Following some disappointing job news yesterday I decided to do a therapy OD pedal build, the Brown Suger (label to come later):
Right side is an Egghead and the left side is a Sparkplug rv. 1.
(http://i1265.photobucket.com/albums/jj516/CurlyMo1981/DSCN1681.jpg) (http://s1265.photobucket.com/user/CurlyMo1981/media/DSCN1681.jpg.html)
It is a veritable rats nest inside, but it works. Not sure about the Presence switch yet...hence the fact that it is just laying on a bed of wires instead of being accessible from the outside. Also used a pre-drilled box from Mammoth so I had to just make things fit as best as possible with the space available.
(http://i1265.photobucket.com/albums/jj516/CurlyMo1981/DSCN1680.jpg) (http://s1265.photobucket.com/user/CurlyMo1981/media/DSCN1680.jpg.html)
Fired up right off the bat and just in time to make a trial by fire run at a gig this afternoon/evening. After the first song, I knew that the Aristocrat that I had been using the last year and a half or so had been booted from the pedalboard. I didn't even take any time to adjust the Bass & Mid trimpots...they're just wherever they were set at when I received them in the mail. This combination plays much more nicely and blends a whole lot better with my Little Dawg Super Dawg (5F4 in a head). Lots more personality and doesn't kill the tweed-ness by tightening up the low end and cleaning out the mids (Aristocrat was almost annoyingly clear throughout the whole tonal range...I like it a lot better through a Blackface amp). I also found myself using less drive on each side than I normally would (Egghead is set up as a low gain drive like I used to use my Barber LTD SR and the Sparkplug is set up as a higher medium gain drive like I used to use my Barber Super Sport). Both are great sounding circuits and I can't wait to fire them up again!
Awesome!
(hope the job thing resolves in a way that works out for you)
Nice!!! So do you prefer your Egghead over the LTD?
culturejam: Thank you. Always other options, just have to find the right one...which of course is also how I got into this crazy pedal building!
jprizz: For my current setup, I do prefer the Egghead over the LTD SR. I originally purchased the LTD SR when I was using a Tiny Terror and wanted more variety of gain without any extra mids. It sounded and worked great that way and I still really like it with an amp like the TT or conversely with a low watt blackface amp where it drives the tone more true than a TS type pedal (to my ears anyway). LTD SR was just a little too polite with the 5F4 Super, though not as much as the Aristocrat. Egghead allows the amp to stay a little rude and keeps the lows in a similar space...not tightening them up but not letting them flub out either. I'm sold on the Egghead though I'll keep the LTD SR for when I'm using a different rig that it is better suited to.
Man, I'll bet those two circuits sound killer together. I really believe the Sparkplug is one of the most underrated DIY drives out there. I had a blast with the one I put together.
Yeah, I built the first version of the Sparkplug for my dad as a Christmas present last year and thought it sounded pretty good. I think the current revision sounds even better and the Egghead does stack well with it. Both circuits sound great with slide which is a big plus over the Aristocrat, no matter the settings.