Pretty Years

[smallsnd/bigsnd]

More on the pretty years thread, jwar and A/B'ed our Pretty Years yesterday, and they sounded remarkably close. The biggest differences we heard was when they ran off of different power supplies. Massive differences in sounds when running it from a one spot chain or from an isolated power supply.

oh yeah? i'd love to hear your findings! i tested them all with a few different supplies and had similar results and have been running mine on a 1spot chain on this tour.

[DRodriguez]

oh yeah? i'd love to hear your findings! i tested them all with a few different supplies and had similar results and have been running mine on a 1spot chain on this tour.

So, jwar was having weird issues with whine and prominent pops when engaging the pretty years with his active bass. We found that a buffer buster in line solved that issue instantly.

Just out of curiosity, we decided to A/B them. At first we accidentally wired then up on different power supplies. Mine was on an iso-5, his was 8th on a chain of 8 pedals. Wired like that, mine had significantly more low end. His would start to do some screeching noises on loud notes that mine wasn't. Once we realized our mistake, we put them both on the iso-5 and they sounded nearly identical.

Jwar's pictures. Here's the chain it was running through power wise.
Miku stomp>Farm Pedals Evolution Fuzz > LAL Cyber Psychic > Fuzzhugger Algal Bloom > dminner Phase Modulator > mtl.asm Goodbye 24 > LAL Misty Cave > Jwar's Pretty Years.

The two Pretty Years side by side before matching them.

[smallsnd/bigsnd]

oh yeah? i'd love to hear your findings! i tested them all with a few different supplies and had similar results and have been running mine on a 1spot chain on this tour.

So, jwar was having weird issues with whine and prominent pops when engaging the pretty years with his active bass. We found that a buffer buster in line solved that issue instantly.

Just out of curiosity, we decided to A/B them. At first we accidentally wired then up on different power supplies. Mine was on an iso-5, his was 8th on a chain of 8 pedals. Wired like that, mine had significantly more low end. His would start to do some screeching noises on loud notes that mine wasn't. Once we realized our mistake, we put them both on the iso-5 and they sounded nearly identical.

Jwar's pictures. Here's the chain it was running through power wise.
Miku stomp>Farm Pedals Evolution Fuzz > LAL Cyber Psychic > Fuzzhugger Algal Bloom > dminner Phase Modulator > mtl.asm Goodbye 24 > LAL Misty Cave > Jwar's Pretty Years.

The two Pretty Years side by side before matching them.

huh interesting. all good info to have.

[augur44]

I have ordered one of the last batch of 30 so have still some time before receiving it.
I'm using a F*ck for more than 1 year.

Some question to users of 1st batch and people who already own a F*ck or Mini :
- How does it compare ?
- Can it make a natural light overdrive as the F*ck or Mini ?
- Can it do weird bias sound like the F*ck (with a kind of enveloppe) ?

Thanks !

[Strange Tales]

-They're completely different, no point in comparing.
-Probably, but you're misusing the pedal then ***
-Probably. I assume with the feedback paths and the FM toggle you can get some really weird sounds out of the modes.

***Yes, you can't misuse a pedal actually; but using it this way you are grossly under-utilizing this pedal.


Also, this with a Misty Cave after is tight as fuck.

[Inconuucl]

This is like weird NIN guitar sound fxs in a box. I think it's either the fragile or with teeth that he makes a lot of noises that the Pretty Years nails. Probably because of distorted resonance.

[Jwar]

Brian it was definitely interesting and now makes me want to get a power starve to see just how weird you can make this sucker. I recorded the difference, but there's too much background noise (damn loud bastards!!! LOL) to hear the pedals. It was COMPLETELY differently voiced though. So crazy and cool IMO.

[baremountain]

jwar and A/B'ed our Pretty Years yesterday, and they sounded remarkably close. The biggest differences we heard was when they ran off of different power supplies. Massive differences in sounds when running it from a one spot chain or from an isolated power supply.

Yeah this is my experience as well. Someone a few pages back suggested that the current draw should be less than 100mA, but when I hooked it up to one of my Phoenix's 100mA outs it sounded real wonky - kind of weak, overall less likely to make sound, and much more pedal noise. I actually haven't tried it on one of the 300mA outs because those were all spoken for at the time I received the PY, but I have it on its own 1-spot now and things are peachy.
Still obsessively playing with this thing too. I can't get over all the crazy sounds it has locked inside. I plugged a bass in for the first time yesterday and I got some insane face-melting sounds. I love how it can go from a more harmonically rich, subtle/textural sound to the most insane fuzz box I've ever played with.

Also to expand on Strange Tales's answers to augur44:
I've never had a fuck or a Mini, but I've seen what they can do. I'd say it's on a different playing field - the Fuck and Mini are more related to fuzz boxes, whereas the Pretty Years seems more comparable to rack gear that allows you to really deliberately sculpt different aspects of the fuzz. Each gain stage has its own characteristic sound, so there's a whole lot going on that can be tweaked. With clipping & filter off, and all other settings dialed in to resemble the bypass signal, you can dial in some light OD mainly by turning the Gain II knob. But as jwar said, that's underutilizing this thing's capabilities because you straight up have to bypass most of the features. It is there if you need it, but I doubt you'll be dialing that tone in once you dive into this box. And I'm not exactly sure what bias sound you're talking about, but the bias knob on the PY is highly interactive and can do pretty much any sound from completely mangled and barely hanging on for life to a very clean slight boost - adding that to the other gain stages and filters, you can get plenty of crazy sounds from bitcrushing to random clicks and pops to squeals and hissy feedback.
It doesn't really compare to anything else I've ever played with, but it's surprisingly easy to use and it has totally changed my mental landscape for dirty guitar tones.
This is actually the second time Brian has done that - the first was when I got a TAFM back in 2010. I'd never heard of clean blend on fuzz, but that feature was the secret to my fuzz tone until the day I opened the Pretty Years.

[D.o.S.]

I'd never heard of clean blend on fuzz

That's fucking wild.

[augur44]

Thank you for your smart observations.
Looking forward to receiving it !

[Inconuucl]

Also, who owns that purple Mini? Gimmeeee

[DRodriguez]

Also, who owns that purple Mini? Gimmeeee

The purple Mini, Fuck, TAFM, and buzz are mine.

[baremountain]

I'd never heard of clean blend on fuzz

That's fucking wild.

My TAFM was my first forray into 'boutique' pedals (meaning non-EHX, Boss, Digitech, or TC) and all the ones I'd had before just had a single volume knob, rather than independent clean/wet signal or even a mix knob. I'd definitely messed with running a stereo rig where my fuzz was only on one amp, but having that control on a single pedal, in mono, was monumental.

[Jwar]

I'd never heard of clean blend on fuzz

That's fucking wild.

Not as wild as people wanting clean blends. Sigh. LOL

[Jwar]

Also, who owns that purple Mini? Gimmeeee

The purple Mini, Fuck, TAFM, and buzz are mine.

I believe Jack has three purple Mini's LOL! So I bet he could be talked out of one.