Holy balls, I'd forgotten what the Anderton/Red Llama/Snarkdoodle sounded like. It's not even close to being boxed up yet, which is why this isn't a build report. Still, it's sitting on my test rig and sounds terrific. One of those crazy moments where you realize you just killed an hour at the bench noodling on an old beater guitar and amp because it sounds amazing. Responds well to volume and tone at the guitar. Not at all transparent (in a good way). A bit raspy just to give it a slightly snotty edge. Dead simple.
Yeah, Anderton was one of those ahead of the times. I first discovered him and works back in the 70's with a monthly rag "Polyphony" full of great circuit ideas. "Polyphony" eventually became "Electronic Musician" and continued great circuit dives until Anderton sold it (out?) to a larger publication group and IMO it went downhill from there. Back issues of Polyphony are still available and one EU site has posted them as scanned PDFs.
Craig's "Tube Sound" circuit just astounded me to think that a CMOS chip was the heart of the sound. Still love the basic circuit.
Not a build report so no gut shots (both are same old same old). Shown here with it's litter-mate.
(https://www.gordomusic.com/Madbean/snark.jpg)
Agreed on the Anderton bit. I built this on perfboard when it was fresh from the pages of Guitar Player (dating myself here). Not only was I amazed it worked (one of my first builds), but that it sounded so good. I devoured the Electronic Projects for Musicians book to the point where the pages fell out. So this build is quite a flashback.
In hindsight I should have called it the Way Tiny Red Llama...
Or the Tube Box Overdrive