Xmas Gear Acquisitions

[tossom]

Merry christmas!

I owe my brother and parents a big thank you, I got this for xmas -

I asked him to try out a Blackstar pedal for me, he was so impressed he bought it and took it home as my Xmas present!

I think I still need to get one of riffers pedals though...

[nonoman]

Got a pack of strings and a bottle of lemon oil from my bassist.

[VOLVO)))]

Set of crowning files, shitloads of steel wool and sandpaper. Strings and socks. Rad.

[johnny problem]

Tascam DP-04.

I'm really happy.

[ROWDYBEER]

Blue mic snowball Bitchin

[Ranbat]

My Agile AS 820 in Natural with chrome hardware. Also got some cash, so it's a gear shopping I will go. I'm thinking new tube amp and maybe a couple of pedals.

[Jor el]

I got nothing music related.   

[Danny G]

Not exactly gear, but my parents got me a small heavy-duty LED flashlight that will no doubt go into my road box. Can never have too many flashlights.

[lordfinesse]

I got some cash, which I hope to apply to the purchase of a tap tremolo. Also (not gear related) I got a Keurig coffee maker (I'm a coffee addict). And my wife got us Wrestlemania tickets. Wait...  I mean fucking WRESTLEMANIA TICKETS!!! I was actually going to buy them for her for Valentine's Day, but she beat me to it. This is why we're married. AND, she gave me the new Hendrix box set and 2 Thin Lizzy import reissues. Awesome.

(edited once because I can't use those fucking buttons correctly)

[Gravitron]

Danny .... the flashlight is so important ... even for a weekend warrieor as me.  I have a purple mini maglite in my road box.

I bought a Korg R3 synthesizer about 4 months ago from best buy on 18 months interest free financing.  So that was my birthday and Christmas present.  Believe me ... it was way more than my wife would ever consider spending on me.  I did the same thing last year when I bought an American made Billy Corgan signature strat .... best buy marked it down to ~ $1,000 then posted a sign that said 20% off.  I insisted on the getting the 20% off ... their fuck up ... I got the guitar for $800 ... then I tould them I need it on interest free credit .... that way when I come home with something like that I say it's only going to cost $45 a month.

[Jake]

I can't believe your parents got you a Fleshlight, Danny. That's pretty thoughtful of them.

I didn't get any gear, but I did get a $100 giftcard from Sears – they sell Electro Harmonix stuff on their website, so I was gonna maybe pick up that Freeze pedal. Does anyone know if those suck balls or are amazing (or something in between)?

[Danny G]

Yes Jake, very thoughtful. It's even small and green, like Yoda. Wait, did I type that out loud?


Got a little cash as well, will be using that on either building or buying yet another new bass wah.

[Chovie D]

TS808 reissue, vinyl coltrane, disc for optigan:"rock and rythym" underneath the trane, Robert randolph pedal steel bar

[black]

Music wise, Santa brought me a couple albums. Shuggie Otis Plays the Blues, Jimmy McGriff Groove Grease, Who's Next and Zappa One Size Fits All. Also Les Paul Chasing Sound dvd.

Gearwise, strings, picks and a Ukulele!

Bitchin'.

[eyeprod]

I brought home the thunderbird I put on layaway earlier this month. a little neck adjustment and the thing rules.

[black_out]

Had my hopes up for the 2 knob bender clone from BYOC, but this is the first year since I started playing that I didn't at least get a pack of strings and a handful of picks. Got some other cool shit, but not one damn thing in the way of guitar shit.

[RacerX]

Strings, picks, new patch cords, a new instrument cable, Fulltone OCD, and a matched quartet of Groove Tubes 6L6s for the Mesa.

Mind you, I bought or ordered all these items for myself, but it was in the X\M/as spirit.

Oh, yeah, I'm also having my Chandler lap steel's nut/tuning posts modified (again) to accept .075 .065, .050, .040, .030, and .022. I had tried the .065 for the low string, but it didn't have enough tension. Hopefully this will be the last step in this experiment. If it works out, I'll be able to tune her to low C, G, C, E, G, C.

[VOLVO)))]

Is the OCD warm, at all?

[RacerX]

It's probably cold as fuck right now because it's sitting in the local UPS facility.

