A full circuit recreation of the mythic Peavey Decade practice amp packed into a pedal enclosure.
The latest innovation from Acorn Amplifiers, the Solid State, is a full circuit recreation of the now-mythic Peavey Decade practice amp packed into a pedal enclosure. The Acorn Amps Solid State incorporates the TDA series class-AB power amp device utilized in the original amp design, giving you the most authentic reproduction available in a modern pedal format. Two separate output jacks allow the Solid State to be used as either a preamp in your pedal chain or as a standalone 10 watt amplifier plugged directly to a speaker cab; they can even be used together at the same time. Additionally, a toggle switch lets you select between sending the signal out before or after the power amp circuit for maximum tonal versatility.
Features
- Full 10 watt solid-state guitar amp circuitry (preamp and power amp)
- Low, Mid, & High controls to dial in your tonal frequency
- Two separate output jacks to use with a speaker cab or normal pedalboard wiring or both together at once
- Two footswitchable tone modes - Normal and Saturation
- Toggle switch to send the signal out from two different points on the circuit path as well as a mute switch for quick studio tracking
- Bi-color LED indicator that lights up green in Normal mode and red in Saturation mode
- True bypass & powered by 18VDC pedal power
Preorder now at acornamps.com.
Stop Dave ... this fuzz may blow the whole freaking ship apart!
Expansive range of massive to fizzy fuzz tones. Killer studio tool. Top-notch build. Looks awesome.
Clipping options can make gain settings a maze.
$199
Acorn TMA-1
acornamps.com
I’ll admit it: The Kubrick fanatic in me made it impossible to ignore the HAL 9000-inspired Acorn TMA-1. But I would love the sound of this thing if it looked like an egg carton. Acorn calls the TMA-1 a four-stage transistor fuzz, which is generally shorthand for “Big Muff.” The circuit board looks the part. And certainly, the TMA-1’s biggest voice is as brutish as the nastiest Big Muff. But it’s also highly tunable. The tone knob ranges from doomy to garage-psych ’66 sizzly. There are plenty of growly sub-maximum gain settings to work with, and a ton of volume on tap, too.
But the TMA-1 transcends simple big-fat-fuzz status—and earns the right to its near $200 price tag—thanks to its clipping options. The four clipping diodes and two mode switches mean you can select between germanium diode clipping and silicon diode clipping at two different points in the circuit’s gain stage—or opt for a terrifying bypass of the clipping stage entirely that makes the TMA-1 preposterously huge. Clipping options yield a super-wide range of tones that vary drastically in output volume and span textures from fizzy to all-germanium settings that can yield dynamic medium-high-gain overdrive to massiveness that’s best measured in megatons. Construction quality, by the way, is superb inside and out. And if you can overcome fear of the TMA-1 becoming malevolently self-aware, you might never want to turn it off.
Test Gear: Fender Telecaster, Fender Telecaster Deluxe with Curtis Novak Wide Range pickups, Rickenbacker 330, Fender Tremolux, Magnatone Starlite
If filthy fuzz is your game, this cheeky stomp may well be your future Hall of Famer.
Cool variety of extreme/deviant fuzz tones. Nice dynamic capability at low gain settings. Fair price.
High gain settings can sacrifice articulation and introduce susceptibility to radio-frequency interference.
$139
Acorn Amplifiers F#%k Face
acornamps.com
What's with the cheeky name and graphics on Acorn Amplifiers' F#%k Face? Long story short: In 1989, the Fleer baseball-card company "accidentally" printed a short-lived card featuring Bill Ripken (Hall of Famer Cal Jr.'s less-known brother), hoisting a bat with "Fuck Face" scrawled on its butt. Besides being funny, the tie-in is that F#%k Face is inspired by the famous round 2-knob fuzz favored by Hendrix, Gilmour, and Eric Johnson—only it ups its progenitor's gain ante with three stages of filth courtesy of three 2N3904 silicon transistors.
I tested F#%k Face with a Stratocaster equipped with Fender Custom Shop '69 pickups, a Gibson '57 Classic-loaded Les Paul, a Tele with Curtis Novak single-coils, and an Eastwood Sidejack Baritone with Novak JM-WR pickups. Amps included a 1976 Fender Vibrolux Reverb, a KT66-driven Sound City SC30, a 6973-driven Goodsell Valpreaux 30, and a Fender Rumble 200.
