Messages

Can't Get Enough of That Wonderful Duff!™

The Duff Drive is a Cornish SS-2 overdrive built on the Black Horse Effects "English Sustain" pcb that I picked up a while ago and never got around to building. With my Matchless in particular, I tend to gravitate towards ODs and fuzzes with a good amount of bass response; lately, I've been using my JMK Moon Lander build as an always-on pedal with playing my Tele through that amp, as it fills out the lows absolutely beautifully. Thus, when I read that some people found the SS-2 to be a bit bassy, I had a feeling that I would probably like it a lot. 

I built the project with no part substitutions and kept the buffered bypass for the sake of accuracy. The one part I did experiment with was the diodes; to my ears, they have a pretty drastic effect on the character of the breakup and the overall EQ of the pedal itself. I tried the following pairs:

D9K - A little brighter than I liked, but a strong choice overall. Bass response sat quite nicely.

OA126 - I really expected to like these the best, as they're my diode of choice in Klone builds. Nevertheless, they made the pedal waaaaaay too bassy. They actually seemed to attenuate the high end a bit as well, which I didn't particularly like.

AN307 - These were just right. Had roughly the same amount of bass as the D9Ks, but sweeter highs overall. Small Bear currently has quite a few of these, and I think they sound quite nice.

I swapped between the D9Ks and the AN307s three or four times before committing - it was that close. Ear fatigue may have played a role after a while, but I really was happy with the tones I was getting. That being said - if you find this circuit too bassy, a diode swap may make just enough difference to make it play well with your amp.

This thing really does a fine job fattening up single coils. For lack of a better term, the breakup is pretty amp-like... I'm surprised more guys don't go nuts over these. I have a feeling this will spend some time on my gigging board. Looking forward to seeing how well it performs as a solo boost.

They have the same logo as Newark, who I've used many times before. Hmmm... may need to spring for one of those fancy schmancy desoldering pumps they gots for sale...

Thanks for the kind words friends! It's fun getting back to building a bit. I hope to have a few more posted in the coming weeks.

Very nicely executed. I'd love to hear a demo if you have time.

You know, this one's already in someone else's hands. I sort of rushed getting it done, as there's a chance it might end up in the hands of a pretty well-known player. That being said, I was pretty enamored with the thing while I was trying it out, so I'll likely build another for myself pretty soon. I'll post a demo of that one!

True story, i just finished watching the last 3 episodes of Breaking Bad, thought i'd check madbean before i went to bed, BAM, here this is. Great build mate, love the theme, love the show. A bit sad that it's finished really, actually saved a heisenberg image for a future build yesterday. 

The Heisenberg sketch was one of my favorite images from the whole show. So cool. I've already decided that if I do another BB-themed pedal, it'll likely feature Hector Salamanca and have some reference to that bell that he dings.

Been on the road a good bit this month, so haven't been building much... I've missed you guys.

I've had this one on my shelf since before I moved to Nashville almost year ago. I remember ordering it the day it came out, but never got around to building it up. When I finally did, I had everything except for the 2MB pot. I found some cheap on eBay... and they were delivered to my old address back in East TN a week later and never forwarded to me.

So... I finally picked up one of those pots in my last SmallBear order and finished the thing.

I love it.

I think I love it enough to sell my MIDI MuRF, as I basically use it for the same purpose. I haven't built an effect in a long time that just felt VINTAGE to me like this thing does. It ticks... it's a little noisy... but it's a charming sort of noise. Almost musical. Funky. Can't explain it, but it's stupidly cool.

No part subs, no issues either... except for me trying to fire it up 3 different times without all of the transistors in place (I was excited).

LEDs are, of course, a nice shimmery meth-y blue.

WUT

In the studio, I consistently pick a ribbon 'sort of close' (probably no closer than 8," and usually more like 12") and a condenser on the room when we do a shootout before a session. It used to be a Fathead and whatever mic we used on Jen's vocals, but now it's the complete spoilers of an R121 and a U47 clone, lucky me ... That combo seems to get just right amount of midrange and air. Though one of my favorite lead sounds on my records was ENTIRELY room, about 10' away, when we accidentally left a mic on, and one of my other favorite guitar sounds was recorded with a vocal dynamic inside a clothes drier on the other side of the basement, so I guess you could say that overall I'm not really much of a fan of close micing a speaker. They're meant to be heard across a room in any case!

