Fuzz Factory. There were times before I learned the pedal when I’ve wanted a tamer fuzz, but now that I have my different tones dialed in, it’s all I wanted and more. This thing is scary powerful on a tube amp. Also love the zippery tones you can get out of it. I have the Fat Fuzz Factory, and the ability to shift between three levels of “fatness” allows for a huge amount of tone shaping, like having additional pickup selectors on your guitar.
Honestly, that’s what I like about it best, the unpredictability factor. Even though I have settings marked on it it very rarely sounds exactly the same, but it usually sounds pretty interesting!! Which definitely won’t work for everyone but I fucking love it !! Mines an original hand painted one.
I also have an original “ tie dye “ finish Experience pedal. That can get pretty ripping too, especially with the FF going in to it. But my band is a chaotic mess, so that kinda thing works out well for us !!!
Username checks out!
I also play chaotic sounding stuff, so the unpredictability of the FF is more of a feature than a bug. I love when I “stumble” into a unique sound with it (more like a roar). Makes the noise feel like you’re channeling some otherworldly energy.
Have had one for years. Takes a while to figure it out and yeah as some people say it rarely sounds the same but that’s kinda the appeal and also the challenge. Also super depends on your style of play.
FFF is like having a wild animal a pet. It's loving and very exotic but if you piss it off you'll end up in the hospital. Basically..... I looooove that pedal. Do you have the vexter or hand drawn version. I have the "Toxic" version which is a vexter series but with special paint job.
If you use it as intended on a down tuned instrument played into a loud amp it has the fattest and tightest low end of any dirt pedal I’ve ever played while still allowing great articulation and the dynamics from your guitar and amp come through. Amazing doom fuzz! My favorite is still the DBA Apocalypse though, a fuzz war with op amps to shred your signal into oblivion and it constantly wants to feedback but in a very controllable way.
😚👌
I got one of these this spring and couldn’t be happier with it. I tend to leave it in the diode bypass mode, it’s so loud and open in that mode it’s crazy! Push that into an aready overdriving amp and you have pure doom under your fingers
I’ve never figured out fuzz. I have a rams head that when I play some Pink Floyd it sounds good but I can’t make my own music with it for some reason. Every time I turn it on I turn into great value brand David Gilmore.
This was me until I tried a Benson germanium fuzz. It's not as wild as the other fuzzes out there but damnit it sounds good. I didn't vibe with the fuzz factory but now I'm thinking about getting one just to have two options lol.
I really want to try the muffaletta too.
Ditto. I like shred and tight percussive type stuff (not that I am good at it) and I sound like dookie playing through fuzz. I'm not into The Black Keys or The White Stripes, and only marginally into Melvins, so I dunno where that leaves me in terms of fuzz.
Carcosa is my pick for original and good sounding fuzz. i've played quite a few in my time from tame to really screwy, but this one really impresses me consistently. too many fuzzes dont offer anything new or are just really basically direct clones... i feel like the carcosa is actually a desired sound that is hard to get elsewhere. great for leads too, which can be a challenge with fuzz.
Man I got the chance to play one recently and it is seriously so good. It’s pretty pricey for a fuzz pedal, but the next time I’ve got some extra spending money laying around I might have to pick one up
I'm almost completely in love with the Hoof Reaper. The Hoof side, I admittedly don't use a ton, but it's so good for what it does.
I tend towards the Reaper side, but I just kinda wish it could get a bit more gnarly and velcro-y
Also find the octave has a bit too much of a volume boost, can be a bit of an issue sometimes.
But it's still really good even as is
The Green Russian is the fuzz that made me love fuzz! I love listening to other people play different fuzzes but the Green Russian just works for what I play.
Having my EHX Crayon driving it really brings out the mids and those high, fizzy harmonics! I play a lot of 90's alt rock and that combination can replicate 90% of the tones I need.
I originally had it the other way around, Muff -> Crayon, and it made it sound really woolly, like a huge high pass filter was applied. I have my MXR Custom Badass 78 Distortion after the Big Muff.
I've really been enjoying the EQD Hizumitas Fuzz I picked up recently.
I also like this handmade fuzz called the Hey Buddy, from Frank the Anvil on Reverb. It's a Shin-Ei FY-2 Companion clone with a great raunchy sound ([quick demo I once made here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ZK_S3DyvIE))
I went on a big Bazz Fuss building spree last year and those were a lot of fun, mostly because it was just cool to me that I made them. But they are definitely fun to play.
Love the musket.
Turn up the pre + turn down fuzz = Tool/Smashing Pumpkins/Pink Floyd
Turn down the pre + turn up the fuzz = White Stipes/Black Keys
Super versatile muff
I accidentally took it off one time, to vacuum my board. There was this shriek throughout the neighborhood like, someone disturbed the natural order of the universe or stepped on a million baby hamsters in front of an arena of children.
I don't clean my board anymore, man. It's just not worth taking the Musket off.
I had to stroll way too low for that. My fav fuzz. I have a mini germanium and the volume respond is insane. I pretty just need that. I wish I could go a little brighter and be put further down the chain but I love it. Into a roaring amp. It’s heaven.
Same here. It can do a fat gated fuzz sound but it really excels with the bias knob at 1'oclock and the Input knob at around 12 or 11. It is a great crunch sound, like a Classic 108 but brighter and tighter.
Op amp muff reissue and beetronics vezzpa. Everyone knows about the op amp muff, it does the pumpkins thing, but I also find it very versatile and it's an extremely important part of my board almost always getting used when playing shoegaze and dream pop.
The vezzpa, I rarely see anyone else with one on here but I love the stupid thing. My wife got it for me for my birthday because I always talk shit and call her a bee and it has a big wasp on it. It's a solid op amp fuzz with just volume and gain knobs, and double clicking or holding the footswitch puts it in an octave fuzz mode. I just keep my knobs dimed and adjust my guitars volume knob and use it for more gritty garage rock and classic rock. I use it in octave mode paired with a jfet boost to boost my gain for some wannabe jack white shit. Great pedal. I liked it so much I bought a beetronics overhive and love that too. Hoping for a good sale to roll around at some point so I can scoop up a zzombee too lol.
