Leon Wright
Portland, OR
Pelican NoiseWorks
www.pelicannoiseworks.com
How long have you been a musician? How did you get into it in the first place?
Music has always been a part of my life. My dad played piano and guitar ever since I can remember. He passed away when I was 8. After that I inherited his guitar and set out to figure out how to play. Since then, it has been a constant thing in my life, not that I have ever actually learned the instrument to it’s full extent! In high school I played pop-punk covers with a couple bands for fun and have continued to play in garage bands ever since.
Who have been some of your major musical influences, past or present?
I’m very influenced by the sound and style of Jack White. I love the simplicity of technique and the crazy sounds he goes up with.
I’m also a child of the 90’s. Growing up with 90’s alternative really stuck with me. Smashing Pumpkins, Nirvana, and Sunny Day Real Estate are all very much a part of the sound I gravitate toward. These days, if I were to have to pick a guitar hero it would be Nels Cline, hands down! Because, really? No explanation necessary!
What led to the start of Pelican NoiseWorks? How long have you been in business?
Pelican NoiseWorks started as an idea. A simple statement that gear doesn’t need to be so serious. Tools of sound creation should be fun! The idea of the first pedal came in 2015 when it seemed that “Klon hype” was in full swing. Not that I have anything at all against that style of overdrive, it just seemed that every time I turned around another klone was being released by a different manufacturer. There are some great ones and I have have nothing against them (I own and love a few of them). It just seemed kind of boring from my perspective. So after about 5 months of developing it, I released the Pelitaur on April Fools Day 2016. It was such a fun way to launch the company and its first product. Leading up to the release, I would throw out little teasers here and there, and was seeing the exact mixture of responses I was hoping for. Some people very annoyed that it appeared to be a ‘yet-another-klone’ and some genuinely curious as to what was going on. The really fun part was the day after release on April 2nd, when people realized that the joke was actually that the pedal was real! That pedal being the Pelitaur, of course. Two distinct fuzz circuits running in parallel with a blend control between the two. The overall sound and function of the pedal was really the passion for me. I made the decision early on that I would only design and build pedals that I actually want on my board. Two different fuzz tones in parallel inside one enclosure was something I wanted on my board and hadn’t found before. Once the prototype was built, I put it on my board and did some testing where I realized that it was exactly what I wanted. In fact, it kicked at least two fuzz pedals off of my board! This idea of building for my own needs seemed to work out very well this time and will try to continue this into 2017.
Of course, I have a very young company. At the moment of this interview, Pelican NoiseWorks is 8 months old. I do all the designing, building, marketing, and shipping. My wife helps me out with shipping and packaging. She also makes the pedal bags that ship with every pedal. When I started production, Everything aside from the enclosure silk screening was done one at a time in my shop. That meant drilling every enclosure, powder coating and baking in a toaster-oven in my garage and sending them to a local screen printer for printing. After there first 80 enclosures, I decided that was taking up way too much of my time. Now I have enclosures drilled, coated, and printed for me. And it is so nice!!
Did you have formal schooling, or are you self-taught? Take us through that story:
I have no formal education where it comes to electronics. I have a day job as a HVAC/R Tech which I did go to school for. I focus mainly on low voltage control systems at work which as it turns out really helped me out learning audio electronics. Schematics are something I encounter on a daily basis as is troubleshooting. These skills, I feel help me out immensely.
What drives you as far as new pedal creation is concerned? How long does it typically take for an idea to come full circle and become a demo pedal? What’s the process behind new gear, and the eventual release of it to the public?
As I previously touched on, I’m very driven by what I actually use to create music. This is where my ideas come from. I build pedals that I have a need for and think others may too. This may not be a superb recipe for business growth or selling a ton of pedals but for now it seems to be the right way to go about it.
For me it takes a long time to fully complete a design and get it into a production pedal. At this time I just have the one pedal. I have many other ideas but haven’t completed them yet. It’s very important to me to move forward and grow. 2016 for me has been clear that the way to do that is keep filling orders and getting them out same or next day. As a one man shop, this has been filling my available time. Every time I get the opportunity to work on the next design I take it but I’m a few months out on that at this time. There is a lot that goes into creating something new. From the breadboard where I get the general circuit(s) worked out, I then start planning out the enclosure size/layout. Then to design the PCB which takes some time to lay out (for me anyway). After that its a series of prototypes until its exactly as intended. Then comes the part where you make tweaks and find the most efficient process to actually build it. It’s a lot of fun.
What are some of the biggest concerns facing your profession today?
Perhaps unoriginality? It seems that when the market gets flooded with TS-style drives and such it makes it harder for other more original circuits to shine through. This could just be me being worried about nothing, but the overdrive market above all is very saturated. There are some builders doing some amazing sounding overdrive pedals that seem to get somewhat drowned out by new versions of the same old thing.
Where do you see pedal building going in the future?
I don’t see the small builder market dying off anytime soon. In fact it seems to be getting stronger. In the future I definitely think there will be a lot of creative uses of DSP technologies. There are some amazing digital pedals out there and I think that builders will keep pushing and expanding the limitations. It’s all very exciting. Personally I would like to see what could be done with digital drive. It still seems like the land of unknown. Perhaps thats with good reason because we have all played some pretty terrible digital distortions!
Who are some of your favorite builders in the industry right now?
Joel Korte from Chase Bliss is ripping minds open left and right! I’m so excited to see what he comes up with next.
Robert Keeley has been doing some amazing DSP based effects. His team has the momentum to do some truly great things.
Rick Matthews of Matthews Effects has been on fire lately and is slowly taking over my pedal board! I think he is creating some incredible sounding pedals.
Solid Gold FX seems to make everything they make perfect. Can’t say enough good things about their work.
I have to shout out Tom from TomKat Pedals, too. Have you seen the insides of his pedals? Wow!
Name the last 5 records you listened to:
1. Wilco – Star Wars
2. Manchester Orchestra – Simple Math
3. The Weakerthans – Left & Leaving
4. The Decemberists – Her Majesty The Decemberists
5. The Beatles – Revolver
The Klon hype: Love it or Hate it?
Hahahaha!!! I think I fall in the middle. It’s pretty fun to make something that is a bit of a joke on the hype though!
Any last comments, or anything you’d like to talk about?
Thank you Mike! I appreciate the support and honestly do enjoy talking gear. Don’t we all?
Thanks so much to Leon for taking the time to answer some questions! Make sure to go check out www.pelicannoiseworks.com to peruse all of their gear – Cheers!
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