Here’s a slight twist on the Celebrity Pedalboard concept – Pete ‘Sonic Boom’ Kember tells us how and why the LA-based boutique handmade stompbox manufacturers Acid Fuzz ended up making his signature pedal.
The pedal includes the fuzz and treble/bass booster combination used by Sonic on much of his work with Spacemen 3 and Spectrum, plus a repeat percussion unit. The (Spacemen) 3-in-one pedal also incorporates extra parameter access, including external pedal control option for repeat speed, FX send/return loop, extended repeat rates and more. If, like me, this last bit goes over your head, maybe this look inside will help…
Sonic says: “About 12 years ago I had a friend called Steve Thomas deconstruct and copy the internal effects from my Vox Starstream guitar so I could use the effects on other instruments (the fuzz, bass boost and repeat bass guitar on ‘The Lonesome Death Of Johnny Ace’ came that way, for example).
“He made a small run of the pedals called Sonic Starstreamer. People kept asking me where they could get one of them, but Steve was deep in his work teaching theoretical physics and working with EMS synthesizers on their remake of the Synthi HI-FLI guitar effects and other amazing EMS interfaces and add-ons as Digitana Electronics.
“About a year or so ago, Jon at Acid Fuzz approached me about doing a Sonic Boom pedal with his company. He had already built a prototype with a load of extra features not available on the Sonic Starstreamer version, giving access to all the parameters of the circuits.
“It’s nice to see these effects being honestly remade using the best components – some of which are absolutely critical to the sound.”
The pedal is currently at the prototype stage, but The Brian Jonestown Massacre have placed a large order for their upcoming tour, and you can see some of their special models below.