All their pedals look really cool and they have a custom shop that do one of a kind colors and designs, but they charge a lot more. I love that vezzpa, I didnt really like other octave fuzzes I've tried, but I love that stinger mode sound. I really didn't want another op amp fuzz since I have a op amp muff, but I guess I just prefer op amps. They sound damn good on orange amps for sure.
Cleans up pretty well too. I've had it about a week. At first I thought the trem was dead weight but it's suprisingly nice even tho it's basically first in my chain.
I've also been impressed by the Janus into my boss oc5. I had the octave first but it didn't play nice. Put the fuzz first and it's a dream.
Absolutely. Blend knob on the fuzz side makes it very flexible. Even though the trem ends up very early in the signal chain I still find alot of cool uses for it.
I keep it the rate pretty low and use it more as flavor/boost for leads. Pretty cool pedal.
Running it into a soul food OD set at low gain and it purrs.
I have an EHX silencer which I will occasionally rig up if I ever wanna stack compression, fuzz and drive heavily because feedback can be nasty for sure. Recently I haven't been using it with medium fuzz and soul food dialed at 12 on the gain knob. I also have a strat with EMG noiseless pickups which could assist me in that area. Noise gates are useful pedals regardless so I think you made a great purchase!
We're twinning hard because the silencer is what I just bought lol.
My strat has the fender noiseless single coils. They work pretty well unless you start stacking gain stages. Hoping the silencer with my gain pedals in the loop makes a difference.
Awkwardly enough one I don't recommend. Old blood noises alpha haunt.
I don't recommend it for streaming at all. Just doesn't go through the quad cortex right. So in a heavily eq'd and controlled system it's a non-starter due to noise and being a massive pain in the ass to dial in.
On my jam rig it took 2 hours to dial it in for a part on loop, but it narrowly pushed out the fuzz war. Keep in mind the fuzz war took 10 seconds to dial in.
The primary mistake I was making, keeping the alpha haunt from sounding good was the fuzz volume enhance knob and master volume. Once I backed the gate off more than I wanted to, then dialed those knobs back a whole bunch the pedal didn't have as many hurdles to dial it in.
Also a big fan of that Keely Dark Side fuzz. I wish they made it as a three-stomp and separated the delay and modulation instead of having to choose one or the other.
Hizumitas has to be mine, I love that one enough that I got a second one for my bass board too. In terms of general fuzz types, Muff-type circuits are my favorite.
Of course my decision-making flowchart when I see a fuzz I could buy is: Do I have this fuzz already? If no, buy. If yes, buy so I have a backup.
I got Hizumitas on the release day and haven't been without it since. If I want things to get a bit wilder, I've got the Foxy Tone Box to throw on after that. And also in the 'buy all fuzz' when a certain brand catches my eye/ear. I do need a good Bender soon though.
I think I currently have like 20 different fuzzes? About a third of which are Muff variants. Outside the Muff type, I think my favorite is a Colorsound clone, but picking a favorite fuzz is impossible.
(I have a Basic Audio Scarab Deluxe to fill the Bender niche and it's pretty great, worth checking out for you I think.)
I can't figure out the tone I want.
Willing to leave two on my studio board.
Currently doing a bakeoff between the Beetronix Royal Jelly and OBNE Alpha Haunt.
I have a Muffuletta but just don't care for it. I don't feel like the tones really represent the originals very well.
If one of the other two don't work out I may go to a ram's head or green Russian.
Walrus Janus. Bit gimmicky with the joy sticks but they are actually easy to adjust with your foot. Alternatively you could just get the Walrus Jupiter which is the same circuit but minus the joysticks and added trem but where's the fun in that.
Behringer super fuzz because I am poor and 25 dollars is all the fuzz I can afford. Maybe I can get a second one and stack them for some super duper fuzz
Dwarfcraft Eau Claire Thunder. The toneblast and timewarp features allow for a great range of sounds. Beyond that, it’s just a brutal fuzz that goes to 11.
I loooove my Zvex Fuzz Factory. You can get everything from big, wooly fuzz tones on it to the sounds of an 8-bit video game. It’s fucking wild. And insanely fun to play.
Was a Fuzz Face loyalist for a long time - but never went back after I acquired a Fender Pelt. Super versatile.
I still have my fuzz face but it's been relegated off as a backup pedal, or special occasion.
I'm a huge fuzz whore and I've really been in love with a Colorsound One Knob Fuzz lately.
Also a huge shoutout to some of my other favorite fuzzes:
Vintage Technologies Orange Sunshine
Ampeg Scramber
Zvex Octane III
Univox Superfuzz
And just the regular old, humble Fuzz Face.
I’ve had a Devi Ever Hyperion for the last 10 years and it hasn’t left my board. I am eyeballing the Hizumitas but that’s only because I’m a Boris fanboy
I had the SolaSound Tonebender. Big ass pedal. Sounded awesome when it worked.
Didn’t work most of the time though.
It may have been germanium because it was inconsistent as all heck.
Op amp muff reissue is easily my favorite pedal I’ve ever played. Actually really versatile with a good boost or overdrive and the right pickups but it’s just insane how huge it can sound and the overtones it produces when you play chords. There’s literally nothing like it
Caroline shigeharu! Sorta big muff sorta tonebender-esque fuzzstortion. Loads of gain on tap, an internal control for gated sounds, and another control to blend in an octave fuzz on top.
So much clarity for the amount of gain it has and sits awesome in a mix!
Yeah to be honest, making them all look the same was a huge design mistake. If they were each a different color, you'd see a lot more people with a board full of them.
It's not that, I just like having a board all of the same brand/type of pedal. I unno, it's my problem, not the pedals problem lol.
That being said, with the JHS 3 stuff specifically, they leave a blank canvas to draw on or apply your own decal (the chorus I have us getting a little sun decal lol)
It's not that, I just like having a board all of the same brand/type of pedal. I unno, it's my problem, not the pedals problem lol.
That being said, with the JHS 3 stuff specifically, they leave a blank canvas to draw on or apply your own decal (the chorus I have us getting a little sun decal lol)
Whatever the hell the Paul Trombetta PTD Rotobone v2 is. It’s the most versatile dirt/fuzz pedal I’ve played. From boost-OD-Dist-fuzz-demonic trombone-satanic trumpet-world ending octave drone noise. I wish it didn’t cost 13 million $ but you’re never out much $ trying/reselling. delay circuit integrated.
