Recently I was torn between getting a Wren&Cuff Pickle Pie B or getting a W&C Tall Font Russian. On Matt's advice, I went for the Pickle, but THEN managed to get a real Sovtek/EHX 'tall font' Green Sovtek Big Muff.
I do understand that Sovtek/EHX QC was probably not great when my Muff was made and results vary from unit to unit, sometimes greatly, however I would like to think that I got one of the good ones, mainly because I think is sounds good and i've had alot of fuzz pedals (lots of them being muffs, most black or green sovtek muffs) however your sovtek muff may sound different to mine. I have also not tried the Wren & Cuff Tall Font Russian, and cant make any comparisons between my Sovtek Big Muff and and the one that Wren & Cuff based their TFR on, yeah they were probably the same run but they could sound very different.
In Brief:
The Sovtek Big Muff is fat and woolly old skool fuzz maker with enough bite to keep it favourite for many.
The Pickle Pie B is brighter, more aggressive, more versatile but just isnt as warm as the muff - for me, that wont be a problem.
The Wren & Cuff Pickle Pie B:
I've bought alot of pedals that have claimed to have interactive controls before, but this is the real thing. To my ears, the SHAPE control goes from super scooped-bass heaviness at minimum to adding the treble back in until about 1 o'clock to then adding the mids and more treble from there.
The Saturation control also becomes more mid-focused at lower gain settings (in my opinion), at about 12-1 o'clock the top end becomes more dominant and it sounds a little more scooped (not a bad thing, just another flavour).
These factors coupled with the clean blend and volume control mean that there are alot of sounds on offer. The volume control boosts the distorted sound, not the overall volume.
My favourite tones with the Pickle are more modern buzzsaw bass sounds with really good definition. I'll keep the saturation at about 10 o'clock, Shape at about 1 o'clock. Boost the Volume to max and bring the fuzz sound into my clean signal using the blend until i have a loud enough fuzz on top of my clean signal.
This way, ive got a great bass distortion that sounds tight and punchy.
It should be mentioned that the clean blend does sound very good and no as obvious as on some pedals that use blends.
The Sovtek/EHX Big Muff (tall font version)
In general, the Sovtek seems thicker and lower gain that the Pickle Pie b. The Sovtek also has more bite on the lowest tone settings that the Pickle does on its lowest tone settings, and seems to retain bass quite well across the board, although I get the impression that compared to the Pickle's SHAPE control, the Muff's TONE control does very little and its more the case that the Pickle has a far wider range of tones and extremes.
The Muff has got a more 'vintage' sound that I personally find hard NOT to like. Its warm, wooly and fat. Whilst i dont think it would be the ideal choice for fast note runs (all you bass shredders take note, as the Pickle WOULD be ideal for this), it certainly would give you a great fuzzed up bass sound with some non-intrusive attack. Great for stoner rock sounds.
Clips
Signal Chain: 1995 MIA Fender Deluxe Jazz Bass (Active electronics) -> Big Muff -> Pickle Pie B -> VT Bass -> computer (via Line6 Toneport GX, no modelling or compression or EQ, tried to keep it as clean as possible). VTBass setting can be seen in the photo above.
Obviously the pedals sound different without the VTbass but I feel that the VTBass sound is closer to my sound and the sound that comes out of my amps (and IS the sound that I send to the PA System) for it to be more representative than recording without it.
CLIPS RUN: Clean - Pickle - Sovtek
Tone Down, Fuzz Max Tone 12 o'clock, Fuzz Max Tone Max, Fuzz Max Tweaking the Tone Controls -The Pickle's SHAPE control really does give alot more bang for its buck than the Muff's tone control.
Some chordal stuff
In this last clip you can really hear how defined the pickle is compared to the muff. This clip is the only one where I have taken advantage of the clean blend and is generally my favourite tone on the Pickle Pie B. (lower gain, alot of clean, higher tone setting). Apologies for my playing and for pushing notes out of tune!
The Pickle Pie B was never designed to sound like the Sovtek Big Muff, it is based on a similar circuit but has been tweaked out to make it one man's vision of an excellent bass fuzz/distortion. On that basis, maybe this shootout is obsolete but im pretty sure there were some people wondering how the Pickle Pie B directly compares to a Big Muff.
