There are a lot of effects pedals out there shrouded in mystery – vintage units that have little public info about them, pedals only made for a short time, or reclusive builders who keep their secrets, well, secret. The HP-1 Harmonic Percolator is most definitely one of these pedals, a weird fuzzy distortion creation that creates an extremely unique sound. The effect we’re looking at today is a Harmonic Percolator Clone, made by the also semi-mysterious Paperboy Pedals…
This white beauty is a clone of the Interfax HP-1 Harmonic Percolator – it’s a genuinely unusual design with a very identifiable sound, originally established in a small electronics repair business in Milwaukee, WI, by a man named Ed Giese. The Paperboy version utilizes an AionFX.com PCB and loaded up with NOS vintage components, this thing sounds amazing. Throw in a toggle switch that allows you to activate 2N3565 Silicon or 2N404 Germanium transistors, which pass even order harmonics while suppressing odd order harmonics, and you’ve got yourself one hell of a dirt machine.
Made famous by recording engineer and guitarist Steve Albini (Shellac, Big Black), the HP-1 Harmonic Percolator is still a bit of an under-the-radar effect, but there are some excellent clones out there. A few we’ve seen besides this one from Paperboy Pedals are the Nine of Swords Headache, one from Bowman Audio Endeavors, the Malaise Forever Clubber Lang and the HP-X from Vaderin Pedals. Paperboy Pedals have a minimal online presence, but you can find them on Reverb.com and over on Instagram – be sure to watch our demo video, too, and like, comment and subscribe…thanks for your support, cheers!!
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May 22, 2024
I actually knew ed he had an audio repair shop north side of milwaukee by my grandparents. Went many times to hid shop as a kid.
I had an interfax eq pedal 3 decades ago looked similar to the perc I think same case but more sliders.
They had a competitor aceffects in milwaukee that were big locally. I remember seeing used Interfax and ace effects pedals on local stores here (dicks music) but they too dissapeared decades ago.
Not much going on musically anymore in milwaukee the chain music stores moved in, killed the local scene then closed themselves.
I see both their pedals come up on ebay once in a great while but the prices are insane.