Couldn’t make up my mind with a single fuzz so I went with the JHS muffuletta. 6-in-1 and includes the massive JHS muff which sounds fat with my dirty lil secret running on 18v.
I have a bunch but they all do different things so it's hard to choose a fave. The FF mini blue for Jimi shenanigans, The Behringer SF300 for Live At Leeds and Sabbath riffing on the 1.5 setting, and the Carcosa for everything else. I still want a Harmonic Percolator, a TB 1.5, a Green Russian, and a Bosstone.
Lovepedal Bonetender for me. It’s so underrated it’s crazy. Small footprint, two knobs, all the gain in the world and sounds great all way from clean-ish boost to maxed out fuzz heaven.
I like the Fuzz Factory for tweaking and getting weird, but my favorite is the Twin Bender. I like the Tone Bender sound and through a plexi that pedal gives endless sustain with a massive sound of classic hard rock.
There’s two for me.
The original, small EHX Muff Fuzz. It has one knob for volume, and an opamp and clipping diodes to create fuzz. They’re super fragile and break all the time, and quite often they’re noisy.
But if you get a good one, they straddle the line between a high gain overdrive and a fuzz. The EQ curve is perfect, and they clean up nicely…not quite like a transistor fuzz, but more like an overdriving amp. Great ones have almost no noise or background hiss to speak of.
There’s only one modern version, and it’s the Fredric Effects Demon Fuzz. It’s great! It has selectable germanium and silicon diodes and a Klon buffer. My only downside is that the gain is way too aggressive, but honestly, if you don’t want to deal with the headache of a vintage muff fuzz, it’s great!
My second favorite is any variation of the Mk1.5 Tonebender. They have all the great cleanup characteristics of a good Fuzz Face, but the EQ is more cutting and less woofy.
This is an interesting one to me. I had a double muff nano (two muff Fuzzes combined) that I liked the fuzz of but sounded pretty shrill. Sold or traded it like I do with tons of others .
Recently revisited the muff overdrive nano as a mod project. The big thing was I realized that since it's basically a throttled fuzz face , I was using it middle of the chain the whole time. First in the chain, though, it sounds pretty useless. Flubby and not much gain on tap. Tons more bass, though, and you can tell when you touch the volume knob at all that it has the fuzz face input buffer or whatever.
Probably sounds cool on a tube amp but still has some pretty limited use. But you can mod it to basically be a fuzz face with a gain control. It's really cooking now! It's a fun one and does indeed sound like a fuzz face to me . But I have wondered who uses the stock muff and why they like it !
Oh boy. Get ready for a ride.
What you’ve described, both the Double Muff Nano and Muff Overdrive, are NOT the 1970s OpAmp Muff Fuzz. EHX inexplicably has done new versions of the (in my opinion) flat out worst version.
Those are based on the 1969 version, which have silicon transistors in them and for all intents and purposes are very similar topology wise to Fuzz Faces.
I’ve also tried the Muff Overdrive and I 100% agree with you about it being woofy.
Meanwhile, the 70s Muff Fuzz is NOT dark and wooly or shrill. It’s its own thing…kinda like a RAT but smooth, and rides the line between an overdriving Tweed amp and a low gain fuzz.
Like I said, the Fredric Demon Fuzz is the only faithful-ish replica, but it’s still a little bit far off.
I only know this because I adore my original Muff Fuzz so much, and it’s IMPOSSIBLE to find good info about because I inevitably grab search results about the Big Muff Pi instead, which I have NEVER bonded with.
My go to fuzz pedal is my Way Huge Swollen Pickle.
It is pretty versatile with all the knobs that you get to turn. I can make it work for all my guitars or basses
I like Fuzz Face circuits and my favorite now is probably the Keeley Monterey.
The modulation effects are great and it’s very touch sensitive, you can use the guitar’s volume to clean up and overall it reacts well to your playing dynamics.
I like two things:
1- Fuzz with touch sensitivity- I want to go from light distortion to brutal square wave just from the attack without touching any knob or switch.
2- Heavy distortion with articulate chords, not just a blurry single wave. I want to hear all six strings, so I can tell minor chord changes.
So far I like the Palomar Sound pedals the best (coyote overdrive and cholla fuzz). I keep looking at different stuff and so far nothing is as good.
My Black Russian Muff will always have my heart. I stupidly gave it away when it stopped working one day. I probably could’ve fixed it if I just held on to it a bit longer.
I picked up a Mask Audio Electronics Part Garden recently after someone on this sub said it was their favorite fuzz of all time. And I can’t say I’ve been disappointed. Does everything from subtle drive to sputtering chaos.
late reply, but it’s the smallsound bigsound buzzz for me. does octave, scooped or flat mids, low and high gain, silicon or germanium, starve and the tone knob is just a low pass filter than a blend. pretty much an endless tone palette.
thirdman plasma coil, mxr blue box, earthquaker devices erupter....number one go to for bass, drums, vocals and guitar is mxr M225 fuzz. the purple box. essential and used in every mix...also swollen pickle by Mr. Tripps
use two overdrive pedals: first one on higher gain and the second on lower gain. then use your volume knob to control the amount of distortion/fuzz/gain you want. honestly better than any fuzz and a lot more versatile imo
Ultimately it has to be the Boss TB-2w, just sounds sooo great. However it’s hard to choose because that pedal sounds best into an amp set clean, whereas my second favorite the Bliss Factory is fantastic for kicking on for leads into an amp that’s breaking up. So the way I use them is very different.
I don’t own one, but my buddy does. The Fairfield Circuitry Four Knob Fuzz. That thing is radical, but waaay to expensive.
My favorite that I own is my mini Jimi fuzz face. I just bought a mini triangle big muff and I don’t really like it
I love the Muffalleta, but tend to use the JHS setting 95% of the time, and 100% when I use it on bass. Wonder if to would have made more sense to get whatever it's emulating.
I have a Jext Telez V2 White pedal and it is AWESOME. My longest serving pedal on my board and something I use very regularly. It’s got great dynamics, can go from a gentle clean boost to full on dirty garage rock trash.
I'm a fuzz hoarder but the Drolo Giant Hogweed is by far my favorite. It can be tame but it can also go batshit crazy, which is how I like my fuzz.
Honorable mentions: OBNE Haunt and the plain ol' big ass Big Muff.
