sprucebringsteen's Country Pedalboard

The Sun Lion was truly my bucket list pedal. I saved for years to get one, and it became a routine to check Reverb for them at under market prices. Eventually when I had the funds, I lowballed a guy with a nice high gain RCA, not expecting him to accept, but was terrified to see the pedal in my cart. It soon arrived on my porch at sat there for an hour at 95 degrees, before I got home. I then brought it in, plugged straight in, and was reminded it didn't like the heat. The Beano Boost side was familiar, as I had one before that I considered integral to my sound, especially with a Vox, but the Sun Face still surprises me to this day. The Fuzz side doesn't sound incredibly different from the red Dunlop Fuzz Face when the gain is maxed, but at lower settings with the bias knob, I discovered a new world of low gain fuzz, and great old school 'overdrive' sounds out of a fuzz pedal, and still think I've barely scratched the surface with the volume knob. Eric Johnson 'Violin' tones and early Black Sabbath riffage are all here in spades.

The Nobels ODR-1 was the first pedal I really loved. I have found myself NEEDING one for the longest time, and I don't mean liking it more than other drives, but needing that sound to even play a gig comfortably or at least have it be an enjoyable experience for me. The Nobels had no single setting that was the best, it's a simple enough layout you can tweak the knobs and find a sound you like. I retired my first Nobels, and tried the mini, liked it, but found myself questioning the quality just as much as an old Nobels, and that's saying something. The weirdest thing about the mini, was that when I tapped on the knobs of the pedal it was microphonic, and it just felt generally cheap even though I had no problems with the sound. I tried the Wampler at a Guitar Center (ick), realized it did the thing, and ordered one by the time I got home. At 18V, it's not indistinguishable from the old Nobels, but Brian Wampler's subtle tweaks all seem to be careful and intentional, and make it just a fantastic take on the ODR-1 formula. I do find myself using more gain on the Belle, because it's quiet, smooth, and doesn't get boomy since you can roll back the bass. Into a tweed amp it just feels like a "more" button, into a black panel Fender it feels like a bit of the Tweed flavor. I even bought a second one, and my ODR-1 lives at home safe.

The Paul Crowther Hot Cake might not be a cheap pedal, but compared to pedals like the Klon Centaur, King of Tone, and others, you can always say it was built by the man himself, Paul Crowther who designed the circuit in the early 70's, and has built every Crowther pedal out of his home since. The Hot Cake has no Mojo components, no magic diodes, and no waiting list. Instead you get what feels like a New Zealand original, that copying would just feel wrong. The Hot Cake is a simple circuit, you could probably build your own. There are a few clones or tributes out there, that I would like to try myself, but the sound of the Hot Cake into a Vox leaves pretty much nothing to be desired, and just feels right to play. If you have the funds and are looking for that just right drive into your AC4, AC10, AC15, AC30, Matchless, Morgan, Victory, or Trainwreck you won't regret it.

If you have one of these pedals lying around or find an old one for a fair price, just get this mod done and you'll have a wonderful pedal you might not be able to live without. For the speed of the service and quality of work, I figured it was a fair value, but from what I know it's an easy mod to perform at home with the right parts. If anyone is struggling to be heard in a mix, any old EQ post drive can get the job done, but this one might just sound a little sweeter.

I picked up the Halo a couple months ago, after most of the hype had died down, to see if it was a suitable upgrade from my TC Electronic Flashback 2 I regretteed selling, with less bugs. For playing everything from church services to Floyd covers, I found the Flashback to sound just right, but found myself alternating between settings and needing to switch on the fly, something the TC was physically incapable of without a loud pop, which seems to be an inherent issue with its design. The Halo's preset banks and on the fly switching intrigued me, so I eventually found one for a good price used, and immediately integrated it into my rig. The stock Andy 1A preset is fun, but I found some of the stock dotted delays to be a little samey sounding and not what I was looking for. My favorite part of having presets is the little pitch warble when you switch delay times, which almost feels like an effect on its own, as it is both seamless and musical sounding. Where this pedal will really shine is customizing your own presets to have in addition to the 'Halo' mode, and in stereo, with a clean and slightly dirty amp. Where I will dock the Halo is the price point in a market saturated with great sounding multi mode delays, but it is a quality piece of kit by a company with top tier service. It can also be noisy on occasion, but that has proven to be user error or lack of isolated power at certain venues, so I can believe the noise floor is lower with the Halo Core.

Appears to be identical to the Rockstock Mini tuner I have been seeing on a lot more boards lately, and judging from the fact even the pictures are the same besides the branding, I would assume they are made in the same factory but exported under different names. The Rockstock tuner is (currently) listed for $49.95 on Amazon, but the Swiff seems to cost half as much or even less. I have not had any problems with the Swiff, but I would not be surprised if the manufacturing had been outsourced, and then this contractor decided to start selling them as their own product.

Update - the screen is falling apart after being carried in a padded pedalboard case.

WIntergreen are the best flavor, but the peppermint ones sound better.