Square for battle!
With this latest creation, Lerxst revisits the early part of Alex’s tone journey when he was a young player inspired by the fuzz-driven guitar heroes of the late 1960s. Looking to make a bold statement with his own playing, Alex found himself chasing the sounds that he was hearing on records by Hendrix, Beck, Page, and more. “My introduction to fuzz was before I had any on my face,” he says. “My first pedal was the glorious Fuzz Face and ‘In A Gadda Da Vida’ never sounded better!”
The Snow Dog builds off of a beloved silicon octave fuzz circuit from the early 1970s while updating the effect for the needs of the modern player. The fuzz section of the pedal has a wide gain range that runs the gamut from subtly satisfying vintage fuzz sounds to thick sustain that can be dialed from the pleasantly muffled to screaming leads with the turn of the tone knob. There is also plenty of volume on tap to provide an added kick to even the cleanest of amplifiers.
The octave section of the pedal combines multiple semitones to create The Snow Dog’s signature upper octave sheen. When used without the fuzz, it can add subtle synthy textures to your core guitar sound as well as a slight gain boost. When combined with the fuzz section, The Snow Dog reaches its final form as a searing octave fuzz that can cut through any mix while still retaining its thickness and texture. Just like By-Tor, the order of the two sections can be changed via toggle switch, resulting in two distinctly different octave fuzz sounds.
The Snow Dog Specifications
- 1970s-inspired circuit for a rich, creamy fuzz
- Analog octave circuit
- Separate fuzz and octave switches
- Toggle switch to change order of fuzz and octave circuits
- Sturdy steel enclosure
- Heavy-duty footswitches, knobs, and jacks
- 9V DC Negative Center Power
- Current Draw: 70mA
- $295
“I use distortion, fuzz, and overdrive pedals and plug-ins when I’m looking for that kind of specific sound for the projects I work on and am having fun with both the By-Tor and Snow Dog pedals,” Alex says. “But it’s the Snow Dog that really screams. It can produce the most horrific fuzz in the Universe!”