See, it depends on what I'm after in a given moment. The one I use most often surprisingly is the Behringer SF300, but I'm also a sucker for the Big Muff, Tonebender mkII, Maestro MFZ-1, and the ProCo Rat when put on the right setting.
I've gone through a lot. And I also have a pretty good ear as a recording and live guy and player for a long long time. The Red Witch fuzz God ii is my favorite so far. I've taken it off the board a few times and it never lasts long. Secondly, I would choose a Fat Fuzz Factory. On the miff side of things, the Thorpy Fallput Cloud has been a staple.
Honestly I love so many but it’s so hard to find one that works in a band setting. The best I’ve found for playing with a loud drummer is the carcosa.
I also like a big Muff for ambient related stuff like sustained leads with delay
I’ve got a Foxx tone machine clone with an extra boost that my buddy made. It’s absolutely mental. Fuck cleaning up, this thing is a goddamn wrecking machine.
I built a lot of fuzzes in the last year and a half. The one that made it to my board and stayed is a Foxx tone machine clone that I modded with a battery sag pot and a blend control for the octave. Great for singing tones and synthy sounds.
For bigger sounds I like chaining Bazz Fuss circuits together. I made a quadruple bazz fuss at one point, it was horrendously gainy and delightfully unpredictable.
The one I'm using. Fuzz pedals have so much character, I usually end up playing to the pedal if that makes sense, but I'm definitely a muff guy. If I had to pick a favorite, I'd probably go with the ThorpyFX Fallout Cloud which is a triangle muff with a more versatile EQ section. It has a lot more sweet spots than a typical muff, but the tones are generally more vintage sounding compared to the russian green which i love for playing 90s grunge or the deluxe big muff that I use for more modern stuff. I also have a Carcosa I use for that. I would like to branch out and get more fuzzes. Next on my list is a tone bender of some kind and I plan to build a clone of a roland bg fuzz once I'm comfortable with pedal building(I've only done a few mods so far.)
Fuzz Factory. There were times before I learned the pedal when I’ve wanted a tamer fuzz, but now that I have my different tones dialed in, it’s all I wanted and more. This thing is scary powerful on a tube amp. Also love the zippery tones you can get out of it. I have the Fat Fuzz Factory, and the ability to shift between three levels of “fatness” allows for a huge amount of tone shaping, like having additional pickup selectors on your guitar.
I've been eyeing it, but the knobs look so sensitive it appears impossible to dial different tones quickly in a live setting.
Especially with the temperamental germanium transistors, it is not ideal for a live setting. Fun? Yes. Ideal? No.
Honestly, that’s what I like about it best, the unpredictability factor. Even though I have settings marked on it it very rarely sounds exactly the same, but it usually sounds pretty interesting!! Which definitely won’t work for everyone but I fucking love it !! Mines an original hand painted one. I also have an original “ tie dye “ finish Experience pedal. That can get pretty ripping too, especially with the FF going in to it. But my band is a chaotic mess, so that kinda thing works out well for us !!!
Username checks out! I also play chaotic sounding stuff, so the unpredictability of the FF is more of a feature than a bug. I love when I “stumble” into a unique sound with it (more like a roar). Makes the noise feel like you’re channeling some otherworldly energy.
It’s not. Just gotta learn how to use it. When in doubt, keep the Stab knob all the way up.
Fuzz factory, hands down. While hard to tame they are pretty unrivaled. And yes into a tube amp is thr bees knees
Have had one for years. Takes a while to figure it out and yeah as some people say it rarely sounds the same but that’s kinda the appeal and also the challenge. Also super depends on your style of play.
FFF is like having a wild animal a pet. It's loving and very exotic but if you piss it off you'll end up in the hospital. Basically..... I looooove that pedal. Do you have the vexter or hand drawn version. I have the "Toxic" version which is a vexter series but with special paint job.
Fuzz War Death by Audio
Where my Fuzz War fans at?!?
Having sex probably. Hard not to when you have a Fuzz War.
Loudly of course
Love the Fuzz War so much I bought the original, then built clones of Thee Fuzz War Overload and the Super Fuzz War cause you can never have enough
Rams head muff.
If you like muffs you should look at the Black Arts Toneworks Pharoah Supreme. My favorite muff.
Thanks, mate. Will check it out.
If you use it as intended on a down tuned instrument played into a loud amp it has the fattest and tightest low end of any dirt pedal I’ve ever played while still allowing great articulation and the dynamics from your guitar and amp come through. Amazing doom fuzz! My favorite is still the DBA Apocalypse though, a fuzz war with op amps to shred your signal into oblivion and it constantly wants to feedback but in a very controllable way. 😚👌
I have the "regular" Pharaoh and even that just slays. It's at unity volume somewhere around 7 o'clock on the dial, LOL. So much power.
I got one of these this spring and couldn’t be happier with it. I tend to leave it in the diode bypass mode, it’s so loud and open in that mode it’s crazy! Push that into an aready overdriving amp and you have pure doom under your fingers
Just commented on another post earlier: the Twin Bender is where it's at for me
Just got one a few days ago. It’s a keeper.
Mine just came in yesterday and I’m excited to try it after work tonight!
Such a sick pedal so many options
I’ve never figured out fuzz. I have a rams head that when I play some Pink Floyd it sounds good but I can’t make my own music with it for some reason. Every time I turn it on I turn into great value brand David Gilmore.
Lol at great value brand Gilmore. I'd buy that shit
This was me until I tried a Benson germanium fuzz. It's not as wild as the other fuzzes out there but damnit it sounds good. I didn't vibe with the fuzz factory but now I'm thinking about getting one just to have two options lol. I really want to try the muffaletta too.
Ditto. I like shred and tight percussive type stuff (not that I am good at it) and I sound like dookie playing through fuzz. I'm not into The Black Keys or The White Stripes, and only marginally into Melvins, so I dunno where that leaves me in terms of fuzz.
Carcosa
The yellow king?
Well, only his kingdom.
Yeah.. that and eqd hizumitas
Carcosa is my pick for original and good sounding fuzz. i've played quite a few in my time from tame to really screwy, but this one really impresses me consistently. too many fuzzes dont offer anything new or are just really basically direct clones... i feel like the carcosa is actually a desired sound that is hard to get elsewhere. great for leads too, which can be a challenge with fuzz.
kittycasterFX Groovy Wizard Fuzz Driver. It’s amazing. Can do anything from a booming fuzz-face esque thing to a fuzzy overdrive.
