ilovefuzz.com

Context:
16 Years Old: Get Fender Jazz Bass for birthday
18 Years Old: Grow tired of bass and get electric guitar
18-23 Years Old: Punk. Power Chords. Simplicity. NO PEDALS (who has money when they're an Undergrad?)
24-30 Years Old: Grad School, Marriage, Baby, Moving around = NO GUITAR
31 Years old: Holy Shit I want to play guitar again. And I want to learn about and try pedals.

Now (32 years old):

So, after I got back into playing a little over a year ago now, I dipped my toe into buying a couple pedals (Overdrive...Fuzz) but as I played more and more I wanted to go deeper into exploring what pedals were out there...so early in the Fall I had $1,500 to set up a pedal board and I told myself I was going to try plenty of things and be okay with the buy/flip loop for a while in order to find what I liked and "needed".

I quickly learned that FUCK OVERDRIVE (I am being "clever" here as over time I think the Fuck by SSBS is the only Overdrive I found worthy). Overdrive, to me, is largely character-less, boring and stale. I'd rather use Fuzz to get my dirt (around this time I found ILoveFuzz and this is when things really started taking off).

I also learned that my priorities align with Fuzz, Delay and Weird ...effects like Tremolo, Phaser, Flanger I found myself not using often (even bought and tried the Spaceman Voyager to make sure I was trying something "special" but still sold it) and thus, I rely on (close your eyes) BIAS FX on my iPAD to get those types of effects I don't use often because guess what? They sound as good as all the "actual" pedals I've tried. Moving on...

I've been able to try offerings from: Dwarfcraft, Earthquaker, Caroline GC, Montreal Assembly, Basic Audio, Arcane Analog, RMA, Industrialectric, SSBS, Fairfield, Red Panda, Spaceman, EHX, SolidGoldFX, Hexe, Dr Scientist, Bad Pixel, Catalinbread, Super Electric, Vick Audio, Chase Bliss and more...(I tried a lot of shit, okay!?) Hours and hours of, "Do I need this!? Should I sell it?! Is it doing enough....Am I? Should I? I need beer....fuck me..."

After many...many buy/flips the only pedal I regretted selling was the Hexe Revolver (had to at the time for a car repair) and I just recently re-purchased it (thanks Jwar!).

The most pedals I had at once was 12 ...and truthfully, was incredibly overwhelmed as I felt I had to be using them all frequently which just caused kind of chaotic attempts at writing songs. Once I was honest with myself with this fact (very recently) I decided to trim it down (especially since I just bought my first Synth).

Sold my 12x18 board (Thanks Worra!) and I am currently getting a small 6x16 built by a builder. I'll have 4 pedals on it, and then 2 more on my desk to be moved around between synth and guitar.

Those 6 pedals are:
Basic Audio Bye Bias (2 Bias Knob fuzz)
Pladask Elektrisk Romferd
Red Panda Particle
Industrialectric Echo Degrader
Hexe Revolver DX with Vario
Make Sounds Loudly Bitcrusher

I've learned so much during this process and a big thank you to many of you for putting up with my PM's (special thanks to UglyCasanova and BareMountain) ...

I've made a commitment to not sell or buy anything until September 1 which will be a "re-evaluation" period ...some may laugh...but when I set a restriction like this on myself I'm pretty serious about it. (Minus the Warped Vinyl I have listed...that's still a victim)

Once my new board arrives...and my new desk...I will post photos of the set up

If you made it this far

Been a hell of a journey--now it's time to make some fuckin' music.

Nice.

How do you feel about ring modulators?

Good write-up, dude! Sounds like a reasonable way to go about your sonic exploration.

Chankgeez wrote:Nice.

How do you feel about ring modulators?

So...the only Ring Mod I've tried was in the BitQuest.

But...Bias FX has a ring mod based on the Moog and I plan to try it w my Synth

raj007 wrote:I've learned so much during this process and a big thank you to many of you for putting up with my PM's (special thanks to UglyCasanova and BareMountain) ...

glad to help, my dude!!

Personally, I've been so busy trying to build electronics, dub tapes, and screen print that I don't think I've picked up a guitar for more than a half hour in weeks. I know I was getting super overwhelmed when I'd sit down and try to populate a board, so maybe a little simplification would do me some good as well. Then again, the thought of selling any of my stuff fills me with preemptive regret so

You've got a sick little lineup though, and I'm sure you'll be able to create all kinds of mayhem with that. I'm stoked to hear what you come up with!

baremountain wrote:

raj007 wrote:I've learned so much during this process and a big thank you to many of you for putting up with my PM's (special thanks to UglyCasanova and BareMountain) ...

glad to help, my dude!!

Personally, I've been so busy trying to build electronics, dub tapes, and screen print that I don't think I've picked up a guitar for more than a half hour in weeks. I know I was getting super overwhelmed when I'd sit down and try to populate a board, so maybe a little simplification would do me some good as well. Then again, the thought of selling any of my stuff fills me with preemptive regret so

You've got a sick little lineup though, and I'm sure you'll be able to create all kinds of mayhem with that. I'm stoked to hear what you come up with!

I'm pretty sure I'll want the 856 for Z in the future, too...but yesterday I told myself to fuck off and suppress the GAS hahaha. So gonna wait it out.

TLDR

hahaha

I'll save you a LOT of trouble here. Ring mods sound like a broken butthole. Does that make sense? Like someone got kicked in the poop shoot until it no longer worked.

i think it's really nice that your setting a limit on yourself and it's not like i know you at all or anything but

i think everyone here has broken many promises to themselves about dipping their toes in the murky waters of "i just want to try it"

stay strong bud!

raj007 wrote: 18-23 Years Old: Punk. Power Chords. Simplicity. NO PEDALS (who has money when they're an Undergrad?)

Sometimes I wonder how I managed to get a PGW PH6 guitar + DRRI + RM-1N + EQD DT.jr + tr2 + rat + some recording gear being undergrad who lives in an apartment without a rich family... ... voodoo