Haven't watched it yet, but definitely plan to.

 

You have to rent or buy it. Considering how much Reverb takes from vendors, they should have offered this for free... it would increase sales and make Reverb even more money.

 

I completely agree!

 

Shout out for Mike Hammer (@mhammer ?) mention by Brian Wampler, and two quick appearances by Axe & You Shall Receive's Scott Hager @sh333 !

I enjoyed the history the most. Hearing about those early effects and who used them. Based on an interview with the movie makers, I expected the second hour to be much more about the people making pedals today, and the kind of creativity that's going on. I was disappointed. It got very dry, and much of it could have been cut. YMMV

 

Thanks. I had heard that I was mentioned, along with RG Keen, but I didn't know in what context or by whom. Quite an honour to be included. Brian's a sweet guy. I look forward to getting together with him again next time Summer NAMM is held in Nashville...and Canadians are allowed to cross the border and come back again.

As far as I know, there is no mention of my buddy Steve Daniels, whose Brooklyn company Small Bear Electronics supplies many of the exotic (and normal) parts for many of the boutique builders included in the doc and spread all over the industry, and also sprang from the loins of the DIYstmpbox forum. If you have and love your germanium transistor fuzz, chances are pretty good you owe a debt of gratitude to Steve, who managed to find some in some exotic location, and supplied them to the person who built that fuzz.

After seeing an assortment of trailers and teasers for it over the past year, I look forward to seeing the movie.

Mark

 

I watched it yesterday and plan to watch it again tomorrow (48-hr rent from youtube).
Shout out for Mark (@mhammer) respectfully mentioned by Brian Wampler!

Very interesting but for a very long film, I expected more input from more makers (e.g. Mythos, Mad Professor, Diamond and others). At times I was under the impression that it's Josh Scott's show, except that he knows the subject well and always speaks well of other makers' products.

They made my day when they talked about Tone Bender pedals. I used to play through a Vox Tone Bender MK3 in 1974 in Poland and it was my only pedal (there wasn't much choice then in Eastern Block). I had no idea of its reputation and future legendary $$tatus of course.

Good film, recommended and worth paying for rental

 

After watching it one more time (ok, I'm weird) I realized that many parts were re-used from "Cry Baby - The Pedal That Rocks The World", documentary from few years back, and probably some other docs. This kind of patch-working usually turns me off. The emphasis on budget became more obvious when I realized that proper audio examples of many effects were not included (i.e. paid for).

Clever documentary films are not easy. Still, this one is recommended, particularly for GAS fueled gear heads like myself.

 

It's a good movie, right up until about the 2hr 8min mark.

 

I agree with your observation completely!! I too thought it was good until about the 2:08 mark. After that, I rapidly lost interest in it. Despite that...... I did watch it until the very end. I find it ironic that I've got a duffel bags worth of BOSS pedals, MXR pedals, Tom Scholz effects (vintage Rockman) Digitech etc. I rarely use any of them because I see no need for them!! A bit of Chorus (every now & then) & a overdrive pedal (for recording, DI into my PC) is about all I ever use. When playing through an amp I skip the pedals & use the overdrive channel. I almost bought a EVH BOSS SDE 3000 digital delay but didn't. It'd probably end up in my equipment duffel bag & rarely/never get used like all the other stuff!!😅

 

I thought it was OK. But I did find too much detailed history about them, it's about 7/8 of the film. I also find stuff like this is generally meant to generate hype and increase profit.

 

Well, it IS from Reverb, after all. It's not like they're a non-profit collective.

 

Yes, I agree. But brilliant me wasn't ready for a 90 minute ad, I should have known.

 

Stumbled onto it on Youtube the other day and started watching, before I got interrupted. It is nominally the "Portugese" version, but all that means is Portugese captioning with the original soundtrack and English interviews intact. Since I didn't get very far into it, I have no idea if the captions obscure critical images.

 

I watched the same YouTube version. It’s all good, the captioning didn’t obscure much. I thought overall it was well put together.

