Many of the electric guitar’s great tone
innovations were discovered by some
adventurous soul twisting a knob just a
bit beyond where it was intended to go.
That kind of attitude—or ignorance—can
often lead to greatness, and in the case of
the humble 4-track cassette recorder, it
was responsible for some very cool sounds.
Those sounds are the inspiration behind
Mid-Fi Electronics’ Demo Tape Fuzz.
As recently as the ’90s, amateur recording
still relied on the 4-track cassette
recorder. And though ambitious recordists
could get great sounds out of 4-tracks,
the intrinsic compressed nature of cassette
tapes could lend an attractive, sometimes
crackling roughness. When players upped
the compression quotient by plugging
their guitar directly into the 4-track’s mic
preamp and cranked the gain, the resulting
fuzz tones could be downright nasty. This
lo-fi, overdriven mic preamp tone is what
Mid-Fi Electronics is shooting for in the
Demo Tape fuzz.
Tape Appeal
Dressed down with colorless, rough-hewn
graphics and a cassette-like image—complete
with chicken-scratched control
names—the Demo Tape looks punk rock
before you ever plug it in. The unit is powered
via standard DC adapter and is true
bypass. The controls include Bass, Treble,
Volume, and Trim. The latter control, of
course, was the key to sending tracks
into the red on your average
4-track, and it’s just as vital here.
Tape Me Back
First things first: Just because
the Mid-Fi unit specializes in the
skuzzy sounds of a home-brewed
punk cassette, it doesn’t mean
there’s not a lot of other very cool
fuzz sounds on tap. Dialing up a
more typical fuzz tone with the
Trim slightly above noon, the
Treble slightly below noon, and a
touch of Bass recalls no less than
my recent vintage Germanium
4 Big Muff Pi with a little more
compression, which is great for
heavy rock leads and rhythm
alike. The pedal is also extremely
touch-sensitive at these settings
and the response to input dynamics
is amazingly expressive. The
Volume control produces plenty
of boost in the output too, allowing
you to blend the Demo Tape’s
overdrive with your amp’s own
grit when you roll the Trim and
Treble back.
At more extreme settings, however, you
experience the unique sonic qualities that
set this pedal apart. With the Demo Tape
positioned between my Fender Strat and
a silverface Fender Super Bassman, and
the Trim knob turned up a little more
aggressively, the Demo Tape’s distortion
is a deliciously abrasive and highly
compressed wall-o-fuzz. The Demo Tape
can also get extremely bright, and rolling
up the Treble will take you well beyond
where most treble controls stop. This
capability can be painful if you’re running
your Stratocaster via the Demo Tape into
a cranked Fender Twin Reverb. But used
with care, it’s extremely useful for moving
key instruments to the front of the mix
and can add some killer ’60s garage-punk
tones to your palate.
The Verdict
Running a guitar directly into a console
preamp is a technique nearly as old as
multitrack recording itself. But like the
4-track cassette itself, the sound of an overdriven
cassette multitracker is an unjustly
maligned and neglected tone. The Mid-Fi
Demo Tape may not always perfectly nail
the fizziest and most compressed aspects
of that sound, but it certainly captures the
spirit and a lot of the sonic payoff of that
approach. It also delivers a lot of very usable
and more conventional fuzz tones—a feat
that should leave fuzz fans very impressed.
Buy if...
you’ve always wanted that grungy,
lo-fi tone popular in the 1990s.
Skip if...
you never look back on the era
of the cassette with fondness.
Rating...
