Few names have more renown for fuzz fiends than the Tone Bender. But getting to the essence of what a Tone Bender really is is a labyrinth that can claim the sanity of even seasoned fuzzologists. Different versions abound, rebranded specimens and copies lurk at every turn, and even within specific types, differing components can make individual units sound worlds apart.
That said, some basic guidelines serve stomp archeologists well when it comes to Tone Benders. For most, the guidelines that serve best are the five generations known as Mk I, 1.5, II, III and IV, but these classifications do little to establish which is the definitive Tone Bender. In fact, the multitude of variations underscores the fact that there’s a Tone Bender for just about every player. Which leads us to the subject of this review—a boss-looking unit from Rotosound. The U.K.-built Rotosound Fuzz is clearly intended to make vintage-fuzz collectors twitch, and this take on the lesser-known but brawny-sounding Tone Bender Mk III inhabits a pretty unique expanse in the fuzz universe.
Her Majesty’s Battleship Fuzz
Rotosound is best known as the string company that made Swinging London rumble. And when John Entwistle became an informal endorser in the mid ’60s (The Who Sell Out had a faux Rotosound radio advert), the brand became the string of choice for English bassists. To expand brand reach and capitalize on the newfound cachet, Rotosound started dabbling in fuzz boxes, too.
The first was a version of Gary Hurst’s Sola Sound Tone Bender Mk II, and it didn’t sell especially well. Nor did the company’s second fuzz—a rebranded version of the Tone Bender Mk III that’s the model for our review pedal. In fact, both pedals might have faded into total obscurity were it not for a brief period in 1969 when Jimmy Page used the second-generation Rotosound fuzz (including for the performance on the French television program Tous en Scene shown on the 2003 DVD Led Zeppelin DVD).
If you’re a stickler for pedalboard space conservation, you can stop reading this review right now: In authentic ’60s style, the Fuzz is a beast—the size of wah, with a tapering profile like a less corpulent Vox or Sola Sound Mk II Tone bender or the Colorsound Mk III Tone Bender. Players who are less space conscious will likely think the Rotosound’s battleship/tackle-box gray hammerite finish is a thing of beauty. And there are practical benefits to its size. For one, when you’re stomping on it, you probably won’t miss it (though the lack of an LED arguably offsets this advantage). But the real plus is that there’s a lot of room to manipulate the volume, treble, and fuzz knobs with your feet, which is critical to making the most of the pedal’s sonic potential.
Big, Bad, Boss Tones
The Rotosound is, in general, about as subtle as a revved-up GTO burning rubber through an intersection. With all three controls cranked and a Les Paul and a blackface Fender Tremolux at either end of the line, the Rotosound generates girthy, buzzing garage-psych fuzz on lower strings and biting higher notes that trade buzz for a spittier, more fractured rasp. A little less tone from the Rotosound goes a long way toward smoothing things out though, and a little less treble input from the Gibson massaged things even further.
The biggest payoff with the humbuckers comes when you use the neck pickup and roll back the guitar and Rotosound tone about two-thirds of the way. Here, the Fuzz is articulate, warm, and violin-like—like a more white-hot version of Clapton’s Cream-era woman tone. Working the Rotosound’s volume with your foot at these settings—particularly in conjunction with lazy, pitch-down bends—yields a subtle , almost phase-y swoosh that sounds amazing for leads up past the 3rd fret. Below there, things can get muddy fast. In most cases, though, retaining definition is simply a matter of rolling back your guitar’s volume and increasing the Rotosound’s tone a notch.
In general, single-coils fare better in terms of definition and control—particularly when it comes to chords. A Rickenbacker 330 generated the richest, most pleasingly growling first-position and power chords when all three Rotosound controls were cranked—a combination that will thrill freakbeat fans. Stratocasters sounded nearly as good with chords, coaxing defined and buzzing lead tones, though they tended to sound slightly more anemic and less capable of generating sustain.
Ratings
Pros: Authentic vintage-germanium fuzz tones. Beautifully built. Searing lead tones and rich, growling power-chord potency.
Cons: Could be more responsive to guitar-volume adjustments. Expensive.
Tones:
Ease of Use:
Build/Design:
Value:
Street: $299
rotosound.com
If there’s a drawback to the Rotosound, it’s that it isn’t as responsive to changes in guitar-input volume as a Tone Bender Mk I or II. This could be attributable to the presence of the treble control, so it’s a good thing that it’s as rangy, versatile, and easy to manipulate as it is. The Rotosound isn’t a high-gain fuzz, and like a lot of vintage and vintage-style germanium fuzzes, it works best with the volume dimed. And if you drop the treble control too much, you can lose the fuzz in a busy mix.
The Verdict
The Rotosound Fuzz isn’t perfect for every rig—few ’60s fuzzes were. But that’s easy to forget in an age when Tone Bender, Fuzz Face, and Big Muff-style circuits are being refined with more gain and midrange control. It’s also not the most versatile fuzz—even by Tone Bender standards. But when the Rotosound is dialed in and paired with the right rig (humbuckers and 12” speakers are a nice fit), it will growl, snarl, and sing with a feral, late-’60s/early-’70s fuzz attitude.
Because of its size, I used the Fuzz in very streamlined rigs. But in doing so I was reminded of the thrilling variety of tones available through crafty use of your guitar’s controls, picking dynamics, and a toe on any of the Rotosound's responsive knobs. Team this pedal up with a good analog delay and a wah, and you have just about every tone a ’60s- or ’70s-geared rocker could ever need.
