This ones been out for a little bit but I never got 'round to writing a blog on it so ...
Back in dark reassesses of the 80's a British record label run by a very perceptive and forward thinking Scottish man made a huge impact on the world, well, it made a huge impact on me.
Creation records was an indie label who signed a string of amazing bands but essentially introduced the world to the Jesus and Mary Chain. Looking back at Upside Down it's hard to believe anyone would release that single but Alan McGee saw the pure brilliant genius in them and put that squalling, noisy, feedback laden track out on 7" and went on to release maybe the most impressive catalogue of any label anywhere.
When Donnie, who works in the shop started recording "shoegaze" as a hobby he quickly turned into a very talented soundscaping engineer who could capture these tones intimately and when he started working for Tym guitars, he had access to more Tym effects than he ever dreamed could be possible.
One of my Tym Benders became a favourite live and recording fuzz and we were talking about making a special one for him with a built in boost so he could use it for both rhythm and lead but keep the tone intact on both.
Initially my idea was to make the Tym Bender with a Boost or Tone Boost added after the circuit, like my Screaming Mud but as I sat there and thought about it, I realized I could work backwards and make a footswitch like the Fuzz Munchkin, but with a volume in that part so you could set the volume, rather than just wide open, like J wanted.
This gives you essentially two volumes on the same fuzz circuit.
With that idea I made my standard Tym Bender using my favourite NOS "tin can" BC108's and one set of germanium clipping diodes, which gives this circuit a very open bottom end and less saturated gain than a BM, which the original Colorsound circuit was based on.
Dropping out of the circuit before the volume pot, which is essentially the last component in the circuit, sending that to a stompswitch, then to a volume pot means you can set the "circuit" volume to one spot and the "boost" volume to another and switch between the two.
Being that Creation records got me (and a million others) into, what became known as "Shoegaze", and they are one of my inspirations for running my label, it seemed fitting to call this the Creation Fuzz in honour of them.
The next challenge was the artwork. Donnie had suggested making it look like the Yamaha SPX rack units that have become synonymous with this style of music and when I looked them up I was thinking "This is VERY 80's and not very ..... organic looking" and thought Tone, who does most of my artwork was not going to be into it.
He loved it and sent back the perfect design, as usual. It is very 80's but works well with the design and the first version had three pots, like the original TB.
I made one with the boost volume on the back of the pedal above the 9V input and gave it to Donnie.
Tone re-did the artwork with four pots to get the boost volume in line with the others and so it was done.
This circuit, while being very similar in many ways to a BM, has more clarity and clean bottom end due to that one clipping stage, and being germanium gives them a little bit more of a "fizzy" edge.
This pedal (and the Tym Bender) work very well with bass as well and it's no secret around here how much I do love those ol' BC108's.
These are not limited edition (well, I have an .... OK supply of those tin cans) and like all my stuff, I'll make them as I get time.