POW!!

However, I should get it tomorrow & I'll let you know how it sounds with my rig. When I tried one out at GC it seemed very transparent and touch-sensitive, with quite a good range from clean boost through grit to light distortion.

[RacerX]

Dammit, UPS doesn't deliver today.

Guess my shit'll get here Monday.

[Chovie D]

I wanna hear and see photos of that lap steel racer.

[RacerX]

Will do, Chovis.

[RacerX]

Got the OCD today. Comes in a burly, 2 piece metal box that assembles with 4 knurled thumbscrews on the sides of the unit. Ugly black on white graphic scheme with 3 different fonts, but I knew she wasn't gonna be pretty.

Inside, all the pc board soldering and wiring is super-clean, and the jacks, pots & switches look to be high quality stuff. The OCD is true bypass, and the face is a standard 3-knobber: Volume and Drive on top, tone centered below. A covered red led is set between the Volume and Drive knobs, and directly above it is a micro switch to choose between the High Peak & Low Peak (HP & LP) settings. A side-mounted DC power input rounds out the features.

I used my SG Classic and my home rig for this test. The head is a Blackstar HT-5, and the cabinet is a 1x12 closed back loaded with a Celestion Greenback.

First, this thing is supposed to be transparent and touch-sensitive, so I started out on the clean channel of the Blackstar. Frankly, I've never much liked this channel because it sounds kinda cold & sterile. I set the OCD volume to the same as the clean signal and dicked around with the tone for a bit to get it in the ballpark. The tone control only affects the highs, and noon was surprisingly close to my tone; I just pushed it up a hair past that. I turned the Drive all the way down and switched the OCD off & on while playing, and my clean amp tone developed a Voxy chime with the unit engaged. Much warmer and a tad punchier than the straight clean channel. Nice. Switching from LP to HP gives a bit more bass and mids and a bit more volume. Still clean as a whistle, though.

Now to put some hair on the clean channel. I cranked the OCD's Drive knob all the way up and left the volume/tone the same. There's a good amount of gain on tap, and in the HP mode, it sounds very AC/DCish, overdriven, distorted, but not fuzzed. Good definition, but aggressive. LP mode with the Drive dimed yields some sweet ZZ Top tones—nice mother tone on the neck pickup with the tone rolled off. The Drive control has a very wide range, and I found 3 or 4 sweet spots between zero and full-on. The OCD's volume control gives a helluva boost if needed, but the gain does slightly increase as the boost increases. The best part: this pedal is very responsive to backing off the guitar volume, just like a Tubescreamer spinoff should be. Unless the Drive is turned way the fuck up, the pedal's gain tames down nicely as the guitar volume drops. Ditto with hard vs. light picking—pick harder, get more grit.

Now to the dirty channel of the HT-5. Usually I have the gain dial cranked when I'm plugged straight in, so I started there. Whoa. With the Drive dimed on the pedal and the amp, my signal is super-saturated and compressed. Not a real useable tone, but I could play one-handed and tapping shit all day with it because there's sustain for miles. I backed the Drive down to 3:00, however, and the attack characteristics became more percussive and distinct. Turning the gain on the amp down improved things a smidge more. The Drive knob on the OCD sounded best between 9:00 & 3:00, and I again found many useable tones in the LP & HP settings, in the vein of Judas Priest, Montrose, Mountain and early Sabbath. I also found many crappy tones in this zone. Again, the gain cleans up as the guitar volume is rolled off, but not as well as into the clean amp.

So those are my first impressions, but I am more interested in how this pedal will work with my live rig and current effects chain, but that'll have to wait until band practice. At this point, my overall impression is that the Fulltone OCD works well as a clean boost and as a basic dirt pedal. For the heavier styles most of us are into, you'll still likely need a fuzz (I'll be using my Meathead), but this pedal pretty much performed as I expected it would. The biggest complaint I have at this point is that because the OCD is very flexible, it's also very touchy. I'll probably mark my settings with a sharpie once I get them settled. Biggest compliment? I'm especially impressed with how it warmed up the previously sterile sounding clean channel on the Blackstar.

[VOLVO)))]

Super pleased with the review. I'm gonna head out and snag one, myself.