First Impressions: Catalinbread Formula 55 Overdrive

I recently picked up another tweed-tone pedal: Catalinbread’s Formula 55 overdrive pedal.

The Catalinbread Formula 55 Overdrive Pedal

Is this going to be the 5e3-in-a-box pedal that I can recommend to anyone who wants the sound of a Tweed Deluxe without having to buy one of these expensive amps? Or is it going to be three out of three for disappointment with Catalinbread pedals?

Read on for my First Impressions.

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Studio Diary #34: Gigrig G2 Goes For A Service

I recently rewired my home studio rack to replace unreliable home-made cables with professionally-made ones that would be noise-free.

Unexpectedly, the rewiring also revealed that I’d been losing some of the treble from my guitar without realising it. While testing all of the different signal paths that I have, I discovered problems with two of the signal chains that I use the most:

  • the signal path through my Gigrig G2 (this blog post)
  • the signal path through my Fryette PS-100 Power Station

In this blog post, I’m going to explain the problem I found, and what I’m doing about it. I’ll also include audio samples, so that you can hear the problem for yourself.

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TweedTalk #3: Mad Professor’s Little Tweedy Drive

Over on Twitter, my friend Alessandro asked for opinions about Mad Professor’s Little Tweedy Drive.

Yes, I have opinions about this particular pedal. I wasn’t a fan when I first got this pedal. Will that change, when I take a second look at the Little Tweedy Drive? Read on to find out.

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New Arrivals: May 2022

After a couple of months with no new (to me) gear, May has been a very busy month.

There’s a few items I’ve been after, both professionally and for home use. All of these things needed to be imported: some because they’re not sold in the UK, and some because they are sold here but are constantly out of stock.

With the UK government threatening to illegally break its own treaty and start a (doomed) trade war with Europe, I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to get them if I didn’t act now. On top of that, rampant inflation means that buying later means paying a lot more.

Now that they’re here, what do I think of them? And how was the import process? Read on for my First Impressions.

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