For those TB'rs who have been fortunate enough to purchase one of his clones which one is your favorite and why?
The thing that makes john's builds so special is his ear and his drive to get the best possible sound. Hard for me to pick a favorite, as each of my three boards are anchored by a different Johnk-built pedal, and I love them all.
The longest-running pedal that has been the base sound for my PT Nano (usually with a P or P/J bass) is a build I commissioned from him a few years back. It's a
Ginger, which is a runoffgroove circuit design based on an Ampeg Fliptop SB-12. It completely ended my extensive search for an Ampeg-in-a-box. Anyone can download that circuit layout and create a pedal, but John is never content to do just that. If there is something tonally he isn't absolutely digging, he will try other components (which is obviously how he came up with the Pork Loin mod). And of course, the craftsmanship is top level. My Ginger has been my preamp of choice for years, particularly on gigs where I will be going through a large sound system. It has just the right amount of "tube like" feel/response that makes me confident in sending my bass signal into a direct box.
More recently, I've built a larger board that is anchored by an original design of his: the
Dual-OD aka Duality (he made this before the similarly named Darkglass pedal came out). It's a custom FET boost with a light Overdrive circuit that lets you choose how to cascade...I use the boost side as a preamp and put the OD in front. It adds just the right stuff to my jazz basses for private gigs and light "pushed amp" overdrive for certain tunes. For bar gigs where heavier sounds are needed, all I need is an OCD style boost in front of the Duality to get amazingly natural distortion badassery.
Third on my list is his build of a Catalinbread
Royal Albert Hall, which is a cleaner version of the Hiwatt-inspired WIIO that has the bonus of a mids control. I use it in front of an Orange Terror Bass with an EB-0 to get some seriously awesome saturated bass for a 60s garage style gig.
I also own his build of a
Blue Tube 903, which has the super bonus of pedal board friendliness, taking center-negative power (the orginal ones had their own 3-prong 12v power cord built in). Unfortunately, I fried this one on accident with a 12v AC adapter and am trying to fix it.
In the past I have owned his version of the
Barbershop and the aforementioned original design
Gamma OD. The Gamma is the most massive bass Overdrive I've ever tried. Seriously, has the hugest low end of any "natural" overdrive I've had. Only sold these because I had other JohnK pedals that fit what I needed.
