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"Best" Bass fuzz

Muzique Fann

Muzique Fann

Howzit brah
Dec 8, 2003
1,740
8
Kauai, HI
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#1
I know this has been done a few times, but I've got it narrowed down - a little. It will only get rare use - with an envelope filter or something. So, I'm torn between these few:

Z. Vex Woolly Mammoth
(TB, very small pedal, blend and the pinch knob sounds cool)
PE Depth Charge
(TB, blend)
Chunk Systems Fuzz
(TB, larger pedal, fuzz & bass knobs, and a gate knob which also is a cool idea)
That Ezekiel pedal looks pretty wild too - but it's been sort of hush, hush around here :)

I know there's no best, but I'd like a little input (where's davidwilson or toastedweed). I'm sorta leaning towards the Chunk pedal, but I really like the small footprint of the Mammoth. I haven't had the chance to try any of these yet. Thanks in advance...
 
#2
You rang? :)

Are you looking for mild or extreme fuzz?

The zvex is pretty extreme, it also has a bit of a hard time dealing with active bass signals and IMO works best with passive basses.

The Chunk is cool, the noise gate is a nice feature but I rarely used it. But to my ears, it was kind of characterless. Also, the lack of a tone knob meant I had to do more fiddling with the bass/effect knobs than I would have liked.

The Depth Charge I'm kind of on the fence about. I have one. Sometimes I like it, sometimes I hate it. I play it at home and it sounds great, live it gets a bit woolly.

Frantone lo-tone is good as well, again I found it worked best with passive basses and seemed to get easily overloaded by active basses.

Black Cat Octave Bass Fuzz is a cool pedal. It has dry/wet volumes plus drive. Despite no tone control, it has the harmonic and filter switches which change the characteristic of the fuzz to more nasal if you want - can make an envelope filter quack more.

For my occassional use on it's own and driving an envelope filter, I'd have to say the Black Cat Octave Bass Fuzz is the one that best fits my fuzz needs. But I'm certainly interested in hearing the Ezekiel :)
 
#4
I think I'm looking for occasional extreme fuzz. All 2 of my basses are active though - so it sounds like the Z Vex and the Depth Charge might be hard to use in a band setting. The Black Cat sounds cool - did you get that from Analogman by chance? I just got his clone chorus with the deep mod and that thing is great! Maybe I'll throw some more business his way.
 
#11
I wish I had ordered an Ezekiel when they were in production... <sigh>

I would order one in a heartbeat if they ever went back into production (hint, hint)

LOL - I never check the dates! Well, thread necromancy is what you get when you constantly tell peeps to do a search before posting a question...

Another +1 for TAFM. Love it, love it, love it.
 
#14
Me still checkin out fuzz pedals(s) my EH bass balls has a fuzz, but may want one to run with a better Phaser, when ever i select one.. heard the keely, maxxon, or psylocibe are some nice ones.
Also wondering if anyone has a diagram of the bass balls, (need to wire in on-off an LED indicator, mine was used and someone broke or remover the light, which i kinda want to have working again.. Paul
 

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