 

Finally finished watching it, after MANY interruptions, Actually, I found the portion after the 2:08 mark some of the most interesting and thoughtful content. It was nice to hear my name mentioned, not just because it was mentioned, but because whatever contributions I have made pale in comparison to my buddy R.G. Keen's many many valuable contributions to the pedal-making community. Sadly missing from the film was my friend Steve Daniels, whose Small Bear Electronics supplied parts to many, if not most, of these pedalmakers over the years. Also completely ignored was the role that Mike Fuller's introduction of the 3PDT stompswitch had on the industry. We take it for granted now, but the omnipresent 9-lug switch that gives us true-bypass AND a status LED only became available because MIke arranged with a switch manufacturer to make them for him. Prior to that, the only pedals that had status LEDs were Boss and other pedals using electronic switching, and none of those were true bypass.

I've had the pleasure of meeting and/or corresponding with a number of the people in the film: Joel Korte, Scott "knobs" Harper, Brian Wampler, Robert Keeley, Matt Farrow (Alexander Pedals), Grant Wilson (Big Ear), and Philippe Herndon (Caroline Pedals). It was the thrill of a lifetime to run into Mike Matthews early in the morning at NAMM, and meet one of my heros, Craig Anderton (who was even nicer than you'd hope your heros might be). The last pic is from a dinner I had with Joel Korte (and Zack Warpinski behind the glass), Steve Bragg of Empress, Guillaume Fairfield of Fairfield Effects, and Tim Larwill of Retro-Sonic. I hope some day to meet some of the other folks in the film.

 

With that length, and in the times we live in, I think it would have been much more entertaining and interesting if it had been a series with 3 or 4 episodes.

 

MMMMM........IMO....... I can't help but notice that with the advent of Netflix "mini-series" documentaries have become the flavor of the week. Netflix started that trend & continues to perpetuate that trend. Maybe a 3 or 4 part mini-series would have made it better. I prefer 90 to 120 minute features with little filler & get to the point. BTW...... WELCOME TO GUITARS CANADA!! I joined about a week ago. I reside in western Canada in the province of British Columbia. How's things in Spain?

 

I agree. A bit less Josh Scott, and a bit more of the other folks would have been nice, too. It was also a bit America-centric. Granted, much of the pedal industry IS American (if made in China or Indonesia), but a short visit to the effectsdatabase site will show you that there are MANY pedal companies and innovators all around the world. A quick pic of the Gamechanger guys (Latvia) and a smidgen of Japan to supplement all the British stuff doesn't really capture just how world-wide stompboxes are. For instance, Greece is now a heavy hitter in the field, as is Canada. Plenty of stuff came from Italy in the early days, and Japan has had entire periodicals devoted to pedals for decades.

One thing it did capture adequately was Craig Anderton's influence on the field/industry. The effectsdatabase.com site has an ever-expanding (355 at the moment) interviews with pedalmakers ( https://www.effectsdatabase.com/interviews/brands#list ), and one of the questions is how they got started. A not insignificant number of them cite Craig's "Electronic Projects for Musicians" book, and the DIYstompbox site as what kickstarted them. And while we're at it, omitting Bart Provoost, who maintains the Disco Freq's effectsdatabase site, is a major oversight, since he is aware of probably more pedals than anyone else in the entire planet. One of the things he does is provide "family trees" and equivalents. So, if a manufacturer like Ross or Loco simply reuses someone else's design with a packaging change or one or two minor tweaks, links to those pedals will be provided to let you know what it is a sibling of. For example, look at this link: https://www.effectsdatabase.com/model/locobox/70s/choker#reviews . Many brands we may treat as different are simply using licensed circuit designs, and often circuit boards, under a different brand name and packaging. Check out this listing for the MANY companies that produce/d a copy of (what we think of as) the Univox Superfuzz ( https://www.effectsdatabase.com/model/companion/fy6#related ). In '76 or '77, I bought myself a Fernandes Funky Filter for $25. It was actually a Mu-Tron III, being sold as a rebranded pedal; ostensibly licensed from Musitronics. In order for Bart to provide this information, he has to be aware of the kinship relations within the pedal universe, which is a HUGE knowledge base. That's why I find his omission a serious shortcoming.

