Pro Tone Bass Fuzz

Mark Olson · #1 11-20-2008, 08:53 AM

So I picked up a Pro Tone Pedals Bass Fuzz off a fellow TB'er, for a great deal and I got it (superfast shipping by the way) and after playing it for awhile I have to say this is probably one of the best pedals I've ever used. By the way I'll say right off the bat I'm not sure how many of these exist so if you own one, say hey! And if you want to find one that might be tough... Anyways, I've used very few pedals that respond to the way I play as musically as the Pro Tone does, great fuzz for Larry Graham style playing, picking, fingerstyle, tapping, pretty much whatever I feel like doing. Crunchy/Distortionish Fuzz, capable of up to medium high gain levels (not nearly as much gain as some of my OCD clips, for example). Nice aggressive sound perfect for my heavy riffing and possibly leads too I think, just excellent for "my sound" (if you've heard a good deal of my soundclips you know what I'm talking about). Doesn't quite have the guitar-like singing sustain of the OCD for example, or a Big Muff, but that's because those pedals are capable of more gain. The fact that the Pro Tone has less gain than some of the other methods I've used recently for distortion makes me think I've been using too much distortion, the Pro Tone is just that conducive to "my sound". I will definitely be bringing the Pro Tone out to the gigs this weekend, and I'll let you know how it fares there. But as of right now I'd say this is one Bass Fuzz that personally I would be willing to pay $500 for, let alone $50.

I fully intend to do a few clips as soon as possible, but I don't have my laptop right now to record, so I'll have to do it later. If you were blown away by the Dano Fab Tone clips I did, you might think this one sounds just kind of "eh", but if you like my playing you might dig this pedal. I know I do.

fretlessman71 · #2 11-20-2008, 09:06 AM

Looking forward to the clips. I, too, like just a touch of overdrive as opposed to drenching the signal. Maybe it's an Olson thing.

Mark Olson · #3 11-20-2008, 09:11 AM

Actually most of my clips are me pretty much drenching my signal. My OCD clips, for example, have some extremely saturated tones, which seems like too much distortion compared to the medium-heavy gain I got with the Pro Tone. 95% of the time I spent with the pedal was with the gain cranked for a medium heavy distortionish fuzz, which is really what I intend to use it for, but it actually cleans up completely with the fuzz knob all the way to pure clean tone. I'll have to see what I can do with it for some real low gain clips... I know a lot of people like that and it's something I seldom do in my clips.

bongomania · #4 11-20-2008, 09:41 AM

Are you using it with an active or passive bass- and either way, would you say it is a lower-output or higher-output level bass?

Mark Olson · #5 11-20-2008, 10:20 AM

I play passive basses exclusively, have for the past few years now, and none with any active EQ or passive EQ for that matter. Simple passive bass, Volume, Volume, Tone configuration. I plugged the Pro Tone in with my Gibson SG Bass, which has relatively high output humbuckers, much higher than say, your typical passive Jazz Bass.

I also played around with different pickup settings, both pickups on full, just the bridge pickup (like I like to do), and I found what I thought was the best sound with the bridge pickup maxed and the neck pickup rolled off a bit, which is probably how I'll record the soundclips, just for the record.

Chances are the amount of distortion I would get with my standard passive Jazz Bass would be far less, and the Pro Tone seems with my SG Bass to be a fairly touch sensitive pedal. If you'd be curious to hear how big a difference there is between the SG Bass and the Jazz Bass I did some clips here:

EHX Nano Muff Overdrive SOUNDCLIPS

which illustrate a HUGE difference. I used only the bridge pickup on the SG Bass for that one; the SG's bridge pickup has roughly the same amount of bottom as my Jazz Bass, which I find a little anemic.

So, morale of the story is, if anyone is interested I can also try this pedal with a standard passive Fender Jazz and do some clips of that too, but I highly doubt that I will like the sounds I get with that bass nearly as much as I like the sounds I get with my SG.

Joe Gress · #6 11-20-2008, 03:23 PM

Hey Mark,

Do you have pictures, or a link to this pedal? I looked for a while, but the site does not have it, and I can find no retailers. I'm mostly interested in the paint job as the rest of there pedals have an awesome paint job.

tigerbass · #7 11-20-2008, 04:54 PM

Hey Mark, glad you like the pedal! I had talked to Dennis personally and he agreed to make me a bass fuzz pedal. He happened to be making one for the bassist in Gwar at the time and made me one too. He asked me what color rally stripes I wanted and I said green, my wifes fav color, so he made both of ours green. I got it almost 2 years ago. I have since acquired a BlueBeard and a Pickle Pie B, so something had to go. I hated it just sitting idle. He doesn't have them readily available and is really busy these days, but you could always try dropping him a line. He is a very cool guy. I think it costed around $120 new.
Peace

Mark Olson · #8 11-20-2008, 09:52 PM

Thanks for the info, and thanks again, pleasure doing business with you! Yeah, the pedal looks a lot like the booster here:

http://www.protonepedals.com/product.../Thruster.html

But it has two knobs, Volume and Fuzz, and the LED is between those two knobs. And of course the racing stripes are green. Nothing fancy like the Rams Skull or anything like that (which is another pedal I'd be very curious to try out).