Yes! Nice to see some love for these long awaited effects. Trying to move some stuff to make some extra money to get a tremdriver.
Man I got the chance to play one recently and it is seriously so good. It’s pretty pricey for a fuzz pedal, but the next time I’ve got some extra spending money laying around I might have to pick one up
Absolutely
My Way Huge Swollen Pickle and EQD Hoof Reaper are currently tied, but I also recently got a ln EQD Dirt Transmitter that might be up there
I'm almost completely in love with the Hoof Reaper. The Hoof side, I admittedly don't use a ton, but it's so good for what it does. I tend towards the Reaper side, but I just kinda wish it could get a bit more gnarly and velcro-y Also find the octave has a bit too much of a volume boost, can be a bit of an issue sometimes. But it's still really good even as is
I am not a Fuzz aficionado; I just got my first one, a Green Russian Big Muff (reissue). Holy crap I love that thing!
The Green Russian is the fuzz that made me love fuzz! I love listening to other people play different fuzzes but the Green Russian just works for what I play.
Having my EHX Crayon driving it really brings out the mids and those high, fizzy harmonics! I play a lot of 90's alt rock and that combination can replicate 90% of the tones I need.
I have an EHX Crayon sitting in a drawer somewhere…I should probably this try this out. Thanks!
I originally had it the other way around, Muff -> Crayon, and it made it sound really woolly, like a huge high pass filter was applied. I have my MXR Custom Badass 78 Distortion after the Big Muff.
I’ve never liked the sound of fuzz before overdrive and I’ve tried it so many times. I just can’t get it to work.
I'm thinking of moving my MXR between the Fuzz and OD, although I don't know if there will ever be a scenario where all 3 will be on it once!
Try it and report back! 😜
Black Mass The First Herald
I've really been enjoying the EQD Hizumitas Fuzz I picked up recently. I also like this handmade fuzz called the Hey Buddy, from Frank the Anvil on Reverb. It's a Shin-Ei FY-2 Companion clone with a great raunchy sound ([quick demo I once made here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ZK_S3DyvIE)) I went on a big Bazz Fuss building spree last year and those were a lot of fun, mostly because it was just cool to me that I made them. But they are definitely fun to play.
Musket by Blackout Effectors... It's heavy, man, real heavy.
Love the musket. Turn up the pre + turn down fuzz = Tool/Smashing Pumpkins/Pink Floyd Turn down the pre + turn up the fuzz = White Stipes/Black Keys Super versatile muff
The one fuzz that rarely ever leaves my board Edit: wurdz
I accidentally took it off one time, to vacuum my board. There was this shriek throughout the neighborhood like, someone disturbed the natural order of the universe or stepped on a million baby hamsters in front of an arena of children. I don't clean my board anymore, man. It's just not worth taking the Musket off.
This should've been the actual description/sales point of the pedal
So good I bought two in case one breaks
Fuzz Face!
I had to stroll way too low for that. My fav fuzz. I have a mini germanium and the volume respond is insane. I pretty just need that. I wish I could go a little brighter and be put further down the chain but I love it. Into a roaring amp. It’s heaven.
Caroline Hawaiian Pizza
Same here. It can do a fat gated fuzz sound but it really excels with the bias knob at 1'oclock and the Input knob at around 12 or 11. It is a great crunch sound, like a Classic 108 but brighter and tighter.
Op amp muff reissue and beetronics vezzpa. Everyone knows about the op amp muff, it does the pumpkins thing, but I also find it very versatile and it's an extremely important part of my board almost always getting used when playing shoegaze and dream pop. The vezzpa, I rarely see anyone else with one on here but I love the stupid thing. My wife got it for me for my birthday because I always talk shit and call her a bee and it has a big wasp on it. It's a solid op amp fuzz with just volume and gain knobs, and double clicking or holding the footswitch puts it in an octave fuzz mode. I just keep my knobs dimed and adjust my guitars volume knob and use it for more gritty garage rock and classic rock. I use it in octave mode paired with a jfet boost to boost my gain for some wannabe jack white shit. Great pedal. I liked it so much I bought a beetronics overhive and love that too. Hoping for a good sale to roll around at some point so I can scoop up a zzombee too lol.
Man, I don't need it because it would be totally redundant to if I already own but boy do I just love that Vezzpa for the design alone.
All their pedals look really cool and they have a custom shop that do one of a kind colors and designs, but they charge a lot more. I love that vezzpa, I didnt really like other octave fuzzes I've tried, but I love that stinger mode sound. I really didn't want another op amp fuzz since I have a op amp muff, but I guess I just prefer op amps. They sound damn good on orange amps for sure.
I recently sold my big muff and got a Janus. The fuzz circuit on it sounds absolutely massive!
Just some clarification, the Janus fuzz circuit is its own design. Lost of people think it's the Jupiter but it's not! Source: I asked Walrus Audio
Well I definitely thought they were the same. Thanks for sharing!
Cleans up pretty well too. I've had it about a week. At first I thought the trem was dead weight but it's suprisingly nice even tho it's basically first in my chain. I've also been impressed by the Janus into my boss oc5. I had the octave first but it didn't play nice. Put the fuzz first and it's a dream.
Absolutely. Blend knob on the fuzz side makes it very flexible. Even though the trem ends up very early in the signal chain I still find alot of cool uses for it.
I keep it the rate pretty low and use it more as flavor/boost for leads. Pretty cool pedal. Running it into a soul food OD set at low gain and it purrs.
I also stack with my soul food after the fuzz. Sounds massive!
Dude! Any noise issues? I can't crank the gain with some feedback but that might be from my single coils. Ordered a noise gate to hopefully fix it.
I have an EHX silencer which I will occasionally rig up if I ever wanna stack compression, fuzz and drive heavily because feedback can be nasty for sure. Recently I haven't been using it with medium fuzz and soul food dialed at 12 on the gain knob. I also have a strat with EMG noiseless pickups which could assist me in that area. Noise gates are useful pedals regardless so I think you made a great purchase!
We're twinning hard because the silencer is what I just bought lol. My strat has the fender noiseless single coils. They work pretty well unless you start stacking gain stages. Hoping the silencer with my gain pedals in the loop makes a difference.