 

I agree. A bit less Josh Scott, and a bit more of the other folks would have been nice, too. It was also a bit America-centric. Granted, much of the pedal industry IS American (if made in China or Indonesia), but a short visit to the effectsdatabase site will show you that there are MANY pedal companies and innovators all around the world. A quick pic of the Gamechanger guys (Latvia) and a smidgen of Japan to supplement all the British stuff doesn't really capture just how world-wide stompboxes are. For instance, Greece is now a heavy hitter in the field, as is Canada. Plenty of stuff came from Italy in the early days, and Japan has had entire periodicals devoted to pedals for decades.

One thing it did capture adequately was Craig Anderton's influence on the field/industry. The effectsdatabase.com site has an ever-expanding (355 at the moment) interviews with pedalmakers ( https://www.effectsdatabase.com/interviews/brands#list ), and one of the questions is how they got started. A not insignificant number of them cite Craig's "Electronic Projects for Musicians" book, and the DIYstompbox site as what kickstarted them. And while we're at it, omitting Bart Provoost, who maintains the Disco Freq's effectsdatabase site, is a major oversight, since he is aware of probably more pedals than anyone else in the entire planet. One of the things he does is provide "family trees" and equivalents. So, if a manufacturer like Ross or Loco simply reuses someone else's design with a packaging change or one or two minor tweaks, links to those pedals will be provided to let you know what it is a sibling of. For example, look at this link: https://www.effectsdatabase.com/model/locobox/70s/choker#reviews . Many brands we may treat as different are simply using licensed circuit designs, and often circuit boards, under a different brand name and packaging. Check out this listing for the MANY companies that produce/d a copy of (what we think of as) the Univox Superfuzz ( https://www.effectsdatabase.com/model/companion/fy6#related ). In '76 or '77, I bought myself a Fernandes Funky Filter for $25. It was actually a Mu-Tron III, being sold as a rebranded pedal; ostensibly licensed from Musitronics. I order for Bart to provide this information, he has to be aware of the kinship relations within the pedal universe. That's why I find his omission a serious shortcoming.

Totally agree with you. USA brands look like "the real thing" but we have incredibly good brands here in Europe and UK.
And for us, Europeans, now it's almost impossible to buy from USA builders without official distributors here because of Customs Fees. Almost 40% of the total amount, including shipment! Crazy...

 

I assume you are familiar with the difficulty British and European musicians had in acquiring Fender and other American gear in the '60s.

Most customs fees are instituted to protect domestic jobs. In other words, "If we make these things here, we would prefer that all or most benefit go to our countrymen, so we'll lightly penalize the same category of goods coming from somewhere else." Naturally, it limits free choice. But as much as we'd love to have free choice, standards of living and labour costs are not the same around the world, few are patriotic enough to resist a much cheaper consumer price, and there is no good that can come out of a race-to-the-bottom. so we live with customs. Hopefully , all such charges are rational and fairly set.

 

I totally understand what you have said and agree with you but the most of the time we pay taxes twice, when you buy and then again to Customs.
Customs don't mind if you already have paid the taxes for an item, they want to charge again.
In our case the problem is only with the USA, and now UK. The rest of the countries, as Canada, has signed a free trade agreement between countries (that's what I've been said) and the customs fees are more reasonable, like 18% or 20% not 40%.
We cannot even receive any kind of gift or anything not bought because they want the invoice and if you don't give them an invoice you don't receive it. In most cases they even don't return it, just destroy it.
I am talking about Spanish customs only by the way.

 

Understood. I won't try to justify or explain the tariffs you pay. There is a difference between the idea/principle of customs, and how countries set them, as well as a difference between what the country sets and how any customs officer interprets the regulations/policies. If I buy electronic components from Thailand and have them shipped via postal service, I never pay customs (which makes sense; Canada does not manufacture ANY of those things). If I have them shipped via a parcel delivery service, like DHL, or Fedex, I not only have to pay customs, but also a fee to the delivery service, who paid the customs on my behalf. This can double the cost of the order for me. But that's a debate and complaint for another thread. This one is, and should be, about the movie.

 

Sure, sorry for talking about this in this thread.

 

Hey, thank you very much for the welcome! It's a bit tough around here, but that's the way it is!