But I'm not sure what I think yet. Yesterday I picked up an
MI Audio Crunchbox at 30th St Guitars. They were quite awesome in there; the dude opened up their wall o' fx and gave me suggestions then sent me to go play with them. I tried:
Keeley Moded Blues Driver
Homebrew Electronics Hematoma
The Crunchbox
(And one more that I can't remember but was rejected almost immediately).
I was going for a tubey overdrive that I could rock with the gain off for an SVT feel to round out my sound in this piano rock outfit I'm in.
I really really wanted to like the Blues driver, I'm not sure why, something about it being modded was cool to me, and it was the cheapest. It sounded great, but there was just something off, it was less organic feeling than the others. So then it became a shoot off between the Crunch Box and the Hematoma. The hematoma is definitely the more versatile pedal, but once I kicked it over from preamp to distortion it got a little crazy. However, the preamp setting with the gain dimed was awesome.
On the other hand, the crunchbox had a darker character that I thought would better suit my purposes. I had to tell myself "you're not looking for a crazy fuzzed out distortion, you're looking for subtle, idiot." It could also go crazy should I want it to. I spent about 20 mins going back and forth between the two. The guy straight from work trying out ricks was getting annoyed at me. I also just found out there's a trim pot inside to mess with, so that's exciting.
Here's my buyer's remorse. I think I may have made a poor decision here. I'm afraid I was swayed by the crunchbox's [marginally] lower pricetag and simple knob layout. I wish I could have both, but I can not. I have clips, once my roommate wakes up and can send them to me at work I'll post them [can I get a "how-to" on that?] and solicit your opinions. I have a jam session with my buddies from HS tonight so I can feel it out, and if I'm not wowed, I guess I'll see if I can exchange it for the hematoma. Thoughts?
peace and chicken grease,
chris
