Tom Dalton wrote:HUGER! It's even huger in person! It's the successor to the Great Wall...really revised (at least 30% new circuitry)! New clipping, new Tone controls...it's really, really big sounding. NewarkWilder and CBA13 have also tried it, so maybe one of them will chime in.
713, dude. That's m'birthday! Anyway.
This is an excerpt (truncated and whittled; even Bowdlerized) from an e-mail I sent to Tom after playing the Huger and Lab Ratchet:
"Right, I first just plugged the *pedals* just like straight into my amp, that is I plugged my Gibson Les Paul Faded Special with P90s into the *pedals* and then into my Fender Blues Deluxe.
HUGER: Immediately I am amazed by just the basic sound of the fuzz. I know my first reaction was "Wow, and this is WITHOUT the tone circuit?", meaning that I was already quite pleased. I can take the tone stack out of my BYOC Large Beaver Triangle (which shall hereby be referred to as the "Triangle"), but it was nothing like the Huger (I've stopped with the caps). Like I said, I was immediately pleased, sonically, by the basic fuzz sound of the Huger. The Triangle is pretty good, but it's not... chocolatey. Haha. It's not... well, it's musical, but the Huger is MUSICAL. It's, ugh, colorful (bad adjective). But do you understand? It's got a lot of character, and is like a really nice warm blanket, whereas the Triangle is heavy yet somewhat metallic... or too scratchy or something. I'm going with whatever words come to mind here. The Huger sans Tone is purple... the Triangle is grey.
Right, so I was into the basic Huger fuzz sound. Then, before turning the tone circuit on, I switched over to the Lab Ratchet. The fuzz here seemed slightly tamer. The Lab Ratchet has a... "rounder" quality to it? "Round"? Like it has a more pronounced kind of vowelish sound to it... almost like it's got a very VERY subtle fixed envelope filter on it... it's just got a different, ahem, rounded sound.
THEEEEEEEN here is what I did: I flipped on the Tone Circuit. This was fun. I went back to the Huger, and went back and forth between like a lot of Bass, low Treble, then a lot of Treble, low Bass, then a good mix, then like a lot of this and a lot of that, then I started to get the hang of it and found a setting that I really liked: Bass at maybe 2ish and Treble at maybe 12:30ish. But this setting is a MONSTER. It rips and tears and sounds so good. Again, more "colorful" (ugh) than the Triangle, and then got into territory that the Triangle cannot reach. Like I was able to get a pretty interesting Op Amp/IC Muff sound from it... I've never played an IC Muff, so I don't know, but there is a GREAT treblish buzz to the Huger, and the ability to crank up the Bass at the same time is something that is lacking from other Muffy pedals... you get the buzz, but you lose the balls... and vice versa. I had some really nice buzzing going with the Huger, and the Bass knob was only at like 1:30 or so and there was plenty of bass/thicknessity to the tone/chords.
The Huger is just more like straight GIRTH. It doesn't have like the ripping attack that the Algal Bloom does, but it's a bit more present. And thick. And probably more fuzzy too, if you're talking like getting into the realm of Big Muff comparison. It's more like 'Here is one big thick SOUND.'
When you turn the tone ON, it's just a fucking ripping buzzsaw rip-fest. I played a line of some kind of riff on the Huger, and it's just this thick cutting banshee razorblade kinda thing. Really great. I love it, and it's way nicer than the Triangle. As far as like immediate/initial reactions, the Huger KIIIIILLLLSSSS the Triangle. It's just like RRRRRRRAAAAAWWWWWWRRRRRRR!!!
The other thing I really like about the Huger is that gate that you mentioned. It's not like SUPERGATE or anything, but it does exactly what it needs to do. Nice touch. Another huge(r) (haw haw) plus is that volume swell thing that I mentioned... I can turn the volume on my guitar all the way down, click on the Huger, and slowly turn up the volume... it's a nice, even crescendo... just like straight "turning it up". The Huger does <the fuzzy volume swell> with no probbage... if you have it off, turn down your guitar's volume, turn it on, strike a chord, and slowly turn up the guitar's volume, it is sooooooo smooth. Same as when you let a chord or note ring out... it is not sputtery or crackly at all... just thick.
Conclusivity:
I love the Huger. The Huger is wonderful. Tone circuit on or off, it is a true Muff killer. Thick, ballsy, fuzzy, and optionally cutting, biting, ripping, thumping.
For me, again, PERSONALLY (which is my opinion and what it is too), the Algal Bloom (MY FAVOURITE FUZZ PEDAL!) has one REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY GREAT sound that I like to use, as it is a perfect fuzz for live power chords and can STILL do all six strings with great clarity, and then can solo like a bitch as well. That's why I love it. The Huger has a larger variety of sounds in it, for like what you want to do with Muff-like thick ballsy fuzz sounds. Both excellent."
Everything that Tom does is dope. I would recommend the Huger to EVERYONE, and the Lab Ratchet to people who love the Algal Bloom, but want to have more options with tone combinations and a really neat "Sustain" knob that goes from shitty-dying-gated-8-bit-fuzz to a thicker, "rounder" (haha, like I said 54 times) distortion/fuzz.
CONGRATS TOM!
And thanks a lot for letting me chime in here before the big releases. My pleasure!
C
p.s. Sorry for all the times I took the gay easy way out and described something as "nice". Ugh. That's poor form. I was kinda drunk when I wrote it and I guess I wasn't trying very hard. But yeah, "nice" is so flaccid. Just put in a different menacing descriptor when I say the word "nice".
compared to the otherwise massively saturated Great Wall! 
