A trio of vintage-rooted analog stomps rises from dustbin has-beens to just-maybe gotta-haves.
Beholding the three new Orange Vintage Series pedals—in all their substantial, Technicolor splendor—it’s hard to believe that they weren’t more successful in their original incarnation. Orange didn’t shift many original Distortion, Phazer, and Sustain units. And these days, when even the most obscure stompbox has been dissected down to the molecular level, little is written about them. Few original specimens pop up for sale, and even Orange itself had to hunt and gather pedals from the guitar community so they could study for this resurrection project.
I’m grateful they went to the effort though. The new U.K.-built Orange effects are awesome. They’re stupidly easy to use. They look amazing—pedalboard space be damned. They also sound killer and offer real sonic alternatives to more common old-school-style effects.
Each of the Orange Vintage Series pedals are $249, which is not cheap—especially given their simplicity. By they are beautifully made, with tidy through-hole circuit boards, serviceable parts, and quality that rivals or equals what I see in a lot of boutique-class pedals selling for similar prices. They are also beautiful. And I, for one, find inspiration in pedals that are fun to look at—particularly when they sound as good as these.
Orange Distortion, Sustain & Phaser Pedal Demos | First Look
Orange Distortion
When the original Orange Distortion appeared in the late ’70s, the delineations between fuzz, booster, overdrive, and distortion were neither clear nor very widely discussed in the greater guitar sphere. Generally, a customer probably went into a store looking for a tool to make their rig sound nastier, tried out a few things, and left with the one they liked best.
It’s cool, then, that this iteration of the Orange Distortion—which, from this trio, deviates most from the original—so adroitly spans so many of those categories. Engineer Ade Emsley didn’t love the sound of the original, so he overhauled the whole circuit. In this iteration, the Orange Distortion is built around a JFET-based amplifier circuit with preset bass and midrange in the tone stack and a treble control that can be adjusted via an internal potentiometer. This shift in design ethos does nothing to diminish the Orange Distortion’s 1970s aura when it’s switched on, however.
Full Throttle
Like a few late-1970s circuits—the DOD 250 and MXR Distortion + come to mind—the Orange Distortion’s drive can be hot and aggressive but leave a lot of room for string detail to breathe. The compression inherent in distortion is not too oppressive here, which helps make things sound big and organic. The high-mid voice has a tough Marshall accent that can dish sweet Peter Green-style lead tones. And pretty grinding distortion tones can still feel and sound articulate. The Orange Distortion also excels at the other end of the gain spectrum. It works as a pretty-clean to just-barely-dirty boost that adds lots of extra-explosive life and sparkle to a bridge pickup and lends a Fender amp circuit a just-right dose of Anglo-amp presence and heat.
A shift in design ethos does nothing to diminish the Orange Distortion’s 1970s aura when it’s switched on.
A few players will want to take advantage of the treble pot on the interior—particularly humbucker players. But while the Curtis Novak Widerange units I used could sound blurry past the first third of the gain range, these tones were still beautiful, liquid stuff. The pedal is also responsive to dynamics, and guitar volume attenuation is effective for coaxing clean tones.
The Verdict
Though “distortion” may suggest a narrow range of tones, Orange’s Distortion gives you a lot of sounds to work with. The near-clean tones are lively and detailed. The mid-gain tones, meanwhile, are rich and brimming with naturalistic and amp-like saturation characteristics. It’s less claustrophobic than my favorite old RAT2, more open and meatier than a Klon clone at high gain settings, and responsive to picking and volume dynamics. Classic rock-oriented players will rejoice at the sounds available here, but there are also loads of tones for less stylistically constrained players to explore, from jangly to compressed and fuzzy.
Orange Phaser
We are spoiled for phaser choice these days—both in sheer numbers and in the extensive waveform-shaping options you get in newer pedals. In light of these evolutions, it’s easy to forget how limited and primitive early phasers were. The two pillars of phase at the time, the MXR Phase 90 and Electro-Harmonix Small Stone, each had just one knob for modulation rate. Only the latter took the radical step of adding a “color” or phase intensity switch. Orange’s Phaser is built in the manner of these classic units. It exhibits many of the best attributes of both but is intoxicating on its own merits. And like so many great 1-knob phasers, it’s deeper and more versatile than you might think.
