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Author Archive
The Keeley Tube Drive is a limited, collector-grade dual-gain engine pairing a genuine 1950s Sylvania 12AT7WA high-voltage Class A tube preamp with Keeley’s legendary Super Phat Mod circuit. Built in Oklahoma City as a numbered run of 100 units with a brushed gold gloss finish, it offers rich touch sensitivity, amp-like body, and flexible dual-voice stacking. It was available for pre-sale on the builder’s site, but sold out within minutes! Controls: Tube Stage (Left): Dual triodes running in series in Class A, feeding a vintage tweed-amp-style tone stack for warm grit and touch-sensitive dynamics. Super Phat Mod Stage (Right): Dedicated drive circuit delivering punch, body, and sustain while preserving the guitar’s natural character. Three Knobs Per Channel: Level, Gain/Drive and Tone – which allows adjusting the EQ of each channel separately. Routing & Switching: Switchable effect order (Tube into Drive or Drive into Tube) via a simple foot gesture or an external Remote jack (Tip assigned to Drive, Ring assigned to Tube). Hardware & Maintenance: Standard top-mounted jacks, a vented rear-panel jack plate for airflow, internal high-voltage conversion powered via a standard 9V DC (min. 500mA) supply, and a tube extraction pin with an included Allen key for easy tube swaps. […]... Click on the title for more
Engineered as an ambitious hybrid utility box, the JHS/Coppersound Boost-a-Drive Fuzz is a DIY kit released in collaboration with the folks at Coppersound. Born from Josh Scott’s Short Circuit series and produced in collaboration with CopperSound, the Boost-a-Drive Fuzz is a multi-stage hybrid circuit that takes the classic two-transistor LPB-1 architecture and evolves it into a dynamic, multi-mode saturation engine. Rather than simply copying a single vintage topology, it merges cascading gain behaviors that channel the feel of high-headroom boosters, amp-like dynamic overdrive, and aggressive, Fuzz Face-style square-wave fuzz into a single interactive platform. Key Specs: Dual high-gain transistor topology, 3-mode Mode selector: Boost, Drive, Fuzz Passive low-pass tone filter, (comparable to a RAT-style EQ knob) Dedicated Gain and Master Volume pots Internal biasing trim pots The Consensus: Independent builder communities and gear roundups praise its broad, highly responsive sweep. Reviewers note that because you are actively adjusting the circuit’s operating point with the gain control, every millimeter of the sweep yields distinct, usable textures—bridging the gap between transparent line-pushing and jagged, touch-sensitive breakup.... Click on the title for more
Bridging the gap between a transparent preamp and a fuzzy-drive machine, the Seward Park Maravilla delivers a rich blend of touch-sensitive clarity and fuzzy-drive weight. Dual pre and post-gain controls allow players to easily dial in everything from open, low-gain preamp boost to harmonically dense, saturated clipping without muddying the low end. Reviewers and early community roundups praise its expansive control framework and dynamic harmonic texturing, highlighting how the interactive gain staging and transformer saturation make it an exceptionally versatile tool for fuzzy overdrive, tonal sweetening, and preamp duties alike. Key Specs: Vintage germanium transistors, Onboard audio transformer, Independent Pre/Post gain stages, Extensive EQ controls with Tone, Mid, Air (Presence) knobs, Master Loud output.... Click on the title for more
The explosive, touch-responsive overdriven tones you hear on Led Zeppelin’s early tracks like “Communication Breakdown” and “Good Times Bad Times” surely inspired many guitarists. That cranked-amp character where saturation and aggression become the same thing also inspired the Missing Link Audio Zepptone pedal. That was the starting point; from there, the circuit opens up into a wider range of drive and fuzz sounds. Instead of stacking separate fuzz and overdrive pedals, this pedal blends both into one interactive gain circuit, delivering the harmonic richness and dynamic response of a pushed amp plus fuzz texture—the sustain and bite of “Heartbreaker” or “Whole Lotta Love,” but with modern consistency. Independent Gain and Fuzz controls layer saturation: Gain shapes overdrive character (attack, punch, amp-like breakup), while Fuzz adds grit, density, and sustain. Because the two interact, adjusting one reshapes the other, covering everything from gritty rhythm tones to thick lead saturation. Two toggles expand voicing options: Body switches output capacitor paths for tighter or fuller low end, while Shift alters midrange focus for either open, cutting rhythm tones or thicker, forward lead voicing. Interactive Output and Level controls shape not just loudness but how hard you’re pushing your amp or next pedal, dialing […]... Click on the title for more
Empty Head Effects , run by Nic out of Mainz, Germany, has been building a reputation for thoughtful, textural pedal designs. We got familiar with the company at our 2026 edition of the London Synth & Pedal Expo, where they attracted a lot of interest. Their upcoming Seafarer is a modulated reverb that’s been in development for a while — breadboarded back in April, teased at pedal shows, and now apparently set to dock soon. The circuit offers a mono long-tailed reverb, but the modulation is where it gets interesting. Instead of a standard chorus or vibrato on the repeats, it uses random pitch modulation meant to mimic the lapping of water. There’s also a random tremolo effect described as “water-logged ears” — uneven, unpredictable, the way sound behaves when you’re half-submerged. A low-pass filter can be controlled by an internal LFO, an external expression pedal, or a front-panel pot, which lets you sweep the reverb tail from bright to dark in real time. Other features include a soft-clipping diode distortion for thickening or dirtying the repeats, separate wet and dry volume knobs, and an infinite feedback footswitch for those moments when you want the reverb to never, ever stop. The search […]... Click on the title for more
Just when you thought the universe had manufactured enough stamped-aluminum boxes to choke every basement guitarist from here to purgatory, a brand called Gigagain crawls out of the woodwork waving a Marshall-in-a-box named the “Golden Legacy.” It retails for roughly a hundred and twenty-nine bucks. For that price, what do you get? A 320-gram chunk of aluminum alloy housing an analog circuit that refuses to apologize for wanting to sound like Great Britain’s finest stack-amp noise. They slapped a three-band EQ on it—Bass, Middle, Treble—plus your standard Gain and Volume pots, and a toggle switch that swings between two moods: Vintage (for that grainy, loose, early-pushed power-amp rattle) and Modern (for a tighter, compressed, higher-gain squeeze). The curious little engineering quirk? A literal physical power switch right there on the pedal. Click it to off, and it completely severs the circuit so it stops bleeding your 9-volt dry while it sits dormant on your board. Is it going to rewrite the gospel of rock and roll? Probably not. It’s a buffered bypass distortion box built to chase the ghost of every loud British amp that ever blew out a teenager’s eardrums. But in a marketplace bloated with boutique nonsense priced […]... Click on the title for more