Watch our video review:
Time Is Riet
Huber’s family has been involved in cabinet
making and master woodworking for over
100 years. Though his father was a pilot,
he taught Nik the family trade at a young
age, crafting toys and other projects in their
substantial home woodshop. Nik also developed
a love for guitar early on, aspiring to
be a professional musician until well into
his 20s. In the early ’90s, Huber attended
lutherie school in Spain and discovered his
true calling.
Early on, Huber forged a vitally important friendship with Paul Reed Smith, who provided guidance and insight. And while there are subtle aspects of Huber’s designs that nod to Smith’s influence—scraped bindings, hybrid hardware, and carved top contours, for example—the designs are uniquely his own. He currently produces about 120 guitars a year across 11 models, including the Rietbergen.
The Rietbergen exudes understated elegance with its classic appointments and thin semi-gloss polyurethane finish. Double-stained in tobacco sunburst, the single-cutaway body is carved from solid tone woods—a flamed, book-matched European maple top and one-piece mahogany back. The latter has been carved out to create hollow chambers on the top and bottom with a solid core down the middle of the guitar. The top features a pair of f-holes, and the muted glow of the finish has just enough yellow and dark caramel accents to look like it has been around for decades. The sunburst finish is accented by a scraped top with pleasing flame grain that accents the top’s warm hues.
The neck is made from a single piece of nicely figured mahogany that joins the body with a sculpted set-neck joint design that improves upper fret access. The neck is capped with a figured East Indian rosewood fretboard and features an ebony headstock veneer with a mother-of-pearl and abalone dolphin inlay and matching ebony truss rod cover. The dolphin inlay ties in nicely with the abalone dot fretboard markers. Our review guitar also features a hardware upgrade package that include a milled brass AVR-II TonePros bridge, aluminum tailpiece with brass studs, aged nickel pickup covers with brushed crème surrounds, gold bell-style brushed knobs, 3-way switch with crème plastic tip, Schaller tuners with ebony wood buttons, and an aged Schaller strap locking system.
In addition to the aesthetic appointments, Huber incorporated some design elements that might make the Rietbergen a little more playable than traditional archtop designs. It features a 25 1/2" scale and a reduced headstock angle that give the guitar a wonderful balance of comfortable string tension and note articulation.
The instrument also has an 11" to 14" compound radius fretboard with 22 medium jumbo frets made from a hardened alloy that has the tone of traditional fretwire but a hardness approximating stainless steel. It’s worth noting that the fret slots do not span the entire fingerboard, which negates the possibility of protruding fret ends and lends the feel of a bound fretboard. The bone nut is a little wider than other Huber guitars, measuring 43.5 mm (1.712") and the string spacing is very comfortable. So is the neck profile, which is best described as a rounded C carve with a little less shoulder. For a relatively thick neck, it feels fast, thanks in part to the semi-gloss finish. Huber called on the seasoned German pickup maker Harry Häussel to outfit the Rietbergen with a pair of PAF-style humbuckers—a 1959 model bridge humbucker and a 1959 custom model in the neck position.
Semi-hollow, Super Tones
Plugged into a Tomaszewicz amplifier, the
Rietbergen is capable of producing an impressive
array of tones for a multitude of musical
genres. The natural assumption is that any
archtop leans toward the blues or jazz vein.
But rock and country cats are every bit as
likely to find interesting—even ideal—tones
in the Rietbergen. Predictably, it has a thick,
bold primary voice, but with sweet highs that
can be very easily shaped and accented just
by varying your pick attack. The guitar still
exhibits all the traditional benefits of a semi-hollow
design—Nigel Tufnel-approved sustain
and expansive frequency response. But there’s
none of the soft or dull note bloom that you
hear in some semi-hollow electrics. Instead,
notes seem to leap off the Rietbergen’s fretboard
with great immediacy and clarity.
Ratings
Pros:
Flawless construction. Spectacular range of tones. Superb playability that makes heavy strings feel light.
Cons:
Expensive.
Tones:
Playability:
Build/Design:
Value:
Street:
$7,325
Company
nikhuber-guitars.com
Pulling up on the tone knob splits the Häussel humbuckers, unveiling another pleasing palette of single-coil tones that, not surprisingly, is a great match for the 25 1/2" scale. The split humbuckers exhibit some of the volume drop you’d expect, but interestingly, they tend to highlight more of the Rietbergen’s acoustic qualities—a range of tones that jazz players in particular are bound to appreciate.
In both split and true humbucking mode, the Häussel pickups are a perfect match for the Rietbergen—capturing and highlighting both the massive natural sustain of the guitar and the excellent string-to-string articulation. It’s hard not be impressed with how both fretted notes and open strings rang out so distinctly and clearly when played in unison. I also appreciated how comfortable the .011–.049 strings felt with the long scale. I executed full-step bends with ease, and needless to say, the heavier strings brought out the bold, yet nuanced voice of the instrument.
The Verdict
Nik Huber named this archtop model
to honor his wife Ingrid’s family name,
because she is one of three daughters and the
Rietbergen name would not continue past
the current generation. Fortunately, the guitar
that bears the same name is likely to not only
survive, but also enjoy considerable renown
for generations to come. The quality and
design execution are top-shelf. And the range
of tones you can summon form the split-coil/humbucking Häussel and the long-scale,
semi-hollow construction is bound to dazzle
or surprise, depending on the extent of your
experience with semi-hollow archtops.
It’s no secret that Nik Huber’s instruments are hard to top in terms of heirloom-level craftsmanship. But what the Rietbergen can deliver in musical terms reflects an equally impressive sense for what makes a guitar sound not just great, but extraordinary.
