Monolith Fuzz

[blunder]

Hi, my name is Bryan, and I am a fuzz-a-holic.

...I ordered an Oracle yesterday. I could not help myself. Sickle, this one is your fault




The new forum looks great!

[mezcalhead]

Beautiful-looking builds, and I love the liquorice-allsort components!

These are muff-based fuzzes? I'm just assuming from the ram head graphic .. dig the LED third eye too .. !

[cubba]

Great pedals!

Here's a thread from The Gear Page on the Monolith Fuzzes:

http://www.thegearpage.net/board/showth ... p?t=431511

[cubba]

My post from ye olde D*A*M site:

Jeez Donovan, I had no idea you knew Mike from Monolith!

I've known him for a few years now and actually have been sending 2 of his pedals
(the Oracle and the Spectre) around NYC to some players.

I can't tell you how much I wanted to post about them here,
but didn't want to broach the subject with Dave out of mega-respect for the Cap'n.
But you wisely did and of course he's cool as can be to give the thumbs-up.


ANYWAYS....

I loved the hell out of the Monolith fuzzes.
They are crafted (just like D*A*M) with the best and most vintage parts available.
Just look at those great NOS components, handwired to one another via turrets (can you say 1960's Marshall amps?).
I've never seen a pedal wired this way.

As far as tone, they were both as good sounding as they looked.

The Oracle has a real bold & chunky thing going on, w/o getting too tubby.
Really voiced rather perfectly for me.
It has a good amount of gain,
but isn't over-the-top fuzz either.
Folks who like fuzz will dig this and folks who are still looking for a fuzz that suits them will also like this,
since it doesn't mess with your tone too much while still giving you a big warm fuzz.
It's pretty classic sounding, walking somewhere between Tonebender, Fuzz Face and even the Big Muff camp a bit.
Like there's something familiar in the tone, but still something new and even modern about it.
I remember Mike telling me he was trying to create something that he heard in his head
but wasn't yet getting from his pedals.

The Spectre is more of a tone shaper, getting those textured, edgy 60's Spaghetti-Western tones.
I nailed some Syd Barrett tones with ease.
But I never found any of those tones shrill or ice-pick.
It can shave the bass off a bit, which mind you folks can be a welcoming thing,
as this pedal has a really defined midrange that gets singing sustain and feedback anywhere on the neck if you wish it to.
But much like Dave's "Superbee" setting,
you can pump some more low-end into the mix by engaging the switch that lies between the knobs.

But like Dononvan mentions,
these pedals really shine when you take 'em out and run them thru amps that are playing at rehearsal or gig level.
Whoa, serious retention of guitar tone and presence, but with a healthy boost and absolute musicality.

As far as Mike clips, they sound cool and illustrate what the pedal's range is about,
but I dug them a lot more at home and in rehearsal.
Way bigger sounding than those clips reveal.

HEY CADO ..... any time to check these out?
I can get them to you before the end of the month...
they're on TOUR right now.



8-)

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[monolithfuzz]

Donovan's right on re: the Muff qualities....

The Oracle is a two-transistor Germanium circuit, so any tonal similarities to a Muff are just a result of tweaking the circuit by ear. It'll sing, but was also designed to give a really useable, dynamic "Fuzzed OD" tone at lower Density settings. Its certainly not a 4-trannie BM build, thats for sure : ) The goal with the Oracle was to juice as much out of as few components as possible. In so many cases while tweaking this box, I found myself removing components I had added. An exercise in trying to acheive balance, and though its cliche', less was certainly more in this case.

Bryan's got an Oracle in the works. Its going to rip.

[blunder]

Bryan's got an Oracle in the works. Its going to rip.

I can't wait!

[monolithfuzz]

Blunder has mail.
An extra spicy Oracle all wrapped up snug in its box is on its way to you as we speak

[grygrx]

Bass friendly? ;)

[cubba]

Bass friendly? ;)

The Oracle should be slamming for bass,
but let's see what the builder thinks.......

[blunder]

Blunder has mail.
An extra spicy Oracle all wrapped up snug in its box is on its way to you as we speak

It's gonna be a long day at work tomorrow. My ears are ringing just thinking about it. My neighbors are in for it!

Tone report coming soon.