a guitar compression pedal in 1981?  Probably worth checking out.  This thing was crazy expensive at the time, btw, $254 in ’13-bucks.  Anyhow, as deep+ wide as the pool of vintage pedals is, can you even imagine how nuts its gonna be 25 years from now, what with the huge explosion in ’boutique’ and ‘DIY’ pedal-craft of the past decade.  It’s really taken on folk-art proportions.

Castle_Phaser_III_1981Above: The Castle Phaser III of 1981.  Goddamn folks loved the shit outta Phase Shift way back when.

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Yu Brother, I <3 U

YuBrother_mics_FX_1981Above: best ad ever.  “Yu Brother” (what???) of Taiwan introduces their line of microphones and guitar effect pedals in 1981.  “From popular to professional type, we have got it all!”  Yes you do, brother.   This might as well be from another planet.