Recorded into an Audient iD44 interface with no EQ-ing, compression, or effects.
Clip 1: Curtis Novak Tele-V bridge pickup into F#%k Face (level 4 o'clock, fuzz min) then a Sound City SC30 miked with a Royer R-121.
Clip 2: Curtis Novak JM-V neck pickup, then JM-V and Tele-V bridge,, then bridge position, into F#%k Face (level noon, fuzz min) then into a SoundBrut DrVa MkII, a Ground Control Tsukuyomi mid boost, an Anasounds Element reverb, and a Vibrolux Reverb miked with a Royer R-121.
Clip 3: Les Paul 57 Classic bridge pickup into F#%k Face (level 4 o'clock, fuzz min) then a Sound City SC30 miked with a Royer R-121.
Clip 4: Les Paul 57 Classic bridge pickup into F#%k Face (level moved from 10 o'clock to max, fuzz at max) then a Sound City SC30 miked with a Royer R-121.
Clip 5: Custom Shop '69 Strat bridge pickup into F#%k Face (level and fuzz at max) then into a SoundBrut DrVa MkII, a Ground Control Tsukuyomi mid boost, an Anasounds Element reverb, and a Fender Vibrolux Reverb miked with a Royer R-121 and a Fender Rumble 200 miked with an Audix D6.
Clip 6: Curtis Novak JM-WR bridge pickup into F#%k Face (level at 11 o'clock, fuzz at max) then into a SoundBrut DrVa MkII, a Ground Control Tsukuyomi mid boost, a Solidgoldfx Electrooman MkII, an Anasounds Element reverb, and a Fender Vibrolux Reverb miked with a Royer R-121 and a Fender Rumble 200 miked with an Audix D6.
Often Fat, Always Nasty
Cutting to the question undoubtedly at the fore of your own face, yes, F#%k Face is nasty. In many respects it reminds me of the vintage-Mosrite-inspired Jordan Fuzztite—a silicon-transistor unit with a switchable high-gain mode that's been my go-to fuzz for years. Both units furnish buzzy, Velcro-y tones that are categorically not for the faint of heart. Put another way: If you're looking for sweetly singing Jimi leads, F#%k Face will do exactly as its name says.
Despite its lack of an EQ control, F#%k Face's tone profile shifts a bit, depending (primarily) on where its level knob is set. Unity gain tends to be anywhere from 10 o'clock to noon, and from there to about 2 o'clock, tones are more mid-dominant, while past 2 it becomes increasingly corpulent and low-mid heavy. In general, lower fuzz-knob settings are thin and spitty (I like the wasp-in-a-tin-can metaphor), while increasing gain past noon simultaneously smooths out the sound, focuses frequencies in the low and low-mid range, and introduces huge, frothing, effortlessly infinite steroidal cello sustain.
If you're looking for sweetly singing Jimi leads, F#%k Face will do exactly as its name says.
At higher gain settings, there were many times when F#%k Face's riotous rotundity felt a little too indistinct and same-y in any pickup position other than the bridge. This might lead one to surmise F#%k Face is for doomy folks. And at extreme settings, many will certainly miss the cushy attack dynamics you typically get from neck or middle pickups. But there's enough interactivity between the pedal's controls, and a decent enough ability to clean things up with guitar-volume tweaks, that you can still get some in-between flavors. A silver lining to this apparent "limitation" is that F#%k Face sounds very consistent from guitar to guitar, regardless of pickup type.
The Verdict
If you're a fuzz deviant like I am, F#%k Face offers a lot to be intrigued by—especially in a stomp category where staid often seems to be the MO. My main wish while playing F#%k Face was that tone shifts were either a little more perceptible or more responsive to volume-knob tweaks at high gain settings. I loved that F#%k Face could make a Les Paul sound like an overloaded arcing Jacob's ladder. But sometimes the gain was so thick it was difficult to predict, rhythmically, how riffs or leads would come out the other end. (Granted, some might view that as a plus.) Interestingly, one of my favorite settings was fuzz at minimum and level at 3 or 4 o'clock, which—with my Tele volume down a tad and my Sound City SC30 dialed to a Vox-y recipe—yielded a responsive, bristlingly dynamic, and hyper-charged Kinks vibe.
