Blunderbuss or Box of War?

[mathias]

Kinda digging that Civil War Muff sound and want it for myself. I wanna sound huge and get dem mids. Do I go for full recreation with the Wren and Cuff Box of War, or for more flexible with the Blunderbuss? Thoughts?

[Bassboar]

I think just a normal Musket would be a good halfway point between the two.

[MEC]

I tried a the Box of War and didn't really like it. I've never tried the Blunderbuss but it seems cool.

What sounds are you trying to get that the Hoof can't cover?

[mathias]

I tried a the Box of War and didn't really like it. I've never tried the Blunderbuss but it seems cool.

What sounds are you trying to get that the Hoof can't cover?

honestly, I just can't get a better, bigger/thicker sound dialed in on the Hoof. My mini Algal Bloom keeps winning out. Figured I'd go after a more mids-y Muff. I know the Hoof goes from scooped to mids. The descriptions of the Civil War Muff and bubble font Muff sounded quite different from what I was getting out of my Hoof.

It's not that the Hoof is bad -- it's a pretty great little pedal. I'm just looking for other sounds. Bigger. Badder. More powerful than a speeding locomotive.

[Almonds]

Yeah the hoof for me is not very compressed and big. It might be the single coils though

[hazelwould]

I would think blunderbuss would have more mids than BOW.

[Fuzzy Picklez]

Blunderbuss has lots of mids.
I hate the gate in it though. To me that just about ruins it. If it didn't have the gate I would use it a lot more.
It still sounds wicked though. Lots of sounds in that thing.

[benjuro]

Haven't had a Box of War, but have a Blunderbuss, Musket, Hoof, and many many russian muffs, including black, green and a Civil War spec'd model.
They're pretty different. For my purposes, Blunderbuss may have one of the best voiced midrange controls of any fuzz I've used. The gating can be annoying, and it does not have the bottom end of the other muff types, especially the Musket or Civil War. It is really just raw, uncompressed and open sounding. I find it pretty far from a Muff, but most people seem to lump it in, maybe b/c of the shared circuit parts. Not as usable for rhythm sounds for me, but man if it doesn't rip the sky open for leads.
If the Hoof isn't getting you close to where you want, not sure BOW is going to do it for you either. MIght be a little meaner or sounding in some settings, but you'll have way more mids control in the Hoof.

[Casavettes]

The gate on the blunderbuss can be annoying but I find cranking the pre and gain and adjusting the EQ pretty much solves that problem. And stacking it with other drives or in my case the fixed fuzz sounds like planets exploding.

[mathias]

Maybe this thread should be: teach me to get a better sound with my Hoof, then. Ripping leads, lots of mids, so that it sounds huge and liquidy? (not thin and fizzy and compressed?)

I might just have to wait for the right BST thread to pick up a bubble font or Civil War muff. Then I can see if the vintage thing is what I'm after with my rig or not, and skip trying to recreate it with some other boutique pedal.

[Chankgeez]

Why not get a pedal that'll boost mids and place it after the Hoof?

[MEC]

One thing that I found odd about the Hoof is that the "Shift" knob works reverse of how you'd think it would.
Full clockwise is for scooping the mids and full counter clockwise is for adding more mids.

For the longest time, I stayed right of noon for fear of scooping even more mids.

[mathias]

Snipped the pic of my Hoof out of my pedalboard pic to show how un-scooped the mids are:



Still feels really thin and fizzy on most settings. Maybe it's my rig? (Currently distrustful of my amp anyways.)

[Casavettes]

hmm when i owned a hoof i would never describe it as thin and fizzy. with mine i'd usually get a fuller sound by rolling back the gain and cranking the output.

[mathias]

hmm when i owned a hoof i would never describe it as thin and fizzy. with mine i'd usually get a fuller sound by rolling back the gain and cranking the output.

Could be that, since I've got a big modulation section after it and I use the volume pedal to adjust output, that I haven't really tried it with the output up enough. (Have to be mindful about clipping in stuff like phasers and delays, unfortunately. And if I ever get a vibe pedal again, those things are reaaally sensitive to being driven too hard.)