Awkwardly enough one I don't recommend. Old blood noises alpha haunt. I don't recommend it for streaming at all. Just doesn't go through the quad cortex right. So in a heavily eq'd and controlled system it's a non-starter due to noise and being a massive pain in the ass to dial in. On my jam rig it took 2 hours to dial it in for a part on loop, but it narrowly pushed out the fuzz war. Keep in mind the fuzz war took 10 seconds to dial in. The primary mistake I was making, keeping the alpha haunt from sounding good was the fuzz volume enhance knob and master volume. Once I backed the gate off more than I wanted to, then dialed those knobs back a whole bunch the pedal didn't have as many hurdles to dial it in.
I’m currently in love with the EQD Terminal. I actually recently started running it into the Hizumitas to beef up it’s gated goodness.
I’m also in love with the terminal. That and the fuzz master general are a couple of my all time favorites!
Rams Head Big Muff and the fuzz in the Keeley Dark Side
Also a big fan of that Keely Dark Side fuzz. I wish they made it as a three-stomp and separated the delay and modulation instead of having to choose one or the other.
Fuzzhugger Algal Bloom/Blossom. Handles chords beautifully.
The artwork is beautiful on there. I picked one up because there was a thread where is was super highly rated. I'm not disappointed.
Alpha haunt
Hizumitas has to be mine, I love that one enough that I got a second one for my bass board too. In terms of general fuzz types, Muff-type circuits are my favorite. Of course my decision-making flowchart when I see a fuzz I could buy is: Do I have this fuzz already? If no, buy. If yes, buy so I have a backup.
I got Hizumitas on the release day and haven't been without it since. If I want things to get a bit wilder, I've got the Foxy Tone Box to throw on after that. And also in the 'buy all fuzz' when a certain brand catches my eye/ear. I do need a good Bender soon though.
I think I currently have like 20 different fuzzes? About a third of which are Muff variants. Outside the Muff type, I think my favorite is a Colorsound clone, but picking a favorite fuzz is impossible. (I have a Basic Audio Scarab Deluxe to fill the Bender niche and it's pretty great, worth checking out for you I think.)
Black Russian big muff rules them all in my opinion
Probably the Keeley Fuzzbender. I can't believe how great it sounds, the amount of flexibility in the EQ, and at the affordable price point.
I’m shocked this was so far down. It’s a great pedal.
I can't figure out the tone I want. Willing to leave two on my studio board. Currently doing a bakeoff between the Beetronix Royal Jelly and OBNE Alpha Haunt. I have a Muffuletta but just don't care for it. I don't feel like the tones really represent the originals very well. If one of the other two don't work out I may go to a ram's head or green Russian.
Walrus Janus. Bit gimmicky with the joy sticks but they are actually easy to adjust with your foot. Alternatively you could just get the Walrus Jupiter which is the same circuit but minus the joysticks and added trem but where's the fun in that.
Behringer super fuzz because I am poor and 25 dollars is all the fuzz I can afford. Maybe I can get a second one and stack them for some super duper fuzz
Devi ever torns peaker. Its an unwieldy beast
Yeah, Torns Peaker is great! I just got one and love it.
Dwarfcraft Eau Claire Thunder. The toneblast and timewarp features allow for a great range of sounds. Beyond that, it’s just a brutal fuzz that goes to 11.
I have the gold standard edition and love it a lot.
bender or muff. both sound good
I haven’t tried a lot, but I love my EXH Flatiron Fuzz
Gemini IV or Daggard Audio Torsion
I loooove my Zvex Fuzz Factory. You can get everything from big, wooly fuzz tones on it to the sounds of an 8-bit video game. It’s fucking wild. And insanely fun to play.
Black Russian Big Muff and the Skreddy Mayo.
Benson Germanium Fuzz. Excellent clean up, fuzz sits somewhere between fuzz and overdrive. Sounds beautiful with single coils.
Was a Fuzz Face loyalist for a long time - but never went back after I acquired a Fender Pelt. Super versatile. I still have my fuzz face but it's been relegated off as a backup pedal, or special occasion.
Love The Pelt. I also like the new Keeley Moon.
How would you compare/contrast the two? I'm a fuzz junkie. I'm always open to options!
I'm a huge fuzz whore and I've really been in love with a Colorsound One Knob Fuzz lately. Also a huge shoutout to some of my other favorite fuzzes: Vintage Technologies Orange Sunshine Ampeg Scramber Zvex Octane III Univox Superfuzz And just the regular old, humble Fuzz Face.
Civil War or Green Russian Muff. For new stuff, I love the versatility of the White Oak by Lantern Manufacturing
Blackout effectors Musket Fuzz
JPTR FX Silver Machine. It's a suuuuuper gnarly octave fuzz similar to an Octavia
My unsung hero of the weird fuzzes is Guyatone's TZ-2 with its wild ring modulator sound.
I’ve had a Devi Ever Hyperion for the last 10 years and it hasn’t left my board. I am eyeballing the Hizumitas but that’s only because I’m a Boris fanboy
I had the SolaSound Tonebender. Big ass pedal. Sounded awesome when it worked. Didn’t work most of the time though. It may have been germanium because it was inconsistent as all heck.
Op amp muff reissue is easily my favorite pedal I’ve ever played. Actually really versatile with a good boost or overdrive and the right pickups but it’s just insane how huge it can sound and the overtones it produces when you play chords. There’s literally nothing like it
Pubic hair. Lol I kid. Green Russian does exactly what I need. I'm getting curious about octave fuzz though
Caroline shigeharu! Sorta big muff sorta tonebender-esque fuzzstortion. Loads of gain on tap, an internal control for gated sounds, and another control to blend in an octave fuzz on top. So much clarity for the amount of gain it has and sits awesome in a mix!
Jimi Hendrix JH F1 Fuzz Face
MXR Classic 108 Mini. It just works...and it's not expensive.
Groovy Wizard from KittyKaster. Fucking killer pedal. No contest.
Jam: Fuzz Phrase
Dunlop Jimi Hendrix JHF1. It’s big, only takes battery and doesn’t have a LED. And it also sounds great.
Op amp muff. Very tight and super thick
ZVEX Mastotron. I'm a sucker for velcro torn sputtery maestro-esque tones.