I use an e609 when I (very rarely) have to mic my amps live, I just liked it better than a 57.

Absolutely digging the tone in this tune bro. Nice, airy, dimensional... exactly what I have in mind when I'm doing cleans with single coils.

For a little extra $$$, I strongly prefer the e906 to the e609. Much less harsh to my ears. Over the past six months, I've used the following:

Shure SM57
Audix i5
Senn e609
Senn e906
Senn MD421

The e906 is my go-to at the moment, and I still own the i5 as well. I'd like to spend some more time with the 421, as the few times I used it the monitor situation wasn't that great.

"Google it"

This is..

..without a doubt...

..something I would do. And have done.

Passionflower has been on my "to learn" list for a couple of years now. Every so often I choose a piece that I think is impossible and challenge myself to learn it (last one was "Locomotives" by Justin King). Not sure if I'll ever get this one quite right... he's flippin amazing.

TOTALLY didn't realize you were headed to Asheville. My wife and I used to live about an hour and a half from there and would go there once every few weekends. My favorite watering hole is a joint called the Thirsty Monk. Downstairs is all belgian ales on tap. Good ones. Gulden Draak. Mmmmm.

Cooool man!!! Hey, where can i find such a small little enclosure? loved the idea!

Both enclosures came from PedalPartsPlus. Love that Snuffer Water finish, although I don't know what "Snuffer Water" means.

Rocked this thing at rehearsal yesterday and at a gig tonight. Fantastic. I've got the tone dialed *just* analogue-y enough to make some nice trailing swells and pads, but still bright enough for rhythmic patterns. Sits in a mix perfectly, and the preamp is dead quiet in the fx loop of the amp. This is a seriously great box.

looks great as always, and the little LB tap tempo is actually a little cooler than if you had squeezed it into the box ...

... Okay, spill the beans on the second LED. Is it Brian's idea for the opposition LED on Pins 7/8 for a tempo indicator? Or are you carrying the tempo on the tap jack somehow?

Thanks for the kind words, sir! The second LED (on the right) is a tempo indicator (the tapped tempo, not the division tempo), and was built into the JMK daughter board. Judging by the schem, looks like he's taking that off of pin 5, but I'll let Jacob answer that one for sure.

I think it's possible to have a switch onboard AND do an external jack as well.

Yes, I actually considered this! Nevertheless, I end up hitting switches accidentally during shows enough as it is, so I thought it best to separate the two 

[Dory Delay 2014 Edition + Squishy Tap]

So it's been FOREVER since I posted something. Finally off the road for a couple of weeks. I've had this one sitting on my desk for a while, and finally found time to finish it. I give you...

Dory Delay 2014 Edition + Squishy Tap



I've used the Dory artwork for past delays, and my friends always seem to want them, so I was left Dory-less again after I sold my last one (a Neptune build). This one is a Hamlet build with an additional Taptation daughter board hidden underneath. I decided to make the tap external so that I wouldn't accidentally hit one switch when going for the other.



Hats off to Jon for another fantastic circuit. The voicing is great and I really love how tweakable the repeats are via the tone trimpot. The added buffer/boost circuit is really nice as well - it's likely going to live in the fx loop of my Naylor, so I'll try to report back with how it works there. I did some A/B'ing with the pedal in and out of the chain going into the amp, and found the onboard preamp to be extremely transparent and generally preferable to the dry signal due to the added buffering. I have mine set for the slightest boost over unity.

The only problem I ran into was some ticking that leaked into the signal path, probably due to me having to do longer wire runs to accommodate the top mounted jacks. I replaced the original in/out wires with shielded ones and it cleaned right up.

This one has earned a spot on my main gigging board, pictured below. Thanks again for the great project, guys!

Blog and pedal gallery both on my page at www.danekinser.com!

The rest is just a big business card to try and get gigs