greatmutah2112

Depends on the fuzz. I don’t care for Muffs or Fuzz Faces with humbuckers much. And higher output pickups are a no go. The overload the front end too much. Tone Benders? I’ve got a EQD Park Fuzz and I love it with singles, P90s, HBs and Filter’trons. The tone control is very powerful on that and it works great. It’s based off a Mk3 Tone Bender. I do want to try a MK2 Bender eventually. Might grab an EQD Barrows. If you want to use a Muff with HBs you can always put a SD-1 or TS in front of the Muff set to clean boost (volume up, gain at 0, tone to taste). I prefer an SD-1 because it cuts more lows and really tightens up the pedal. Muffs also can be put anywhere in the chain so it’s not as important to have them be first to see the pickups. Fuzz Faces and Tone Benders should be first before anything. I’ve tried them in other spots and this just works. Rats are more distortion boxes than fuzz per se but they can get pretty fuzzy. Catalinbread’s Katzenkönig is set up like a Mk 2 Bender but with the added EQ section of a Rat. I really like this one because it doesn’t cut as much lows as a Rat does and can get pretty fuzzy and raunchy at higher settings. Also has an input knob to balance the pedals input impedance against your pickups or wherever it’s at in the chain. Makes it buffer friendly. Lastly, but certainly not least, is Octave Fuzz. There’s a few variations out there but the mains are stuff based off the Ace Tone Fuzzmaster and the Octavia. My experience is with variations of the Ace Tone Fuzzmaster. EQD does a variation called the Fuzz Master General which takes the Fuzz Master circuit and adds a tone knob (originals had a tone switch) to go from scooped to mid heavy and anywhere in between. I love this pedal. It also has clipping options. Ge transistors, Si, or none for a cleaner boost and just the octave. The octave overtones only come into play on the neck pickup above the 12th fret with the tone rolled way back on the guitar. It’s a glitchy gnarly sound and with the mids up it cuts well. The Catalinbread Octapussy is closer to a Octavia in design but is still more mid forward and less scooped. Great with just about anything.

Yeah I got my Mk I in the wave of the first 25. Funny story… earlier that year I won an auction on eBay for 4 Greenbacks and asked if I could meet the guy in Saginaw. He sent me George’s address and told me to meet him there. That was Danny Ardouin and he introduced me to George and they sold me an amp by having me play his prototype and 12380. I made an order shortly thereafter and got #22. This was when it only had the 68 and modded 68 modes. He later did the 66 mode and offered free upgrades to anyone who wanted to send theirs in. So I drove back up and he happily ripped my amp apart to get it up to date lol. Last time I saw George in person was before my son was born in 2018. Took my amp up just to have it looked over and checked out and say hello. He gave it a clean bill of health but while he had it on the bench he let me try the clipping diode he was using for the DVL-1s. Offered to put it in too. We A/B’ed that a couple times against the stock and I stayed with the stock because I liked it better. More classic plexi chime in that one. I could have had a DVL-0.5 hahaha. George is a salt of the earth human being and I’m bummed his business went this way but I hope he’ll be back in some capacity. Why a company like Boutique Amp Design or someone else hasn’t offered to buy and produce his designs and have him on as a consultant is beyond me. Yeah, I know folks will say Dave Friedman’s stuff is already in their portfolio and I get that… but Dave’s stuff sounds like a recording of a perfected modded Marshall. George’s amps sound and feel like real 60s Marshalls. George’s amps capture the raspiness and raw edginess of the old Plexis.

It’s been a massive bummer. I still read the Friday blurbs from George. I’m sad I wasn’t able to jump on one of the Mk IIs but my Mk I is going strong still. George loved building amps. When I took mine back in to have the free upgrade done to give it 3 modes instead of 2, George was so geeked to tear into mine just to make sure I had the latest updates and best sounds available. That amp is my desert island amp. It can do anything I want it to do. And I’ll always be thankful that I got to meet the man before I bought it which cemented me buying it. Playing the prototype alongside his 68 Superlead sealed it.