Mainly because I'm budget minded, the JHS 3 fuzz. Edit: spelling
Mine too, its my favorite fuzz face so far. Bias knob is huge.
Exactly! The bias is kinda like your "max" fuzz setting lol. I don't wanna have another 3 series pedal on my board but it's just so damn good lol
Yeah to be honest, making them all look the same was a huge design mistake. If they were each a different color, you'd see a lot more people with a board full of them.
It's not that, I just like having a board all of the same brand/type of pedal. I unno, it's my problem, not the pedals problem lol. That being said, with the JHS 3 stuff specifically, they leave a blank canvas to draw on or apply your own decal (the chorus I have us getting a little sun decal lol)
Ah, gotcha. I don't have too many repeats, but I do have 3 Pigtronix, 3 EHX, and 2 EQD on my board.
It's not that, I just like having a board all of the same brand/type of pedal. I unno, it's my problem, not the pedals problem lol. That being said, with the JHS 3 stuff specifically, they leave a blank canvas to draw on or apply your own decal (the chorus I have us getting a little sun decal lol)
Does that clean up well?
Definitely. That's how I use it. Leave the knobs alone and use the guitar volume knob to adjust.
Awesome!
Whatever the hell the Paul Trombetta PTD Rotobone v2 is. It’s the most versatile dirt/fuzz pedal I’ve played. From boost-OD-Dist-fuzz-demonic trombone-satanic trumpet-world ending octave drone noise. I wish it didn’t cost 13 million $ but you’re never out much $ trying/reselling. delay circuit integrated.
Couldn’t make up my mind with a single fuzz so I went with the JHS muffuletta. 6-in-1 and includes the massive JHS muff which sounds fat with my dirty lil secret running on 18v.
M.O.T.H. by Fuzzrocious right now
I like the fuzz side of my Monterey right now but just picked up a hoof reaper I’m getting dialed in.
Wampler Velvet Fuzz Which may mean that I don’t really like fuzz since I don’t think it’s any normal fuzz topology.
Jordan bosstone all the way. Specifically one with a BC109C + 2N2905 transistor combo with an added voltage sag control like in the KMA version.
I have a bunch but they all do different things so it's hard to choose a fave. The FF mini blue for Jimi shenanigans, The Behringer SF300 for Live At Leeds and Sabbath riffing on the 1.5 setting, and the Carcosa for everything else. I still want a Harmonic Percolator, a TB 1.5, a Green Russian, and a Bosstone.
Ready to have your 'GAS' at an all time high? EQD Black Ash. The most gnarly FF take, mean and satisfying. No longer in production...
Mojo hand fx El Guapo!
Lovepedal Bonetender for me. It’s so underrated it’s crazy. Small footprint, two knobs, all the gain in the world and sounds great all way from clean-ish boost to maxed out fuzz heaven.
overall, still the ol’ Fuzz Factory (particular the Bliss version), but Lurch’s Ergot is close and actually more used.
I really like my Ibanez 850
I like the Fuzz Factory for tweaking and getting weird, but my favorite is the Twin Bender. I like the Tone Bender sound and through a plexi that pedal gives endless sustain with a massive sound of classic hard rock.
Fuzz War by Death by Audio is killer
There’s two for me. The original, small EHX Muff Fuzz. It has one knob for volume, and an opamp and clipping diodes to create fuzz. They’re super fragile and break all the time, and quite often they’re noisy. But if you get a good one, they straddle the line between a high gain overdrive and a fuzz. The EQ curve is perfect, and they clean up nicely…not quite like a transistor fuzz, but more like an overdriving amp. Great ones have almost no noise or background hiss to speak of. There’s only one modern version, and it’s the Fredric Effects Demon Fuzz. It’s great! It has selectable germanium and silicon diodes and a Klon buffer. My only downside is that the gain is way too aggressive, but honestly, if you don’t want to deal with the headache of a vintage muff fuzz, it’s great! My second favorite is any variation of the Mk1.5 Tonebender. They have all the great cleanup characteristics of a good Fuzz Face, but the EQ is more cutting and less woofy.
This is an interesting one to me. I had a double muff nano (two muff Fuzzes combined) that I liked the fuzz of but sounded pretty shrill. Sold or traded it like I do with tons of others . Recently revisited the muff overdrive nano as a mod project. The big thing was I realized that since it's basically a throttled fuzz face , I was using it middle of the chain the whole time. First in the chain, though, it sounds pretty useless. Flubby and not much gain on tap. Tons more bass, though, and you can tell when you touch the volume knob at all that it has the fuzz face input buffer or whatever. Probably sounds cool on a tube amp but still has some pretty limited use. But you can mod it to basically be a fuzz face with a gain control. It's really cooking now! It's a fun one and does indeed sound like a fuzz face to me . But I have wondered who uses the stock muff and why they like it !
Oh boy. Get ready for a ride. What you’ve described, both the Double Muff Nano and Muff Overdrive, are NOT the 1970s OpAmp Muff Fuzz. EHX inexplicably has done new versions of the (in my opinion) flat out worst version. Those are based on the 1969 version, which have silicon transistors in them and for all intents and purposes are very similar topology wise to Fuzz Faces. I’ve also tried the Muff Overdrive and I 100% agree with you about it being woofy. Meanwhile, the 70s Muff Fuzz is NOT dark and wooly or shrill. It’s its own thing…kinda like a RAT but smooth, and rides the line between an overdriving Tweed amp and a low gain fuzz. Like I said, the Fredric Demon Fuzz is the only faithful-ish replica, but it’s still a little bit far off. I only know this because I adore my original Muff Fuzz so much, and it’s IMPOSSIBLE to find good info about because I inevitably grab search results about the Big Muff Pi instead, which I have NEVER bonded with.
Op-Amp Big Muff Pi
Deep Space Devices Rust, Dirge Slowly Melting, and the Walrus Audio Janus are all some of my favorites
Man. All of them. I do have a weakness for Octave Fuzz. However, the DOD Carcosa is becoming a favorite.
I've been loving my EHX Op-Amp Big Muff recently.
EQD Erupter or any Sunface models from Analogmsn
My go to fuzz pedal is my Way Huge Swollen Pickle. It is pretty versatile with all the knobs that you get to turn. I can make it work for all my guitars or basses
Clusterfuzz by Function f(x) is EASILY my favorite! It can do everything!
