Guitarists in need of their monthly dose of sonic wickedness should take a hard look at the Acorn Amps ADHD, which is an acronym for Adaptive Droning Hyperfuzz Device, described by the builder as a “glitch, filter, bit crushing, octave, square wave guitar synth oscillator disguised as a fuzz pedal.”
If I understand this correctly, this pedal works a little like a two-oscillator synth, where one of them is your guitar signal turned into a square wave by the fuzz circuit, and the other one is a controllable oscillator (also of the square wave shape) that can be controlled via an external expression pedal or tuned by hand with the Frequency knob. The two channels are highly interactive, and a small, pink Balance knob in the center of the pedal lets you mix them to taste.
The Threshold knob does the glitchy/bit crushing thing of gating the circuit to give the fuzz a spitty/lo-fi quality when turned anti-clockwise or a full-on body at higher settings. Level controls the output, while the Tone knob works in a rather unexpected way, adjusting the bandwidth of the fuzz circuit interacting with the oscillator.
This looks like a simple device that can do a lot of cool and unexpected things with just five knobs. Check it out in action in the videos below.
Acorn Amps ADHD – Adaptive Droning Hyperfuzz Device, Builder’s Notes
The ADHD, or Adaptive Droning Hyperfuzz Device, is a glitch, filter, bit crushing, octave, square wave guitar synth oscillator disguised as a fuzz pedal. An adjustable square wave oscillator accompanies a rambunctious fuzz circuit to create a wildly interactive guitar or bass guitar effect. 8-bit vintage video game tones become searing octave leads with the turn of the five control knobs on board the ADHD and the synth noise oscillator can be controlled using an external expression pedal or tuned by hand with the Frequency knob.
The Acorn ADHD is assembled using a voltage controlled timer that blends with the gain control of an LM386 amplifier IC chip to produce interactive and layered bit crushed octave-up-and-down fuzz tones that can be sculpted even further along the frequency bandwidth with the tone/filter control. Transform your guitar into an expansive fuzzy synthesizer with the Acorn Amps ADHD pedal.
Features include:
- Five shapable controls on the pedal face to design your own fuzzy, synth-y soundscapes
- Expression jack to control the oscillation circuit externally
- Balance control to blend the synth oscillator with the fuzz circuit
- Pedalboard friendly compact design assembled in a 1590B aluminum enclosure
- True bypass and powered by standard 9V DC pedal power. Consumes less than 30mA of current
