So I’ve had my PPB for about a week now, the final piece of my pedal board puzzle and I thought I would give my impressions/a short review of it, being that it’s been a bit less talked about for a while.
1. Initial impressions: This is one of the new/re-issue versions that W&C brought back as some people preferred the original PPB to the replacement Suppa Phat Phuk. Before I put it on my board I popped the back of to check out the insides. It does look quite different to previous photos I’ve seen of the circuitry, with a green PCB with a different layout and the use of standard resistors etc rather than some of the larger “old school” parts used in the original. Germanium transistors and JFET are readily identifiable. No idea if there would be any sound difference between the originals and the latest run, was just curious to see what/if anything had changed. Reportedly a custom shop item according to W&C’s website, I ordered mine directly from the Australian dealer who had it in stock.
2. Build quality: Very solid pedal, interior workmanship is great and the finish is one of the nicest I’ve seen on a pedal. It is obviously a very pink pedal, but it’s not until you see it in person that you realise how pink it really is! It is a very eye catching shade of pink and the sparkle finish gives an almost 3D like depth to the pedal. Very pleasing to the eye, if you don’t happen to mind the pink!
3. Pedal placement: I’ve been interested in this pedal for a while after hearing many reports that said it added a special something to their tone. As the original run had finished I thought it would be a pedal I wouldn’t get a chance to try, very happy that W&C decided to reissue it! As I started to play with it I tried it both pre drive and post and found that I liked it better running just before my tube preamp. It quickly became apparent that even though I bought it to be a boost pedal I was most likely going to be running it as an always on type pedal! Fortunately the Amptweaker Pressurizer has a boost function that I can use to push the drive on the Alpha Omicron and the Olympic when I need it.
4. The sound: the PPB is advertised as a slightly dirty germanium bass boost but this doesn’t really describe what it’s actually doing to your bass sound. It’s definitely one of those pedals that you don’t really hear what it’s doing until you compare it to your bypassed sound. My clean bass sound (Kiesel VB4 Short Scale -> touch of compression from the Pressurizer -> Olympic MkIII eq’d to taste) sounds great, but the PPB (volume at noon, which is a tad past unity) adds a little extra sparkle and 3D quality to the sound. To my ears I’m hearing a slight bump in the high mids region, accounting for the sparkle and a slight tightening of the lows, not so much a loss as taking away a bit of flabbiness in the sound. Increasing the PPB volume past noon starts to push the Olympic into a “tubey” overdrive with a corresponding volume increase. Bypassing the Olympic into my GK MB110 + MBP112 the PPB actually sounds quite clean. The original W&C demo has quite a dirty sound but I believe this is from the pedal pushing a tube amp, and I get this sound running the PPB running into the Olympic. Without the tube preamp it sounds like a reasonable clean boost and it still had the same sparkle and tightening effect on the sound. With regards to using the PPB with dirt, it sounded great pushing the Alpha Omicron, but I couldn’t tell if it was adding anything to the sound or if it was mainly driving the AOm harder. Placed after the AOm in the chain, the PPB has a much greater effect on the sound. It adds a much greater depth of harmonic richness to the distortion/OD from the AOm which was really pleasing. Pushing the AOm with the boost from the Pressurizer and following up with the PPB gives me a wickedly heavy, and nicely saturated tone will still retaining great note definition! Placed after the Morris Polymoon I’ve found that the PPB really wakes up the delay and reverb tails, again giving them a bit more sparkle and clarity.
Final thoughts: though I’ve only had the PPB for a short time I’m really happy with it a glad to see that it had lived up to my possibly unrealistic expectations of what it might do to my sound. It adds a great, special something to my sound and I can see why a lot of folks have used it as an always on pedal. I have a fondness for Germanium transistor pedals and though this one is more clean boost than fuzzy saturation I’m really happy with it! I would say it’s one of those pedals that just adds a certain something and has a deserved reputation as a unique boost circuit with an eye catching finish and cheeky name!
Feel free to share experiences or ask questions!
