One-off pedals, or pedals that were only made in a batch of 3 or 5 or 10, have always appealed to my sense of collection. These specimens, being rare and sometime highly sought-after, make my (and others’) pedal collection that much cooler. I especially like it when no one can guess what it is, or inquisitively comment about the pedal and it’s origins. That said, we’ve got one of those today: the Vulture Fuzz from Keisman Pedals.
As some of you may know, Keisman is making some great gear as of late, and has become especially known for their monster Thunderbird Dual Overdrive. Apparently, they made only a few prototype pedals of something they had been working on, but either decided to go a different direction, or put it on the back burner for a while, which has now turned into years. Either way, only a handful of these pedals were made, and I was lucky enough to get my hand on one of them.
The Vulture Fuzz is a relatively simple fuzz pedal, with only 2 main controls (Volume and Fuzz), and not much else. With the Fuzz around 10:00 or so, and the Volume at noon, the Vulture Fuzz has a nice overdriven break-up kind of sound to it, with a bit of squelch and crackle, but not too much to where it becomes a completely different animal. Turn up the Fuzz knob past 1:00, and it continually gets crunchier, resulting in some nice, warm, thick fuzz tones, complete with sustain that goes on and on. Add a little more Volume in, and this is one bad mamma-jamma of a fuzz.
With it’s disturbing graphics and bright orange enclosure, this is not a pedal that’s easily missed by anyone who comes into it’s vicinity. Brian and the folks at Keisman are supposedly working on some new fuzz pedals, but for right now, I have access to an uber-rare and fun simple little fuzz pedal. Check out the video to see this awesome fuzz in action!
Submitted by Mike B, Website
Demo Rock pedalboard by West Coast Pedalboard
