Need a build suggestion

[madbean]

For Father's Day, my wife got use tickets to see Trail of Dead in Nashville in Aug. I think this is only the second time they've been here since we moved from TX. Anyway, TOD is one of my all-time favorites and I was thinking about building a pedal for the lead singer/guitar player Conrad and giving it to him at the show. But, I'm not sure what to build. I'm thinking fuzz maybe.

Suggestions are welcome.

[Invertiguy]

Get weird with it and build a PLL 

[Willybomb]

A Klonpressor.

[Zigcat]

Rustbucket!

[Aentons]

After a few narrow misses over the decades, I finally got to see Phish recently and it was awesome. There were moments during the concert that really made me appreciate why I like their music. If I had to narrow it down to one pedal... for me and my relationship to Phish, it's the Digitech Whammy.

I would suggest that you try to identify what it is that you appreciate and what your internal relationship is to Trail Of Dead and see if it comes down to something that stands out as an identifiable thing that you would like to continue seeing them do

[BricksnBeatles]

Any pedals that are a distinctive part of one (or many) of their songs that you could do? If there's a really great tune of theirs that has a really distinctive phaser part for example, you could do that with a graphic that thematically fits that song.

Sorry I can't be of more help with the specifics in that regard, but I have made some pedals as gifts for musicians, and stuff like that always goes over really well because of the feeling of a collaborative connection it gives— it's like their work of art is directly inspiring a different work of art that they can then use to create a new work of art.

I'm seeing Pond in November (never seen them before since they rarely play the US outside of Festival dates— last time I had an opportunity to see them was like 2012 or 2013, but it was a school night and I was just a wee lad) and I'm hoping to build a simple custom pedal each for Jay, Nick, and Shiny Joe, and a noise synth for Jamie

[matmosphere]

Very cool idea Brian. It's been a long time since I've seen TOD but I think that guys dirt is straight up cranked Marshall, so something that would sound cool pushing that maybe. Maybe a Rat, Box of Rock, or a 250, something that has enough of its own character to stand out in front of a dirty Marshall.

Might I suggest the cluster fuzz? I mean, if you can find somebody who has the schematic .

I also think he might dig something a little weird, maybe one of Freppo's circuits like an Arcadiator or the Sidescroller mkii (haven't made it yet but it looks cool).

[madbean]

Really good feedback guys, thanks. It's funny how in tune we all are. The first thing I thought of was either a Tone Virus or Clusterfuzz. But I ruled both out (the TV is really not their sound and I don't think it would be cool for me to use the Clusterfuzz circuit in that way).

So, I am thinking maybe a turret built fuzz with input gain control. Or, maybe the Glitchee since it's got some great tones. I don't think Conrad uses many pedals at all so it's hard to go wrong with a basic fuzz. He's also a pretty talented illustrator so my plan is to appropriate one of his pieces for the artwork and do a etching of it.

[Bio77]

I really like the Glitchee idea, since it's something nobody can get.  Also, it's one of my all time favorite MB circuits. But, since you mentioned him not using a lot of pedals you might want to consider adding a battery and that would be strait forward in a fuzz.   

[EBK]

Someone who doesn't use a lot of pedals may appreciate something that can function as a clean boost at some settings

[jimilee]

Multi rat!


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[madbean]

I ended up just messaging Conrad to tell him what I wanted to do. He seemed into it! So, a gave him a few examples of what I could build for him. Hopefully this will work out 😉

[glops]

I was fortunate living in Austin when Jason and Conrad moved there in the mid 90's. Got to know them fairly quickly as I was in a band in roughly the same scene. Got to see them many times when they were a blistering 2 piece and then as a 3 piece. I actually went to high school with Kevin who became the 3rd member. And then would see them as a 4 piece. I was taking pictures at the time with my Pentax 35mm and shot a couple of their shows. Most of them didn't turn out to be good pics as there was a lot of drinking going on at the time. There was one good one from a club called the Blue Flamingo which was a trans club that hosted punk shows, they destroyed their gear that night and I took a pic of the snare with some debris scattered around it that ended up going on the back cover of their 1st record. I also took the cover pic and backside pic of the painting for their second record, Madonna. I also took a bunch of pics of them when I worked at a 1hour photo studio. Never scanned any of those so should look for those negatives. And I shot them with Super 8mm a couple of times but the camera I had was always malfunctioning so footage not great but there is one small clip that would make an amazing GIF.

[madbean]

So I finished this just under the wire (considering the show is tonight). This was a nightmare build. I actually just about gave up on it today but I managed to stick it out and solve the issues. I'll do a post mortem on it at some point to list all the problems I had to overcome with this f*#@ of a PCB. I'm going to have to change my approach on some of the 4-layer designs going forward.

[madbean]

Somehow, my wife captured this photo to make this situation look incredibly awkward, haha. It was anything but. Conrad and Jason were incredibly nice and gracious to me. The only positive thing I can say about this image is that I can see how much weight I've lost in the last two years The pic kinda cracks me up.