Like both a vintage Small Stone and the Phase 90, the Orange Phaser’s modulations feel and sound extra dimensional.
Like the original Phase 90 and Small Stone, the Orange Phaser is a 4-stage phaser circuit, which usually adds up to a sweet spot between intensity and clarity. In the Orange Phaser, that translates to a liquid pulse that’s reminiscent of a favorite vintage Small Stone. It’s a little less vowel-y than my favorite script Phase 90. But like both a vintage Small Stone and the Phase 90, the Orange Phaser’s modulations feel and sound extra dimensional. In the case of the Orange unit, that means a balanced emphasis on low- and high-end frequencies as it cycles through its modulations, which gives it a chewiness and a noticeable sense of size. And for an analog phaser, the Orange is a remarkably quiet pedal. Its low noise floor creates extra clarity and a full-spectrum feel.
The Verdict
A 4-stage, 1-knob modulator—we’ve heard this tune before, right? Yes and no. The Orange unit is highly reminiscent of vintage Small Stone and Phase 90 sounds. But the low noise floor enhances detail in an already clear-sounding circuit, creating a more vivid picture of the rubbery drag and elasticity that makes a vintage phaser sound so watery and immersive. It may be very old school, but Orange’s phaser still feels like real refinement.
Orange Sustain
“Sustain” in the case of this new Orange pedal means compression. And this take on vintage optical compression spans familiar and more open-ended sounds and textures. For starters, the Orange Sustain, like the Phaser, adds very little additional noise to your signal, so you can add loads of sustain (via the depth control) and an ample helping of boost (from the level control) without adding an intolerable layer of hiss.
At certain settings (and especially at low volumes), the Sustain feels and sounds a little like the many Ross-derived compressors that appeared in the 1970s. And many players who use a Dyna Comp or other Ross-inspired compressors will find cool equivalent sounds and effects in the middle ranges of the Sustain’s controls. In general though, the Orange’s optical circuitry helps make the Sustain feel much more oxygenated. There’s a lot less speaker-smothered-in-a-blanket squish and obliteration of picking dynamics—even at high sustain levels. For players that like the sonic benefits of super-heavy squish, the absence of these heaviest compression sounds might be a deal breaker. But I suspect most players will love the clear, potent boost and the more subtle squish and sustain this circuit generates.
The Orange’s optical circuitry helps make the Sustain feel much more oxygenated.
The Verdict
The Orange Sustain, like its sibling pedals in the Vintage Series, inhabits a very cool niche. It’s as simple-to-use and as sonically forgiving as a Dyna Comp—perhaps even more so. But with a well-executed and simple optical circuit, it manages to sound big and transparent almost in the fashion of a studio compressor. Low-compression boost sounds are burly and smooth, thanks, in part, to the optical circuitry. And piling on more sustain and output volume makes things warm and growly. High-squish addicts, or those that like the more brash side of a Ross or Dyna Comp, might find the Orange a little refined. But try plugging one in with a little reverb and a big tube amp cranked up loud.… I expect you’ll be psyched.
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The country virtuoso closes out this season of Wong Notes with a fascinating, career-spanning interview.
We’ve saved one of the best for last: Brad Paisley.The celebrated shredder and seasoned fisherman joins host Cory Wong for one of this season’s most interesting episodes. Paisley talks his earliest guitar-playing influences, which came from his grandfather’s love of country music, and his first days in Nashville—as a student at Belmont University, studying the music industry.
The behind-the-curtain knowledge he picked up at Belmont made him a good match for industry suits trying to force bad contracts on him.
Wong and Paisley swap notes on fishing and a mutual love of Phish—Paisley envies the jam-band scene, which he thinks has more leeway in live contexts than country. And with a new signature Fender Telecaster hitting the market in a rare blue paisley finish, Paisley discusses his iconic namesake pattern—which some might describe as “hippie puke”—and its surprising origin with Elvis’ guitarist James Burton.