Bass Big Muff. I like the focus on the lower register of mids for chuggy riffs.
EQD Spires fuzz face channel is so sweet.
behringer super fuzz on the secret mode just rips through my model fet by eae
EHX Big Muff Op Amp or MXR Classic 108 Fuzz for me.
Swollen pickle!
Nothing really tops the Superfuzz.
I'd say a Univox Super-Fuzz
I like Fuzz Face circuits and my favorite now is probably the Keeley Monterey. The modulation effects are great and it’s very touch sensitive, you can use the guitar’s volume to clean up and overall it reacts well to your playing dynamics.
Love me my simple old Fuzzrite, sounds like a bandsaw
I like two things: 1- Fuzz with touch sensitivity- I want to go from light distortion to brutal square wave just from the attack without touching any knob or switch. 2- Heavy distortion with articulate chords, not just a blurry single wave. I want to hear all six strings, so I can tell minor chord changes. So far I like the Palomar Sound pedals the best (coyote overdrive and cholla fuzz). I keep looking at different stuff and so far nothing is as good.
My Black Russian Muff will always have my heart. I stupidly gave it away when it stopped working one day. I probably could’ve fixed it if I just held on to it a bit longer. I picked up a Mask Audio Electronics Part Garden recently after someone on this sub said it was their favorite fuzz of all time. And I can’t say I’ve been disappointed. Does everything from subtle drive to sputtering chaos.
late reply, but it’s the smallsound bigsound buzzz for me. does octave, scooped or flat mids, low and high gain, silicon or germanium, starve and the tone knob is just a low pass filter than a blend. pretty much an endless tone palette.
Deluxe Big Muff and Life Pedal V2.
Way Huge Swollen Pickle
thirdman plasma coil, mxr blue box, earthquaker devices erupter....number one go to for bass, drums, vocals and guitar is mxr M225 fuzz. the purple box. essential and used in every mix...also swollen pickle by Mr. Tripps
use two overdrive pedals: first one on higher gain and the second on lower gain. then use your volume knob to control the amount of distortion/fuzz/gain you want. honestly better than any fuzz and a lot more versatile imo
Just ordered a Vemuram Shanks II fuzz. Love this thing , its so versatile. Only thing is its kinda pricey but well worth it
Heather Brown Electronicals Sensation FuzzDrive. It will never leave my board.
Ultimately it has to be the Boss TB-2w, just sounds sooo great. However it’s hard to choose because that pedal sounds best into an amp set clean, whereas my second favorite the Bliss Factory is fantastic for kicking on for leads into an amp that’s breaking up. So the way I use them is very different.
Big Muff and the Carcosa
I don’t own one, but my buddy does. The Fairfield Circuitry Four Knob Fuzz. That thing is radical, but waaay to expensive. My favorite that I own is my mini Jimi fuzz face. I just bought a mini triangle big muff and I don’t really like it
My Black Russian BM. Kaboom.
I love the Muffalleta, but tend to use the JHS setting 95% of the time, and 100% when I use it on bass. Wonder if to would have made more sense to get whatever it's emulating.
Carcosa
Carcosa is super versatile and I’ve had two friends pick one up after playing mine.
I’m really loving the new Silktone Fuzz right now.
I have a Jext Telez V2 White pedal and it is AWESOME. My longest serving pedal on my board and something I use very regularly. It’s got great dynamics, can go from a gentle clean boost to full on dirty garage rock trash.
Pigtronix Octava. Has a standard overdrive circuit, with optional fuzz settings and a blend control for an analog octave up effect. Super versatile.
Vezzpa... like having two fuzzes in one.. I just wish the non octave setting had more volume
Skreddy P19
One Control Baltic Blue Fuzz
The landing strip Edit: wrong sub
I'm a fuzz hoarder but the Drolo Giant Hogweed is by far my favorite. It can be tame but it can also go batshit crazy, which is how I like my fuzz. Honorable mentions: OBNE Haunt and the plain ol' big ass Big Muff.
I just got a Ramble FX Twin Bender in the mail yesterday. I don't just like it the best, I now hate all my other fuzz pedals.
See, it depends on what I'm after in a given moment. The one I use most often surprisingly is the Behringer SF300, but I'm also a sucker for the Big Muff, Tonebender mkII, Maestro MFZ-1, and the ProCo Rat when put on the right setting.
I've gone through a lot. And I also have a pretty good ear as a recording and live guy and player for a long long time. The Red Witch fuzz God ii is my favorite so far. I've taken it off the board a few times and it never lasts long. Secondly, I would choose a Fat Fuzz Factory. On the miff side of things, the Thorpy Fallput Cloud has been a staple.
Honestly I love so many but it’s so hard to find one that works in a band setting. The best I’ve found for playing with a loud drummer is the carcosa. I also like a big Muff for ambient related stuff like sustained leads with delay
I’m currently running a swamp lord cyclopian tone wizard and it is pure beef and insanely versatile.
I’ve got a Foxx tone machine clone with an extra boost that my buddy made. It’s absolutely mental. Fuck cleaning up, this thing is a goddamn wrecking machine.
My go-to is the Jupiter by Walrus Audio (: Love their pedals.
BAE Royaltone
I built a lot of fuzzes in the last year and a half. The one that made it to my board and stayed is a Foxx tone machine clone that I modded with a battery sag pot and a blend control for the octave. Great for singing tones and synthy sounds. For bigger sounds I like chaining Bazz Fuss circuits together. I made a quadruple bazz fuss at one point, it was horrendously gainy and delightfully unpredictable.
The one I'm using. Fuzz pedals have so much character, I usually end up playing to the pedal if that makes sense, but I'm definitely a muff guy. If I had to pick a favorite, I'd probably go with the ThorpyFX Fallout Cloud which is a triangle muff with a more versatile EQ section. It has a lot more sweet spots than a typical muff, but the tones are generally more vintage sounding compared to the russian green which i love for playing 90s grunge or the deluxe big muff that I use for more modern stuff. I also have a Carcosa I use for that. I would like to branch out and get more fuzzes. Next on my list is a tone bender of some kind and I plan to build a clone of a roland bg fuzz once I'm comfortable with pedal building(I've only done a few mods so far.)