Over the years, the effects units we’ve examined from the mad scientists at Discomfort Designs have wowed, excited and perplexed me, in all the greatest of ways. We’ve got their latest creation for you today, and this one takes off into outer space the minute you plug it in. The Phantom Limb Delay Looper combiners two of our favorite effects, while adding a bunch of sonic manipulation into the fold… Phantom Limb is a...
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We’re always on the lookout for new, exciting pedals here, and Discomfort Designs is a company that always delivers in that department. Today’s effect of theirs is the Iceland Spar Loop Refractor, a complex but easy-to-use dual looper with a ton of experimental options baked inside. If you like to sit down and get weird with your pedals, this one is a perfect addition to your rig… The Iceland Spar features a pair of...
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Happy Halloween, everybody! In keeping with the spookiness, oddities and non-normal activities of this All Hallows’ Eve, we’ve got an effects unit that defies all logic and convention, giving “out-of-the-box” an entirely new meaning. The aptly named Riemann’s Grave Modulated Allfiter from Discomfort Designs is a curate trio of biquad filters paired with a sample rate reducer. If that doesn’t confuse...
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For the second time in a row, we’ve got a seemingly basic but surprising pedal from our friends at Discomfort Designs. Following in the footsteps of The Big Mistake Fuzz, we present the mighty Doomsailor Distortion, a powerful beast with a simple control setup. With a wide range of tones and all the heavy grit you can handle, this one is ready to annihilate everything in its musical pathway… The Doomsailor Distortion is...
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You know who you are. You get a new fuzz pedal, turn the fuzz up all the way, set the tone, and never touch the knobs again. If you fall squarely into this camp, then you’ll love today’s pedal, The Big Mistake Fuzz from our friends at Discomfort Designs. There’s even less to do with this one, though, as it features one lone knob and nothing else, letting you produce blistering fuzz tones instantly… The Big...
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The crew at Discomfort Designs just keeps bringing the thunder with each new release, and while today’s pedal from them isn’t as loud and heavy as some of the others, it’s a force nonetheless. The Passage Through the Hollow Earth Reverb features a simple control section, but in these few knobs lies otherworldly ambient tone, spreading far and wide with each note you pluck. Get ready for a ride, ’cause...
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Seemingly out of nowhere, Discomfort Designs has become one of our favorite pedal companies of late. Creating loud, weird and exciting effects, these guys are pushing the levels of noise creation to new heights. Their latest, the Neon Black Fuzz Booster, combines two odd circuits and makes them into one powerhouse of a pedal. In your face, bold, screechy and fantastic, let’s check it out… The left side of the Neon Black is...
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We certainly love three-knob overdrives and one-knob phasers and non-too-complex delay pedals here, but what really peaks our interest are the bizarre, the weird, the unique, the intriguing. Today’s pedal encompasses all of these qualities, taking your instrument’s signal and completely annihilating it, to points beyond recognition. The TMA-1 Jupiter: and Beyond the Infinite from Discomfort Designs is a ring...
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We’ve had a couple of pedals from Discomfort Designs come through the shop recently, and they just keep getting better. Today’s machine, the Black Tooth Doom Octave Distorter, sounds as mean as its name might suggest…and then some. Not for the weak, faint-of-heart or tender-eared, this crushing black beauty is all geared up to rip some speakers and melt some faces… The Black Tooth is a high gain, hard-clipping...
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Our first foray into the world of Discomfort Designs was their 1981 DRV-inspired Spectrum Overdrive, which we were extremely impressed with. Today, we’ve got another pedal from their lineup, one that takes overdrive, delay, bit crushing and general noise, wraps them all up into one wild package and unleashes it on the universe. The Glow Cloud Toxic Delay Device is not going to be for everyone, but for us and those of you who...
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Sometimes, actually, a lot of times, three knobs are all you need to make a perfect overdrive or distortion pedal. Today’s effect is an example of one of those times, without a doubt. Based on the ever-popular 1981 Inventions DRV, the Discomfort Designs Spectrum Overdrive boasts a wide range of dirt tones, from slightly dirty boost to a brutally gorgeous distortion, and all kinds of in-between… The Spectrum is a hand-wired...
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