Plus, hear how Paisley assembled his rig over the years, the state of shredding on mainstream radio, when it might be good to hallucinogenic drugs in a set, and the only negative thing about country-music audiences.
Tom Bedell in the Relic Music acoustic room, holding a custom Seed to Song Parlor with a stunning ocean sinker redwood top and milagro Brazilian rosewood back and sides.
As head of Breedlove and Bedell Guitars, he’s championed sustainability and environmental causes—and he wants to tell you about it.
As the owner of the Breedlove and Bedell guitar companies, Tom Bedell has been a passionate advocate for sustainable practices in acoustic guitar manufacturing. Listening to him talk, it’s clear that the preservation of the Earth’s forests are just as important to Bedell as the sound of his guitars. You’ll know just how big of a statement that is if you’ve ever had the opportunity to spend time with one of his excellently crafted high-end acoustics, which are among the finest you’ll find. Over the course of his career, Bedell has championed the use of alternative tonewoods and traveled the world to get a firsthand look at his wood sources and their harvesting practices. When you buy a Bedell, you can rest assured that no clear-cut woods were used.
A born storyteller, Bedell doesn’t keep his passion to himself. On Friday, May 12, at New Jersey boutique guitar outpost Relic Music, Bedell shared some of the stories he’s collected during his life and travels as part of a three-city clinic trip. At Relic—and stops at Crossroads Guitar and Art in Gilbertsville, Pennsylvania, and Chuck Levin’s Washington Music Center in Wheaton, Maryland—he discussed his guitars and what makes them so special, why sustainability is such an important cause, and how he’s putting it into practice.
Before his talk, we sat in Relic’s cozy, plush acoustic room, surrounded by a host of high-end instruments. We took a look at a few of the store’s house-spec’d Bedell parlors while we chatted.
“The story of this guitar is the story of the world,” Bedell explained to me, holding a Seed to Song Parlor. He painted a picture of a milagro tree growing on a hillside in northeastern Brazil some 500 years ago, deprived of water and growing in stressful conditions during its early life. That tree was eventually harvested, and in the 1950s, it was shipped to Spain by a company that specialized in church ornaments. They recognized this unique specimen and set it aside until it was imported to the U.S. and reached Oregon. Now, it makes the back and sides of this unique guitar.
A Bedell Fireside Parlor with a buckskin redwood top and cocobolo back and sides.
As for the ocean sinker redwood top, “I’m gonna make up the story,” Bedell said, as he approximated the life cycle of the tree, which floated in the ocean, soaking up minerals for years and years, and washed ashore on northern Oregon’s Manzanita Beach. The two woods were paired and built into a small run of exquisitely outfitted guitars using the Bedell/Breedlove Sound Optimization process—in which the building team fine-tunes each instrument’s voice by hand-shaping individual braces to target resonant frequencies using acoustic analysis—and Bedell and his team fell in love.
Playing it while we spoke, I was smitten by this guitar’s warm, responsive tone and even articulation and attack across the fretboard; it strikes a perfect tonal balance between a tight low-end and bright top, with a wide dynamic range that made it sympathetic to anything I offered. And as I swapped guitars, whether picking up a Fireside Parlor with a buckskin redwood top and cocobolo back and sides or one with an Adirondack spruce top and Brazilian rosewood back and sides, the character and the elements of each instrument changed, but that perfect balance remained. Each of these acoustics—and of any Bedell I’ve had the pleasure to play—delivers their own experiential thumbprint.
Rosette and inlay detail on an Adirondack spruce top.
Ultimately, that’s what brought Bedell out to the East Coast on this short tour. “We have a totally different philosophy about how we approach guitar-building,” Bedell effused. “There are a lot of individuals who build maybe 12 guitars a year, who do some of the things that we do, but there’s nobody on a production level.” And he wants to spread that gospel.
“We want to reach people who really want something special,” he continued, pointing out that for the Bedell line, the company specifically wants to work with shops like Relic and the other stores he’s visited, “who have a clientele that says I want the best guitar I can possibly have, and they carry enough variety that we can give them that.”
A Fireside Parlor with a Western red cedar top and Brazilian rosewood back and sides.
A beautifully realized mashup of two iconic guitars.
Reader: Ward Powell
Hometown: Ontario, Canada
Guitar: ES-339 Junior
I’ve always liked unusual guitars. I think it started when I got my first guitar way back in 1976. I bought a '73 Telecaster Deluxe for $200 with money I saved from delivering newspapers.
I really got serious about playing in 1978, the same year the first Van Halen album was released. Eddie Van Halen was a huge influence on me, including how he built and modded guitars. Inspired by Eddie, I basically butchered that Tele. But keep in mind, there was once a time when every vintage guitar was just a used guitar—I still have that Tele, by the way.
I never lost that spirit of wanting guitars that were unique, and have built and modded a few dozen guitars since. When I started G.A.S.-ing simultaneously for a Les Paul Junior and a Casino, I came up with this concept. I found an Epiphone ES-339 locally at a great price. It already had upgraded CTS pots, Kluson tuners, and the frets had been PLEK’d. It even came with a hardshell case. It was cheap because it was a right-handed guitar that had been converted to left handed and all the controls had been moved to the opposite side, so it had five additional holes in the top.
Fortunately, I found a Duesenberg wraparound bridge that used the same post spacing as a Tune-o-matic. I used plug cutters to cut plugs out of baltic birch plywood to fill the 12 holes in the laminated top. I also reshaped the old-style Epiphone headstock. Then, I sanded off the original finish, taped the fretboard, and sprayed the finish using cans of nitro lacquer from Oxford Guitar Supply. Lots of wet sanding and buffing later, the finish was done.
I installed threaded insert bushings for the bridge, so it will never pull out. The pickup is a Mojotone Quiet Coil P-90 and I fabricated a shim from a DIY mold and tinted epoxy to raise the P-90 up closer to the strings. The shim also covers the original humbucker opening. I cut a pickguard out of a blank and heated it slightly to bend it to follow the curvature of the top.
All in all, I'm pretty happy how it turned out! It plays great and sounds even better. And I have something that is unique: an ES-339 Junior.
ENGL, renowned for its high-performance amplifiers, proudly introduces the EP635 Fireball IR Pedal, a revolutionary 2-channel preamp pedal designed to deliver the legendary Fireball tone in a compact and feature-rich format.
The EP635 Fireball IR Pedal brings the raw power and precision of the ENGL Fireball amplifier into a pedalboard-friendly enclosure, offering unmatched flexibility and tonal control for guitarists of all styles. This cutting-edge pedal is equipped with advanced features, making it a must-have for players seeking high-gain perfection with modern digital convenience.
Key Features:
- Authentic Fireball Tone – Designed after the renowned ENGL Fireball amplifier, the EP635 delivers the unmistakable high-gain aggression and clarity that ENGL fans love.
- Two Independent Channels – Easily switch between two distinct channels, with each channel’s knob settings saved independently, allowing for seamless transitions between tones.
- Built-in Midboost Function – Enhance your tone with the integrated Midboost switch, perfect for cutting through the mix with extra punch.
- Advanced Noise Gate – Eliminate unwanted noise and maintain articulate clarity, even with high-gain settings.
- IR (Impulse Response) Loading via USB-C – Customize your sound with user-loadable IRs using the included software, bringing studio-quality cab simulations to your pedalboard.
- Headphone Output – Silent practice has never been easier, with a dedicated headphone output for direct monitoring.
- Premium Build and Intuitive Controls – Featuring a rugged chassis and responsive controls for Volume, Gain, Bass, Middle, Treble, and Presence, ensuring precise tonal shaping.
SPECS:
- Input 1/4” (6,35mm) Jack
- Output 1/4” (6,35mm) Jack
- Headphone Output 1/8”(3,5mm) Jack
- 9V DC / 300mA (center negativ) / power supply, sold separately
- USB C